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Articles
“Churchill Always Admired and Offered Peace to Mussolini”
- By RICHARD M. LANGWORTH
- | February 6, 2024
- Category: Churchill Between the Wars Truths and Heresies
Lawgiver to Jackal, 1927-1940
The art of the out-of-context quote is practiced frequently over Churchill’s supposed views of Benito Mussolini, the Italian fascist dictator. With careful editing, one can almost cast Churchill as an ardent fascist. Indeed, Churchill himself once praised Italy’s “renowned Chief,” with his “Roman genius…the greatest lawgiver among living men.”1 Little more than a decade later, Il Duce had become a “jackal” in Churchill’s vernacular. What a hypocrite! Perhaps, perhaps not.
Out of context, Churchill’s praise sounds damning, knowing what we do of Mussolini’s true nature. But the criticism gets worse. “Before the war, Churchill offered Il Duce a deal,” wrote Clive Irving. “After the war, British intelligence tried to destroy their correspondence…. When Churchill became prime minister in May 1940 he tried, in a series of letters, to dissuade Mussolini from joining the Axis powers. He was ignored.”2 This assertion mixes much that is true with much that is trite, as Arthur Balfour once quipped: “The problem is that what’s true is trite, and what’s not trite is not true.”
Early encounters
One of Churchill’s responsibilities as Chancellor of the Exchequer (1925-29) was recouping foreign war debts to Britain. Italy owed £600 million (£30 billion today). In 1926-27, after meeting with Finance Minister Count Giuseppe Volpi, Churchill agreed to defer payments until 1930, then to accept installments through 1988. Mussolini sent “the warmest expressions of gratitude” and offered Churchill a decoration, which he wisely refused.3 (Imagine if that was among Churchill’s medals.) Needless to say, the debt was never paid off.
In Rome in January 1927, Churchill had two brief meetings with Mussolini. At a press conference afterward, Churchill told journalists:
I could not help being charmed, like so many other people have been, by his gentle and simple bearing and by his calm, detached poise in spite of so many burdens. If I had been an Italian, I am sure that I should have been whole-heartedly with you from start to finish in your triumphant struggle against the bestial appetites and passions of Leninism.4
That remark was typical of his courtliness to foreign hosts. But—often cropped after “finish”—it has been used to damn Churchill as pro-fascist. Yet it is clear that he was referring to Italy, not Britain. One tends to say polite things about a foreign leader when he has promised to pay your country a lot of money.
As the context shows, what Churchill wanted was Italy not falling to Bolshevism—which in 1927 he feared more than anything. “[I]n the conflict between Fascism and Bolshevism,” he wrote, “there was no doubt where my sympathies and convictions lay.”5
Rome versus Berlin?
Hitler’s advent made Churchill think of Mussolini as a potential ally. Hitler’s plans for Austria and perhaps Trieste did not seem in Italy’s interest. A fortnight after Hitler came to power, Churchill gave an impassioned speech to the Anti-Socialist and Anti-Communist Union. Contemptuously he recited a recent motion by the Oxford Union—“That this House refuses in any circumstances to fight for King and Country.”
Churchill contrasted Germany’s “clear-eyed youth,” demanding to be drafted into the army, and Italy’s “ardent Fascisti, her renowned chief and stern sense of national duty…. One can almost feel the curl of contempt upon the lips of the manhood of all these peoples when they read this message sent out by Oxford University in the name of young England.” But Churchill rejected fascism for Britain. The “greatest lawgiver among living men” and his government was “not a sign-post which would direct us here.”6
The diplomatic situation became trickier in 1935 when Mussolini invaded Ethiopia (Abyssinia). On 26 September, Churchill said Britain would support League of Nations sanctions and an arms embargo. Later he told Parliament that though the conflict was “a very small matter,” the League was “fighting for all our lives.”7
Fixed on Germany, Churchill remained lukewarm about challenging Il Duce: “I would never have encouraged Britain to make a breach with him about Abyssinia,” he wrote, “or roused the League of Nations against him unless we were prepared to go to war in the last extreme.”8 In May 1937 he proposed a Mediterranean pact against “further aggression” by Hitler, hoping Mussolini might join.9 By then, however, the breach was complete. Mussolini would never forgive Britain’s support of sanctions.
Trying to hold Italy
Was Churchill’s attitude toward Mussolini inconsistent or realistic? Italy’s aggression was directed far from pivotal Europe. In Europe, Churchill considered Germany a greater menace than Russia. Accordingly, he courted both Rome and Moscow, often at the same time.
