Authors: Claudio Pavone
Beyond remaining loyal to or abjuring both old oaths and institutions and new commitments, treason came to acquire meanings that no longer, or not only, regarded the power system, however conceived, but also and above all in reference to the system of human solidarity, of people's deepest affections and convictions. On the local scale, âa whole dense web of ties' had formerly united the partisans not just to one another but also to their Fascist enemies, and all of a sudden âeach, reciprocally, had become a traitor in the other's eyes'.
75
âTraitor' was, in short, becoming a label to pin on those who, like the Fascists, refused to collaborate in the reconstruction of a profound system of human solidarity, and indeed were doing their level best to nip it in the bud.
But within the Resistance groups themselves, suspicions of betrayal could reappear, contrasting with the idealised compactness of the group itself, reiterated possibly in the very act of oath-taking â suspicions both of those who seemed to deny that compactness and of other groups. As we shall see, this process appeared most evident in the relations between the Communists and the groups to their left, and found classic expression in Pietro Secchia's article âIl sinistrismo maschera della Gestapo'.
76
But the Third Internationalists were not the only ones to âpaint their adversaries as traitors'.
77
The temptation to do so could nest within the same fraternal bond uniting the
resistenti
as such. Terror may indeed bud from fraternity, and âthe magic power of the taboo of betrayal' spread âto those who break it'.
78
This helps account for the great fear of betraying, particularly under torture, felt by many
resistenti
. To save himself from this danger, Luciano Bolis cut his throat in prison, thereby succeeding in severing his vocal cords.
79
To this day a Mauthausen deportee recalls: âIn a certain sense I felt freer because at least I no longer had this anxiety' â namely of betraying.
80
It should be added that the Italian Resistance was less afflicted by such degenerative processes than other Resistance movements, such as the Yugoslav, the Greek and the French. In Italy, affinity between certain basic ethical and existential attitudes and unity as a main political line probably managed better to help each other out on this score.
The
resistenti
frequently felt rage against âthose who have betrayed us'. âChe Dio maledica chi ci ha tradito/portandoci sul Don e poi è fuggito' (âGod curse those who betrayed us/leading us to the Don and then escaping'), ran
Pietà l'è morta
, one of the most intense partisan songs. This was one of the ways in which the revolt of a generation was expressed against the regime brought up under and against the ruling class that had dragged them into war. The accusation feeding this revolt cannot be seen exclusively in terms of betrayal; but betrayal does help explain the label âtraitor' when it is attributed not only to the Fascists, but also, as we have seen, to the king, Badoglio and the Germans themselves.
âBetrayal', âloyalty', âhonour' and the like frequently figure in the propaganda and journalism of the Social Republic, but also in the letters of the fallen Fascists. For many of them, too, the point of departure seems to be the âapocalyptic
devastation of 8 September',
81
the reaction to the fact that men âhave flung their consciences in the mud and become mere wrecks'.
82
But 8 September, as we have seen, remained in the minds of the Fascists as a nightmare,
83
a baffling offence. The letter of a sixteen-year-old member of the Republican National Guard, written to his mother, expresses this sense of a catastrophe from which one is trying to emerge, only to become more and more ensnared; and it is worth quoting a passage from it at length, where the memory of 8 September serves to reconfirm the boy's reasons for his choice in response to the emotion provoked by the wounded Italian enemy:
âMamma' was the invocation of the partisan whom I myself had to carry in my arms to the dressing station. During the journey, his sole thought was his mother. Over and over again he asked me if we would have harmed his mother too, and incredulous when I said no, spoke to me to remind me of my own mother, wanted to know about you, asked whether I got mail from you, if I had a photograph of you, since he did not have one of his own and that way, he said, he would see his own mother in you. I wish that scene had been witnessed by all those people who discuss and talk so lightly about 8 September, without having the slightest notion of what disaster and ruin it brought to our
patria
. Because, you see, that partisan, the one I had to fire at â otherwise he would have fired first â spoke the same language as me, said âmamma' as I am saying it now; he was a brother! Believe me, if at that moment I'd had that @#$%¡ in my hands and those who helped him, I'd have made mincemeat of them.
84
But who and what, for the Fascist combatants, should not have been betrayed? One might answer, with a pat formula: above all a past with which they could identify only in terms of mechanical continuity. It was a past partly lived at first hand, partly imagined, as seems to be the case with the very young joining up for the first time, often invoking loyalty to their father, âItalian and Fascist',
85
and to an Italy âwhich you older combatants have entrusted to us, to maintain her prestige and her honour'.
86
Loyalty to the oath itself gained force above all in this context; and there is a whole category of Fascists whose oath to the Duce as an institution was unquestionably influenced by the charismatic figure of the Duce, even when, as things now stood, he came across as the object of at least momentary but always affectionate pity: âPoor Duce, what a change
has come upon him!' wrote a soldier who had had the honour of sitting at table with him, and who immediately continues: âThe Man he was, robust, authoritarian, is no longer recognisable; what he has suffered in these months must have been indescribable for Him who loved Italy so much and had given everything for her. Now, however, he has gathered â¦Â new energy and with his will, which is made of iron, is reconstructing our Italy anew.'
87
A paratrooper of the Folgore Division sent his mother his medallion of the Duce so that she would always wear it on her breast as a reminder of him.
88
We shall be returning to the myth of Mussolini betrayed. Suffice it to record for the time being that Mussolini really did appear, paradoxically and somewhat grotesquely, as the most betrayed of all Italians. âPisenti, we've been betrayed by the Germans and by the Italians', was how the Duce summed it up to his minister of justice, on returning from his visit to the archbishop's palace, when the final catastrophe was well and truly under way.
