To better understand the continental European situation of today we have to look back in the days, this is one of the reason why on this blog I like to write about historical facts that occurred in the past and that had a massive influence and consequences that have led to important changes we do live in the present time, all things are on history books that’s right but always the analysis of some specific events are poor or simply merely reported.
Differently from the beginning of the twentieth century today we do have too many instruments to documenting reality, mainstream above all establishing the importance of each single episode it is writing the history according with a specific political point of view that would be a reference model for historians too in particular those in charge of taking care of scholars books.
Educational it’s a very important matter indeed and is not a pure formality that any National State got a dedicated Ministry therefore Political process can have an important role on some changes that might appear irrelevant to the young students because maybe it’s about events that occurred too far in a past seen in black and white pictures or also in some silent film, the emotional detachment it’s huge of course, more realistic are the pictures and the footage too then it change the attachment we can feel.
Reality isn’t black or white of course there are different colors and with the technological evolution of media the effects of films or documentary footages have changed.
Nationalism it’s been associated with negatives aspects as egoism and aggressive behave towards the next, lack of freedom of speech and many others negative aspects however the importance for any ethnic group to have its institutions political, cultural and social or rather its own National State it’s been written on the international treaty of Versailles of 1919 post first world war, the translation of theory in real facts is the real challenge.
The American President of that times Thomas Woodrow Wilson on hand appeared he understood the importance for any ethnic group to live in peace in separate National States on the others for him it was just a matter of redesign the geographical map of Europe, far from the European reality Wilson had a vague idea of how things really were and he was strongly influenced by the colonial empires of U.K. and France otherwise by all the rest of National States and especially those new ones as Germany and Italy who were considered just like earthenware pots between steel barrels, inevitably these conclusions produced consequences, but we can says that all historians objectively agree that the peace treaty that ended the hostilities of the First World War actually laid the foundations from which the second was born.
Paris 1919 Versailles (planting of the seeds of discontent)
The treaty of Versailles of 1919 it’s one of the path that put end to the first world war It is divided into 16 parts and consists of 440 articles, the winners of the first world war U.K. the Republic of France, the Kingdom of Italy, Russia, Japan and many others dictated the lines, the first global war took place in a large scenario which included the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean, Europe, Africa, Middle east, the first global earthquake provoked by the hands of the mankind left behind 5.520.000 dead militaries, 12.900.000 wounded, 4.121.000 missing and 3.155.000 dead civilians, the total of the victims of the winner side its estimated of 12.801.000 the opponents of the so called Central Empires have had equally a considerable amount of victims but slightly lower 11.601.000 in total, almost 25.000.000 victims among military and civilians have died to redesign the European map.
When today students reads about the first world war they doesn’t have any idea of the meaning of these data, are just numbers on a page or on a tablet screen as the war it’s so far that doesn’t even feel any emotional involvement despite his ancestors joined that war, who is writing have never known his grandfather the few pictures I have portray him in military uniform with a sword on his side, I have others pictures of my Grandfather in Asmara ( Eastern Italian African colonial territories) in civilian clothes.
It’s tradition in the southern of Italy to give the name of the parents to the sons in my case the fact that my father remained orphan of both mother and father at the age of 8 years old in particular have influenced my parents decision on giving their name to me and my sister in memory of them but also in honor of my grandfather, both my grandfathers joined those wars so when I was a student I recall I had in mind that picture of my grandfather of which I share the same name and second name, blood and dna.
The first world war for Italy was the last of a series of wars of independence to finally complete the Unity of all lands lived by Italian people , Italy as Unitarian Kingdom born in 1861, the first world war divided the public opinion of that times initially Italy didn’t participated but soon after a long work of intelligence and of reciprocal interests among France and U.K. and of course Italy after 10 months on May 24th 1915 Italy finally joined the war breaking a secret path known as the “Triple Understanding” secretly signed before with Austria Hungary and Germany, therefore finding itself directly on one of the hottest front line facing once again Its historical enemy the Austro-Hungarian empire, the main deadly front line was all through the borderline between France and Germany of course, and the countries who had considerable lost and damage were France and Italy indeed due to the proximity with the enemy
The role of the masses was crucial and after the terrible defeat of “Caporetto” the Italian Army at that point had the total support of the overwhelming majority of the population, this is not a secondary fact on the contrary it’s very important as the mood of the soldiers changed radically, the initial hesitations negatively contribute to the general mood and in particular on the willing to join that war, After Caporetto things have changed Italy industrial capacity compacted worked to better supply the army with modern armaments, even the press changed and insisted on the fact that the war now was a war for the survival and protection of the State integrity.
