SOURCE



Mussolini 'diaries' may solve war riddle

Alessandra Mussolini, the granddaughter of Italy's late dictator, has said newly found diaries, allegedly kept by her grandfather before the second world war, show that he took Italy into the conflict only with great reluctance.

A controversial Italian senator and bibliophile, Marcello Dell'Utri, told the newspaper Corriere della Sera that the books were with a lawyer at Bellinzona, in the Italian-speaking part of Switzerland. He said he examined them last summer and found five day-to-a-page Red Cross diaries covering the years from 1935 to 1939.

"Mussolini's handwriting is clear and recognisable, even though in the diaries it is a bit hurried," Mr Dell'Utri said.

Ms Mussolini, who was also allowed a sight of the books, said: "All the efforts made by grandfather to avoid the war come out in these diaries. They are important documents because they will allow Mussolini to be interpreted with greater objectivity."

Valerio Castronovo, a professor of contemporary history at the University of Turin, was cautious. "Lots of [Mussolini diaries] have surfaced in the past 20 years and none has been found to be genuine."

But the British historian Denis Mack Smith said yesterday he thought the diaries might be from the same collection as one he examined 20-30 years ago. "I had no reason to doubt their authenticity," he said. "But they were just boring ... the sort of things you or I might write."

Only one other person is know to have seen the purported diaries, a handwriting expert who, says Mr Dell'Utri, had vouched for their authenticity. Mr Dell'Utri, who is currently appealing against a nine-year sentence for Mafia links, told Corriere della Sera the diaries had been found in a suitcase the dictator was carrying when he was caught by partisans in Dongo, at Lake Como, while fleeing to Switzerland in April 1945. One of the partisans, who died recently, had hidden the books but they were now with a lawyer, who was negotiating the rights.

Rumours have always circulated that the dictator had been transporting bullion. But there is speculation that the so-called "Dongo gold" was, in fact, a trove of archives or diaries.

PS: When there's a chapter on the strokeworthiness of Claretta Petacci, then I'll believe it's the real deal.

I look quite dashing, don't I?

I was pining for the fjords.

It's fake shit.

And what about the reluctance to enter the war? Mussolini and no reason at all to enter the war, he just chipped in becuase he thought it was an easy way to gain something, believing/expeting Germany to win the war alone.

Friggin idiot.

No to mention he probably CAUSED Germany to loose the war, because when Italy entered in war and FAILED Greece invasion, Germany had to move important divisions from eastern front to help out, same goes when Italy went into total shit and signed the "armistice" with the Allies and Germany had to move further divisions to occupy Italy and defend south europe from the Allies hordes.

If The Fatman was here, we would now have seen a 32 paragraph historical posting concerning Italy's role in all world affairs from the House of Medici through to the present day.

In their defense, their food is considerably better than the pretentious puke that the French consume. See, my take's a lot less political than Fatty's.

We're only into killing people very slowly by feeding you so much that you become not only a fat ass but a cholesterol junkie to the point of croaking painfully in the chest from backed up arteries. It's beautiful because we see nothing wrong with it, in fact... it's only because we um... love... love to feed.