BOY SOLDIERS.

Waikato Times, Volume 116, Issue 19452, 17 December 1934, Page 15

BOY SOLDIERS.

BEGINNING AT SIX.

COMPULSORY TRAINING, A decree has been signed by Signor Mussolini ordaining that all boys be- j tween six and eight years of age shall' be enrolled In a special corps for premilitary training. It Is made clear that these young children will not merely ’ “ play at soldiers.”- They will be equipped with gas masks when undergoing training In anti-gas drill, will be taught to , shoot by army instructors, will engage in marches and gymnastics, and will spend a period in oamp under ordinary military discipline. The corps will weaf a speoial uniform, consisting of black shirt with a wolf badge, knickerbockers of the grey-green colour used by the Italian army, and a black fez with tassels hanging over the left eyebrow. It is to be called “ Balalla della Lupa ” (Wolf children), in honour of the wolf which is said to have nursed Romulus and Remus, the legendary founders of Rome. Within the next few weeks tho membership of Fascist juvenile military organisations will, it is calculated, be increased by a million boys, bringing the total between the ages of six and 18 up to 5,000,000. Membership of the new corps is obligatory for all healthy hoys, and parents who fail to enrol their children will be liable to a fine.

Those boys who are good at their studies, but bad at their drill, will be •treated as If they had failed to pass examinations for their promotion to higher forms.

The scheme for providing pre-mili-tary trailing for the young was the most Important part of the decree promulgated last September, when Signor Mussolini said, “ In the Fascist state the sections of citizens and soldiers are incomparable.” The decree, in brief, makes every male child of six a soldier citizen. At eight he will-enter the ordinary Balilla oorps., Between the ages of 18 and 21 his pre-military training will be intensified. At 21 he will join the colours. When released from the army he will start his post-military training, and not until he is 55 does his actual military training cease. When the September decrees for militarisation of the nation were promulgated, tlie Italian press said that history bad no parallel for such nationwide militarisation. To-day this re« mark is even more apt.