Bento Mussolini: Italy's Greatest Evil (2023)

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- Mussolini was a unifying

force for the Italian people

and they had faith in him

and they had a belief in him.

- He's been a writer, he's been an editor.

So he knows the power of ideas,

he knows the power of the written word.

He knows the power of expression,

and he knows how to harness it.

- He talked about the

solidarity of the trenches,

and of course he developed

a very nationalist ideology

and that appealed to many

who had been dispossessed

or socially dislocated by the w*r.

- Italy had, in fact a

pretty angry population.

There was a lot of dissatisfaction

with the Treaty of the Versailles in 1919,

and there was a lot of widespread unrest.

- So Mussolini made his primary appeal

to those members of the population

who were most socially uprooted

or dislocated by the w*r.

- Mussolini absolutely

captivates his audience.

I mean, he brilliant with

his use of body language

and facial expressions.

You know, his speeches are

really something to watch.

- The fascist regime used

violence from the start

and Mussolini was determined

to prevent any opposition.

- But he was also quite aggressive

and he often clash with

teachers and his fellow pupils

'cause he had this very

sort of proud nature.

He was quite grumpy and he

was always pretty violent.

Benito Mussolini was an Italian

politician and a journalist,

but he was a bit more than that.

He was actually the dictator of Italy

and he led the National

Fascist Party from 1922.

- In terms of Mussolini's family life,

his mother Rosa was an ardent Catholic

and she made sure that her children

were baptized and went

to church every Sunday.

She was the local school teacher,

so she brought in the

regular income to the family.

- Mussolini's Father Alessandro,

he worked as a blacksmith

and the young Benito

actually helped him at the Forge.

And as a result, the two men became,

you know, really quite close.

And what Alessandro taught young Benito

was all about the revolutionary

leaders that he so admired.

And one of them was Karl Marx.

- So in terms of the influence

of his father on his life,

Benito certainly feared his father

because he hit him to discipline him.

At the same time, Mussolini

looked up to his father

for his ideals and for his beliefs.

Mussolini as a child, was quite willful.

Bullying, showed signs of

violence from quite a young age.

He actually had some

difficulties learning to speak,

so there was some concern about that,

although he did get over that

and developed to become

quite a bright child,

but also quite difficult

and quite badly behaved.

- The young Mussolini

showed signs of violence

from a very young age.

When he was just 10,

he was actually expelled from school,

not for some, you know, student prank,

but for actually stabbing another student.

- Benito was sent away to boarding school

at Faenza that was run by Salesian Monks.

And he regarded that being

sent away as a punishment

and kind of made him feel rejected.

So he did recall a lack of

warmth and affection at home.

And perhaps this had some bearing

on his future personality as it developed.

- You know, he was quite a shy boy,

but he was also quite aggressive

and he often clashed with

teachers and his fellow pupils

'cause he had this very

sort of proud nature.

He was quite grumpy and he

was always pretty violent.

- Between 1912 and 1914,

Mussolini worked as

editor of the newspaper

of the Italian Socialist Party, Avanti.

Here he developed and honed

his skills in journalism.

At the same time, his intransigence

and his difficult nature

also became clear.

He was determined to use his

time there to prepare the way

for revolution as part

of the socialist party.

- When the Great w*r breaks out

what we today call World w*r I,

Mussolini sees this as a

potential start to revolution.

And what he begins to do is

support Italian intervention

whilst the Socialist

party is actually opposing

Italy's involvement in the w*r.

And because of this, in 1914,

Mussolini is actually expelled

from the Socialist party

and also an organization called Avanti.

And what he does is to start

his own newspaper publication.

And that is called the People of Italy.

- So once he established

his own newspaper,

he as an experienced journalist,

had a very good sense for

gauging public opinion

and understanding what

the people were thinking.

And this helped to launch

him in his political career.

He actually got support

for his new newspaper

from Italian industrialists

who would have something to

benefit from Italy going to w*r.

And he also got support from the British

and French governments

because they wanted Italy

to join on their side,

which Italy did in 1915.

Mussolini was conscripted

in September, 1915.

He remained a soldier until June, 1917

when he was discharged from

the army due to injury.

He later used his wartime

experience to his benefit,

talking of his time in the trenches,

and very much being one

with the other soldiers.

He talked about the

solidarity of the trenches,

and of course he developed

a very nationalist ideology.

