Mussolini killed how many people

He rattled sabers against his neighbors constantly, but he also did more than talk, greatly expanding the army, building up a gigantic fleet the Regia Marina , and equipping a powerful air force the Regia Aeronautica , hugely expensive projects for a land like Italy, which was almost totally devoid of the necessary raw materials. In June , with German armies running riot all over Europe, the Duce decided to strike. He declared war on France and Britain in June No more posturing now: this was the real thing, when all that hard work and money he had lavished on the Italian military would bear fruit and show the world that he had created a new kind of Italian: a warrior as of old.

Consider this quick summary. Italy entered the conflict in June , declaring war on an already beaten France and launching an invasion of the Savoy region. The French—disintegrating all over the map—stopped the Italians cold. After advancing 50 miles, Graziani halted at Sidi Barrani in order, he said, to begin construction of a paved supply road back to Libya, something that would have taken months even under peacetime conditions. He was still 80 miles away from the main British position at Mersa Matruh!

As that adventure ground to a halt, in October , the Italian army invaded Greece from the Italian colony of Albania. Even worse, Great Britain now sent forces to Greece to oppose him.

The next month, in November , the Italian fleet was caught at anchor at Taranto by British torpedo bombers. One battleship was sunk and two more disabled, neutralizing the Italian surface navy for the rest of the war. In the early morning, an end-run round the Italian southern flank by the 4th Indian Division achieved total surprise, catching the Italians in their beds.

Fairly or unfairly, the Italian military has come to be synonymous with wartime ineptitude. Mussolini led Italy, alright: he led it straight into disaster. First it was bombing raids on Italian cities, which possessed only rudimentary antiaircraft defenses. Then came actual invasion, of Sicily in July and the Italian mainland in September. To be sure, Italy paid a steep price for Mussolini. As a result, he joined armed supporters who flooded the streets of Rome the following day.

Mussolini did not become a true dictator until After becoming prime minister, Mussolini reduced the influence of the judiciary, muzzled a free press, arrested political opponents, continued condoning fascist squad violence and otherwise consolidated his hold on power.

However, he continued working within the parliamentary system at least somewhat until January , when he declared himself dictator of Italy. Following a series of assassination attempts in and , Mussolini tightened his grip even further, banning opposition parties, kicking out over members of parliament, reinstating the death penalty for political crimes, ramping up secret police activities and abolishing local elections.

Mussolini was anti-Church before becoming pro-Church. As a socialist youth, Mussolini declared himself an atheist and railed against the Catholic Church, going so far as to say that only idiots believed Bible stories and that Jesus Christ and Mary Magdalene were lovers. He even authored an anti-clerical pulp novel. But after taking power, Il Duce began working to patch up that relationship.

Despite having many mistresses himself, he also put in place harsh punishments for adultery. In Mussolini signed an agreement with the Vatican under which the Church received authority over marriage and was compensated for property that had been seized decades earlier.

Mussolini sought to establish an Italian empire. Mussolini launched his first military action in when he bombarded and briefly occupied the Greek island of Corfu. Mussolini's National Fascist Party came to power in Italy in the aftermath of World War One, backed by armed groups known as blackshirts who intimidated opponents.

The Fascists seized power in the early s, dismantling democratic institutions, and Mussolini became Italy's dictator in Mussolini adopted some of Hitler's policies - notably the anti-Jewish laws of that stripped Italy's Jews of their civil rights. More than 7, Italian Jews died in the Holocaust. Mussolini was executed after his capture by Italian partisans in , while attempting to flee the Allied advance. Obelisk hides message from Mussolini.

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Captain William Bligh and 18 of his loyal supporters were set adrift in a small, open boat, and the Bounty set course for Tubuai south of Following the defeat of his proposals for constitutional reform in a national referendum, Charles de Gaulle resigns as president of France. A veteran of World War I, de Gaulle unsuccessfully petitioned his country to modernize its armed forces between the wars.

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