Italian Social Republic - Economy and War Effort

Economy and War Effort

During the existence of the Italian Social Republic, Mussolini, whose government had banned trade unions and strikes, began to make increasingly populist appeals to the working class. He claimed to regret many of the decisions made earlier in supporting the interests of big business. He promised a new beginning if the Italian people would be willing to grant him a second chance. Mussolini claimed that he had never totally abandoned his left-wing influences, insisting he had attempted to nationalize property in 1939–1940 but had been forced to delay such action for tactical reasons related to the war. With the removal of the monarchy, Mussolini claimed the full ideology of Fascism could be pursued, and, to gain popular support, reversed over twenty years of Fascist support of private property and relative economic independence by ordering the nationalization of all companies with over 100 employees. Mussolini even reached out to ex-communist Nicola Bombacci, a former student of Vladimir Lenin to help him in spreading the image that Fascism was a progressive movement. The economic policy of RSI was the "Socialization". In practice, little resulted from the socialization of the economy. Unions did not exert real control of their managers and took no part in state planning. The Italian industrial sector was excluded from the new reforms by the Germans and Italian industrialists were opposed to the changes in any case. The Italian labor force (large parts of which had remained socialist or communist despite fascist rule) regarded socialization as a sham and responded with a massive strike on March 1, 1944.

In Greece, while the government of the Kingdom of Italy surrendered and many Italian soldiers in the Aegean were tired of the war and had become opposed to Mussolini, Italian Fascist loyalists remained allied to Germany in the Greek campaign. In September 1943 General Mario Soldarelli rallied Fascist Blackshirts and Italian soldiers loyal to Mussolini to continue the war, along with military men who felt it was dishonorable to turn on an ally and with those who'd developed comradely feelings toward the Germans. German forces in Greece convinced 10,000 Italians in the Aegean to continue to support their war effort.

In 1944, Mussolini urged Hitler to focus on destroying Britain, rather than the Soviet Union, as Mussolini claimed that it was Britain which had turned the conflict into a world war and that the British Empire must be destroyed in order for peace to come in Europe.

He wanted to conduct a small offensive along the Gothic Line against the Allies, with his new RSI Divisions: on December 1944 the Alpine Division "Monte Rosa" with some German battalions fought the Battle of Garfagnana with some success.

As the situation became desperate in January and February 1945, with Allied forces in control of most of Italy, Mussolini declared that "he would fight to the last Italian" and spoke of turning Milan into the "Stalingrad of Italy", where Fascism would make its last glorious fight. Despite such strong rhetoric, Mussolini considered evacuating Fascists into Switzerland, although this was opposed by Germany, which instead proposed that Mussolini and key Fascist officials be taken into exile in Germany. Further disintegration of support for his government occurred as fascist and German military officials secretly tried to negotiate a truce with Allied forces, without consulting either Mussolini or Hitler.