A Civil War (62 page)

53
See the proceedings of the conference
L'altro dopoguerra
, esp. part II,
La gente e la guerra
, ed. Paolo Sorcinelli, of the proceedings of the conference
Linea gotica 1944
. A lively description of the impressions aroused in ‘G.I. Joe dell'armata americana e Tommy Smith della 8a armata brittanica' by an Italy so different from what they had imagined it to be like was given by G. Spini, ‘Alleati e Resistenza', in
Fascismo e Resistenza (1936– 1948). Lezioni e testimonianze
, Milan: Feltrinelli, 1962, pp. 565–76.

54
This is the reason why Bianco, for example, does not have an enthusiastic memory of the Anglo-American ex-prisoners who joined the GL formations: little fighting spirit, and moreover they preferred Switzerland, in fact. By contrast, Bianco had an excellent opinion of the behaviour of the French, who were evidently more highly motivated (Bianco,
Guerra partigiana
, p. 124).

55
See, for example, the testimony of private Edwin Hogg, protected by sharecroppers in the Prato area, in R. Absalom, ‘Ex prigionieri alleati e assistenza popolare nella zona della linea gotica 1943–44', in Rochat, Santarelli e Sorcinelli,
Linea gotica 1944
, p. 471, note 28.

56
See what Battaglia writes,
Un uomo
, esp. pp. 76–8. There is a relatively large number of memoirs and reminiscences about Allied prisoners who, in various ways, joined the Resistance forces. Here I shall simply record S. Hood,
Pebbles from My Skull
, London: Hutchinson, 1963; see also P. Ginsborg,
A History of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics 1943–1988
, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1990, pp. 2–3.

57
See Bernardo,
Il momento buono
, pp. 115, 177–8.

58
To be exact, Portelli refers to the city of Terni, where the bombardments actually did compel the population to engage in an almost total exodus. See the essay ‘Assolutamente niente. L' esperienza degli sfollati a Terni', in the proceedings of the above-mentioned conference,
L'altro dopoguerra
, pp. 135–44.

59
See one of the few accurate enquiries on the subject: C. Rosati, ‘La memoria dei bombardamenti. Pistoia 1943–1944', in Rochat, Santarelli and Sorcinelli,
Linea gotica 1944
, pp. 409–32.

60
‘Rapporto sulla situazione nelle fabbriche', signed Giovanni, December 1943 (IG,
Archivio PCI
). The document is quoted, with the title ‘Aeronautica d'Italia', in Dellavalle,
Operai
, p. 222.

61
See what Fenoglio writes,
Il partigiano Johnny
, p. 216 (English translation by Stuart Hood,
Johnny the Partisan
, London: Quartet Books, 1994).

62
For the attribution to the Fascists of responsibility for the bombing raids preceding 25 July, see Gallerano,
Gli italiani in guerra
, pp. 308–16.

63
A vast assortment of posters, postcards and pamphlets stigmatising the Allied bombings is contained in
Fondo RSI
.
Italia cattolica
demanded the excommunication of the bombers, in support of the thesis of the Venetian Fascist newspaper
Fronte Unico
, and in controversy with the bishop of Cremona, who claimed that the excommunication of non-believers was out of the question. Catholicus,
Parole chiare di un cattolico
15 January 1955 (quoted in C. Scagliola,
L'Italia cattolica
, ‘Un foglio al servizio della RSI', in Poggio,
La Repubblica sociale italiana
, p. 159). The bishop of Padua, monsignor Agostini, explicitly invoked ‘divine punishment on the enemy bombers'. See Canfora,
La sentenza
, p. 79.

64
See, for example, in the northern edition of
L'Unità
, the articles entitled ‘Lo sciopero generale a Torino contro gli industriali profittatori', 25 November 1943 and 10 July 1944, ‘
500 workers assassinated by the Nazis
(at the Dalmine plant), as a consequence in fact of their failure to sound the alarm'; a leaflet distributed by the CLN of Forlì after the 19 May 1944 air-raid (‘those responsible are the Fascists'), quoted in Flamigni and Marzocchi,
Resistenza in Romagna
, p. 192; the article entitled ‘Umanità nazifascista', in
La voce della realtà. Giornale murale per la populazione a cura della XIX brigata d'assalto Garibaldi Eusebio Giambone
(Piedmont), 13 August 1944 (‘after all', this article explained, ‘if the Fascists hadn't helped the Germans things wouldn't have come to this pass'). One Fascist reply was that it had been the Gaps who had cut the wires of the alarm system (report from Cremona by Luciano, 1 and 11 July 1944, in IG,
BG
, 011211).

