At the Arcadia Conference, held in Washington, DC, from December 24, 1941 to January 14, 1942, the Western Allies agreed to a Germany First policy to govern global strategy, but the question where to engage Germany, and when, remained unsettled. Furthermore, he had had a reputation for being reliable and trustworthy; he was also known to have disliked Audisio personally. In the post-war years, the "official"[note 1] version of Mussolini's death has been questioned in Italy (but, generally, not internationally) in a manner that has drawn comparison with the John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories. 1. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. Mussolinis mouth was agape. by Adnan Nasser L April 3, 2023. The assassination marked a serious crisis for Mussolinis regime.After Matteottis sudden disappearance, he first denied having anything to do with it. British war plans in the 1930s, in fact, flirted with abandoning the entire Mediterranean to Mussolini in the event of a conflict, so worried were the British that they could not resist his attacks. See. The treaty that Hitler hated even more than the Treaty of Versailles and one of the most important treaties you have probably never heard of. Soon, however, he changed his mind about intervention. I said I could not shoot Petacci, so John said he would shoot her himself, while making it quite clear that Mussolini however, had to be killed by an Italian. He rattled sabers against his neighbors constantly, but he also did more than talk, greatly expanding the army, building up a gigantic fleet (the Regia Marina), and equipping a powerful air force (the Regia Aeronautica), hugely expensive projects for a land like Italy, which was almost totally devoid of the necessary raw materials. He obtained a teaching diploma and for a time worked as a schoolmaster but soon realized that he was totally unsuited for such work. Differing accounts exist of who made the decision that Mussolini should be summarily executed. Mussolini needed a strong military to back up his dictatorship. Inside The Murky Death Of The Soviet Dictator, What Stephen Hawking Thinks Threatens Humankind The Most, 27 Raw Images Of When Punk Ruled New York, Join The All That's Interesting Weekly Dispatch. At least twelve different individuals have, at various times, been claimed to be the killer. The man who once boasted that he was going to restore the glories of ancient Rome, wrote the Times, "is now a corpse in a public square in Milan, with a howling mob cursing and kicking and spitting on his remains. Indeed, the scene was grisly: the bodies of Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci dangling upside down by their heels in front of a gas station in Milans Piazzale Loreto. Keystone/Getty ImagesBenito Mussolini lies dead in Milans Piazza Loroto with his mistress, Clara Petacci. One woman felt Il Duce wasnt dead enough. [1] Following the Allied invasion of Sicily in July 1943, Mussolini was deposed and put under arrest; Italy then signed the Armistice of Cassibile with the Allies in the following September. Mussolinis own Milan newspaper office was barricaded with huge rolls of newsprint paper and barbed wire and guarded by a curious mix of Fascists, police, and Army troops. So, how did Mussolini die? [77], In his 1993 book Dongo: half a century of lies, the partisan leader Urbano Lazzaro repeated a claim he had made earlier that Luigi Longo and not Audisio, was "Colonnello Valerio". Benito Mussolini was Europes first 20th-century fascist dictator. Faces of European History: Fact or Fiction? He was the youngest to ever hold the office and now had a wider audience for his speeches, policies, and worldview than ever before. Accounts vary as to how he died: Some say he was killed with coma-inducing injections, others say it was from electric shock treatments. Backed by increasing numbers of supporters and strongarm paramilitary squads dressed in black, the Fascist leader calling himself Il Duce soon became known for fiery speeches fueled by his ever more violent political worldview. [75] However, within Italy, the subject has been a matter of extensive debate and dispute since the late 1940s to the present and a variety of theories of how Mussolini died has proliferated. Still, he voraciously read the works of great European philosophers like Immanuel Kant, Georges Sorel, Benedict de Spinoza, Peter Kropotkin, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Karl Marx. Lampredi said that Mussolini's last words were "aim at my heart". A simple slogan summed it up: Il DUCE, the Italian people were told, ha sempre ragione! (The Duce is always right!). They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. The Duce, it was said, could recite cantos of Dante from memory. The Fhrer convinced Il Duce to set up a Fascist state in northern Italy where it all began with Milan as its headquarters. And when it did start, Mussolini took his place on the world stage like never before. [78][79][80], There have been several claims that Britain's wartime covert operations unit, the Special Operations Executive (SOE), was responsible for Mussolini's death, and that it may have even been ordered by the British prime minister, Winston Churchill. In the early morning, an end-run round the Italian southern flank by the 4th Indian Division achieved total surprise, catching the Italians in their beds. [6], Before long, it was noted that there were discrepancies between Audisio's original story published in L'Unit, subsequent versions that he provided and the versions of events provided by others. Benito Mussolini with sons Mussolini was hailed as a genius and a superman by public figures worldwide. In 1966, the U.S. military turned over a slice of Mussolinis brain to his family. Joseph Stalins death in March 1953 ended his long and brutal reign as leader of the Soviet Union. In 1935, Mussolini used a border dispute between Abyssinia and neighboring Somaliland as a public excuse to invade the country. Italy fared poorly from the outset, with ignominious defeats in North Africa, Greece, and the Soviet Union. His father was a blacksmith. 