Mussolini, whose full name was Benito Amilcre Andrea Mussolini, he lived from 1883 to 1945. He was the ultimate leader (the dulce ) of Italy during the period 1922 to 1943 – when he was arrested by Allied troops during the Second War . It was also he who created the movement fascist , which gave rise to the National Fascist Party , in the late 1910s. Mussolini was the first totalitarian ideologue in Europe to reach the maximum power of a Western European nation.
The exercise of political power, for Mussolini, should extend to all areas of individuals' lives, which should be adjusted to the will of Dulce , that is, of himself, as a leader capable of leading everyone towards the “triumph of Italy”, as a nation and empire. The aspiration to total control of citizens' lives by the State inspired several other political leaders of the time, among them Francis Franco, in Spain, Adolf Hitler , in Germany, and even Getúlio Vargas , in Brazil, in the phase of the dictatorship of the State New.
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Entry into political activity and World War I
Benito Mussolini began his political activism in the first decade of the 20th century. At the time, Italy, like many other European nations, was experiencing turbulent political upheavals in which ideologies such as communism, radical syndicalism, socialism, anarchism, among others, came into conflict. Mussolini was part of the Italian Socialist Party and exercised his militancy mainly through the journal Avanti ! , linked to the party.
However, when World War I began , Mussolini began to disagree with the other members of the party because he defended the entry of the then Kingdom of Italy into the war and wanted to make this clear as the party's position through the newspaper. Due to the intransigence of his defense, Mussolini had to leave the newspaper Avanti!, but continued to defend his position through another vehicle, created by himself, called Il Popolo d'Italia (The People of Italy).
In Il Popolo d'Italia , the future Dulce it progressively shifted from socialism to the nationalist and collectivist corporatism that would characterize fascism. During World War I, Mussolini enlisted in the Italian Army to fight against the forces of the German allies, Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, reaching the rank of sergeant. When the war ended, which was also devastating for the “victors”, in 1918, he associated with people from various social strata, workers, peasants, liberal professionals, the military, to form the so-called Fasci Italiani di Combat .
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Fasci Italiani di Combattimento
The Fasci Italiani di Combattimento , something that could be translated as “Italian Combat Beam”, was the name given by Mussolini to the paramilitary association, founded in 1919, which would become the National Fascist Party . The name “fasci” , in Italian, means “beam” and refers to the image of the bundle of sticks surrounding an axe, which was a symbol of power in the Roman Empire. Fascism, between 1919 and 1922, managed to gather a very expressive number of people, so that, on October 28 of that last mentioned year, these supporters of Mussolinian ideas took to the streets towards the seat of the Kingdom of Italy to pressure Victor Emmanuel III , then king, to appoint Mussolini prime minister. This event became known as the “March on Rome ”.
Taking power, the fascists began to give vent to their totalitarian projects. One of the strategic steps taken by Mussolini was the promulgation of the so-called Labour Charter , in 1927. It was a device for controlling unions and workers' associations, in general, which became fully integrated into the Corporate State. Another strategic decision was the granting of sovereignty over the Vatican territory to the Catholic Church through the Lateran Treaty , from 1929.
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“Axis Powers” and WWII
In the 1930s, the fascist state began to act more rigidly over Italy's zones of influence on the African continent – Italy had colonial possessions in Africa since the 19th century. One of fascism's most aggressive military operations took place in Abyssinia (now Ethiopia), then ruled by another dictator, Haile Selassie, in 1935. The Italian army used chemical weapons to exterminate Ethiopian soldiers and civilians. This gesture generated the public repudiation of nations that until then had not taken a stand against fascism. This was the case in France and England.
As he invested militarily in campaigns in African territory and other regions, Mussolini needed weapons and other types of support. In the year 1936, support came from Nazism , who was already at the forefront of power in Germany, with Adolf Hitler as the ultimate leader. That same year, the Japanese Empire, which also had totalitarian and expansionist characteristics, allied itself with Germany and Italy, forming the so-called Rome-Berlin-Tokyo Axis . It was around this (and against it) “axis” that the Second World War revolved.
Mussolini was only ousted from the government of Italy in 1943, when he was captured by allied troops (the so-called "allies", in World War II, were against the "Axis" powers and were led by England, the United States and the USSR) in Sicily. The Sweet was then taken to the Hotel Gran Sasso , where he was taken into custody. However, in September of the same year, paratroopers of the Nazi special forces, the SS , invaded the aforementioned hotel and freed the fascist leader, who tried to regain power in his country from a headquarters set up in the city of Salò . This attempt to regain power became known as the Fascist Social Republic .
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Death by members of the Italian Resistance
On April 28, 1945 , when the “Axis” powers were almost completely defeated, Mussolini was captured by members of the Resistance Italian , who acted alongside the allies against fascism. Mussolini was shot with his wife, and their bodies were exposed for several days in Piazza Loreto in Milan.
By me. Claudio Fernandes
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