There was also the risk of the commissar assuming the guise of a factotum, through being too caught up in the duties of administrator, supply assistant, and storekeeper.44 A commissar might devote himself to assistance functions (in some formations the commissars seem to have been mainly medical students);45 and it is no accident that this feature became most marked in the unified commands that saw Communist and Christian Democrats working alongside each other.46 Some Communist commissars limited their political initiative for fear of being criticised by Christian Democrats.47 An authoritative Communist leader gave this rather unsparing picture of the commissars of one formation: ‘The commissars have greatly lowered the function and characteristics of the commissariat. Idlers, no courage, chatterboxes, or else sloggers, but not in their activity; full of life, but not in military terms; gerarchi at times but not commissars.’48
When Boldrini, by now deployed with his formation in the British 8th Army in Rome, wanted to reassure General Berardi, chief of the General Staff, he described the commissars as ‘head cooks’, ‘head quartermasters’, ‘those responsible for daily shopping’. Pajetta, who recounts the episode, ironically commenting on the general’s simple-mindedness, does not, however, bear in mind that there was some truth in this parody given by Boldrini, and that it was very much in the general’s interest to give it credence.49
Certainly, one needs to have a better idea of who the commissars were. Evidently not all of them were of the excellent quality described above by Tersilla Fenoglio or the lamentable quality described by Andreis. Faith, enthusiasm, honesty and ‘giudizio’ (‘good judgment’), as one document states, could make up for lack of political expertise;50 but that does not mean that they always succeeded in doing so.
The specific character of the single formations exalted the principle of the ‘free choice of unit by the aspiring volunteer’,51 but often made transferring from one unit to another a tricky business. A military man like Mauri had lost no time in solving this problem: in his formations anyone who passed from one unit or one command to another without the commander’s written permission was considered a deserter, and as such could be shot.52 On 14 November the CVL General Command, which certainly could not brook such a crude way of going about things, issued a circular, as peremptory as it was unrealistic, against the ‘buying up of combatants from other units’. The Command recalled that all units were open to all parties, but that all therefore followed the policy of the CLN alone. Only with the authorisation of one’s own commands (or, if appropriate, of the higher ones) could a partisan, from that moment on, switch formation; but no penalties were envisaged for transgressors.53
Only a few days earlier, the Lombard delegation of the Garibaldi brigades had decreed that transfer could be ordered neither by the military commands nor by the parties, ‘unless a reinforcement of the formations results from it’, but the safeguarding of the individual’s freedom of choice was accompanied by that of the group’s solidarity: the decision for transfer was to be ‘taken by all the men of the formation’.54 A commander asked twenty or so men who presented themselves to bring him authorisation by the Command they came from.55 But in that same period the soliciting of men between formations was denounced in the Cuneo area.56
In fact, worthy unitary intentions were not sufficient to resolve all the conflicts that could arise between the free choices of single partisans and the reinforcement of the military and political character, and esprit de corps, of the individual formations. At times this reinforcement generated clashes and abuses of power on both sides. In both the Garibaldi and GL documents, the denunciation of acts of incorrectness by others is always accompanied by the reaffirmation of the wish to collaborate.57 Emulation, not competition and bullying between the bands, was the appeal launched by the Cuneo zone command on 3 February 1945,58 which sums up the repeated declarations of good-will on this score.
Tensions between formations, which reached the point of attempts at mutual disarmament,59 also beset the Matteotti brigades and the various autonomous groups such as the Osoppo brigades, the Green Flames and Mauri’s divisions. Here facts and suspicions mingle in a way that is hard to unravel, and coexist with flattery addressed by various commands to individuals or entire units. An example of this can be found in the letters that the Command of the Valle di Susa divisions addressed to the commander of the De Vitis autonomous division, showering him and his men with praise and offering him a paternalistic ‘recognition’.60
Indeed, in the Garibaldi formation there arose a certain tendency to regard every fine and valorous partisan as a natural Garibaldino. The Communists sought in this way to reap the fruits of their choice for their formations of such a widely and universally resonant name which, at the beginning, had been used sometimes without any particular political or organisational reference in mind.61 Condemning the behaviour of those who had forcefully compelled several units of the Monviso GL brigade to go over to the Garibaldi, the General Command actually developed the concept that Garibaldini are all those who ‘offer themselves as an example and model for all combatants’, wherever they may be serving. These ‘garibaldini d’onore’ were to be awarded the red scarf with tricolore stitching.62 For their part, during the occupation of Alba, the autonomous units of Mauri, who were defined as the expression of the Italians ‘who would like to empty the partisan movement of all popular and democratic content’,63 represented a sore temptation for the Garibaldini, who were more poorly armed, shod and fed.64 In his turn, Nando, chief of one of Mauri’s bands, went over to the GL brigades simply because they were better armed and, ‘if they could have greater supplies’, he said, he ‘would go over to the Garibaldini, because war is waged with arms, not politics’.65 The process of politicisation which gives pride of place to the CLN did not always correspond to the reality of the presence of politics in the bands. The CLN tended to present itself as the civilian government presents itself to the armed forces. The Piedmontese regional CLN reminded the formations of the ‘necessary bond of subordination and discipline … for everything relating to political and administrative activity’.66 The Ligurian CLN called on the Command of the 1st Liguria (Garibaldi) division to adhere to the principle that ‘political authority lies exclusively with the CLN’.67 A clear-cut distinction between civilian power and military power is also made in a Garibaldi document.68 Dante Livio Bianco, for whom the CLN was the ‘true and authentic