So what would happen if Mussolini wasn't thrown out of the socialist party?

bob e

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Imagine if mussolini wasn't thrown out of the socialist party, instead he remains mostly a socialist but leads Italy towards a synthesis of pragmatic left leaning ideas and italian identity, but without starting another movement that would inspire the likes of Hitler (fascist party), so what happens?
 
It's hard to tell, but there's a good chance that (since Italian fascism was never invented) there might have been no takeover of Italy by fascism. It's harder to say for Germany and Spain, but without an Italian coup, there's no Beer Hall Putsch (which was inspired by the Italian coup). The Nazi Party might still rise, though, with the Great Depression.
 

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Imagine if mussolini wasn't thrown out of the socialist party, instead he remains mostly a socialist but leads Italy towards a synthesis of pragmatic left leaning ideas and italian identity, but without starting another movement that would inspire the likes of Hitler (fascist party), so what happens?

Red Italy?
 
It's hard to tell, but there's a good chance that (since Italian fascism was never invented) there might have been no takeover of Italy by fascism.

I disagree. Just because there isn't Mussolini leading a right-wing, militarist, revanchist, imperialist party, that doesn't mean there isn't that niche. Or that there aren't army officers smarting for such a party, wealthy landowners and industrialists ready to bankroll it, and people from every walk of life willing to vote for it.
It would simply have another leader - very possibly D'Annunzio of Fiume fame.
 
I disagree. Just because there isn't Mussolini leading a right-wing, militarist, revanchist, imperialist party, that doesn't mean there isn't that niche. Or that there aren't army officers smarting for such a party, wealthy landowners and industrialists ready to bankroll it, and people from every walk of life willing to vote for it.
It would simply have another leader - very possibly D'Annunzio of Fiume fame.

Isn't Italo Balbo usually the most popular candidate for alternate Fascist leaders around here (presumably because of his personal distaste for anti-semitism and his hostility towards Hitler)? If such attitudes kept Italy out of the war then combined with his relative youth he could have lasted as long as Franco.
 
Isn't Italo Balbo usually the most popular candidate for alternate Fascist leaders around here (presumably because of his personal distaste for anti-semitism and his hostility towards Hitler)? If such attitudes kept Italy out of the war then combined with his relative youth he could have lasted as long as Franco.

I don't know around here, but back in 1921 in Italy D'Annunzio was well known after his Fiume adventure. Paradoxically, that made him less palatable to the rightist financial backers; he had overexposed himself. But if there is no Mussolini, then the second choice, I guess, would be D'Annunzio, still enormously popular among nationalists, anti-Communists, the officers and the conservatives in general.
Balbo is a fine candidate for succeeding Mussolini after the Fascists have attained power. But for replacing Mussolini before that, in the drive to power? I have my doubts. He's not well known outside his home region. Yes, he's a brave WWI veteran, but D'Annunzio is that too, and much more.
 
I don't know around here, but back in 1921 in Italy D'Annunzio was well known after his Fiume adventure. Paradoxically, that made him less palatable to the rightist financial backers; he had overexposed himself. But if there is no Mussolini, then the second choice, I guess, would be D'Annunzio, still enormously popular among nationalists, anti-Communists, the officers and the conservatives in general.
Balbo is a fine candidate for succeeding Mussolini after the Fascists have attained power. But for replacing Mussolini before that, in the drive to power? I have my doubts. He's not well known outside his home region. Yes, he's a brave WWI veteran, but D'Annunzio is that too, and much more.

Everything related to Fiume makes D'Annunzio seem way more impulsive and reckless than Mussolini, though. I feel like he'd have screwed everything up if the fortunes of Italian fascism were in his hands.
 
Everything related to Fiume makes D'Annunzio seem way more impulsive and reckless than Mussolini, though. I feel like he'd have screwed everything up if the fortunes of Italian fascism were in his hands.

Likely. I never said he'd surely be effective.
 