The consequent born of special unit of assault plus a better organization of the military forces had its positive effect, the Italian army in the end repelled the enemy in the famous battle of the Piave river and ran after him thirsty for blood right up to their house, Italy lost in total 1.240.000 people between military and civilians, sat at the peace conference of Versailles with his head held high in the full right to honor above all the memory of the fallen.
The four great actors were U.K.,France, Italy and U.S.A. however the ongoing discussions wasn’t easy the Italian delegation protested and left the meeting but blackmailed returned, France and U.K. had the support of the American President that far away from European affairs took their side even if didn’t wanted an expansions of their own colonial empires.
Wilson policy
produced two important effects, the birth of the ‘Society of the Nations’ ( mainly on the hands of France and U.K.), first embryo of the United Nations and established the main important principle of the reorganization, on an ethnic basis, of the charter of Europe or rather pointed out the importance that any ethnic group should have formed its own National State.
Despite Italy won that war delusion, bitterness and sense of revenge
were dominant sentiments among the armed forces and especially of the Italian populations of the eastern border who felt betrayed and abandoned, Italy obtained part of the unredeemed lands of Trieste, Istria except Dalmazia and the city of Fiume who counted in 1910 over 24.212 Italians native speaker, 12.026 Croatians plus other ethnic minorities the architectures of those urban territories were and still are speaking Italian, even the stones of the beach of Pola, the dull American president but the international politics of the United States in general lacked of realism and had no direct knowledge of European situations as it was mainly influenced by France and U.K. and if on its intention the Americans wanted to prevent in future others terrible conflicts it obtained the opposite result leaving the basis for the second world war.
There are moments where spontaneously the human reaction it’s dominated by the feeling of anger because of the injustice more than revenge but are absolutely aspects of the human being ,Anger and revenge, are intended as primordial feelings. Literature, history, ancient myths and religion often associate this emotion with powerful, just; noble or divine figures (remember the wrath of Achilles, the fury of Orlando, the wrath of God ...). Getting angry is a condition that is linked to the sense of justice, to the violation of laws and norms; it is therefore an appropriate reaction to wrongs and offenses. Those who rebel are considered strong, courageous, fearless, and generous in spirit.
Rebellion it’s the key word of this story, and it’s what happened when a part of the official national army of a country it rebelled against the offensive and unfair treatment suffered by Italy in the peace negotiations of Paris, what occurred then with the occupation of the city of Fiume is the strong, courageous reaction to an injustice and moreover an insult to all those Italians soldiers died in the war.
The gap between the ruling class and the brave men who have fought the war was huge and in the Italian case I’d say considerably very huge, as written on the introduction Italy joined ten months later the first world war, it was a Nation divided in two and that division had a bad influence over the mood of the army, the first world war was also the occasion for the people of the south to catch up with those of the north or central Italy and viceversa, it was a moment in which young men from any corner of the country gathered together familiarizing with themselves and realizing the importance of being member of a unique Nation free and independent and the Italian Kingdom was only formed in 1861. The ideologies of the twentieth century were arising and the first world war basically was like and earthquake that invested everything, the industrial revolution leaded to new ambitions, new vision of the mankind and the role of a new man for the future society.
Alongside the industrial revolution the impact on national economies was so huge that inevitably new ideologies arisen, the revolutionary ambitions of the socialist as described by the Marx and Engels Manifest of the Communist party didn’t considered that later on that revolution would have its affirmation in the Russia of the Zars which was far away to be considered as a country with an ongoing Industrial revolution on progress.
Imagining the Socialism as a unique big river whose intention is to link the masses of each country while suddenly arrived the war and with it a heated debate started among the socialist leaders.
The world war In Italy as in any other European country the struggle within the Socialist family was particularly vivid and violent too, the Socialist were against the war and only considered that the only real war worth to fight for was the revolution to overthrow the capitalistic system or rather the class war of the working class against the bourgeois states.
