By Benito Mussolini
My response to the questions of the honorable comrades of this Chamber comes a little late for the following reasons:
In the first place, I wanted to read the stenographic reports of the speeches made in the Austrian National Council. Second, I wanted to have a conversation with our Minister in Vienna to get further information regarding the atmosphere in which those speeches were delivered, as well as concerning the circumstances preceding them and the repercussions produced by them. Thirdly, and last but not least, I wanted a sufficiently long interval of time to elapse in order for the incident to lose some of its excessive drama. Hannibal is not at our gates. Nor is Monseigneur Seipel! (Long laughter).
Italy today is a great State, politically unified, ethnically homogeneous, morally compact, and more solidly organized than any other State in Europe. (Applause). Italy today is a great Nation of 50 million people, of whom 42 million live on the peninsula. Tempered by Fascism, these people have solid nerves, talk little and know how to hold hard. Austria is what she is.
I had been asking myself if it was worth it to respond, and certainly if the Chancellor, i.e. the Head of the Austrian Government, a man of eminent qualities in many respects, had not intervened in the debate, I would have let the matter pass and would have not taken any note of the anti-Italian and anti-Fascist verbal exaggerations of the Austrian National Council. (Approvals).
I will therefore speak with the utmost calm, but without ambiguity, that is to say, I will speak clearly, as it is our habit. I will immediately add that this is the last time I shall speak on this matter. Next time I will let actions do the speaking for me.
It is a chapter of history that I am writing, not for the benefit of Italians who know this history, but for the benefit of the world who either ignores or forgets this history. I intend to demonstrate and I shall demonstrate that the Austrian demonstration is not justified and for that reason is an act of provocation. It is in no way justified in view of the general policy followed by Italy from 1919 to 1928 toward the Austrian Republic; nor is it justified from the standpoint of the policy of the Fascist Government in the province of Bolzano, which, being one of the 92 provinces of Italy, is treated by the Fascist Government like all other provinces, with the same equality of rights and the same equality of duties.
If I now recall the many proofs of friendship given by Italy to Austria from the Armistice down to this day, it is not with the intention of reproaching Austria for her ingratitude. We are gentlemanly enough to know the value of discretion. I do it merely to let the world know the facts for once and for all. (Approvals).
Our friendship towards Austria within the last ten years has developed in three main directions: first, it was demonstrated in a social and humanitarian manner; later came the period of financial assistance which is not yet concluded and which has been made possible by Italy's sacrifices; then there was the interval of an essentially political character during which Austria greatly profited from Italy's disinterested support.
I shall dwell on this last point for a moment. In virtue of article 49 of the Treaty of St. Germain, a plebiscite was to be held in the Klagenfurt zone. It took place in October 1920 under the presidency of an Italian Prince, Livio Borghese. At a certain moment the threats from more or less regular Yugoslav elements became very insistent. Austria requested Italy's help, which is documented by the following telegram sent by the Marchese Della Toretta:
"The Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs advises me urgently that according to reliable information nine battalions of infantry and one of artillery have been sent by Yugoslavia to the vicinity of Assling. Under such conditions the Austrian Government emphatically requests that the withdrawal of our troops should be postponed."This was done. The result of the plebiscite was favorable to Austria. On October 14, 1920, the Marchese Della Toretta telegraphed as follows:
"Herr Renner [then Chancellor] in communicating to me the result of the plebiscite asks me to convey to the Royal Government the expression of his gratitude for the support which has been given and which has ensured the liberty of voting", etc.One year later the question of the Burgenland came up. After the Venice agreement, Chancellor Schober sent the following telegram to our Minister of Foreign Affairs:
"Upon leaving Italian soil I have the pleasure to renew to Your Excellency my sincere thanks", etc.The advent of the Fascist Regime has not changed this line of unselfish friendship towards Austria. It would take too long to retrace the history of the past six years. I may mention only that not more than two weeks ago the Austrian Minister at Rome came to thank me once more in the name of Monseigneur Seipel for the extremely favorable attitude taken by Italy on two issues which are of particular interest to Austria: military control and the new Austrian reconstruction loan. It is possible that in the interval of time necessary for the completion of the details of this loan, Italy may temporarily withhold her indispensable definite adhesion.
After ten years of this policy, which at times materialized in veritable and real agreements, we are now confronted by a demonstration which the honorable interpellators have perfectly defined as an "intolerable interference in the internal legislation of our State". As a matter of fact, there is no international question concerning the small minority in Alto Adige. This minority, furthermore, is absolutely negligible compared to the compact mass of 42 million Italians in the Kingdom. It is also negligible in comparison with the millions of Germans who have come under the domination of other States. If such a question existed, it would be found in some peace treaty or diplomatic convention. There is no trace of anything of the kind. All the efforts to create what does not exist are therefore completely useless and absurd. It is like beating against a rock.