Mussolini remaining in the socialist party mean that the fascist party don't exist as a more united force, it was Benny to glue them together and him as a socialist mean just that there is another that vie for leadership increasing the infighting (he was hardly loved by the majority of the party, both leader than members)
D'Annunzio is not up for national leaderships, lack the slightest interest in the day to day work of politics and the necessary compromise, plus he is seen as a more revolutionary menace than Benito, so if he attempt anything like the March on Rome he will be shoot on sight
Balbo is too young and not that famous at national level for attain leaderships of the movement and the movement itself without Mussolini will lack someone that can convince the conservative and the rich landowner/industrialist that he is the solution at the socialist problem and that can work with the system
 
Without the March On Rome, Primo de Rivera wouldn't coup, certainly delaying and maybe averting the 1931 Revolution and the Civil War with it.
 
Red Italy?
If that happened, an Italian brand of socialism would not be adverse to the Roman Catholic Church and leave religion out of its doctrine. That alone would drastically change the perception of the philosophy, especially in America.
 
If Italy becomes red, though, that would be perfect Nazi propaganda about the Communist menace, and they might still come to power, possibly sooner than IOTL.
 
Reading the title I thought this POD was about the socialist party choosing not to throw Mussolini out, but it seems the POD is more about Mussolini himself choosing not to switch ideological directions. Well in that case it’s impossible to tell what his fate will be. He isn’t some Chosen One who was destined to lead Italy regardless of circumstances, if he was leading a movement that’s totally different from the National Fascist Party then there’s no reason to believe he’d eventually become prime minister. And as said before me here, even without Mussolini the same forces he’s lead would still be there, just under different leadership.
 
Reading the title I thought this POD was about the socialist party choosing not to throw Mussolini out, but it seems the POD is more about Mussolini himself choosing not to switch ideological directions. Well in that case it’s impossible to tell what his fate will be. He isn’t some Chosen One who was destined to lead Italy regardless of circumstances, if he was leading a movement that’s totally different from the National Fascist Party then there’s no reason to believe he’d eventually become prime minister. And as said before me here, even without Mussolini the same forces he’s lead would still be there, just under different leadership.

But for the fascist leadership was everything for achieve their result as OTL, without someone like Benny that for all his reputation as a buffoon was a very smart politician, there is nobody to really unite the proto-fascist and the ANA and D'Annunzio will be much more prominent but they will also less succesfull in creating a so broading coalition and frankly D'Annunzio lack the necessary leadership skill and it's see a too much revolutionary type by the enstablishment.

Benny on the other side, will probably create a schism in the left forming his own hardliner party
 
Imagine if mussolini wasn't thrown out of the socialist party, instead he remains mostly a socialist but leads Italy towards a synthesis of pragmatic left leaning ideas and italian identity, but without starting another movement that would inspire the likes of Hitler (fascist party), so what happens?

1) This pretty much requires that Mussolini convinces the rest of the party to back his extreme pro-war views. Which is interesting all in itself.
2) Why the heck would Mussolini ever get power in TTL? In OTL, the king of Italy offered him power on a silver platter. In part because the Black Shirts were so anti-socialist. If a Red Shirt "march on Rome" happens, the Italian establishment will stick together and gun down the "reds".
3) There's nothing about socialism that seems to significantly predispose adherents to pragmatic ideas. And nothing about Mussolini that seemed to be particularly predisposed to pragmatic ideas, so why would Mussolini+socialism="a synthesis of pragmatic left leaning ideas and italian identity"?

fasquardon
 
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Basically, doesn't this require that the PSI be pro-war? If they remained anti-war, it's hard for me to see them not expelling Mussolini for not only advocating war but founding a newspaper (Il Popolo d'Italia) dedicated to attacking the PSI's main policy--peace.

And it's hard for me to see the PSI taking Mussolini's position. "Mussolini had plenty of supporters in Milan but few elsewhere, and even in Milan most of them were not Socialists: it was the syndicalists, Futurists and students, not the party stalwarts, who backed his call." https://books.google.com/books?id=EX3JAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA23

(Italy incidentally was not the only country where pro-war Socialists were expelled from or left the party: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Democratic_League_of_America Also, there was Plekhanov's Yedinstvo group in Russia, which found even the Mensheviks insufficiently pro-war...)
 
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