The prominent figure of the Italian Socialism at the early years of the twentieth century was a young school teacher who made a successful career within the socialist local party and later on he would became the director of the main national journal of the Socialist Party, the ‘Avanti’- Ahead – that young man was Benito Mussolini who initially in line with the Socialist party was contrary of the participation of Italy at that war, note that back in the days to be director of the main press in an era when there was no television but only newspapers, radio and newsreel it meant only one thing, the director was to all intent and purposes the principal representatives of the Socialist thought.
But Mussolini who was really Ahead among of all the socialist main figures of the party, understood what all those the idealistic dreamers of its colleagues didn’t, first of all the internationalism of the socialists Parties the unity of proletarians working class was pure smoke in the face while they were debating on the opportunity for Italy to join or not the ongoing war, comrades of France were engaging a war against the Germans ones and so the others as well plus, and this is not of a secondary importance, Mussolini understood that to establish a sort of international brotherhood, the resolution of matters so delicate and important at the same time, as it was indeed the complete process of unification of some of the Nations in particular those new ones as was in the case of Italy and Germany inevitably was at the center of any future successful foreign policies, to talk about ‘Internationalism’ intended as brotherhood among the Nations, the word itself it presupposes the very existence of Nations understood as defined territories of each people, a great Nation of course must be in terms of a large territory and of a numerous population, these aspects made the difference between a medium powers and a big ones, only medium power can and must have the ambition to extend its proportion in terms of territory and number of inhabitants too, the forces is in the number would later said Mussolini, and when you want to achieve the brotherhood among the Nations you cannot consider the importance of it, if Italy didn’t had the respect due during the treaty of Versailles was mainly because in spite of the human cost of life Italy didn’t had large shoulders enough to impose itself as a big actor so its legitimate requests weren’t considered as it should have be.
However it’s not Mussolini the main character of the Fiume adventure but the worldwide known poet of Gabriele D’Annunzio the commander of the Fiuman legionaries who in total disagreement with the decisions of the treaty of Paris occupied the city of Fiume and declared an independent state waiting to join the mother land. It was a common feeling among the Italians that they fought a war and won but the victory was a ‘Mutilated Victory’, injustice and sense of anger arise among those brave soldiers who managed to bring the skin at home and have seen a huge of brothers in arms who have died while many politicians and in particular those socialist who were against the war used to spit in their face and assaulting also in many occasion, among the soldiers it’s absolutely right that having challenged the death to defend the motherland they have gained the natural right to have a word on the decisions about the country, not those pass cards, usurers, bankers with their ‘asses in the heat’ who also made big economic profits with the war industry, both the two world war have been provoked and wanted especially by people that never held a pistol in their hands who didn’t gave a shit of putting brothers against brothers, Mussolini joined the war and got injured too so did Gabriele D’Annunzio.
Sir Oswald Mosley in U.K. who was a brave soldier but a smart politician too knew exactly who behind the lines took profit from the world war and did anything he can to prevent U.K. to join he Second world war, Mosley wasn’t a pass card or a coward he knew of the atrocity of war better than any others of those moneylenders who took over in England, taking control of the Bank of England as of the media therefore of both the traditional parties, he fought that enemy at home and did everything to prevent the repeating of a war, as he knew that those who would have died were the young British men fighting others European brothers in a deadly great civil fratricide war, without any reasonable guilt Mosley was jailed considered as a traitor, this happened in the Democratic United Kingdom of that time guess now what it would have be with today Politically correctness no sense crap probably they would have hang him.
The Napoleonic wars laid the foundations for the birth of the Renaissance in Italy the Unity of all lands of Italian native people meant war, war to kick out all foreigners domination that spirit didn’t died with the birth of the Italian Kingdom for many Italians it continued and didn’t stopped with the end of the first world war, Gabriele D’Annunzio who was a famous poet, writer and bizarre figure also in politics, he moved from the right wing to the left wing, bypassing those limits all intellectuals that too ironed ideologies have it was representing a sort of new man, an Avant-guard source of inspirations for many contemporaneous brave men, while Mussolini crossed those limits politically D’Annunzio more passionate and less rationally attached to the political strategies move a hundred steps ahead by taking direct action.
Both men joined the war, Mussolini on the battlefield D’Annunzio on the airspace famous for his dangerous but very effective propaganda exploits as the Flight over Vienna, in the middle of the war he has violated the enemy airspace not to bomb the city but to urge the Viennese to rebel against their government, warning that the government would not be able to defend them from further and eventual bombings.