504-528-1944. When Alexander took command on February 20, 1943, one of his first tasks was to assess II Corps combat readiness after its setbacks during its early engagements around Kasserine Pass. He was wrong. [8], Over the week following his arrival in Milan, and with the military situation deteriorating, Mussolini vacillated between a number of options including making a last stand in the Valtellina, a valley in the Italian Alps (the so-called Ridotto Alpino Repubblicano), fleeing to Switzerland, or attempting to negotiate a peaceful handover to the partisan leadership, the CLNAI,[note 2] or to the Allies. It was never anything more than a German satellite state, and it did German bidding, rounding up and shooting anyone associated with the thriving anti-Axis partisan movement. Setelah Jerman menyerah di Italia pada 1945, Benito Mussolini Mussolini was killed two days before Hitler and his wife Eva Braun committed suicide. Containing both labor and management, their task was to negotiate labor settlements. At the same time, the corporative structure allowed the Mussolini regime to direct the nation's economic life and make decisions about production and distribution that were normally in the hands of the industrialists. They made the Germans hand over all the Italians in exchange for allowing the Germans to proceed. [13] It also issued a decree establishing popular courts, which included in its provisions what, in practice, would constitute a death sentence for Mussolini:[14]. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. Jenny Craig Institute for the Study of War and Democracy, Operation FLAX, April 1943: Severing the German, General William H. Simpsons Ninth US Army and the Crossing of the Rhine, Black Volunteer Infantry Platoons in World War II, Kasserine Pass: German Offensive, American Victory, Gallantry against Great Odds: LTC George Marshall and Operation RESERVIST, Prelude to Liberation: Genesis of American Amphibious Assault in the ETO. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. Mussolini was the first child of the local blacksmith. He once more became a schoolmaster, this time in the Venetian Alps, north of Udine, where he lived, so he confessed, a life of moral deterioration. But soon tiring of so wasteful a life, he returned to trade-union work, to journalism, and to extreme politics, which led yet again to arrest and imprisonment. The tomb has become a neo-fascist place of pilgrimage. In it, he outlined the major political philosophies of nationalism and militarism and violent extremism that would direct his later life. The New York Times MUSSOLINI ON ISLE TORE OFF HIS SHIRT; But The Ousted Dictator As A Prisoner On Ponza Soon Wearied Of Tragic Role. [21], By some accounts, on 26 April, Mussolini, now joined by his mistress Claretta Petacci, made several failed attempts to cross the border into Switzerland. Some writers believe that Mussolini's death was part of a British special forces operation, with the supposed aim of retrieving compromising "secret agreements" and correspondence with Winston Churchill that Mussolini had allegedly been carrying when he was captured. Mussolini had developed a cult-like following and instant recognizability over the past 25 years due to his face being plastered all over propaganda nationwide and now it had come back to haunt him. And that brings us back to where we started: that ill-fated gas station in the Piazzale Loreto. [57] Samples of Mussolini's brain were taken and sent to the United States for analysis. info@nationalww2museum.org Though he tried to flee the country dressed as a German officer, Mussolini was killed, desecrated, and strung up at a gas station in Milan. In June 1940, with German armies running riot all over Europe, the Duce decided to strike. Upon Mussolinis death, the final words he uttered were No! He also claimed that Mussolini was inadvertently wounded earlier in the day when Petacci tried to grab the gun of one of the partisans, who killed Petacci and Michele Moretti then shot dead Mussolini. Not only did they fail to conquer tiny Greece, the Greeks counterattacked, drove the Italians back across the Albanian border, and for a time threatened to destroy Mussolinis army altogether. No autopsy was carried out on Petacci. [4], Slowly fighting their way up the Italian Peninsula, the Allies took Rome and then Florence in the summer of 1944 and later that year they began advancing into northern Italy. Another few miles and Mussolini would have been free. [67] Ian Kershaw notes that while it is uncertain whether Hitler was told the details of Mussolini's death: if he did learn of the full gory tale, it could have done no more than confirm his anxiety to take his own life before it was too late, and to prevent his body from being seized by his enemies. Life in Mussolinis Italy was somewhat different from other dictatorships. But just like that, Mussolinis violent life had come to a violent end. What were Benito Mussolinis political beliefs? We want this, even though we think an execution platoon is too much of an honour for this man. [44], In a book he wrote in the 1970s, Audisio argued that the decision to execute Mussolini taken at the meeting in Dongo of the partisan leaders on 28 April constituted a valid judgment of a tribunal under Article 15 of the CNLAI's ordinance on the Constitution of Courts of War. Allegedly, it was part of a "cover up" to retrieve "secret agreements" and compromising correspondence between the two men, which Mussolini was carrying when he was captured by partisans. During a period of freedom in 1909, he fell in