national government of invaded Italy’, attributed the distrust of the ‘gentlemen of the committee’ to the ‘usual “trincerismo” ’ (“diehard trench mentality”), an all too familiar phenomenon of the ‘small-mindedness’ of the ‘military formations’.69 On one occasion Major Mauri acknowledged that he, and his Blues, were under the orders of the CLN; but ‘so deep-seated was his “trenchman’s” ’ spirit as to induce him then to write: ‘In twenty months’ warfare waged over two-thirds of the Cuneo territory, there was never a sign of there being a provincial CLN in Cuneo. But it doesn’t bother me in the least that I don’t have to know it even today.’70 But distrust of the CLN cannot be put down merely to a priori aversion to politics on the part of the ‘pure’ military men,71 which was also present at times in the political formations, such as the GL.72 Even the CVL (Voluntary Liberty Corps) command proclaimed the autonomy of the military organisms in deciding who should be appointed to the commands.73 Nor would it be correct to attribute certain manifestations of hostility to the CLN only to the fear that they were dominated by Communists.74 The ‘stuttering CLNs’ could be seen as being infected by the ‘highly dangerous gangrene’ of attesismo (waiting on events).75 Before an invitation to call a truce in the guerrilla war, ‘the conviction, which had been deep-rooted for some time, grew all the stronger that in the CLNs there lurked the spectre of betrayal’.76 One CLN, though composed almost solely of Communists, could be defined as ‘partisans of pious works’.77 ‘The bias of our Garibaldini against these committees’ was considered ‘widespread and deep-rooted’.78 ‘The bands’ hatred of the Modena and Bol
ogna Committees reached the point of threats.’79 Even a Communist chief was unaware of the very existence of the Ravenna provincial CLN.80 Words with a Tocquevillian emphasis appeared in a Garibaldi document. The CLN, ‘created for liberty, was performing the function merely of making slavery more accommodating’.81 Bandied back and forth increasingly were accusations of incompetence in directing the struggle, of falling short in the work of assisting the partisans, of improper and incompetent interference in things military, of totally irrational behaviour.82 Distrust might go so far as to advise that ‘no plan, no method, no tactic for action is to be communicated to any political organ’.83
In some cases the local CLNs were more highly thought of than the provincial ones, insofar as they relieved the partisans of civilian duties,84 duties which, however, the partisans themselves sometimes claimed, using their power directly to settle disputes and right wrongs. This is what Ciro and Cino did when they severely warned the Sub-Alpine Railway and Navigation Company of Lake Maggiore against reporting unauthorised absentee workers to the Fascist authorities.85
In recalling all this, my intention is not to reopen the debate on the nature and real substance of the CLN, at the various levels, nor on the consequent intermingling, in the exercise of power, between the committees, the military formations and, in the free zones, the variously constituted popular governing juntas.86 I simply want to emphasise that the problem of the presence of politics in the Resistance goes beyond simple adhesion to the single parties and/or their coalition expressed by the CLN. This kind of politicisation and its limits was put to the test in the unification of the various formations. I do not mean the initial efforts,87 nor the unification, which remained mainly formal, that occurred from 19 to 20 June 1944 with the creation of the CVL General Command, but that, which was intended to be substantial, decided by the CLNAI (National Liberation Committee for North Italy) on 29 March 1945.88 Initially the Communists had resisted this prospect. On 9 November 1943, in Turin, they had declared it ‘unviable’ and ‘an error’.89 If in this case it was a question of avoiding the controversial General Operti being appointed commander, a letter the following month from the Milan to the Rome party headquarters expressed the broad conviction that the appointment of ‘un responsabile’, a ‘dirigente’, a ‘capo’, could not fail to have an anti-Communist significance: therefore, it is stressed, ‘we demand parity within the political committees and within the military committees’, but nothing else.90 In expectation of a popular national army being created by a ‘government of national liberation’, the Communists insisted on the absolute parity of the parties in the committees and the denial of any ‘operational directional function’ to the committees themselves.91 The growth of the Garibaldi brigades and the Salerno ‘turning-point’ led to a change in this position. In the ‘Instructions for all comrades and for all the party formations’, drawn up by Togliatti in Naples on 6 June 1944, the demand appeared for ‘a single armed organisation, with a single military command, which should be entrusted to the most energetic and determined anti-Fascists and to the most militarily capable’.92 Two days before this, the northern edition of L’Unità had published an article titled, ‘The immediate formation of a single command for the whole partisan movement is necessary’, in support of a proposal formally presented by the party in March, where ‘essentially’ coordination, orientation and aid duties were envisaged for the ‘unified central Command’ as well.93
The unfolding of events that led to General Cadorna’s appointment as Commander, with Luigi Longo and Ferruccio Parri as vice-commanders – Longo representing the Garibaldi, Parri the GL brigades – is well enough known. But it is worth recalling that, in the Action Party too, which then became a convinced champion of unification,94 initially some perplexity was expressed out of fear that the partisan struggle would be emptied of its political significance.95 When, on 9 January 1945, the party’s North Italy executive drew up the ‘Report on the outline for a decree for the unification of the partisan formations in the Corpo volontari della libertà [Volunteer Corps for Freedom],’ it maintained:
Unification cannot be ‘military–apolitical’; relations between CLN and CVL cannot be those that regularly come into play between government and army, precisely because this is a war of political deliverance and the freedom fighters are fighting as much against the foreign invader as the interior and still more contemptible Fascist reaction. This can never be forgotten, especially by those who longed for a CVL of pure military men; if it were to lose its anti-Fascist, anti-imperialist, anti-reactionary and therefore democratic, liberating, popular and progressive line of political orientation and justification, the CVL would be incapable of fighting and would be devoid of justification and purpose … All the commands are quite as much political organs as they are military ones.