The charismatic Poet Warrior became the commander of an army of rebels and as a Renaissance knight entered in the city of Fiume on a white horse on 12 September 1919 landed together with 2500 arditi and legionaries in occupied the city militarily has established the Italian Regency of Quarnaro.
The Poet that lived and wrote it’s most amazing piece of artwork in the reality it has been a unique case in the history of mankind.
The Speeches from the Balcony, the roman salute, the warrior mottos of encouragement
All the aesthetics that will later be used by the nascent fascist movement was born in Fiume from the genius of the warrior poet
The first real revolution years before the Paris commune or the ’68 ferments was the occupation of Fiume, the neo declared independent state had its written constitution known as ‘La Reggenze del Carnaro’ encrypted by the socialist trade unionist Alceste de Ambris and reworked in form by the poet Gabriele D'Annunzio, it was promulgated by Dannunzio himself on 8th September 1920 in Fiume during the last months of the Fiume (Rijeka in Croatian) enterprise.
It was the model for a future corporate-revolutionary state and it’s precisely from the “D'Annunzio” Carnaro Charter that the Fascist regime would later take inspiration for its own economic political doctrine re-proposed in the Labor Charter of 1927, where through the policy of corporatism they wanted to create an antagonistic system towards capitalist society, and the Marxist one. (Those that later would form the Allied forces)
Here some passages of the Cranaro Costitution.
«Premise – The People of the Free City of Fiume/ Rijeka, in the name of its centuries-old franchises and the inalienable right of self-determination, reconfirm their wish to be an integral part of the Italian State through an explicit act of annexation; but since the arrogance of others forbids him for now the fulfillment of this legitimate will, he decides to give himself a Constitution for the political and administrative order of the territory (City, Port and District) already forming the “corpus separatum” ( separate body ) annexed to the Habsburg crown and of the other Adriatic territories that intend to follow their fate. “
“Art. 2 – The Republic of Carnaro is a direct democracy, based on productive work and the broadest functional and local autonomies as an organic criterion. It therefore confirms the collective sovereignty of all citizens without distinction of sex, race, language, class and religion; but it recognizes greater rights to producers and decentralizes, as far as possible, the powers of the state, in order to ensure the harmonious coexistence of the elements that compose it. “
“Art. 5 – The Constitution also guarantees all citizens, without distinction of sex, primary education, compensated work with a minimum wage sufficient for life, assistance in the event of illness or involuntary unemployment, a pension for old age, the use of legitimately acquired goods, the inviolability of the home, habeas corpus, compensation for damages in the event of judicial error or abuse of power. “
The Charter has contents partially referable to left interventionism, which in Fiume found expression in a fringe of left-wing futurists and in the official ‘Iron Head’ newspaper. Its director, Mario Carli, was (albeit in his own way) pro-Bolshevik.
The political institutions he describes are, however, modeled in various ways on the Athenian assembly, on the governments of the medieval Italian municipality and on the institutions of the Venetian Republic.
That political experiment was too dangerous it annoyed the financial elites who took over U.K. and France and who plundered the colonized states, the City Of Fiume Independent State officially recognized the legitimacy of the new born Soviet State, who initially was completely different of what soon became, that constitutional model was dangerous for several reasons and the Italian King and the ruling class as the Vatican too bloodily suppressed a revolutionary project, the project of a model of State that should have become Italy.
Today as yesterday it’s only by the union of that unique river which is Socialism that has been divided since the outbreak of the first world war that the masses can achieve a real justice for all on earth and the fair redistribution of richness among all the population of the world in particular those oppressed, the struggle shouldn’t be among the oppressed, Divide et Impera applied today it’s just to prevent a real awakening of all, BLM and antifa in US are fooled and directed as puppets against the ‘White Privilege’ or towards ‘racism’ of police brutality while the real enemy it’s just there a few miles away in Wall Street, in Europe too and even worse the struggle between antifa and fascist it’s been watered since the end of the second world war while financial elites created a super state partially inspired on the totalitarian communist Russian experience and modelled by the bankers and the dominant financial system at the expenses of the life of a lot of people who have died during the cold war and afterwards too, those infamous politicians in Europe that always declare that It’s because of the actual E.U. that we have had peace in Europe for over 70 years are disgusting liars despite supported and financed by those financial elites that are pretending to re write history wherever things are telling the opposite, today as yesterday those economic model it’s still valid and worth to fight for.