65
See in the Catholic
Il Segno
and the monarchic
L'Italia nuova
the articles entitled ‘Le opere e i giorni del nazifascismo' and ‘Dopo 14 secoli', both 1 March 1944.

66
See the mural newspaper
La voce della realtà
, quoted above.

67
See, for example, the undated poster
Al popolo di Vicenza
of the local CLN on the air raids of 14 May and 18 November (IVSR,
Archivio
, section 1, envelope 49, CLN,
Stampa non periodica
). A specific accusation against the Communists is contained in a poster that was put up on the orders of Grazioli, the provincial chief of Turin, 18 April 1944 (Vaccarino, Gobetti and Gobbi,
L'insurrezione di Torino
, p. 209).

68
See Nelia Benissone Costa's testimony in Bruzzone and Farina,
La Resistenza taciuta
, p. 58. Benissone Costa relates how she refused a reward of 20,000 lire offered to her after the Liberation for having accompanied some British escapees from a concentration camp into Switzerland. The aerial bombings of Turin had in fact been carried out above all by the RAF.

69
See his article entitled ‘Condizioni di armistizio', in
Rinascita
, July 1944, quoted in Canfara,
La sentenza
, p. 269.

70
‘Bombardamenti', in
Aurora
, 2 December 1943 (quoted in G. Bertolo, ‘Le Marche', in
Operai e contadini
, p. 301).

71
‘Qui gladio ferit gladio perit', article that appeared in the Rome edition, 23 January 1944. See what Thomas Mann declared in April 1942 from an American radio station after a British air raid on Lubeck: ‘I think of Coventry, and I have no objections to the theory according to which we shall all pay' (quoted in Canfora,
La sentenza
, p. 38).

72
And she added (8 December 1943): ‘We hate the Germans because it was they who liberated the Duce'. Her husband, a functionary in the prefecture, was as a result dismissed from his job (ACS,
SPD, CR, RSI
, envelope 24, folder 170,
Pozzetti Giordano
). See the parody that the Neapolitans had made of the popular song
Oi Marì:
‘Se sente ‘na sirena / Nu brivide m'afferra / Ciurcillo ha fatta a guerra / Pe' tante infamità. / Putisse ave' ragione / Ma nuie che ce trasimme? / A Roma sta a sfaccimma / Iatela a bumbardà!' ‘One hears a siren / A chill seizes me / Churchill makes war / With so much infamy / Maybe he is right / But what does it have to do with us? / The scum is in Rome / Bomb over there!'

73
Letter sent from Como: ‘Esame della correspondenza censurata al 30 giugno 1944' (ACS,
SPD, CR, RSI
, envelope 9, folder 3).

74
‘Fu necessario un manifestino' (‘A leaflet was necessary'), explains Cri. in a report to ‘cari compagni', late December 1943 (IG,
Archivio PCI
).

75
Article entitled ‘Problemi operai. L'acciaieria', in
L'Unità
, organo umbro del PC, 10 January 1944 (ACS,
SPD, CR, RSI
, envelope 9, folder 3).

76
Article entitled ‘I bombardamenti aerei', in
Fratelli d'Italia
, 5 May 1944. On 7 April 1944 Treviso had suffered a massive air raid, which the newspaper described as a ‘catastrofe'. The article said that ‘both Badoglio and the Allies have been repeatedly informed' of the scant military results of the destruction caused.

77
See the document ‘Da parte del Comitato di Liberazione per l'Alta Italia', 3 April 1944 (INSMLI,
CLNAI
, envelope 3, folder 3), brought to the notice of the Allies through the Lugano delegation (see Catalano,
Storia del CLNAI
, p. 152). The document gives the example of Padua. For analogous reactions in Genoa see A. Gibelli,
Genova operaia nella Resistenza
, Genoa: Istituto storico della Resistenza, 1968, pp. 162–3.

78
Article entitled ‘Parole agli Alleati', 20 March 1944.

79
Article entitled ‘Bombardamenti', August 1943. On the complaints by the members of the French Resistance against the Allied bombing see Michel, ‘Gli Alleati e la Resistenza in Europa', p. 88. The fault of Vichy, certainly, wrote
Provence Libre. Organe régional des Mouvements unis de la régionale des Mouvements unis de la résistance française
, ‘mais les fautes des uns ne sauraient excuser les fautes des autres', ‘the faults of one does not excuse the faults of the others' (Les bombardements Anglo-Américains, 1 June 1944).

80
Voce Operaia
, 19 November 1943, article entitled ‘I cannoni del Cremlino tuonano'.

81
‘Esame della corrispondenza censurata al 30 giugno 1944' (ACS,
SPD, CR, RSI
, envelope 9, folder 3).

