Fifth Column in Italy Upholds Ideal of Liberty

Bay of Plenty Times, Volume LXIX, Issue 13244, 21 January 1941, Page 6

Fifth Column in Italy Upholds Ideal of Liberty

A special correspondent from Berne. Switzerland, writing to The Christian Science Monitor says: While the dictators have exercised much ingenuity and expended money liberally in developing Fifth Columnists in democratic countries, they are not without Fifth Column troubles of their own. Ruthlessly as their secret police have attempted to extinguish all freedom-loving groups in their midst, these groups continue to exist. In Italy there is a group known as the Italian Republican Party, which is still carrying on the principles of democracy and freedom along the lines of the “Young Italy” movement founded by Giuseppe Mazzini in the first half of last century. These Italian Republicans are heirs of 100 years of secret, political propaganda. These Italian patriots want a free, democratic Italy and a United States of Europe made up of free and democratic member states. The largest part of their hundred-year-old struggle for the fulfillment of these ideals has been spent in uniting Italy and freeing the Italian people from Austrian and French domination. Now that they have freed Italy from foreign domination these logical idealists are forced to fight against the present Italian Government to prevent their country from imposing its domination on other peoples. First Step Toward Union The World War was the turning point when the last Italian peoples under foreign control in Trieste and Trentino were united with Italy and at the same time an Austrian minority in the Austrian Tirol and- a Slavic minority near Fiume on the Adriatic were subjected to Italian rule. Signor Mussolini has further extended this forceful subjection of non-Ital-ian peoples. The Republicans say, overthrow Mussolini and return the Tiroleans to Austria, the Slavs to Yugoslavia and the Albanians to Albania as the first step to a free and united Europe.

The main accusation of Italian Republicans against dictators is that their power is not legal and that there can be no peace or freedom in Europe until the Government is legal. They believe that a ruler has a legal right to power only when he derives his power from the people as a whole and. allows a minority of the people freedom to express opposition to the government in power, just as in England, where the Opposition is paid by the Government. Small Discussion Groups The Italian Republicans do not spend their time in theorizing. Since 19 2 G they have been actively working to. keep idealism alive in Italy. Their method is to form small discussion groups of 8 or 10 persons to present the case of democracy. The contacting of possible members of a group is not done by the propagandists themselves but by a special group of fearless revolutionaries fitted by their physical strength aiid resourcefulness for this task. They are a type which welcomes danger.

r It is not until the group has been formed that the propagandist arrives on the scene and presents the case of freedom in secret meetings in cellars, barns, and forest depths. The propagandist, too, must be ready to drop everything and flee in disguise to hide for months in a mountain fastness or to slip across a border with false passes. The average lifetime of a group isi 15 days duping which time as much instruction. Is given as possible. The danger of spies is very great; after about 15 days the group is usually discovered and the members escape or are caught and thfov’n into prison.

1 Propaganda is directed at the discontented, the unemployed, the disillusioned-and>; persecuted.. . The gtjal is to form an elite of daring idealists who will carry the word a ling and aid in the final overthrow * of? tyranny, f Two Kinds of Propaganda iAnti-Fascist propaganda is divided into two kinds: destructive and constructive. Destructive pro.l paganda, the aim of which is to show thfe black side • of fascism, comes first; when the- object is sufficiently convinced of the’ Wrongness o? ‘Fascism, he is shown the positive ideal of democratic freedom. |The only hope for Europe after this war, many Italian Republicans believe, * is SiYgTd-Baxon” countries take (the defeated populations in hand and teach them the positive ideals of democracy. Against the Republicans the Fascist state employs secret agents

Though paid for their activities, these are at the same time ordinary tradesmen, teachers, laborers or even school children going about their usual activities and spying only as a sideline. Every conceivable branch and group of society is honeycombed with these spies so that two friends cannot talk openly for fear that one of them is a spy. Similar to English Aims The Italian Republicans emphasize the constructive side of their programme rather than the destructive side. In their ultimate aims of a free and democratic union of European states they are similar to the Federal Unionist group of England. Plans are being made by these two advanced guards of freedom and democracy to get-together and co-ordin-ate their work. For the time being the Italian Republicans have to live on the charity of their adherents and friends or on what little of their own property they have have saved from confiscation. They are not the only party working for the overthrow of the dictatorship; there are many others who are bound together in an anti-fascistic league. There are the Revolutionary Socialists and* Reform Social- „ ists . There is also the ‘League for the Rights of Man.” The organization of the anti-Faseist groups among themselves is rather loose, for they are only travelling together to overthrow Mussolini. Their final goals are all different, so that the real unity is lacking. They are, however, all sincere and determined in their opposition to Fascism.