And that appealed to many

who had been dispossessed

or socially dislocated by the w*r.

Italy had a frankly,

a pretty angry population.

There was a lot of dissatisfaction

with the Treaty of Versailles in 1919,

and there was a lot of widespread unrest.

- As Italy had not been

given all the territories

that had been promised to her,

she felt a wound to her national pride,

and Mussolini was able

to capitalize on that.

So Mussolini made his primary appeal

to those members of the population

who were most socially uprooted

or dislocated by the w*r.

There were some two and a

half million ex-servicemen

to be reintegrated into

the peacetime economy.

And of course, the

economy was suffering too.

Italy was quite unstable

politically in this period

with five different governments

between 1919 and 1922.

So what Mussolini was saying was that

his new party, the Fascist party,

would sort of sweep

clean all the decadence

and the corruption associated

with the existing governments,

and that he would really bring

something new to the nation.

And in 1921,

the Italian King Victor Emmanuel III,

he actually dissolves the parliament

'cause there's all this kind

of violence and chaos raging.

- Mussolini's new party was

designed to offer a third way

between liberalism and Bolshevism.

So it was something completely new.

And there were certain

key aspects of ideology

associated with the Italian Fascist Party.

First of all, Mussolini was determined

to create a new fascist man

who would lead this new nation.

And absolutely central to

fascist ideology was the state.

So it was to be a very strong state,

and one which really was

a totalitarian state,

a totalitarian state with

complete submission to the state.

So the state would control everything,

not just politics and the economy,

but cultural life, social life,

and even intervening into everyday life

and private life of the population.

The Blackshirts were the paramilitary wing

of the Fascist Party.

By the end of 1920,

there were these Fascist

Blackshirt Squads,

the

And after 1923,

you have this all volunteer militia

of the kingdom of Italy

under Fascist Rule.

And that's quite similar to

the SA, the n*zi Brownshirt.

- They went around in groups

of between 200 and 250.

The fascist squads were

attacking and burning down

socialist and communist headquarters,

also left-wing printing presses

and agricultural cooperatives

and those kinds of organizations.

So what the fascists were doing therefore,

was standing up for the industrialists

and for the landowners against

Bolshevism or communism.

So there was a big fear of communist

or red revolution in

Italy during this time.

And the fascists really seemed

to be the defenders against that.

So the fascist party

then got a lot of support

from industrialists and from landowners

because they were the ones who

were seeming to defend Italy

against this communist threat

or this perceived communist threat.

Mussolini was a unifying

force for the Italian people,

and they had faith in him,

and they had a belief in him.

So through his sense of vision,

he sort of transmitted that to the nation.

There came to be this kind

of symbiotic relationship

between the leader and the lead.

Mussolini

actually captivates

his audience, I mean, he's brilliant

with his use of body language

and facial expressions, you know,

his speeches are really

something to watch.

- Through his public appearances

and through his speeches,

Mussolini soon became very popular.

Using his body language

as well as his words,

he created a cult of a

leadership around him

where the people very much

saw him as this visionary man.

And he unified the Italian people

in a way that they hadn't been

in the recent history before.

He was a unifying figure for the nation,

and he was very keen to show

his prowess and his vigor.

He was shown open water swimming

or engaged in some of the public works.

So this was all designed to

create an aura around him,

of this great leader.

By October, 1922,

the fascists were becoming

increasingly strong

and they believed that the time was right

to stage their coup or

their seizure of power.

What

happens in late October, 1922,

is that you have the fascist

party leaders planning

an insurrection, you know,

they want a revolutionist,

let's make no bones about that.

And they want that to take

place on the 28th of October.

This becomes known as the March on Rome.

- This March on Rome was

mythologized by the fascist

as a great unstoppable force,

but in fact, the reality

was somewhat different.

They talked about a

hundred thousand fascists

marching on Rome, but the truth

was there were only 20,000.

And actually they waited outside Rome

for orders that never came.

The fascists were able to come to power

not as a result of actually

using force at that moment,

but through the threat of using force.

You've

got the Prime Minister,

a man called Luigi Facta.

He's wishing to declare

a state of siege quite understandably,

but this is actually overruled

by the king Victor Emmanuel.

The

King Victor Emmanuel III

invited Mussolini to form a government

and accepted his demands.