The Austrian speakers insist that there are promises, assurances from Governments which preceded the Fascist Government. I do not deny this possibility. But it may also be possible that those who gave them have later repented in view of the arrogant interpretation of such promises. (Lively approvals).
However, even though the Fascist Government may have given its respect for and scrupulous observation of treaties, it does not hold itself bound in the least by more or less vague and verbal assurances made by men representing systems and Governments which the Fascist revolution has inexorably superseded. (Very lively, prolonged applause).
Realizing that it is impossible to stand on diplomatic ground—and Monseigneur Seipel himself has not attempted it—endeavors are being made to carry the question on political-sentimental grounds, and we hear rumors about systems of tyranny, of tortured brothers, of a population being slaughtered under the barbaric Fascist dictatorship. All this, besides being false, is supremely ridiculous. We are not the disciples of Austria, who for a century had covered half of Europe with executioners, who had filled the prisons with martyrs and set up gallows without interruption. (Very lively applause).
The alleged Fascist atrocities are an invention of idle fantasy. Of the two ethnic minorities who were the only ones sent to prison, one was almost immediately set free; the punishment of the other was reduced and he too would have been released had it not been for the campaign from abroad. A self-respecting State does not tolerate such foreign meddling. (Applause). The democratic-republican Fuller, Governor of Massachusetts in the United States of America, has given us a striking example in this regard. (Applause).
The individuals whom I am speaking of were not sent to prison because they were Germans, but because they were anti-Fascists, in other words, counter-revolutionaries. This is what the "evidence" regarding Fascist barbarism amounts to and nothing else. Herr Kolb himself has talked vaguely about oppression without specifying anything. But oppression as regards language, customs and local traditions is also non-existent. The reality is that on this very day, after six years of the Fascist Regime, some fifteen journals are printed in the German language in the province of Bolzano—political, economic, religious, literary and educational journals. Since our great patience has been misinterpreted, I now give this last warning: If the anti-Italian campaign on the other side of the Brenner is going to continue, then the fate of all these foreign language publications will be sealed: they will be suppressed. (Very lively applause).
As for the "oppression" of the ethnic minorities, it is well to inform you that there are still as many as 376 civil employees of foreign language in the city of Bolzano and 664 in the province of the same name. Since all this has not been appreciated, all these elements will soon have to face the dilemma: either move to other provinces of the kingdom or be dismissed and replaced. (Very lively applause).
I affirm with a clear conscience that not one single act of persecution has been perpetrated against people of foreign language in the province of Bolzano, among other things because this population, largely rural, is calm and disciplined, accepts the Regime, does not welcome the rumors from the other side of the Brenner, and only asks to be left in peace. The recent entirely spontaneous telegram of fifty innkeepers from the province of Bolzano which was sent to the Vienna newspapers in order to deny these lies, is a proof of what I have just said. Further proof is found in the telegrams from Bressanone, from Brunico and from the local Blackshirts of the Alto Adige Legion.
The elements of foreign language in Alto Adige can not feel like strangers in the Italian State because they enjoy equal rights with all other citizens within the framework of the great syndicalist corporative organization of the State. From the innkeeper to the merchant, from the artisan to the peasant, they all participate in the life of the great national organizations.
The Fascist Regime has approached those people with a fraternal spirit. A typical fact proves this: the war-mutilated and disabled veterans of the former Austrian Army are members of our own national organizations and draw the same war pensions as the mutilated and disabled war veterans of the Italian Army. We have applied the same equality of treatment to former Austrian war-orphans.
I ask you, is this not a profoundly Christian act, dear Social Christians from beyond the Brenner? Is this Fascist barbarism? Or does barbarism consist in the fact that, in accordance with the principles of our Revolution, we have suppressed the municipal councils in the province of Bolzano, just as they have also been suppressed in the other 91 provinces of the Kingdom? Or does it consist in the fact that we sent 200 poor children of German families to improve their health on the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea?
The fact that there is no oppression on the part of the Fascist Government is proved conclusively by the following figures:
In Italy there are 55 nursery schools and they are used by 3,500 children. Italian primary schools include 750 classes which are attended by 15,200 children. The Italian middle and high schools—of which twelve are public and seven private—are attended by 1,850 pupils. But there is an even more significant figure. Italian courses for adult men number 193 and are attended by 3,835 students who, with a sympathetic and laudable will, feel the necessity of learning the language of their new Fatherland, since they have definitively become Italian citizens. It can be justly said that the new generations of the province of Bolzano understand and speak Italian.
At this point one may ask: If there are no reasons of an international character and no motives of a special character, how does ones explain the improvised demonstration of the Austrian National Council and of Chancellor Seipel? First of all, this is not an improvisation, but the culminating of an episode of a campaign which has been carried on for years, ever since the close of the war, and which has become more accentuated after the formation of the province of Bolzano. The truth is that Germanism raises its cries because, being confronted by the strong will and tenacious system of Fascist Italy, it feels that its game is lost. (Applause).
