On this
day in 1945, Benito Mussolini’s job as dictator of Italy was terminated permanently.
It was an ending suffered by many dictators in history, most recently by Kaddafi
in Libya. It was an ending that someone should remind Assad in Syria about.
On April
28th, 1945 "Il Duce" and his mistress, Clara Petacci, were
shot by Italian partisans who had captured the couple as they attempted to flee
to Switzerland.
The
61-year-old deposed former dictator of Italy was established by his German
allies as the figurehead of a puppet government in northern Italy during the
German occupation toward the close of the war. As the Allies fought their way
up the Italian peninsula, defeat of the Axis powers all but certain, Mussolini
considered his options. Not wanting to fall into the hands of either the
British or the Americans, and knowing that the communist partisans, who had
been fighting the remnants of roving Italian fascist soldiers and thugs in the
north, would try him as a war criminal, he settled on escape to a neutral
country.
He and
his mistress made it to the Swiss border, only to discover that the guards had
crossed over to the partisan side. Knowing they would not let him pass, he
disguised himself in a Luftwaffe coat and helmet, hoping to slip into Austria
with some German soldiers. His subterfuge proved incompetent, and he and
Petacci were discovered by partisans and shot. Their bodies then taken to
Milan, where they were hung upside down and displayed publicly for revilement
by the masses.
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