So this very celebrated March

on Rome in fascist mythology

wasn't quite what it was made out to be.

Of

course, what this means,

that political power

has now been transferred

to the fascist without any armed conflict.

- The fascist regime used

violence from the start,

and Mussolini was determined

to prevent any opposition.

- Even quite soon after

gaining power in 1925,

what the fascist government does,

is to even make suspicion

of being anti-fascist

a punishable crime.

And you can be imprisoned

for that suspicion alone

without any trial at all.

And then in 1927, Mussolini forms

what's called the

organization for vigilance

and repression of anti-fascism,

actually, that's a secret police.

- So he established the OVRA,

which was the secret police,

and that was used to track down

and deal with any political opposition.

- Mussolini survives three

assassination attempts in 1926.

Violet Gibson tries to k*ll

him on April the seventh.

On October 31st, you have

a man called Anteo Zamboni

tried to k*ll him.

And then on September the 11th in 1926,

you have a man called

Gino Lucetti having a go.

Now, all these attempts on his life

what they do is they

lead to an introduction

of a new law called the

the law for the defense of the state.

Now that is enacted on the

25th of November, 1926.

And this is a crucial part

of Mussolini taking control.

Because what that law does is to dissolve

all political parties, organizations,

associations, you name it,

anything opposed to fascism it goes.

So the new law allows those being accused

of being enemies of the state

to be sentenced to prison

or worse still to death.

- The Acerbo law was a key moment

in Mussolini's consolidation of power.

- Now, the Acerbo law stated that

the party gaining the

largest share of the votes

provided they got at least 25% of them

would actually gain two thirds

of the seats in parliament.

I mean, it's insane.

And the purpose of it is to

give Mussolini's fascists

a majority of deputies,

it's quite obvious.

And that law was only used

in the 1924 general election

because of course that

was the last proper full

competitive election, if you

like, held in Italy until 1946.

New elections

were held in April 1924,

after this law had come in at

the end of the previous year.

And using both this

law as well as violence

and intimidation, Mussolini

very much cemented his power.

Giacomo Matteotti

was an Italian socialist politician,

and on the 30th of May, 1924,

he openly speaks in

the Italian parliament,

and he's saying that the

fascists have committed fraud

in the recently held elections.

And he's denouncing the violence

they've used to gain votes.

He called

the results into question

because of the violence

and the intimidation

and really held that the election results

shouldn't be valid.

- Guess what happens, 11 days later,

he's kidnapped and he's

k*lled by the fascists.

The m*rder of Giacomo Matteotti

it does cause a real stick.

And you've got newspapers

launching really fierce attacks

on Mussolini and the

entire fascist movement.

And you've got all the

anti-fascist parties.

They're go, hang on a minute,

we are just gonna abandon

the chamber of deputies.

What we want to do is we

wanna force the crowd,

king Victor Emmanuel III

to act against Mussolini.

Socialist

deputies and others,

seceded from the Italian parliament

in what was known as

the Aventine secession

as a protest to what had happened.

Mussolini

is nothing, if not cunning,

and what he does is to

devise this counter maneuver.

And on the 3rd of January,

1925, he gives, you know,

what is now a really famous

kind of notorious speech,

both attacking the anti-fascist

and confirming that he and only he,

Mussolini was the leader of fascism.

And what he does is he

challenges the anti-fascists

to prosecute him.

He says, go on, have a go.

And he admits that the

murderers were fascists

of very high station as he calls them.

You know, he's proud of these guys.

I mean, this is what Hitler did.

You know, after night of the long knives.

On

the 3rd of January, 1925,

Mussolini made quite a famous speech

and one which was really meant to cement

his position as leader.

So it was both attacking anti-fascists,

but also saying that as far

as fascism was concerned,

he was the only and the

indisputable leader.

- Mussolini basically sort of,

kind of rhetorically claims fault.

And what he states is this.

He says, I assume that I

alone Mussolini the political,

moral and historical

responsibility for everything

that has happened.

And if these sentences more or less maimed

are enough to hang a man,

well then frankly out with a noose.

So what Mussolini is concluding

here is with a warning,

what Italy needs is stability

and fascism is gonna

ensure that stability,

and it's gonna do so in

any manner necessary.

And this speech is

considered the very beginning

of the dictatorship in Italy.

