INTRODUCTION

What really was fascism? Is there a risk of its return? We talked about it with historian and journalist Aldo Cazzullo. Cazzullo, what really was fascism?  

CAZZULLO RESPONSE: Fascism was a regime of oppression and violence. Fascists took power in blood, by violence, and maintained it by force. Of course, they also had consensus. But this vulgate that fascism up to 1938 had got almost all of them right, though. Too bad then the alliance with Hitler, the racial laws, the war — but not only the war. War is the natural outcome of fascism. Inherent in fascism is the idea of one race imposing itself on another, one nation imposing itself on another. And sending our men to war without even the proper shoes was a crime against our own people. But in 1938 Mussolini rather than having got almost all of them right, had already caused the violent deaths of almost all the opposition leaders: Antonio Gramsci dying after 11 years of imprisonment, Giacomo Matteotti assassinated, the beating that obviously affected the death of Piero Gobetti, Giovanni Amendola, Don Giovanni Minzoni was clubbed to death, Don Sturzo was clubbed forced into exile Alcide De Gasperi locked up in prison, also imprisoned Palmiro Togliatti, Scoccimarro, Di Vittorio, so in short, there is really nothing good to be saved in fascism. A regime is measured by the final tally: 472,000 dead in World War II. Italians’ savings wanted nothing more and also 2 million homes destroyed. Even the building balance of fascism, beyond a few beautiful buildings Mussolini had built, is negative as well.  

QUESTION BERTOLUCCI: What was it for the Italian press and fascism? 

CAZZULLO RESPONSE: Well Mussolini was a good journalist, he was very often thinking more about the next day’s headlines than the future interest of the country. The Italian press was enslaved, on the day of the march on Rome Mussolini telephoned Luigi Albertini, editor of the Corriere della Sera, and asked him “but what do you think of me?” and he replied “I think you should be arrested.” Instead, Mussolini received a telegram from the king begging him to come down to Rome in a sleeping car to receive the task of forming the new government. Luigi Albertini, had to leave Il Corriere della Sera, Alfredo Frassati had to leave La Stampa, the newspapers were enslaved. Mussolini sent out the tissue, if the pope criticized him, he would write “ignore the pope” or even “little pope” and then this was paid for by the Italian press in terms of credibility, no doubt about it. Although then, after World War II, there is a great revival of Italian journalism  

BERTOLUCCI QUESTION: Why is it so difficult, even for so many politicians, to declare themselves anti-fascists today? 

CAZZULLO RESPONSE: I think we Italians are much more attached to Italy than we say we are. We like to criticize Italy, but only we can do it, if foreigners do it we get angry. Italy is like mother to us Italians. National history excites us, outrages us, involves us, especially when it coincides with the history of our families. And so many had their grandfather, father, uncle fascist even after September 8, and to say today, “My father, my uncle, my grandfather in good faith believed he was serving Italy, but he was on the wrong side,” this is reasoning. Whereas instead the adherence is given from the gut, “He was my grandfather, he was my father, he was my uncle and therefore he was right.” If I then find out that even on the other side there were, and there were, partisans who behaved badly, the revenge-and then we were all fascists and then all anti-fascists. No, that is not the history of Italy. In the specific case of politics, Gianfranco Fini believed that to become a future prime minister he had to somehow abjure, erase, denounce fascism. And instead he took then 0.4 percent and a post-fascist party with the symbol flame went to the government without needing to declare themselves anti-fascist them. If anything they are anti anti-fascist they are not fascist, but they are not anti-fascist either. And when they say eh, but the communist partisans wanted dictatorship, the others also behaved badly, they always throw the ball into the other camp. Instead, let them go and honor, if nothing else, the liberal, Catholic, moderate partisans, there were plenty of them. Military, carabinieri, Jews, civilians, women…. The no said to Nazi-fascism was plural no. Among the partisans there were communists and monarchists, there were socialists and liberals, there were Catholic shareholders and many 20-year-old boys who did not even know what a party was. They had grown up under fascism. But who refused to fight for Hitler and Mussolini.  

QUESTION BERTOLUCCI: Is there a link between the advance of the far right in Europe and fascism? 

CAZZULLO RESPONSE: But I don’t think there is a direct link between fascism and the far right. History never repeats itself in the same way and with the same name. Certainly they are parties that do not have a negative judgment of fascism. In tune alas with a good part of the electorate. Then the issues of course are different. Right now the far right is strong because there is a lot of immigration, and the price of immigration is paid by the working classes, not by entrepreneurs who need cheap labor. It’s paid by the working classes who see a harm, a downward competition for their wages and rights. And then there is the national issue, which in Italy I think weighs a little less, but in other countries more, because many countries do not want to be absorbed by Europe. But now Europe is there and we need it, and we Italians, who are the ones with the highest public debt, are the ones who need it most of all  

QUESTION BERTOLUCCI: Is there a danger of the return of fascism in Italy? 

CAZZULLO RESPONSE: Certainly not, fascism is not coming back. That is, I don’t think there is a problem of return to fascism, I’m not saying that. I’m saying that in Italy there are still many fascists and a lot of people who don’t have a negative opinion of fascism because they don’t know the things that I tell in the theater, that I tell about my book, especially they don’t want to know them.