“CAPTAIN MUSSOLINI”

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 10 November 1928, Page 11

“CAPTAIN MUSSOLINI”

ONE trioniing in April, 1919, when the embers of war were cooling in the Italian _ spring, I fomul myself in the Regina Margherita Hotel in Rome. Silhouetted against a window was the figure of a stern young man oft Napoleonic appearance. There was something about this man which held me, and for some moments I.stood and watched him. Sud denly he stood up and moved quickly in my direction. Still standing with the light behind him, he scrutinised me and said: ‘T am Captain Mussolini of the Italian Army.’ “After this brief introduction;” writes Boris Schelownikoff, a former Russian military attache at Rome, in the “New York Times,” “he ushered me into a private room and ordered coffee. Little did I realise at the time that this peculiarly straightforward Italian with whom the force of circumstances had thrown me was destined in a few years to assume the control of his country after one of the most dramatic coups which the history of the world has recorded.

Mussolini sat, I felt deliberately, with his back to the light. This was a point of vantage from which he would continue his scrutiny. He was essentially a dramatist. This struck me immediately, and the impression has never left me. But his drama is always with purpose. Prom the half-shadow he fired a question at me. ‘The war has brought about many changes. What kind of a Russian are you?’

“I am a general,” I replied, “of the Russian Imperial. Army. My convictions are unaltered, and I am true to my ideals.”

The captain was silent for a few seconds, while he smiled and watched me. I felt he was forming his conclusions about, me. Then he spoke more slowly, and with a quieter intonation, none the less dramatically. “You must drive straight forward to your goal, if you will pursue vour ideals. No detours, no deviations. Never mind the obstacles in your way. You must sweep them aside.” Then we moved our discussion to Italy, and Mussolini spoke of his country in a rather heavv staccato.

ALPINI OFFICER IN 1919

RUSSIAN GENERAL’S IMPRESSIONS

“We Italians have won a great victory against the forces of Germany and Austria. Our victory is a great step forward in our national history. Our alliance with the Central Powers was ever wrong, I always regarded this alliance as unnatural. You cannot unite fire and ice. There is a historical, a traditional reason why such an alliance can never be. The Latin peoples must always stand together.” Mussolini paused, and drew closer to me. He gazed harder into my face. He relaxed his muscles for a moment like a trained athlete about to undergo a strenuous physical lost, lie spoke again more quietly. “It has been a great victory,” he said, “but there is a greater one yet to come. Italy to-day is faced with the same problems as. Imperial Russia. We have an enemy to fight at home. That enemy is industrial strife. And that enemy is with us in town and country alike. We have to fight a battle for economic welfare.” And still more softly: “I am at the beginning of a great work. I am going to direct all the human forces in my brain and my body to the fulfilment of a great, ideal. My country is the heir of the old Roman Empire. I will restore to my country her rights. I realise that many dangers will be in my path. But I will face them without faltering, for. first and foremost lam an Italian. I will rid my country of these demagogues. “The essential condition for the welfare of a nation is that the sovereign and the people should be in accord. And the -sovereign must realise that his greatness depends upon the greatness of his people. I am detex-mined to bring about this xxnity. ” As I left the young officer I walked through the halls of the hotel amid glibly chattering crowds of young men and young women. But T could think only of the last words of this son of the people: “You need all your energies for the service of your country. I need all my energies for the service of mine.” T knew that I had met a great man. Two and a-half voars later he took Rome.