- So this made his position very plain,

and his days of sort of

dealing with what was left over

of the liberal state came to an end.

And now he was very much determined

to have his one party state

and his totalitarian state.

- Mussolini was a really

gifted propagandist.

He was a journalist at heart

and he was really aware of

the relationship between

power and optics, the

way that power is viewed.

You know, he understands completely

the necessity of having

the press on his side

in his efforts to maintain power.

You know, he's been a

writer, he's been an editor.

So he knows the power of ideas,

he knows the power of the written word,

he knows the power of expression

and he knows how to harness it.

- The fascist government introduced

a number of different

policies and measures,

some of which gained

quite a lot of popularity

with the Italian people.

So the party introduced youth

groups, also women's groups,

and also an organization called the OND,

which was the after work organization.

So this had clubs where there

were billards tables and bars

and sort of social activities.

It also sponsored holidays,

trips to the seaside subsidized

cultural events and so on.

And this was one of the

most popular aspects

of fascist Italy because

it's introduced mass tourism

and mass leisure in a way

that hadn't been there before.

The other policy that created

quite a lot of popularity

for Mussolini's regime

was his Lateran treaty,

his accord with the Pope in 1929.

And what that does

is officially recognizes the Vatican

as a sovereign state,

and it also makes Catholicism

Italy's official religion.

Now that's a really popular decision.

It's a really smart move.

'cause of course Italy has

a predominantly Catholic population.

So this

brought about a reconciliation

between the Pope and the Italian state

for the first time

since the state had come

into being in 1870.

So this policy with

the church in obviously

a very predominantly Catholic country,

made this regime quite popular.

The regime's public

work schemes and efforts

to reclaim land from the sea

and to put into place irrigation

policies and such like

also was making sure

that people were at work,

and that also increase the

popularity of the fascist regime.

Mussolini actually starts

a large number of public works

which actually dramatically

reduce unemployment.

And what they're also designed to do

is to improve infrastructure.

And of course, famously to

make the trains run on time.

What's commonly observed is

that the Great Depression

takes place and that leads

to a rise in fascism.

But you know, you gotta

remember that fascism

was made popular by

Mussolini in Italy from 1922.

And that we really gained

more traction after 1929,

because people looked at it

and went, hang on a minute,

this is one of the only

forms of government

that is surviving this economic collapse.

People looking at fascism thinking maybe

that's the way forward, not democracy.

In the

early years in terms of

the international

reputation of the regime,

Mussolini was hailed as quite successful

for these public work schemes

and other policies that were sort of

keeping the economy going

and also the population reasonably happy.

Of course that was to change

later, but at this point,

I think people were saying that

whatever else you could say

about Mussolini, he made

the trains run on time.

- There were many public figures

all over the world saying

that Mussolini was this kind of genius.

He was a kinda superman, if you like.

And his achievements,

some saw has been nothing

less than miraculous.

What he had appeared to have done was to

taken this demoralized country

and to kind of transform it

and kind of reinvigorate it.

And he'd carried out

all these social reforms

and these public works

and the landowners and the industrious

they were still on side,

and he had even made a deal with the Pope.

So on the surface, everything

looked kind of peachy,

looked all right, but if

you scratched below it,

nothing was quite as rosy as it seemed.

You know, way back in 1911

when he was a young socialist,

what Mussolini did was to take part

in his really violent protest

against Italy's invasion Libya.

But then spool forward to 1925,

Mussolini is now advocating

his spazio vitale,

he is now a fully fledged expansionist.

Spazio vitale was the

territorial expansionist concept

of Italian fascism.

What Mussolini dreams of

more than anything else

is to build a new Roman empire.

- Spazio vitale was a fascist concept,

Mussolini's concept for living space.

So this was very similar

to Hitler's concept of

Lebensraum, living space.

And Mussolini wanted to

create a new Roman empire

and to expand Italian power.

So this was always about expansion.

Rather than being confined

or hemmed in by the Mediterranean,

Mussolini talked about making

the Mediterranean our sea,

the Italian sea.

So a space from which

the Italians could expand

and gain empire.

At the end of the 19th century,

Italy had made some

territorial acquisitions.

So particularly in Somali

land and in Eritrea.

The Italians had failed

to take Ethiopia in 1896.

And so this remained a bit of

a thorn in the side of Italy,

the fact that they didn't succeed

in taking that land at that time.