In early 1939, Churchill offered Soviet Ambassador Ivan Maisky proposals for collective security against Hitler. Russia, Maisky declared, would “not come in to any coalition which includes Italy.” The Soviets had “no confidence in France or ourselves if we start flirting with Italy.” Churchill shot back: “[T]he main enemy is Germany.” It was always a mistake, he added, “to allow one’s enemies to acquire even unreliable allies.”10
As Prime Minister in May 1940, as France was reeling before the Germans, Churchill became more loquacious than ever. Recalling their cordial meetings in 1927 he wrote his first and only letter to Mussolini. A “river of blood” threatened to engulf Britain and Italy. “I have never been the enemy of Italian greatness,” Churchill wrote, again referring to “the Italian lawgiver.” He was not writing in a “spirit of weakness,” although of course he was. Mussolini answered accordingly:
Without going back very far in time, I remind you of the initiative taken in 1935 by your Government to organise at Geneva sanctions against Italy, engaged in securing for herself a small space in the African sun without causing the slightest injury to your interests and territories or those of others. I remind you also of the real and actual state of servitude in which Italy finds herself in her own sea…. the same sense of honor and of respect for engagements assumed in the Italian-German Treaty guides Italian policy today and tomorrow in the face of any event whatsoever.”11
Fake “peace feelers”
On 10 June 1940, Italy declared war on France and Britain. Ironically, Mussolini was the first major wartime figure to fall. On 25 July 1943, the Fascist Grand Council repudiated their leader of two decades. “The keystone of the Fascist arch has crumbled,” Churchill told the House of Commons. Long before then, Mussolini had long gone from “renowned chief” to “hyena” in the Churchill lexicon.12
Was Churchill impressed by the Mussolini of the 1920s and 1930s? Many people were, although a realist might conclude that Churchill said what he did mindful of British interests. Churchill redacted little from his archives; researchers can pore over a million documents and pursue odd theories. One such involves the so-called Churchill-Mussolini “peace correspondence,” which has long been rumored to exist—somewhere.
Three incriminating letters from Churchill to Mussolini, with offers of support provided Italy left the Axis, are mentioned at least since 1954, when Giovannino Guareschi published the purported texts in his magazine Candido. Guareschi was later prosecuted and imprisoned for publishing forged letters by Alcide De Gasperi, Italy’s 1945-53 prime minister. The Churchill letters were also alluded to by Renzo De Felice, official historian of fascism and biographer of Mussolini. De Felice died in 1996, his evidence unpublished.
In 1985 the most persuasive conspiracist, Arrigo Petacco, reproduced copies of the three letters (two dated 1940, one 1945). Ignoring their stilted English, even the casual would find it difficult to believe they are genuine. The Italian historian Patrizio Giangreco reviewed them in 2010, proving them obvious fakes.13 (See “Further reading” below.)
“La pista inglese”
The Churchill Archives hold only one Churchill letter to Mussolini—that of 16 May 1940—and Mussolini’s negative reply two days later. But the conspiracists persist. “Although there would have been copies in London of the Churchill-Mussolini exchanges,” wrote Clive Irving, “none has ever turned up and in April 1945, somebody in London was very anxious that Mussolini’s copies should never see the light of day.”14
The idea is ridiculous. Churchill wanted Mussolini dead “to prevent the letters…coming to light,” speculated newspaper correspondent Henry Samuel. (Who then destroyed his credibility by adding they were written before the war.)15 An Italian writer speculated that Clara Petacci, Mussolini’s mistress, was really a British spy. She stole the Churchill letters to protect the Prime Minister. Or that an operative codenamed “Captain John” was sent by Churchill to capture the letters from Mussolini. Italian historians dubbed this scenario la pista inglese (the English trail).16
In September 1945, the myth continues, Churchill himself joined the quest. He traveled to Lake Como, an area that had been controlled by Il Duce’s rump Republic of Salò, staying at the “Villa Aprexin.” There a photograph was taken and published in R.G. Grant’s Churchill: An Illustrated Biography. Ostensibly on a painting holiday, Churchill’s real purpose was to retrieve his Mussolini letters. With so many people out to steal this correspondence, it’s amazing that none of them came up with it.
