Mussolini and his thugs

In the 1922 election, Mussolini’s Fascist Party won a mere seven per cent of the vote. But Mussolini found another route to power – through violence. The success of his party was built on a mound of dead bodies, burnt books, smashed union headquarters and traumatised victims. Violence was fundamental to the fascists in how they took power and kept it. Without violence, Mussolini would have never come to power or stayed there for so long.

Mussolini was originally a passionate socialist until the moment that he was expelled from the party in 1914 for being in favour of Italy entering the First World War.* After that, he established his own newspaper and then – in September 1919 – his own party, which was strongly anti-socialist. It has been known as the Fascist Party but it is telling that its original name was Fasci Italiani di Combattimento  – “Italian Fascists of Combat”. It was pro-war and hyper-nationalist. Just as important as the creation of this party was the founding, a month later, of the squadrismo, a violent grass roots movement which included former members of the Arditi, Italy’s elite shock troops in the First World War. Fascism and the squadrismo were largely a reaction to the chaos, pacifism, international communism and seizure of land by agricultural workers at the end of the First World War. The years 1919 and 1920 were known as “the two red years” with strikes across the country. The socialists, who were then in the ascendency, included many of the sort that revered revolutionary Marxism, Lenin and the Bolshevik coup of 1917. The squadristi were people who resolved to oppose the socialists themselves because the government could not contain them.

The squadrismo was led by powerful local leaders known as ras (commanders). Some were aristocrats or landowners. Almost all had fought in the war and were very willing to use violence.  For them, it was a kind of civil war. Ras commanded their own regional squads, and exercised considerable autonomy, often acting independently of Mussolini’s central authority. Some of the most notable figures were from the north of Italy, including Italo Balbo, in Ferrara, Leandro Arpinati, in Bologna, and Dino Grandi, in Emilia-Romagna.

In the heart of Bologna on 21^st November, 1920, a crowd of 2,000 supporters of the socialist party cheered and clapped.  Ennio Gnudi, a humble railway worker, had been elected mayor. He stepped out onto the balcony overlooking the Piazza Maggiore. White doves with red ribbons were released into the air. Then chaos broke loose. Shots were fired and panic broke out in the square. The squadristi refused to accept the socialist victory and were determined to undo it.  Socialist ‘Red Guards’ attempted to defend the council by hurling bombs but these fell among their own supporters. Eleven people were killed that day and Gnudi never became Mayor. Bologna’s new fascists had won a victory and this new style of politics set a precedent for the next three years. The scene was set for Italy’s black years – 1921-22  – a period of intense fascist violence and political repression.

Italo Balbo was one of the most significant and ruthless local leaders and his impact was transformational. After the First World War, most squadristi were disorganized, semi-criminal gangs with no unified political drive. Under Balbo’s charismatic leadership in Ferrara, he developed and perfected violent tactics.

Balbo is said to have pioneered the use of castor oil as a form of punishment. An enemy of fascism was bound to a chair and with his mouth forced open, up to a litre of castor oil was poured down his throat. In February 1921, trained thugs rid Ferrara of socialists and the success inspired other squadristi, across northern Italy, to be just as violent and effective. In one case, Marco Cirianin, a former parliamentarian, was forced to drink castor oil and then paraded through his home region tied to a truck.

Many squadristi aligned themselves formally with Mussolini’s party, providing the muscle behind the party’s rise. But there were times when they more violent and uncontrolled than he wanted. Over time, the so-called “action squads” were developed into a formal paramilitary structure, the Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale (the Voluntary Militia for National Security) The squadristi, also known as ‘blackshirts’ were unmistakable.  Their “action squads” consisted of thirty to forty men, clad in black shirts. Many gripped revolvers, while others brandished nail-studded cudgels. They revelled in burning, looting, and torturing their enemies – socialists or anyone else that didn’t align with fascism. Raids were accompanied by alcohol, laughter and song. Cheerful photographs transmitting pride and brute-masculinity were often taken before a raid. The damage they did was documented afterwards. They photographed their dead and injured – their ‘martyrs’.

Town after town was taken over by fascist thugs. Local democratic institutions fell, one by one. Once towns were taken over, control and obedience was maintained through torture and terror. Natale Gaiba was a local union organizer. His involvement in socialist activities defied the fascist ban. In 1921, he was forcibly seized by the squadristi, underwent severe physical beatings and was murdered in front of his family with two gunshots. His murder, like many, instilled fear of even thinking of opposing fascism.

Mussolini felt considerable pressure to curtail the anti-socialist violence and signed the “Pact of Pacification” with the Italian Socialist Party in August 1921. The radical blackshirts felt betrayed and the pact was widely ignored by the local ras. Mussolini was forced to abandon it. To consolidate his power once and for all, Mussolini, officially founded the National Fascist Party in November 1921, solidifying the role of the squadrismo as the armed wing. He negotiated with prominent ras, offering them positions within the party to win their loyalty. Most of those who ended up governing Italy had committed crimes as ras for which they were rarely investigated, let alone tried.

In autumn, 1922, the squadristi gambled on a march on Rome. Italo Balbo was one of the leaders. Some 20,000 took part. Their reputation for violence helped convince the king to accept Mussolini as the new prime minister. He was accepted largely because he was presumed to have the power to stop the violence of his supporters. But the violence continued.

Giacomo Matteotti was the most important Italian socialist leader in the 1920s and the most vocal critic of Mussolini in the Italian Parliament, He was a problem and irritant for the fascist regime. Just days after delivering a speech in Parliament exposing the violence and corruption of the 1924 election, he was abducted and beaten to death by a fascist squad. His body was discovered weeks later, buried in a wooded area 20 kilometres outside of Rome. There is no proof that Mussolini ordered the murder but it was certainly done by his squadristi supporters.

There was revulsion in Italy at the apparent murder of Matteotti by the fascists. For a while it looked as though Mussolini’s position was in danger. But then, on January 3, 1925, he made a speech in the Chamber of Deputies in which he boldly assumed responsibility for the violence of the fascists — though he did not confess to Matteotti’s murder. He made it clear that anyone who opposed him would be eliminated. His use of force to maintain power was explicit.

Mussolini proceeded to dismantle democracy in Italy over the next few years. He used “exceptional decrees” to outlaw rival parties.  In 1926, Mussolini began to establish his secret police and, in 1927, the OVRA  (Organizzaione per la Vigilanza e la Repressione dell’Antifascismo) was formally created. Its job was to root out anti-fascist activity, spy on citizens and squash dissent. It became a model the Gestapo in Nazi Germany.

Mussolini remained in power for twenty-one years. His was regime was built on the foundations of violence and scorn for democracy.

*Mussolini said in response to his expulsion from the Socialist Party, “I am and shall remain a socialist and my convictions will never change. You hate me because you still love me.”

Sources:

Foot, J. (2022). Blood and Power: The Rise and Fall of Italian Fascism. United Kingdom: Bloomsbury Publishing.

SEGRÈ, C. G. (1987). Italo Balbo: A Fascist Life (1st ed.). University of California Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/jj.2711581

Paxton, R. O. (2011). The Anatomy of Fascism. United Kingdom: Penguin Books Limited.