So Mussolini could use that

to project again this concept

of living space and this

idea of territorial expansion

by the Italians and so to

try again to take Ethiopia,

and that's what he did.

So he invaded Ethiopia in 1935.

- In October, 1935, Italian

troops invade Ethiopia.

And this is seen as an example

of this expansionist policy

that is kind of characterizing

what the Axis powers are gonna do.

- Italy invaded Ethiopia in October, 1935,

and Mussolini's justification for this

was the need for Italy

to have living space.

The Italian military forces

actually went against

international law as outlined

in the Geneva protocol of 1925.

Italian military forces

used something like 300

to 500 tons of mustard gas

to attack both kind of military targets

and even more horrifically

civilian targets.

Italy was a signatory to

the 1925 Geneva protocol

that banned gas, Mussolini

just didn't care.

And you know there are some estimates

that say around one third

of Ethiopian casualties

of Mussolini's invasion were

caused by gas chemical weapons.

- Ladies and gentlemen,

the second speaker on the list

is his majesty Emperor Haile Selassie,

the first dedicated Ethiopia.

- In response to all the

appeals from the Ethiopians,

the League of Nations actually condemns

the Italian invasion in 1935,

and it votes to impose

economic sanctions on Italy.

But these sanctions are really,

really, really ineffective

because there's just a

general lack of support.

Italy's

invasion of Ethiopia

was a blow to the principle

of collective security

represented by the League of Nations

and to international stability.

- And what it also exposes is

this dreadful ineffectiveness

of the League of Nations

before the outbreak

of the Second World w*r.

You know that organization

simply cannot stand up to the dictators.

Mussolini has looked at

the League of Nations

and kind of laughed them off.

I mean, just dismissed them,

you know, there were no repercussions.

And what this also does, crucially,

it shows Mussolini's fellow

dictator Adolf Hitler

that the League of Nations

has got basically no power.

In fact, what happens

is all these tariffs,

all these sanctions that

are imposed on Italy

by other nations because of the invasion,

actually it increases

Mussolini's popularity.

You know, in May, 1936,

you've got more than 30

million people celebrating

the victory on the streets of Italy.

You know, this is a huge sign

of Mussolini's increased power,

increased popularity and the w*r also saw

the creation of a new military rank.

And that was called Field

Marshall of the Italian Empire.

And of course, you know,

he awarded that to himself

and also to the king.

And so therefore he sort of,

kind of making himself as prime minister,

the same rank theoretically

as the king himself.

At home

the invasion of Ethiopia

and the successful w*r there

made Mussolini's regime even more popular

and made Mussolini

himself even more popular.

So in 1936, millions of

Italians took to the streets

to celebrate this victory.

This was a foreign policy success

that just contributed to the whole aura

that surrounded il Duce, the leader.

- It's fair to say that

Mussolini's invasion

doesn't really gain

him a lot of popularity

amongst other nations.

And in fact, you know,

it comes as no surprise to

learn that the only nation

that doesn't oppose Italy's

invasion is n*zi Germany.

Mussolini could be conceived

as something of a political chameleon

because he changed quite a lot over time.

So he started out his

political life as a socialist,

but he was also influenced by

syndicalism and by anarchism.

And then he founded his

Italian fascist party.

And then later on, even within that,

his policies changed as

the Italian fascist state

became closer to Hitler's n*zi regime.

And then we can see that his policies

became much more influenced by Hitler.

Now in the late 1920s,

Mussolini is providing

some financial support

to the n*zi party as

it continues its rise.

And what he had also done

is to allow Brownshirts,

the SA and even SSS men to train

with his own paramilitary brigade.

Those are the Blackshirts of course.

Mussolini views the rise of the n*zi party

as something that's

affirming his own ideology.

This is saying, yeah,

fascism's on the march.

It's not just Italy, it's Germany next.

And who knows where else.

In private, however, you know,

Mussolini's really quite

scornful of Hitler and his Nazis.

You know, the Italian leader describes

"Mein Kampf" as boring.

Actually he was right.

And he thought that

Hitler's ideas and theories

were kind of coarse and simplistic.

And indeed Mussolini is dead right here.

In his early years when he

was leading the n*zi party,

you know, Hitler was a

big admirer of Mussolini.

You know, the n*zi leader

was particularly fascinated

by Mussolini's March on Rome.

