The History of WWII Podcast XX
[0] Welcome to True Spies, the podcast that takes you deep inside the greatest secret missions of all time.
[1] Suddenly out of the dark, it's a bit in love.
[2] You'll meet the people who live life undercover.
[3] What do they know?
[4] What are their skills?
[5] And what would you do in their position?
[6] Vengeance felt good seeing these.
[7] People paid for what they'd done, felt righteous.
[8] True Spies from Spyscape Studios, wherever you get your podcasts.
[9] Hello, this is Ray Harris.
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[15] Thank you.
[16] Hello, and thank you for listening to a History of World War II podcast, Episode 3, Mussolini, Part 1.
[17] Benito Mussolini.
[18] the father of authoritarian nationalism, later labeled fascism, was born on July 29, 1883.
[19] He was named after Benito Juarez, the Mexican revolutionary who executed Emperor Maximilian.
[20] And yes, there will be a biography episode on Hitler that will take us up to where we started with him in episode one.
[21] Sorry about that.
[22] Over the bed Mussolini was born on hung two pictures.
[23] One was of the Virgin Mary, hung by his mother, Rosa, and the other was of Giuseppe Garibaldi, the revolutionary liberator of Sicily, hung by his father, Alessandro.
[24] The two images symbolized the struggle in Mussolini's head and heart throughout his life.
[25] I think it's safe to say the father won.
[26] Mussolini's father and grandfather were anti -clerical and socialist to the point of being under constant surveillance by local authorities.
[27] Being born in the little village of Predapio, as well as being poor as their neighbors, Mussolini would suffer from a deep -rooted inferiority complex his whole life.
[28] Reading several biographies, one can't help but see his actions and the way he conducted his life as an image of Mussolini simultaneously running away from his origins and running to something he thought he needed or deserved.
[29] Mussolini had to be number one.
[30] He ached to be on the big stage, alone, with everyone thinking the best of him.
[31] He wanted to be odd and awesome, in the original sense of the word.
[32] To do that, he would at times say or do the opposite of what the majority were doing, just to stand out.
[33] Everyone has insecurities, but how that is handled determines who you'll be.
[34] Mussolini did make it to the top, so that might have put some of his demons to sleep.
[35] but considering he was killed by his own people at the end, his last thoughts had to remind him of what he was running from all along.
[36] By age eight, he was banned from the local church for pinching those next to him as well as talking loudly during Mass. He got his revenge, though.
[37] He would climb up a tree next to the church and throw rocks at the priest and congregation as they came out.
[38] A few years later, his mother, bless her soul, was still trying and sent her son to school in Feenza, 20 miles away.
[39] Unfortunately, the school was run by priests, and Mussolini by this time had already declared to anyone who would listen that he knew there was no such person as God.
[40] Predictably, there were fights, arguments, and the occasional stabbing with a pocket knife.
[41] Mussolini carried one and seemed to use it when an argument wasn't going his way.
[42] This was a precursor to the numerous duels he would fight in his life.
[43] So by the summer of 1894, Mussolini was kicked out but came home a hero.
[44] His father, Alessandro, could not have been more proud of him, and gave Mussolini books with themes of the oppressed fighting successfully against priests and capitalism.
[45] But his mother, again still trying, sent him to school in Forli.
[46] There was more fighting, more suspensions, and another stabbing, but he managed in 1901 to graduate with an elementary school teacher certificate.
[47] Yes, Mussolini would be an elementary teacher.
[48] Also in Forli, Mussolini found his incredible lust for women.
[49] When his mother was at Mass, he would visit the brothels and explore that particular world.
[50] Whether it was lust or violence, it has to be said, Mussolini wore his heart on his sleeve.
[51] In 1902, he got a job as a substitute teacher, but only because the administrator was a fellow socialist and indulged him.
[52] When his term ended, he was not asked to return.
[53] He was simply too colorful for the locals, what with bathing naked in the town's main river and seducing anyone who was willing.
[54] By June 1902, Mussolini found he needed to leave Italy, so he went to Switzerland to avoid military service, bad debts, and a few enraged husbands.
