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Pietro Badoglio, 1st Duke of Addis Abeba, 1st Marquess of Sabotino (28 September 1871 – 1 November 1956) was an Italian soldier and politician. He was a member of the National Fascist Party and commanded his nation's troops under Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in the Second Italo-Abyssinian War; his efforts gained him the title Duke of Addis Abeba. On 24
July 1943, as Italy had suffered several setbacks in World War II,
Mussolini summoned the Fascist Grand
Council, which voted no confidence in Mussolini. The following
day Il Duce was removed from government
by king Victor Emmanuel
III and
arrested. Badoglio was named Prime Minister
of Italy and
while mass confusion in Italy reigned, he eventually signed an armistice with the Allies.
When this was made public, it threw Italy into chaos. A civil war took
place, and the fascists fought the partisans. The king and Badoglio fled Rome leaving the Italian Army with no orders to follow.
Eventually from Brindisi on 13 October, Badoglio and
the Kingdom of Italy declared war against Nazi Germany.
Badoglio did not stay as Prime Minister for long however, as world
opinion at that stage desired a person with a non-Fascist past to head
the government. In June 1944, Badoglio was replaced by Ivanoe Bonomi of the Labour
Democratic Party. He was
born in Grazzano Monferrato (later Grazzano
Badoglio) in the province of
Asti (Piedmont).
After studying at the military academy in Turin,
he served with the Italian Army from 1892, at first as a Lieutenant (Tenente)
in artillery,
taking part in the campaigns in Eritrea (1896) and Libya (1912), where he
distinguished himself at the Battle
of Zanzur. At
the beginning of Italian participation in World War I,
he was a Lieutenant
Colonel (Tenente
Colonnello); he rose to the rank of General following his handling of the
capture of Monte
Sabotino in May
1916 and by the late months of 1917 (mostly thanks to his Masonic connections, including his
superior, General Capello) was named as Vice Chief-of-Staff (Sottocapo
di Stato Maggiore) despite being one of the main people responsible
in the disaster during the Battle of
Caporetto on
24 October 1917. In the years after World War I, in which he held
several high offices in the Italian Army, Badoglio spent significant
effort in modifying official documents in order to hide his role in the
defeat. Post-war,
Badoglio was named as a Senator,
but also remained in the army with special assignments to Romania and the U.S. in 1920 and 1921. At first,
he opposed Benito Mussolini and after 1922 was
side-lined as ambassador to Brazil.
A change of political heart soon returned him to Italy and a senior
role in the army as Chief of Staff from 4 May 1924. On June 25, 1926,
Badoglio was promoted to the rank of Marshal of Italy (Maresciallo
d'Italia). Badoglio
was the first sole governor of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica (Italian Libya)
from 1929 to 1933. During his goveronship, he played a vital part (with Rodolfo Graziani,
deputy governor of Cyrenaica) in defeating the Libyan rebels. On 24
January 1932, Badoglio proclaimed the end of Libyan
resistance for
the first time since the Italian invasion in 1911. Badoglio
was not in East Africa when Emilio de Bono began the invasion of
Abyssinia on 3
October 1935. De Bono was the
Commander-in-Chief of
all Italian military forces invading Ethiopia and he was in direct
command of the invasion army on the northern front. Ultimately, the
progress of De Bono's
invasion was
judged to be too slow by Mussolini. As a result, Badoglio, who in the
meantime had launched an epistolary campaign against De Bono, replaced
the latter in December. Badoglio
was immediately faced with the Ethiopian "Christmas
Offensive" and
he sought and received approval for the use of mustard gas.
He employed it to effectively destroy the Ethiopian armies confronting
him on the northern front. Badoglio commanded the Italian invasion army
at the First Battle of
Tembien, the Battle of Amba
Aradam, the Second Battle
of Tembien, and the Battle of Shire.
On 31 March, Badoglio defeated Emperor Haile Selassie commanding the last
Ethiopian army on the northern front at the Battle of
Maychew. On 26 April, with no Ethiopian resistance left between
his forces and Addis Ababa,
Badoglio launched his "March of the
Iron Will" to take the Ethiopian capital city and end the war.
By 2 May, Haile Selassie had fled the country. On 5 May
1936, Marshal Badoglio led the victorious Italian troops into Addis
Ababa. Mussolini declared King Victor
Emmanuel to be
the Emperor of
Ethiopia, and Ethiopia became part of the Italian Empire.
On this occasion, Badoglio was appointed the first Viceroy and Governor General of Ethiopia and ennobled
with the victory title of Duke of Addis
Abeba. On 11
June 1936, Rodolfo Graziani replaced
Badoglio as Viceroy and Governor General of Ethiopia. Badoglio returned
to his duties as the Supreme Chief of the Italian General Staff.
According to Time Magazine,
Badoglio even joined the Fascist Party in early June. Badoglio
was not in favour of the Italian-German Pact of Steel and
was pessimistic about the chances of Italian success in any European
war but he did not oppose the decision of Mussolini and the King to declare war on France
and Great Britain. Following the Italian army's poor display in the invasion of
Greece in
December 1940, he resigned from the General Staff. Badoglio was
replaced by Ugo Cavallero. On 24
July 1943, following the Allied invasion
of Sicily, there was a meeting of the Fascist Grand
Council. On the following day, in a technical coup d'etat, King Victor
Emmanuel dismissed
Mussolini as Prime Minister and appointed Badoglio to
head the government in his place. Martial law was
declared, Mussolini was arrested, and negotiations were covertly opened
with the Allies. Publicly, the King and Badoglio claimed that Italy
would remain with the Axis. Instead, they were plotting in the
background. On
September 3, General Giuseppe
Castellano signed
the Italian
armistice with the Allies in Cassibile on behalf of Badoglio. On
September 8, the armistice document was published by the Allies in the Badoglio
Proclamation.
It was published before Badoglio could communicate news of the switch
to the Italian armed forces. The units of the Royal Army, Royal Navy,
and Royal Air Force were generally surprised by the switch and
unprepared for German actions to disarm them. In the early hours of
September 9, Badoglio, King Victor Emmanuel, some military ministries,
and the Chief of the General Staff escaped to Pescara and Brindisi
seeking Allied protection. On 23
September, the longer version of the armistice was signed in Malta.
The Badoglio government officially declared war on Germany on
October 13. Badoglio continued to head the government for another nine
months. Following the German rescue of Mussolini, the liberation of Rome,
and increasingly strong opposition, he was replaced on 9 June 1944 by Ivanoe Bonomi and
other committed anti-Fascists. Badoglio was never tried for war crimes
by the Allies primarily because he helped them during the invasion of
Italy. |