89
Among the republican Fascists there were also those intent on demonstrating the illegality of the Badoglio government, as a basis for their conduct,
90
and those, by contrast, who wished to vindicate âthe act of will of which all the soldiers of the Italian Social Republic are justly proud'. These words conclude a passage dedicated to admirals Mascherpa and Campioni, who were shot by the Fascists because they had obeyed orders to oppose the Germans: the two admirals âcould have rebelled but there is no juridical thesis that can demonstrate that they were obliged to do so'.
91
The right to rebel against the order to betray was invoked by Major Mario Rizzatti to justify his own conduct: âThe regulation of discipline establishes that all orders are to be obeyed save one: which is, if one's superior commands one to betray one's country. Often, speaking to the whole assembled battalion, I would illustrate, with imaginary examples, this duty of non-obedience, hinting that sooner or later it would have to be applied.'
92
According to the Fascists, those who above all were not to be betrayed were the Germans, âto whom we are tied by a pact, a war fought together. And this out of loyalty and a sense of honour, independently of any sentimentalism and practical interest.'
93
We are united to the Germans, another letter reads, by âsworn
faith, friendship cemented by blood in a hundred engagements'.
94
More dryly, another Fascist wrote: âI started with an enemy, I must finish against the same enemy.'
95
A Fascist (later a member of the Movimento Sociale Italiano) gave this dignified testimony:
I found âla guerra continua' [âthe war must go on'] and 8 September ignoble. Therefore I considered it a question of personal coherence to stay on the losing side, knowing that almost certainly I was following the losing side. But I didn't think it right at such a moment to turn your back on your ally, because it was well and truly an act of betrayal.
96
An interpreter in the employ of the Germans replied to the internees who complained about the treatment being meted out to them, that it was âgood and what you deserve, given that we had betrayed them'.
97
As the Fascists saw it, the war dead were not to be betrayed.
98
Here mechanical continuity with the past is particularly evident, especially if compared with the effect that insistence on the same need had on so many other fighting men who joined the Resistance. In the Fascists, this need sometimes assumed the guise of a desire for physical and close-range revenge. âI cannot follow those who have killed a brother whom I must avenge at all costs',
99
one letter reads; and another: âFor what reason did I join up? Because I have a brother asking to be avenged, who was killed by our enemies, by our dear “Liberators”.'
100
At times, Fascist fidelity to the war even transcends fidelity to the dead. It might be a question of a âperennial and metaphysical war', or a war which is âlike a disease'.
101
In these âcombatants of all wars', human solidarity appears to have stiffened into virile camaraderie.
At other times the Fascists seem to be banging their heads against the wall, dismayed and furious at what appeared to be a âwar fought in vain â¦Â a war of few, betrayed by many [and which all the same] is my whole life'.
102
Indeed, rife among the Fascist combatants too was the sensation of being victims of a profound and obscure swindle, of which the wicked 8 September was but a partial manifestation. They saw the traitor not in Fascism but in those who had betrayed Fascism, all the worse if the latter were Fascists and, as such, unpardonable: âBetrayed ideas cannot welcome back the traitors with open arms.'
103
These Fascists thought that the Social Republic was the last opportunity to rediscover the purity that had been sullied by the Fascism of the
ventennio
. A man who had asked to enlist in the republican army wrote from Germany that he wanted to fight âfor the
patria
and the idea', and that he was certain he would find âreal men', who were not âused only to cheering, flag-waving, uniforms of every ilk, as before, and to which the men of the past regime had accustomed us, but men who said little, but who were ready to take up arms to wash away the dishonour with which we have been stained by the traitors who have sold themselves to the enemy'.
104
âWe are few but healthy', says another letter explaining the reasons for joining the republican Fascist party;
105
and a naval lieutenant declared that âall in all the party has gained' by ridding itself âof the dead wood of opportunists'.
106
Carlo Emanuele Basile, the Genoese provincial chief, boasted to the SS Command that âthe shame of betrayal can only be washed out in the blood of a well-trained minority who show that not all Italians are servile in spirit'.
107
In a private letter, a republican National Guard militiaman rejoiced at the idea of
taking revenge on the traitors with fire and the sword.
108
Major Mario Carità refused to allow a condemned man to be shot in the breast rather than the back: âNo, you are a traitor, you have fought against your country in the ranks of the red militias, and must die as traitors die.'
109
On the same occasion, the brother, also a Fascist officer, of Lieutenant Colonel Gobbi, for whose killing there was a reprisal, abused the victims thus: âCowards, let them thank God they died in daylight; my brother was killed last night treacherously, at the street corner on his way home after doing his duty.'
110
Here things seem to come full circle: traitors can only strike âtreacherously'.
Even those who almost boast about pitching Italy â warring Italy â against Fascism seem to be convinced of the need to take revenge on traitors: âI am a twenty-one-year-old son of Italy. I belong neither to Graziani nor to Badoglio but I am Italian: and I am following the path that will save the honour of Italy.'
111
But among the republican Fascists there were those who felt the need to reject the accusation that it was they who were the traitors. A republican National Guard militiaman wrote to his children that their father âhas been neither a coward nor a traitor but one of the few who have kept an oath that they swore, without ever having had anything in compensation'.
112
And even a âMuti' was to implore: âLook at me, mamma, I'm your son, your Dante: I haven't sold myself, I'm not a turncoat, I'm not a traitor. I'm your son.'
113
But since this book has referred constantly, though at times only implicitly, to the war waged from 10 June 1940 to 8 September 1943, we would do well, at this point, to take a direct look at that period.