[55] If he thought his home village was bad, it was nothing like the complete destitution he suffered there.
[56] Like Hitler's Vienna days, he had neither food, friends, nor hope.
[57] He lived under a bridge.
[58] refused jobs of manual labor, stole bread, and was arrested right before his 19th birthday.
[59] Once freed, he met a group of expatriate Italian workers and shared their hatred of the right, the rich, and all authority.
[60] His fellow Italians were impressed with his speaking skills and made him Secretary of the Italian Trade Union of Bricklayers and Assistants.
[61] He used their common hatred and his education to give moving speeches that tapped into the group inferiority complex.
[62] He first felt it in school because the students had been divided along economic lines, so he could relate.
[63] As the crowds grew, he used obvious parlor tricks to win them over, like, if there is a God, may he strike me down in one minute.
[64] Of course, he would stand there absolutely unafraid for that minute.
[65] His speeches were the typical fare of attacking the church, Christ, their king, the army, the current government, and summation, the establishment.
[66] But Mussolini found that even though his reputation was growing, he could still only get blue -collar jobs such as a butcher boy or delivery boy.
[67] Word was getting around about this young, angry speechmaker, so he was watched by police, soon arrested, and escorted from Switzerland.
[68] In July 1903, the Italian police tried to put him under surveillance, but he had gone back to Switzerland, again running from military service.
[69] Mussolini wasn't a coward.
[70] but he hated the government and didn't want to support them in any way.
[71] But in late 1904, early 1905, an amnesty was declared for the deserters.
[72] Mussolini, tired of running and tired of barely surviving, accepted the amnesty, and his record was wiped clean.
[73] The other part of the amnesty was that the deserter would then do a tour of military service.
[74] So at age 21, Mussolini did his time.
[75] Of course, he still tried to get out of it, by using his mother's death as an excuse, but was told no. He spent 18 months in the army, still preached sedition, but cautiously, and mostly stayed out of trouble.
[76] Getting out with a fresh start, Mussolini found that, like before, he could only get low -paying jobs.
[77] He did manage to secure a second -grade teaching position, but was not asked to return.
[78] I'm sure he blamed the world for his misery, but the truth was that his old habits of seducing anyone who fell for his charm, talking sedition, and violent tendencies had more to do with his frequent unemployment.
[79] Facing complete destitution again, he did what any young person does.
[80] He moved closer to his father for support.
[81] But not giving up by any means, in November of 1907, Mussolini passed the French exam and now was allowed to teach the language.
[82] Besides increasing his chances to find employment, he would soon become a Francophile during World War I. He felt a connection to all the revolutionaries of that country's turbulent past.
[83] Things were starting to turn around when he got a teaching job and became the editor of a small socialist newspaper, but soon he lost both jobs and went to work at his father's tavern.
[84] But Mussolini was never to be kept down, in part because that ghost of insecurity always haunted him, and in February 1909 became the editor of an Austrian newspaper.
[85] But Mussolini's shocking writing style was too much for the times.
[86] The paper was considered too seditious by those who mattered, and the paper was confiscated and he was jailed.
[87] Seven months later, he was released and expelled from Austria.
[88] Back in Forli, Italy, Mussolini stumbled into a happy period as he started a family with a young lady as well as his own newspaper, La Lota di Classe, or The Clash Struggle.
[89] The Mussolini's were poor but surviving, and the head of the family was happy because he was controlling the paper completely.
[90] Mussolini was at his best when making noise and upsetting people.
[91] He was a master puppeteer, especially when someone thought they had no strings.
[92] But in all honesty, the paper was a vehicle for his ego and he printed contrary things just to get attention.
[93] There were no new ideas and the paper certainly wasn't trying to move Italian culture forward.
[94] In 1911, Italy was still seen as the least of the great powers.
[95] There had been some economic growth, but mostly in the northern half, and the people were far from united in any political sense.
[96] Prime Minister Giolitti decided that a short war with Turkey over Libya would do much that ailed his country.
