Mussolini, guest of Hitler in Berlin: “We will march with Germany”

The offer is impressive. On the evening of September 28, 1937, 800,000 people crowded the Olympic stadium in Berlin and its environs, “Mayfeld”. The crowd greets the convertibles in which the great leaders of Germany and Italy arrived: Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini with thunderous applause.. The Fuhrer greeted his guest warmly. The first part of the stay took place in Munich, the cradle of National Socialism, then the two dictators visited factories and military installations around the Third Reich. Now in Berlin is the time of apotheosis.

The assistance given by Germany to Italy during the war in Ethiopia, in defiance of economic sanctions decided by the League of Nations, and the joint commitment in the war of Spain together with the soldiers who rose up against the Republic, strengthened the relationship between the two countries. systems. Mussolini became convinced that Western democracies were deeply flawed and doomed to decay. He sees Hitler as a potential ally in fulfilling his dreams of greatness.

The two dictators ascended to the platform, which was placed so high that they could be seen clearly. Everywhere, spotlights create a play of light that makes the atmosphere majestic, almost mystical. German Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels took the floor first, to give a brief introductory greeting. Then it’s up to the Führer, who seduces the Duce by calling him “one of those lonely men who are not the heroes of history, but make history themselves.”. He further declares that his regime desires peace as long as the rights of the German people are guaranteed. Finally, he extols the “community of ideas, but also of action” between Rome and Berlin.

It was Mussolini’s turn, who prepared a speech written in German, a language he knew well. The crowd cheered him on for a long while before he could speak. The Duce repeats that Rome and Berlin want peace. Then he summarizes the features that unite the two systems: the belief in the will as “a decisive force in the lives of peoples”. glorification of work, “a sign of human nobility”; line “economic autonomy”. Then the dictator recalls the sanctions imposed on Italy by the League of Nations and asserts that the Third Reich did not participate in them.“We will not forget her,” he said.

Then, as the rain on Berlin wets the newspapers in front of the speaker, making reading difficult, Mussolini moves on to a very binding declaration: “Fascism has its own morals, to which it intends to remain faithful, and it is also my own. moral: Speak clearly and openly, and when you are friends, move forward together». He concludes with a dangerous and perilous prediction: “Europe will be fascism tomorrow because of the logical progression of events.”

Subsequent events seem to prove the Duce right, but according to an approach that sees Germany as the driving force and Italy as the powerful ally. The first official act, on November 6, 1937, is Our country’s accession to the Anti-Comintern Pact directed against the Communist International It took place the previous year between Germany and Japan. Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano is enthusiastic about it: “Italy – he writes in his memoirs – has broken its isolation: it is at the center of the greatest political and military mixture that has ever existed.”

But then come the hard-to-swallow bites. While in 1934 Rome stood as the guarantor of Austria’s independence, in March 1938 Mussolini witnesses Hitler’s entry into Vienna without lifting a finger, implying the presence of the Third Reich on Brenner’s borders. And then the Duce found himself in the role of mediator at the Munich Conference (September 29-30, 1938), after which the Third Reich, with the consent of London and Paris, seized the Czechoslovak lands inhabited mainly by the German-speaking population, the Sudetenland. An insidious joke circulated in Italy: “Mussolini changes history, Hitler changes geography.”

Also in 1938 Italy adopts anti-Semitic racist legislation following that introduced by Germany in 1935
. This did not happen as a result of Hitler’s pressure, but due to Mussolini’s delicate will, who intends to imitate the Nazi regime for which he is beginning to feel an inferiority complex. Jews are excluded from school and university, from public employment and the army, and are severely restricted in the exercise of their jobs and their civil rights.

The Third Reich is firmly on the path that leads to war. Italy follows suit, though aware of its unwillingness to prosecute a war. In March, Hitler occupied Prague, reducing Bohemia and Moravia to a Reich Protectorate. May 22, 1939 An alliance treaty with Germany, the Pact of Steel, was signed in Berlin, a real halter for our country, obliging each of the two contracting parties to intervene in support of the other by any means when they are engaged in war of any kind, even aggression. There are all conditions for disaster.