Radio War Nerd EP #226 — Italy on the Eastern Front, Pt. 1 with Annibale
Recorded: April 17, 2020
Guest: Annibale
First, the War Nerd and Ames discuss foxes...
At 07:45 - Annibale joins us for an update on the pandemic in Italy: crackdown on Lombardy's privatized medical care hucksters & coming to grips with possibility there'll be no vaccine or cure...
At 31:00 - Annibale tells the little-known story [in the Anglo world at least] of Fascist Italy's uneasy relationship with Nazi Germany, and how that played out in the eastern front war on the Soviet Union...
Total time: 2:05:19
Comments (19)
Here in East London, we have a momma fox and 4 cubs in the backyard. Dubious or not, they are cute as hell.
I'm on the pro-fox side of this, but a certain someone who will remain nameless convinced me to watch the Crack Fox episode of the Mighty Boosh and I can never see foxes the same again.
I second the request for the list of books, though I think some were listed already in Annibale's fantastic multi-part series on the Resistance. Also thank, you Annibale for mentioning the "Myth of the Clean Wehrmacht." Some people still apparently believe in it -- I am thinking about the just-published autobiography of a certain recent presidential candidate who touted his own military service in Afghanistan as a presidential qualification.
The "Poor Man's War" diary sounded so interesting, I'd go page by page putting the Italian into google translate
I'm a big fan of Annibale, but isn't it a bit of a simplification to suggest that the Italian version of Fascism was not racist, if that is what is being suggested? Didn't Mussolini justify his imperialist policies by invoking white supremacy and the danger to the white "race" from the races of Africa. According to wikipedia: "On 3 January 1933, Mussolini told the diplomat Baron Pompei Aloisi that the French in Tunisia had made an 'appalling blunder"' by permitting sex between the French and the Tunisians, which he predicted would lead to the French degenerating into a nation of 'half-castes', and to prevent the same thing happening to the Italians gave orders to Marshal Badoglio that miscegenation be made a crime in Libya." Also, I don't think Italian Fascism was as tolerant as all that to modern art, even though it was preceded by (or began with) Futurism (as had happened with supremacism in Russia). As I see it, the official art of both Fascism and Soviet Communism quickly became associated with the idea of the creation of the heroic "new man", monumental and bulging with muscles, accompanied by a simplified architectural neoclassicism.
Italian Fascism was racist, but as racist as every European society of that era, no more, no less. It had a larger dose of "cultural racism", because its founding myth was the Roman Empire, but had no real sense of "scientific fascism" until 1938 (and even there, it was just an imitation of Nazi racial politics, not anything done in autonomy (which, in my view, makes it even morally worse than the German version, tbh). The Wikipedia article is not accurate, as the first law addressing mixed marriages was approved by the fascist regime in 1937. As I say in the episode, the law was a result of having conquered new colonies, and not vice versa: the Ethiopian conquest was one enabling factor the Italian fascist state becoming "officially" racist
Can you name those relevant Italian books mentioned in the podcast again?
In regards to the memoirs, they are listed in Nuto Revelli's wikipedia page.
Keeping an eye on Oregon in the stats. Corona/population is now second best in the Contiguous US. Great!
I probably missed it but have you guys discussed the Russian film "Come and See"? It makes all other war movies look like a bunch of guys in costumes playing dress-up. And it's set in Belarus during Barbarossa.
There's a meaningless bit of trivia related (peripherally) to that film, on the night when the swedish prime minister Olof Palme was shot he had visited the cinema and "Come and See" was one of the four films he could have seen. The other three were Ran by Akira Kurosawa, Amadeus by Milos Forman and "The Mozart brothers", a swedish comedy no one remembers. He visited the swedish film. If he had gone and seen "Come and See" who knows, maybe the assassination attempt would have failed. So when in doubt see the war movie, might save your life!
A film was made of the Garden of the Fitzi-Continis - does their name mean pretend counts?. Was it any good? When Mussolini invaded Greece and his troops (the Alpini included) fought well or so I've read, but ran out of ammunition due to bad logistics, Hitler was forced to delay his Russia plans in order to take the Balkans. Both sides would have got the measure of eachother then I would have thought? The writing would have been on the wall then. That might make a good series.
No, Finzi Contini is an Italian Jewish second name. The film is good but Bassani (the book's author) was not happy with the changes made to the story.
Mark, try to score some original recipe Deet spray. If you think Rochester’s mosquitoes are a nuisance you won’t stand a chance when Black Fly season rolls around. If you really get bored up there take the time to walk through Rochester’s abandoned subway tunnels, it’s eerie but also provides the most beautiful views of those towering waterfalls
Black flies sounds bad. If they're anything like the clouds of biting gnats I experienced in Ussuriysk. I'll never forget the poor German Shepherd yelping in agony trying to drown itself to get away from those vampire-clouds. The abandoned subway tunnels on the other hand...
‘He was a nazi man’, You’re like king arthur’, ‘this here sir is my hat, sir. Peach hat!’ etc... so good.
Mark, as a Russia guy and a fox appreciator, you might like this Russian dude's fox content. It's fairly soothing stuff: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=231-ZXiZbZI&feature=youtu.be&t=40
Lmao I was gonna comment this guys channel as well, absolutely precious
Now we’re talking!