[97] A successful conflict would put Italy out in front on the international stage, and the Italian people would unite against a common enemy.
[98] When word got out that mobilization of troops had begun, the Socialists, with Mussolini desperately trying to be out in front, voted for a strike.
[99] This was the common socialist reaction to war as it never seemed to better the commoner's life.
[100] On September 26, the rail lines used by the military were destroyed, and a quick clash of government cavalry ended in a socialist victory.
[101] Of course, the government reacted quickly.
[102] Mussolini and others were arrested, but in his case, when the officers politely asked Mussolini to accompany them to the police station, Mussolini asked if he could finish his coffee first.
[103] They agreed.
[104] Waited, and only then did they respectfully take him away.
[105] Mussolini went on trial on November 18, 1911, in Forley.
[106] Much like when Hitler was on trial after the failed putsch, he turned the courtroom into his showroom.
[107] He spoke well and defended himself as a hero with a conscience.
[108] He defied the government's version of him as a criminal or evildoer.
[109] The people were impressed with his conviction, or more likely passion.
[110] He spun the trial and turned it into a circus.
[111] His angle was to demand respect if he could not get justice.
[112] So every time something negative was said about him, he was able to look to the people and say, see, I won't get justice, but they won't give me respect either.
[113] But the court was unimpressed with all this and sentenced him to a year in prison for which he only served four months.
[114] While he was away, his paper, La Lota de Classe, wrote about his burning eyes and sacrifice.
[115] Even the largest socialist paper, Avanti, or forward, wrote nice things about him when he was released on March 12, 1912.
[116] He came out a hero to many and reveled in his status.
[117] He now had something to work with.
[118] Welcome to True Spies.
[119] The podcast that takes you deep inside the greatest secret missions of all time.
[120] Suddenly out of the dark it's appeared in love.
[121] You'll meet the people who live life undercover.
[122] What do they know?
[123] What are their skills?
[124] And what would you do in their position?
[125] Vengeance felt good.
[126] Seeing these people pay for what they'd done felt righteous.
[127] True Spies from Spyscape Studios.
[128] Wherever you get your podcasts.
[129] Mussolini moved quickly to capitalize on his newfound standing.
[130] He became the four -league correspondent of Avanti and wrote a book about a Czech Protestant theologian that, although had little historical accuracy, was very racy with sex in convents and papal conspiracy.
[131] On July 7, 1912, the socialists were convening for their 13th party congress and Mussolini was asked to speak.
[132] His speech was everything he and they wanted it to be.
[133] He started with stating as a fact that he must now be acknowledged as a major political figure.
[134] He then launched into a standard attack on Parliament and announced that he had the answer.
[135] The so -called leading reformist had to be sacked, which might open up a seat for him in the future.
[136] The success of the speech was enough to get him elected to the Socialist Party National Executive Committee.
[137] He was then made interim editor of Avati.
[138] The position soon became permanent, and he moved his family to Milan.
[139] His bombastic style raised circulation and added members to the Socialist Party, finally an audience and stage worthy of his ambition, if not of his talents.
[140] Milan had much to offer the boy from Predapio, especially the more interesting and intelligent women.
[141] The way he lived his life created enemies on all sides of society, but in the end, he was good at his job and raised the circulation of Avanti to 100 ,000 right before World War I broke out.
[142] But the success in women were not enough for Mussolini.
[143] Due to his other writing obligations, he had to comment on international events and situations.
[144] He judged the Libyan War a colossal waste of money and launched a periodical for the intellectuals called Utopia.
[145] It never took off, but it allowed him to attack those it was safe to attack and to ingratiate himself to those whom he desired respect from.
[146] But he would always be a better speaker than writer.
[147] He ran for parliament twice and lost.
[148] but few doubted he would one day find his place in the National Assembly.
[149] The term Duce started sticking to two men during this time.
[150] One was to the Prime Minister Giolitti, but the sarcastic tone was always there, and the other was to Mussolini, and with time this became more widespread.
[151] The people were looking for a leader in a larger sense of the word.