The problem with all this, as Giangreco noted, is that Churchill’s villa, where he stayed from 2 to 19 September, was “La Rosa.” The photograph of him painting nearby is the one in Grant’s book. From La Rosa Churchill went to Villa Pirelli near Genoa, and from there to Monte Carlo and the French Riviera.17
Conspiracies upon conspiracies
Still the beat continued, Clive Irving fanning it in 2015: En route to Lake Como, Irving wrote, Churchill stopped in Milan to stand bareheaded at Mussolini’s unmarked grave! No evidence is offered, nor is there any. Churchill flew from London September 2nd and arrived in Como the same day.18 Irving claimed Churchill flew to Milan under the cover name “Colonel Warden,” which he says was the pilot’s name. Actually that was Churchill’s codename throughout the war, derived from his title, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports.19
Churchill’s villa at Como, Irving continued, was “owned by none other than Guido Donegani… an industrialist and Fascist collaborator,” who was “interrogated by British intelligence and later released.” Donegani apparently handed him the incriminating letters, papers or diaries—they are variously described. Irving claims that official biographer Martin Gilbert “concluded that the correspondence had been retrieved and handed over to Churchill, but it never turned up in the Churchill archives and was never seen again.”20
This is passing strange, since Martin Gilbert dismissed the whole idea of secret Mussolini correspondence. His account does not mention Donegani, who died in 1947. If Donegani did own Villa La Rosa, there is no evidence Churchill ever met him. The day after he arrived, Churchill wrote his wife that the villa belonged to “one of Mussolini’s rich commerçants who had fled, whither is not known.”21
“You haven’t looked hard enough”
Churchill admitted in his memoirs that he had once expressed admiration for Mussolini as a bulwark against Bolshevism. He also distinguished between different types of fascism. Unequivocally opposed to Nazism, he was also anti-fascist in British affairs. He was uncritical of fascism in Italy—until Mussolini fell in with Hitler and declared war in June 1940. The Prime Minister who would have “no truce or parley” with Hitler and his “grizzly gang” would never have supported the Italian “frisking up at the side of the German tiger.”22
Possibly the best rejoinder to all this is by the historian Andrew Roberts:
Leaving aside the fact that Churchill would not at that stage [1940-43] have wanted or needed peace with Mussolini, one charge goes that the relevant documents are in a waterproof bag at the bottom of Lake Como. So, when one takes issue with them, the conspiracy theorists say “go and look.” Of course, if you don’t find anything, they just say, “you haven’t looked hard enough.”23
Endnotes
1 Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 5, Prophet of Truth 1922-1939 (Hillsdale, Mich.: Hillsdale College Press, 2009), 456-57.
2 Clive Irving, “The Untold Story of Mussolini’s Fake Diaries,” in the Daily Beast, 12 April 2015. Note: Italy joined the Axis in 1936, not 1940; Churchill wrote no “series” of letters to Mussolini. He wrote one letter, 16 May 1940, which the Italian leader rejected two days later. The article concerns alleged letters, not “diaries.”
3 Gilbert, Prophet of Truth, 142.
4 Ibid., 226.
5 Winston S. Churchill, Their Finest Hour (London: Cassell, 1949), 106-07.
6 Gilbert, Prophet of Truth, 456-57.
7 Ibid., 669, 676.
8 Churchill, Their Finest Hour, 107.
9 Gilbert, Prophet of Truth, 740.
10 Harold Nicolson Diary, 3 April 1939 (Nicolson Papers), in Martin Gilbert, ed., The Churchill Documents, vol. 13 (Hillsdale College Press, 2009), 1429.
11 Churchill, Their Finest Hour, 107-08.
12 Richard M. Langworth, ed., Churchill by Himself (New York: Rosetta Books, 2016), 365. Cf. Arrigo Petacco, Dear Benito—Caro Winston (Rome, Mondadori, 1985).
***
13 Patrizio R. Giangreco, “Leading Myths: ‘Churchill Offered Peace and Security to Mussolini,’” Finest Hour 149, Winter 2010-11, 52-53, 57.
14 Irving, “Untold Story.”
15 Henry Samuel, “Winston Churchill ‘ordered assassination of Mussolini to protect compromising letters,’” in the Daily Telegraph, 2 September 2010.
16 Cf. Ubaldo Giuliani-Balestrino, Il Carteggio Churchill-Mussolini alla Luce del Processo Guareschi [The Churchill-Mussolini File in Light of the Guareschi Trial] (Rome: Edizioni Settimo Sigillo, 2010.)
17 R.G. Grant, Churchill: An Illustrated Biography (London: Bison Books, 1989), 210. For Churchill’s travels at the time see Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 8, Never Despair 1945-1965 (Hillsdale College Press, 2013), 134-51.
18 Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, 7, Road to Victory 1941-1945 (Hillsdale College Press, 2013), 134.
19 Warren F. Kimball, Churchill & Roosevelt, The Complete Correspondence, 3 vols. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1984), II: 344. Lady Soames to the author, 2010.
20 Irving, “Untold Story.”
21 Gilbert, Road to Victory, 344; Martin Gilbert to the author, 2010.
22 Winston S. Churchill, Broadcast, London, 27 April 1941, in Langworth, Churchill by Himself, 365.
23 Andrew Roberts, “Churchill’s Reputation,” remarks at the Cabinet War Rooms, London, 16 November 2005.
Further reading
Patrizio Giangreco, Mistero Churchill, by Roberto Festorazzi, 2015
___ ___, with Andrew M. Garvey, L’arma Segreta del Duce, by Mimmo Franzinelli, 2015.
Richard M. Langworth, Churchill-Mussolini Non-Letters, 2015.