Benito Mussolini
early life and beginning of politics
Leader of Italy
child hood
early adulthood
political parties
Rosa Mussolini
Alessandro Mussolini
Mussollini
Was a school teacher in Italy
Was an alcoholic who barely stayed afloat with job after job
was on house arrests for many years because of revolutionary activities
was an athiest
believed that the poor people needed to rebel in order to improve their lives in italy
was raised as a catholic
taught Benito that the one way to be successful was to be educated.
Born on July 29 1883
As a child he did not have many friends and was very moody. He often picked fights with many kids and even stabbed 2 kids on different occasions. He was very violent and stubborn.
Mussolini adored his mother and did not want to do anything that would disappoint her. as a result, he made sure to get good grades during school and tried to hide bruises and cuts away from his mother.
He also did well with instruments as a child and would keep playing the violin later on in his life. He also had a knack for speaking and really liked to write. He got a certificate to be able to teach at the end of high school
after graduating high school Mussolini wasted all of his money like his father by gambling and drinking.
then he moved to Switzerland to escape military service and finally got a teaching job. After the school year of him being a bad teacher he lived on the streets broke.
he joined the local socialist party and tried publishing articles like a journalist but he wasn't very popular and still didn't have money.
he ended up going back to Italy because of getting arrested in Switzerland, his mother becoming sick and needing to enter military service.
his mother died in 1905 of meningitis and Mussolini started teaching again.
around the year 1908 Mussolini became more involved into socialism and went to Trent Italy and other places to spread his beliefs, which were very similar to his father's. Mussolini wanted to somehow break the new Italy and reform the government to be completely socialist instead of peacefully getting socialism into parliament.
later in 1910 he came back to forli where he and his father moved after his mother's death. He also lived with Rachele Alessandro's nurse's daughter and eventually married her
In 1913 he abandoned socialism because he wanted to support the world war 1 because it would give him more power and influence
later that year he became a fascist and owned a newspaper. He also was drafted for World War I however.
World war 1 came around with Italians on the allies side and but was happy because the country was at war and he got to show his patriotism.
during World War I Italy had many defeats and didn't gain much territory despite the allies winning.
during the war he ended up having a kid with one of his affairs and it brought him a little trouble but he covered it up.
he sorta threatened the government to get into world war I but they were already going to join it anyway secretly. However he took a lot of the credit.
Mussolini blamed the government and then decided that he wanted to be the new leader of the country who had bring it back to it's glory.
after WWI Italy's economy was still in despair. Veterans were angry at the horrible economy and joined the fascist party which Mussolini was in. Many of them wanted a strong central government that controlled labor and industry and brought more order in the country.
while this was happening, socialists kept having more and more strikes to get what they wanted and all of this made Italians feel like in more economic despair and there was a growing opposition for socialists because they were easy targets for the anger and helplessness of Italians. Fascism started growing.
fascism kept growing and socialism was dying due to events such as police favoring fascists in riots, which Mussolini used to his advantage, the economic crash which made every class poorer, and the fear of communism turned many people against socialists, (who wanted communism). It made many want to leave the hands of the country with fascism in order to fix the problems happening.
Mussolini fueled the fascist party by anger and fear and to prevent the socialists teaming up with the prime minister and actually creating a good government, Mussolini presented a coalition to the prime minister Geolitti for a revote of the current parliament
the election was full of violence and voter intimidation but this time, despite it not being a majority, Fascism finally got a voice in the government with 35 people in parliament and Mussolini being one of them.
Once In government Mussolini did everything to get Italians to join the fascist party by twisting many stories around, and leave the other parties by saying they will ruin Italy with his great public speaking skills.
Peace never resolved with the parties and when Luigi Facta become the 6th prime minister in 4 years after WWI, Mussolini tested his power. He planned assaults on the government and when there was no response to the attacks Mussolini planned on overtaking Rome and becoming the new leader.
the government ending up destroying itself anyway so the fascists did not need to attack and at age 39 Mussolini was pronounced the youngest prime minister of Italy by the King Victor Emmanuel III after Mussolini would not accept any less.
Some first actions that Mussolini did was make sure to keep the country's constitution but threaten it disappearing, took action and became aggressive against other countries, and created new agricultural districts and made sure to show the public of every good deed he did. He also made sure other parties would not try to threaten the new government and almost completely removed socialists and communists in the government. (did not have a government full of fascists because he did not want them to rise up against him)
Mussolini became a full dictator in Italy. He ended up imprisoning all who opposed him and started influencing the whole country including schools to be completely fascist. the church eventually even recognized fascism and Mussolini's government to be in control of all of the country and Rome. Then Mussolini recognized the Vatican city as an independent.
Later Mussolini put up his plans for expanding the empire and made excuse to retry and take Ethiopia because of the defeat the Italians had in 1896. Italians took Ethiopia with no challenge and in 1936 they controlled the country and the capital and the League of nations did nothing about it, telling other countries like Germany Italy and Japan that they could take over the world without the world doing anything about it.
during this time Hitler became the chancellor of Germany in 1933 and Mussolini and him made plans for expanding their countries in 1934. After Ethiopia, they became very close allies by 1939 when they practiced their warfare with Spain's civil war, and helped fascism win in spain.
After being shown this Hitler decided to invade a part of Czechoslovakia called Sudetenland and then betrayed a deal with British prime minister chamberlain of stopping after this invasion. Following that he invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia and Italy took Albania. it looked as if the world war was going to go into another war.
Italy and Germany made the pact of steel saying that if either started a war that the other would help no matter what. Mussolini sent word to Hitler that his military would not be ready for a large scale war for another few years, but Hitler ignored him and said he expected help. Then he invaded Poland