[152] If World War I had not come along, Mussolini would have certainly risen in his profession and become a prominent opinion maker.
[153] The Socialist Party Congress met in April 1914 and, as before, honored Mussolini in all his work.
[154] But it dawned on Mussolini that the Socialists had no long -term plan of implementation.
[155] It was a revolutionary spirit without an arm.
[156] Soon after the Congress, large -scale strikes and riots broke out.
[157] It was labeled Red Week, and it caught Mussolini and his party by surprise.
[158] Suddenly, the Socialists were beginning to look good to the undecideds, compared to the dreaded Communists.
[159] But other events were about to prove themselves out of Mussolini's control as well.
[160] On June 28, 1914, the Archduke Ferdinand and his wife were assassinated.
[161] Tension built, and countries were choosing sides and waiting for the first shot to be fired.
[162] Mussolini, like everyone else, could see what was happening, so on July 29, days before war broke out, he and the executive committee signed an anti -war manifesto, condemning the coming war as a capitalist conflict.
[163] Italy's government stated it would be neutral due to its membership of the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria, as well as its traditional friendship with Britain and France.
[164] The reality was that Italy was militarily weak and suffered from a feeble economy.
[165] This neutral position was backed by leading politicians, the king, officers in the army, big business, most bureaucrats, many Catholics, the Pope Benedict XV, most peasants, and of course, the majority of the women.
[166] The latter group did not fall for the line of the war being over in a short time.
[167] Also, this collective group had the very human trait to see which side would win before jumping in.
[168] Only two groups wanted to intervene now, some conservative elements of government and the intellectuals.
[169] Mussolini would soon change his tune and lead the latter group.
[170] In fact, his conversion would only take a couple of months.
[171] Both interventionalist groups wanted Italy to join France and Britain.
[172] but the intellectuals had their reasons published.
[173] Although not in touch with the common people, they spoke of a new Italian man and a new Italy.
[174] Both would be reborn in the conflict.
[175] I'm sure it looked good on paper, but the reality was at the end of the war, the peasants did all the fighting and dying.
[176] Again, there were no new ideas for Mussolini.
[177] He saw and rode the wave.
[178] He rode his ideas for public consumption because he was trying to be seen as an intellectual.
[179] Of course, His opinion was the most shrill in order to be out in front of the pact.
[180] He started subtly by publishing a pro -war article in his newspaper, but balanced it out by attacking it.
[181] Then he himself wrote an article that just being Italy's position should be one of active neutrality instead of passive neutrality, whatever that meant.
[182] Then finished off with an article attacking the concept of neutrality.
[183] How could Italy be neutral when the world was changing?
[184] He said neutrality was backward -looking.
[185] The transition was complete when he sent to press an article saying socialists should commit Italy to the Allied side.
[186] Outraged, the socialists put him on trial, but he resigned before he was kicked out on October 19th.
[187] During his attempt to get their attention, he grabbed a glass and crushed it in his hand.
[188] The blood started to flow, which usually quieted any crowd, but not this time.
[189] But the interventionalists welcomed him, and the bourgeois papers interviewed him.
[190] Whenever a socialist came near him, They would yell, Chi paga, or who's paying?
[191] This was an appropriate question, because on November 15, 1914, there was a new newspaper with Mussolini's name on top.
[192] It was called Il Popolo d 'Italia, The People of Italy.
[193] Its slogan was, Whoever has iron has bread.
[194] It was financed by people with connections to the government, although it is probable that Mussolini did not know this.
[195] But he did knowingly take French and eventually British money for his newspaper.
[196] They were trying to get Italy into the war on their side.
[197] Being Mussolini, he used his paper to attack those who kicked him out of the Socialist Party.
[198] He said they would see him again.
[199] He declared this was not over.
[200] His paper expressed his desire to see a short war because he feared a prolonged struggle would divide the common people of each country who were fighting each other for the elites.
[201] By December of 1914, Mussolini advocated the creation of pre -fascist groups called faci di azione rivoluzionaria, or revolutionary groups.
[202] Yes, I butchered that.