love with 16-year-old Rachele Guidi, the younger of the two daughters of his fathers widowed mistress; she went to live with him in a damp, cramped apartment in Forl and later married him. This was taken after the mob desecrated their bodies. One of the new regime's primary goals was to win military glory for Italy, to restore Italy to the grandeur of ancient times. At noon, given a lunch of polenta in their upstairs bedroom, Mussolini told Petacci that he had lost his appetite; suspense over their fate was getting to him. Some historians believe that what happened to Mussolini was a factor in Hitler's decision to take his own life and have his body burned. Benito Mussolini took control of Italy thanks to the pen just as much as the sword. Additionally, it was better placed for an escape to the Swiss border. They lived in two crowded rooms on the second floor of a small, decrepit palazzo; and, because Mussolinis father spent much of his time discussing politics in taverns and most of his money on his mistress, the meals that his three children ate were often meagre. For some time after his return little was heard of him. Corrections? [62] The following day, Hitler killed himself in Berlin, shortly before the city fell to the Red Army. [Long live Italy! After returning to Italy, he amassed a large following while working as an editor for the socialist magazine Avanti!. Known For: Mussolini was a fascist dictator who ruled Italy from 1922 to 1943. While earning a reputation as a political journalist and public speaker, he produced propaganda for a trade union, proposing a strike and advocating violence as a means of enforcing demands. The country was battered, and it was, many thought, all Il Duces fault. In general, it was this loss of freedom that best describes the bargain the Italian people had made with Mussolini. At the age of 19, a short, pale young man with a powerful jaw and enormous, dark, piercing eyes, he left Italy for Switzerland with a nickel medallion of Karl Marx in his otherwise empty pockets. MUSSOLINI WAS EXPELLED FROM SCHOOL. First it was bombing raids on Italian cities, which possessed only rudimentary antiaircraft defenses. By the spring of 1945, the war in Europe was over and Italy was broken. The exact story of Mussolinis death seems to be blurry. [note 5] The tomb is decorated with fascist symbols and contains a large marble head of Mussolini. After the defeat of the Italian Army in Russia, Mussolini was removed as head of state and imprisoned. [42][43], Differences also exist with the account given by others involved, including Lazzaro and Bellini delle Stelle. Whatever he might once have been, he was now a German puppet, beholden to Hitler for his very life. [29] According to Leo Valiani, the Action Party representative on the CLNAI, the decision to execute Mussolini was taken on the night of 27/28 April by a group acting on behalf of the CLNAI comprising himself, Sandro Pertini, and the communists Emilio Sereni and Luigi Longo. A third son, Bruno, was killed in an air accident while flying a Piaggio On 27 April 1945, a group of local communist partisans attacked the convoy in which Mussolini and Petacci were travelling, near the village of Dongo on the north western shore of Lake Como and forced it to halt. These lands, he said, were Italia irredentaunredeemed Italy.. Fearing another rescue attempt of Mussolini by the Nazis, partisans whisked Mussolini and Petacci away to a remote farmhouse. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. It is said that the correspondence included offers from Churchill of peace and territorial concessions in exchange for Mussolini persuading Hitler to join the western Allies in an alliance against the Soviet Union. [75], Audisio was first named in a series of articles in the newspaper Il Tempo in March 1947 and the Communist Party subsequently confirmed Audisio's involvement. Also Known As: Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini. When Benito Mussolini, the tyrannical ruler of Fascist Italy before and during World War II, was executed on April 28, 1945, it was only the beginning. A Tale of Two Lebanons: Stuck Between Hezbollah and a Republic. [17][18] That evening,[19] with the German army in northern Italy about to surrender and the CLNAI taking control of Milan, Mussolini decided to flee the city. Benito Mussolini served as the Prime Minister of Italy from 1922 to 1943, and his death marked the end of a brutal era in Italian history. Il Duce tried to wear a Nazi helmet and coat as a disguise in the convoy, but he was instantly recognized. [Long live Italy!]. The campaign in North Africa began with a daring Anglo-American commando raid code-named Operation RESERVIST. Modern mechanized armies need a robust logistics chain to provide fuel, ammunition, and other sinews of war to sustain combat operations. Ivanoe Bonomi, the prime minister, later denied that this was said with his government's authority or approval. WebHow Benito Mussolini Died In the meantime, Il Duce and his mistress had risen late. The story might well have ended here, but in September 1943 the Germans staged a daring commando raid on Mussolinis prisonactually the Hotel Campo Imperatore on the Gran Sasso massif. [75] Comparisons have been made with the John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories,[20] and it has been described as the Italian equivalent of that speculation. Hed declared war against the rest of the world with only Germany to back him up. He claimed that on 28 April he convened a "war tribunal" in Dongo comprising Lampredi, Bellini delle Stelle, Michele Moretti and Lazzaro with himself as president. [69][70], The authorities then arranged for the body to be hidden at a Capuchin monastery in the small town of Cerro Maggiore where it remained for the next eleven years. 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