And this is a very kind of

influential moment for him.

He looked

upon the March on Rome

as something to be admired

and in fact staged his

own coup or tried to

in November, 1923 following

the example of Mussolini.

But let's not forget

Mussolini's prone to his own

personal kind of egomania,

and he's got a low opinion of Hitler's

kind of rise to power,

which he thinks is far

less glorious than his own.

Even though they're

both fascist dictators,

the first meeting that takes

place between Mussolini

and Hitler, which is

in Venice, in June '34,

was frankly a bit of a disaster.

So Mussolini

turned up with his knowledge

of German without therefore

bringing a translator

and assuming he'd be fine.

Mussolini

speaks a little bit of German

and he said too arrogant

to use a translator.

And he had a lot of

difficulty in understanding

Hitler's kind of somewhat rough

and coarse Austrian accent.

And then what Mussolini is subjected to

are these huge notorious

Hitler long, boring monologues,

and Mussolini was so bored.

He

was also listening to

all these ideologies

that Hitler was espousing

and not particularly impressed.

- There's a big difference

between Mussolini and Hitler

and that lies in their racial views.

You know, Mussolini, let's

face it like Hitler did think

that white Europeans were

the kind of architects

of culture and civilization.

But what Mussolini

doesn't share with Hitler

is this kind of hateful and

eliminationist antisemitism.

What Mussolini was an Italian nationalist,

first and foremost and what he's doing

is he's harking back to the glories

and triumphs of ancient Rome.

You know, so he's really pretty

scornful of Hitler's rants

about early supremacy it is not really

Mussolini's bag, if you like.

And in one speech, the Italian leader

is actually actually

expressing kind of pity

for the racial views being

kind of expressed by the Nazis.

He's looking at them and

going, these people are,

you know, in his words,

the descendants of those

who are illiterate, Roman,

Caesar and Virgil and Augustus,

he kind of thinks the Germans

are inferior in some way.

And so both men kind

of walk out of Venice,

this summit, you know, thinking,

yeah, I don't think much of that guy.

Mussolini then pays a

state visit to Germany

in September, 1937, and where

he's met with a really long,

vast parade of troops, and

there's military equipment,

paraded a*tillery, you name it.

And these shows of strength

that were really obvious,

you know, they were there to

kind of impress Mussolini.

And you know what? It worked.

They came

to see the commonalities

of their ideologies and

indeed of their policies

and what could be gained by

becoming closer together.

And in 1936, they formed

the Rome Berlin Axis.

So coming closer together,

and that was cemented

into the Pact of Steel,

which was a formal alliance in 1939.

By the late 1930s,

we can see something of a

shift in the relationship

between Mussolini and Hitler,

and we see Mussolini being

much more heavily influenced

by Hitler in a number of ways.

So this could be seen by the introduction

of a series of reforms to

the way behavior took place.

So for example, that the Italian forces

were obliged suddenly to

goosestep that civil servants

were obliged to wear military

uniform for the first time.

So those kinds of things

showing the closeness

of the Italian regime to Hitlers

and just a kind of change in manners,

a change in the way of

behavior in the Italian state

heavily influenced by Hitler.

And this came to the fore in 1938,

with the racial laws adopted

by Mussolini's Italy.

- They restrict the civil

rights of Italian Jews.

They ban books written by Jews

and they exclude Jews from public offices

and even higher education,

this is antisemitism.

And there're more and more laws

stripping Jews their assets,

restricting their travel

and finally it even puts

them into internal exile.

It kind of treats 'em

as political prisoners.

But what Mussolini is known to,

it's systematically murdering Italy's Jews

in the way that Hitler does

with his Jews if you will.

So in 16

years before of fascist power,

there had not been any racial laws.

And suddenly at this point,

because he was showing his closeness

and proximity to Hitler,

and because he was heavily

influenced by Hitler,

Mussolini introduced a

series of racial laws

that were not too dissimilar

to the Nuremberg Laws in n*zi Germany.

Good evening everybody.

Tonight it seems clearly apparent

that the first great phase

of the w*r in the West

has been won by Germany.

The army of French and British

has made a valiant battle

in its effort to retreat to Gangoh,

where there is some slight chance

that some part of it can be evacuated.

It's all

Hitler's mechanized forces

are racing toward Paris as

French resistance collapses.

- This was a w*r that Hitler wanted.