[203] On January 6, 1915, Il Popolo d 'Italia published a draft constitution for membership.
[204] It stated it was not a political party, but an organization for those with like views.
[205] Sounds like the same thing to me. He was a master of incrementalization.
[206] But subscriptions to his paper stayed low.
[207] The people he was seeking to inspire were content with neutrality.
[208] Mussolini raged in his paper at the people, but it did no good.
[209] So he went back to attacking the government and keen for not entering the war.
[210] He backed up his writing with a pro -war demonstration, April 12, 1915.
[211] He was arrested but released in eight hours.
[212] Unknowing to him, this would be the last time he saw the inside of a jail.
[213] By May 24, 1915, Italy had negotiated the secret treaty of London, which would give them the areas of Trento and Treiste in northern Italy.
[214] War on Austria was declared.
[215] A jubilant Mussolini celebrated by writing that Italy was alive and had a soul.
[216] He did not volunteer, but accepted the draft when it came and went in as a private.
[217] The coalition government of Salandra and Soninho tried to restrict fighting to Austria alone, but eventually engaged Germany in August 1916.
[218] Most of the fighting took place in the mountains, so there was no rapid advance, as was seen in other theaters.
[219] Some saw Italy's war as a sideshow, but she had five million men in service, hundreds of thousands lost as POWs, over a half million dead, and another half million incapacitated.
[220] Not surprisingly, the peasants suffered the most, while government bureaucracy grew, as did war profits.
[221] The people started backing the war as their men went to the front.
[222] But no great general or politician rose to lead the people during the war, and power remained diffused along political, military, industrial, and land -holding lines.
[223] Mussolini saw 17 months of action.
[224] He was treated no differently than anyone else, and was humble and even embarrassed when fellow soldiers came to shake his hand.
[225] He suffered like a common soldier, but had his diary published weekly in his newspaper.
[226] He was the most famous private in the army.
[227] Millions of his followers cheered when he was promoted.
[228] On one leave, he married Raquel December 17, 1915, in a civil ceremony.
[229] He was the soldier's prophet, describing in detail what he and the rest of them went through in the trenches.
[230] But the socialists still screamed for an end to the war, and the people only had the returning soldiers to vent their frustrations on.
[231] In February 1917, Mussolini and some others were testifying a new howitzer.
[232] It exploded and a few were instantly killed.
[233] Mussolini had 44 shrapnel wounds and needed 27 operations.
[234] He got to meet the king who was visiting a military hospital.
[235] When he had mostly recovered, he came home a hero.
[236] But the elation did not last.
[237] There had been no revolution while he was away.
[238] The elites and their sons were still running things.
[239] Besides his articles being read by the common people, he had not been on the great stage as before.
[240] And now that Italy had entered the war, What would be the grist for his mill?
[241] He had gotten what he wanted, and the results were that he had suffered, nearly died, and came home to find his newspaper had suffered almost as much.
[242] Subscriptions were down, and the paper was in debt.
[243] His replacement had spent the money on a mistress or two.
[244] It was obvious to Mussolini that the previous editor had left his passion in the hotel room.
[245] The paper was being bailed out by a politically active industrialist.
[246] When Mussolini was wounded, the paper made much of it.
[247] even calling him Il Duce, and sales increased for a while.
[248] But the industrialist was gone, and a flattering title wouldn't fund a paper or feed a family.
[249] Mussolini had known highs and lows before, but this was something different.
[250] It seemed that everyone had forgotten him.
[251] He squared his belligerent jaw and stared defiantly into the abyss.
[252] Next time, we'll cover Mussolini as he tries to find his place at home while his country is at war.
[253] Welcome to True Spies, the podcast that takes you deep inside the greatest secret missions of all time.
[254] Suddenly out of the dark, it's appeared in love.
[255] You'll meet the people who live life undercover.
[256] What do they know?
[257] What are their skills?
[258] And what would you do in their position?
[259] Vengeance felt good.
[260] Seeing these people pay for what they'd done felt righteous.
[261] True Spies, from Spyscape Studios, wherever you get your podcasts.