In its proposal the Action Party was to present an international argument: the Greek experience could easily have been avoided if the partisans had presented themselves to the Allies as a united bloc. France and Yugoslavia were in fact showing the advantages of fusion and incorporation into the regular army.96 As their documents repeat,97 the Communists’ fundamental objective was the transformation of the partisans into a regular army and their incorporation with the one being reconstituted in the South, even if this meant paying the price of an operation of a watered-down political value. The Action Party, by contrast, saw unification as the creation of an anything but blind military arm of that new organ of government, transcending the parties, which was how the party, or at least part of it, was fond of viewing the CLNs – as instruments of ‘democratic revolution’.98 The two parties most deeply engaged in the armed struggle were those that tried to tackle the question of unification and its political significance, whereas the Christian Democrats and Liberals presented no proposals. The Liberals and Christian Democrats, and General Cadorna with them, on the one hand seemed concerned at the prospect that unification might bring with it;99 on the other hand, they were ready to take advantage of the benefits that the initiative of others might bring them, sensing that the prize catch was flapping in their hands. The position of the Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity (PSIUP) was isolated: it appeared unenthusiastic – even though it eventually fell into line – about placing under the command of reactionary generals an army, like the partisan army, whose purpose was to remain ‘the efficient force for the conquest and defence of democratic liberties’.100 The PSIUP raised another objection: it demanded that those concerned, namely the partisans, be consulted. Documents widely attest that the latter were somewhat suspicious about what was, as Leo Valiani has subsequently written, not a super- but inter-party unification being imposed from above.101 Scepticism was widespread about the true results of an operation by now aimed more at measuring out forces among the parties with a view to the post-Liberation period than at creating an effective fighting instrument. In his report of 31 December 1944, Giorgio Agosti was already prophesying that, given the different formations’ political leanings and their extremely powerful esprit de corps, it would be a ‘unity of appearances’: that was the only way he himself was prepared to accept it.102 A young Garibaldino of the Piacenza zone, though favouring unification, was convinced that ‘many things will go back to being as they were’.103 The difficulty of finding enough party representatives, as well as officers, to fill all the posts in the jumbled unified commands was an accepted fact. Gorrieri made fun of General Marco Guidelli who, at the suggestion of the Communists, was put in charge of the Modena Command zone: up in the mountains this high-ranking officer’s letters-cum-proclamations were ‘greeted with utter indifference’.104
Indeed, the impression one gets skimming through the Resistance documents of the last two or three months before the Liberation is that, while the documents of the preceding months hint at a richer reality, which they do not succeed in fully expressing, things now are the other way round. The later documents mainly testify to the setting in motion of an organisation aimed at spreading a v
ast and uniform network of commands, appointments, and so on, carefully and punctiliously measured out, in such a way as to pre-establish faits accomplis, if not in reality at least on paper. This could even lead to increased quarrelling between the formations: involved though they were in the process of unification, they dragged behind them old resentments, born at times of their experience in the single commands they had formerly fought under.105 The bands, therefore, almost closed ranks in order to prevent new and unexpected ones, which might modify power relations, from springing up at the last minute.106 Moreover, these relations in the unitary organisms agreed over the table did not always tally with the reality that had established itself on the field. This was a source of concern for the Garibaldi general command in a directive adopted by the Piedmont delegation, which urged ‘doing way with the great disproportion currently existing between the influence and prestige enjoyed among the partisans and the population by the Garibaldi formations … and the actual forces deployed … For all this, a special effort must be made by all to create new brigades.’107
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