He was an out and out aggressor.

And of course the first months of the w*r

were very successful for Germany

with the Blitz Creek

lightning strike on Poland,

and then very quick successes in the West.

Mussolini

is watching the progress

of Hitler with actually

quite a lot of jealousy.

He's a bit bitter to be honest,

you know, and as he sees

each a fresh German victory,

he gets more and more livid.

And he's starting to express the hope

that maybe the Germans will be slowed down

or they'll have a defeat

or some form of reverse

and that will make him

feel a little bit better.

You know we don't like it

when our friends are too successful

and this is what's going on here.

But Germany, of course,

just the advances Westwood, you know,

and not only takes all the low countries,

but even takes France.

And when France is on

the verge of collapse

Mussolini felt he can't delay any longer.

So then on June the 10th, 1940,

there's this fateful declaration of w*r.

It's apparent by 1943 that

that Italy's military position

is simply untenable.

You know, you've got the

axis forces in North Africa

being finally defeated

in the Tunisian campaign,

and that's in early '43.

And then you've also

got Italian involvement

on the eastern front

against the Soviet Union.

Setbacks are happening there as well.

And then to make matters

worse for Mussolini

the allies that invade Sicily.

So, you know, you've got the invasion

of Italy on its own doorstep if you like.

The Italian home front is in a bad way

'cause you've got the allies bombing.

And of course, you know, bombing

campaigns take their toll,

factories are being

brought to stand still.

You've got raw materials, a

stranglehold on them, coal oil,

you know, those are all

starting to run very short.

And on top of that, you've

also got a shortage of food.

And the food that is available is being

grossly overpriced.

And you've got this kind of black market

of incredibly expensive food.

And of course the result of this

is gonna be huge discontent.

So by March, 1943,

you've got strikes taking

place in the north,

which is the Italian industrial heartland.

Mussolini is in trouble make no doubt.

After the Italian surrender

in North Africa in '43,

the Germans begin to take precautions.

They look at Italy and

think it's gonna collapse.

You know, what Mussolini has

done is grossly exaggerated

the extent of his public support

for his regime and indeed

for the w*r itself.

As

the w*r years progressed,

Mussolini's popularity with

the Italian people declined.

And the reason for this was that Italy

was more and more

dependent on n*zi Germany.

You've got

this German presence in Italy

and that starts to turn public opinion

against Mussolini even more.

And you know, when the

allies invade Sicily,

the Sicilians look at the allies and go,

these people are liberators

they're not invading.

Between the

24th and 25th of July, 1943,

Mussolini was removed from government

through a vote of no confidence.

This is

the downfall of il Duce.

And by this time, you

know, discontent with him

is absolutely widespread and intense.

And when the news of his downfall

is announced on the radio,

there's no resistance to it.

People rejoice 'cause

they think that actually

what the end of Mussolini

also means is the end of w*r.

By

the last days of 1945,

Mussolini could see that the end was near.

- On the 28th of April, 1945,

Mussolini is shot dead by

partisans in the north of Italy.

It's a really ignominious end.

Mussolini was in no doubt

that the end was coming.

I mean, he was trying to flee

before the 28th of April 45.

You know, he was on the

run, he was desperate,

he was running for his life.

The day after Mussolini is k*lled

on the 29th of April, 1945,

his corpse and that of his mistress,

Clara Petacci, they're dragged

along and they're dumped

on the ground in front of

the old Piazzale Loreto.

And there

was some important symbolism

to the location because this

was where a few months earlier

the Nazis had carried

out some bloody reprisals

on Italian partisans.

And they're

kicked and they're spat upon

and then the bodies are

then hung upside down

from the roof of an SO petrol station.

And then the bodies are then stoned.

I mean, it's kind of endless abuse

of these corpses by civilians.

I think the reason for

this, it's symbolism

I mean, it's kind of done

as a very public display

of discouragement, it's

saying to other fascists,

Blackshirts you know,

you gotta end the fight

otherwise this is what's

gonna happen to you.

And of course it's also an act of revenge

'cause so many partisans were hacked

in that same place by

the Axis authorities.

One man who sees what

happens to Mussolini's corpse

and learns from it, is

of course Adolf Hitler.

And it's the abuse of Mussolini's corpse

that leads Hitler to make a decision

to actually k*ll himself a few days later.