82
It is enough to cite this testimony, which is if anything too drastic, by Altiero Spinelli, about the scant echo of the federalist manifesto of Ventotene: ‘We had in no way foreseen that, after the end of the war, Europeans would no longer be their own masters in their quest for their future, but that, having ceased to be the centre of the world, they would be heavily conditioned by extra-European powers', Spinelli,
Io Ulisse
, pp. 311–12.

83
L'Osservatore Romano
of 10 November 1943 reported that, on 7 November, de Gaulle, inaugurating the consultative assembly of Algiers, had complained that France had not been invited to the Moscow conference (held from 19 to 30 October 1943), and had contrasted this with what had instead occurred at the Congress of Vienna, where the new French rulers, wrote
L'Osservatore
, ‘were regarded as interpreters of that part of the nation which had no responsibility for the policy of the fallen regime'. A pamphlet, ‘Breve storia di cinque mesi' (which declares itself as Actionist-inspired, though independent of the party), maintained (quoting pp. 95–6 of the Vatican paper) that this ‘is the situation of today's Italy, which could,
eadem ratione
, aspire to be considered an equal': provided, mind you, that it was not the king who would be sending his representatives to the peace talks.

84
Letter of 18 May 1945, marked as ‘secret', and with Togliatti's marginal note ‘parlatone con Badoglio' (‘talk about it to Badoglio') (IG,
Archivio PCI
, ‘Direzione Verbali della Delegazione PCI per l'Italia Meridionale'). Togliatti took an identical public position in the already-mentioned article ‘Condizioni di armistizio' in
Rinascita
of July 1944 (quoted in Canfora,
La sentenza
, p. 269). In the party's national council of 7 April 1945, he would repeat that ‘we could not expect that Italy would be treated as a country to be put on the same plane as the great Allied democratic countries'. Togliatti,
Opere
, vol. V, p. 115.

85
‘Rivoluzione dall'alto?', Rome edition, 20 May 1944.

86
See the text of the agreement of the upper Val Maira, stipulated on 30 May 1944 between D. L. Bianco and M. Juvenal (Giovana,
Storia di una formazione partigiana
, pp. 120–2).

87
Togliatti's words in his speech at the Brancaccio theatre in Rome, 9 July 1944 (Togliatti,
Opere
, vol. V, p. 60).

88
The rumoured consignment of a third of the fleet to the USSR was considered an insult which, fortunately, London and Washington seemed to intend to spare us (leading article entitled ‘Cobelligeranza', 20 March 1944).

89
The declaration of the Council of Ministers of 23 May 1944 is published among the
Fonti dell'Archivio centrale dello Stato relative al Governo di Salerno (febbraio-giugno 1944)
, in A. Placanica, ed.,
1944. Salerno capitale: istituzioni e società
, Naples: Edizioni scientifiche, 1986, pp. 683–4. See the enthusiastic comment by
L'Unità
, Rome edition, 28 May 1944, article entitled ‘Il governo all'opera. Energica azione contro la quinta colonna fascista. Una dichiarazione programmatica di politica estera'.

90
On the exclusion of France and Greece, and their protests, see Toscano,
Dal 25 luglio all'8 Settembre
, pp. 55–7.

91
See Kogan,
Italy and the Allies
, p. 168. As regards the Dodecanese, Sforza had done no more than recognise that Greece had a ‘moral right' to it and express his hope in ‘friendly negotiations' between the two countries. By contrast, Lussu and Nenni's positions were unequivocally in favour of Greece. See Sturzo,
L'Italia di domani
, pp. 5–6; E. Lussu, ‘La ricostruzione dello Stato', June 1943 (
Quaderni dell'Italia Libera
, I), p. 15; P. Nenni,
Che cosa vuole il partito socialista
, speech given in Naples, 3 September 1944, p. 15.

92
See Bonomi's introduction, datelined ‘Roma, giugno 1944', to the reissue of
Le vie nuove del socialismo
, which dated from 1907, entitled ‘Travaglio di dottrine e di metodi in mezzo secolo di movimento socialista' (partly reproduced as an appendix to L. Cortesi,
Ivanoe Bonomi e la socialdemocrazia italiana
, Salerno: Libreria internazionale editrice 1971, from which I quote p. 131). On 20 March 1944,
La Democrazia del Lavoro
, the clandestine newspaper closest to Bonomi, had written that Italy, ‘within the parameters established by the same allies after the other world war, will participate with her capacity for work in the colonising activities that will begin with the peace'. Article entitled ‘Parole agli Alleati'.