DUCE'S BOAST

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23002, 1 April 1938, Page 9

DUCE'S BOAST

READY FOR WAR FRESH CAMPAIGN MYSTERIOUS speech ability to fight STRENGTH OE NATION Jy Telegraph —Press Association—Copyright (Received March 31, 10!l0 p.m.) ROME, March'3l A mysterious reference to another impending campaign on behalf of the Italian Empire is reported to have been made by iSignor Mussolini when receiving a number of senators in the Palazzo Venezia .after his speech in the Senate. After thanking them for raising him -to the new rank of Marshal of the Empire, he added: "This new ap--pointment increases my responsibility for the third great victorious campaign Of tho Empire in which I shall lead you."

The first two campaigns are presumed to be Abyssinia and Spain.

In the course of his speech in the Senate to-day Signor Mussolini significantly stated that the presence of an Italian army in Libya and another in Spain had not weakened Italy's miliary structure. He reviewed military, and a> r force expansion, remarking: "Our forces are tuned for an implacable, rapid war. We have the most powerful fleet of submarines in the TFOTld' Navy and Air Force "By 1941 Italy will lave eight firstline battleships, totalling 240,000 tons, and an Air Force which will be one of the I>est in the world, comprising several thousand new machines. "Our war factories are working day and night; 58.000 workers are building aeroplanes and aero engines, and we can now muster 20,000 to 30.000 pilots. All our giouhd organisation is ready, also our fuel and explosive depots. "Air warfare must be conducted so as to throw confusion into the preparations of the enemy and destroy the mornle of the people. ]! am convinced -that everything is :now ready. We can sleep quietly in our beds." • Ability to fight, said II Duce, was .always the determining factor in international relations, and this ability •depended above all on the will, which .had never been so strong and ardent .•in Italy as it was to-day.

Signor Mussolini spoke as Minister of War, the Navy and Air. He declared that if hostilities broke out he -would be the supreme commander of •the forces under the King. A special meeting of deputies created a new rank, "Marshal of the Empire," which was immediately conferred upon the. King and Signor Mussolini, to •whaip the new rank is to be limited.