The voices of several authoritative German writers and journalists have already publicly rallied to acknowledge this fact. A population which increases and grows will easily fill up its frontier zones.
Here it behoves me to proclaim that Italy has not gone to take away, but rather to bring a potent contribution of civilization to the province of Bolzano. Italy has undertaken gigantic works there; she has liberally spent hundreds of millions of lire. It is Italy who has proceeded with the electrification of the Bolzano-Brenner line to the great advantage of international traffic. For the production of the required electric power, two plants are under construction, one of 40,000 horsepower, the other of 270,000 horsepower, of which 195,000 horsepower will be available for private industry. A total expenditure of 300 million lire, with 5,000 workmen employed in its construction. It is interesting to note that, during the work, Roman coins from the first centuries of the Empire were discovered.
It was during the Fascist Regime that the colossal establishment of the Montecatini near Merano was built and now sends its nitrate products as far as India and Japan. It is Fascist Italy who has begun the land reclamation of the Adige valley and has settled there the first nuclei of settlers from the old provinces. It is the Fascist Regime which, not more than two months ago, has allotted 11 million lire to the rural credit establishment of the province and has thus saved thousands of German peasants from poverty. It is the Fascist Regime which, with timely loans, has saved the Savings Bank of Merano. Other millions of lire have been spent on forests, roads and rivers.
This intensive civil activity of Italy has been demonstrated on the greatest scale in Bolzano, where we are building the Governor's Palace, imposing groups of houses for State functionaries, a pavilion for a civil hospital, a new railway station, a kindergarten, soldiers' barracks, a house for the Balilla, a school building and a Victory monument which will be inaugurated with the greatest solemnity on May 24th. (Applause).
The moral and material effect of this vast activity of the Regime is realized on the other side of the Brenner. The extreme elements of Pan-Germanism raise desperate cries in order to bring to life a question which has already been settled. Those on the other side of the Brenner know that within a few years the remaining elements of German descent in the province of Bolzano will be proud to be citizens of the great Fascist Fatherland and they will then be identified only by the endings of their family surnames, if they decide to keep them. (Approvals).
This will happen because it is the logical and fatal order of things, an order established by the summits of mountains, by the currents of rivers, by the prophecies of Dante and Mazzini, by the sacrifices of old and recent martyrs, by the blood shed during the three years of a hard-fought war by entire generations of Italians. (Very lively applause).
Should we perhaps refute some of the many absurdities which are printed in newspapers on the other side of the Brenner? What do we care about the paper play in other countries? Fascism is not an article for export. If Europe is willing to infect herself still more seriously with diseases which we have cured ourselves from, that will make us only more vigilant in defending ourselves with every possible weapon against the slightest contamination.
The League of Nations? Geneva? Vain hopes! If the Geneva Council ever enters into the labyrinth of the so-called minorities, it will never extricate itself from it. (Lively approvals).
The very accusers of today may be placed on the bench of the accused tomorrow, and rightly so. (Lively applause).
And what then?
It is time to say, and perhaps for the last time, that every demonstration on the other side of the Brenner is useless and harmful. The time has come to declare that insolent speeches, odious insinuations, vulgar insults have only one result: namely, that of accelerating the pulse of Fascist life (very lively approvals), and opening up an abyss between neighboring peoples.
Now, so far as it is in our power, we want to be friends with the Germanic world—whose qualities we recognize and whose contributions to civilization we appreciate. But on the condition that our security, the security of 42 million Italians, must not be endangered, not even remotely. That it all concerns our security and not mere scholastic questions is clearly demonstrated by what happened after the now famous session of the National Council.
The anti-Italian campaign continues unabated. For Monday, on March 5th, a rally has been planned at Innsbruck to protest against "Fascist insolence and oppression" of Germans. The rally was called by the Socialists, which proves that the question of Alto Adige is merely a pretext for indulging in anti-Fascism. Another large rally, which was planned for March 6th in Vienna, has been postponed with some difficulty until March 14th.
A Tyrolese journal writes that "not only the oppression of the German subjects of Italy, but also the existence of the Brenner frontier is in contradiction with the natural balance of Central Europe." Still graver is a speech delivered the other evening in the Municipal Council of Innsbruck in which the future German generations are admonished "to struggle so that the North and the South of the Tyrol, from Kufstein to Salorno, may be once again reunited.".
This statement, after all political tortuosities, has a brutal sincerity which we admire. But with equal sincerity we now tell the Tyroleans, the Austrians, and the world, that on the Brenner there stands, with her living sons and with her dead, all of United Italy!
(Very lives, prolonged, enthusiastic applause. The President, the ministers and all the deputies rise to their feet. Shouts of: "Long live the Duce!". Loud, prolonged, repeated ovation).
