The Saturday Review section of THE TIMES (23 May) published a review (by one
Saul David) of “MUSSOLINI’S WAR Fascist Italy 1935-43” by John
Gooch.
Before Musso attacked France in 1940 he had been a Knight of the Bath for about 18 years, and before his accession to power had been financed fromBritish Government funds, on the recommendation Sir Samuel Hoare of the Secret Service. His war from 1935 had been against Abyssinia. According to the reviewer:
“With the League of Nations distracted by German rearmament, he (Mussolini) authorised an invasion of half a million men.
It was quite an achievement, with the navy shipping 635,000 tons of supplies, 10,000 vehicles and 40,000 pack animals.
Five army corps, Gooch tells us, ‘were kept supplied in mountainous regions lacking resources more than 400 km from the coast and 4,000 km from the Italian patria.’ “
Geography students will realise that the equipment and supplies didn’t travel past Gibraltar and round the Cape of Good Hope. And cynics will guess that they, went through the Suez Canal and paid tolls into British Government coffers. And the cynics will be right. Hand on hearts the British can swear that they made Mussolini pay for the crime that left 275,000 Abyssinians dead, as against 4,500 Italians. The Italians gained territory more extensive than France and Germany combined.”
The reviewer tells us that Musso’s next foray was ideologically driven – “supporting Franco’s Nationalists against the left-wing government in the Spanish CivilWar.”
He makes no mention of the MI6 Agent Hugh Pollard, who flew Franco from the Canaries to Morocco whence the traitor launched his attack on Spanish democracy.
Pollard later served in the British Embassy in Madrid, when (we are expected to believe from other sources) that Graham Greene of MI6 was seeking to frustrate any attempt by Franco to join the Axis against the British.
It is now suggested that Greene, while apparently sympathetic to left-wing Spaniards in the post-Franco decades, was playing the game which Pollard had continued playing since his black-propaganda days in 1920 Dublin.
The reviewer does not mention Emperor Haile Selassie’s appearance before the League of Nations in Geneva, demanding its members honour their Covenant and to defend his country from attack. Nor does the reviewer mention the President of the General Assembly of the League who supported Haile Selassie’s demand that members honour their Covenant. Nor that he was prepared to send troops from his own country as part of a League of Nations force to help defend Abyssinia.
The Statesman’s name as Eamon de Valera, leader of the Irish Government. De Valera’s demand fell on deaf ears at the time.
It has eluded historians, even, ( or should I say?) especially, in Ireland.
The four founding and permanent members of the Council of the League of Nations were Britain, France, Italy and Japan. When Japan annexed Manchuria, the League did little to stop it. The British and French had given themselves Mandates wrapped up in League ribbons, to administer territories wrested from the Ottoman Empire, supposedly to preparethe inhabitants for independent democratic sovereign rule.They used artillery bombardment, aerial bombing with high explosives and poison gas, aerial straffing with machinegun fire to “police” those territories – notably Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Palestine. When, in a democratic act of self-determination Ireland established a Republic in an election “regarded on all sides as a Plebiscite” according to THE TIMES, the inhabitants of Palestine were denied a vote on their future. They were lumbered for the next thirty years with a “Police Force” largely redeployed Black and Tans who carried on as they had in Ireland. And Lord Balfour, who, when Prime Minister led Government which passed an Act restricting immigration into the UK, aimed largely at Jews, proclaimed himself the friend of Jews who might betake themselves to Palestine.
Although Jewish communities were long established in the Ottoman Empire (long predating the Ottomans) they had shown no enthusiasm to settle in Palestine.Zionism was largely the product of “Christian” anti-Semitism in Europe. It was cynically espoused by Balfour and his successors in Britain and their successor imperialists in the United States.
Mussolini was the darling of the respectable classes, Pope Pius XI was a devoted one, Fine Gael condemned de Valera for not supporting him, the (Protestant) IRISH TIMES apparently thought highly of him and Winston Churchill doted on him and particularly admired his rape of Abyssinia. But then, like THE IRISH TIMES (which hailed Her Hitler’s accession to power) Churchill had praise for Hitler as late as 1938.
Despite all the commentators who smear de Valera and sneer at his politics De Valera never echoed, endorsed or praised the persons, politics, or actions of Mussolini, Hitleror Franco. Nor was de Valera Knighted by the British.
Bookshops and Libraries, even gardening centres in Britain have shelves groaning with praise of the Commandos, Dambusters, SAS and other popular heroes. But I have yet to see even ,one pamphlet, let alone a book, devoted to the history of the League of Nations. A League co-founded by Britain, France, Japan and Italy all of whom welshed on their obligations under its Covenant.
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