Rome

ON THE WORLD TODAY

WANDERING through the Italian countryside is a heartening experience right now. Bridges and houses are springing up on all sides; what used to be heaps of rubble is again clean, civilized landscape; whatever could be done with stones, mortar, and labor of hands independently of bureaucratic interference and foreign raw materials is being achieved by the indefatigable industry of a people which has made up its mind not to die.

But the treaty draft has had a depressing effect on the people. Practically everything the Germans plundered is to be returned to the original owners, even the Hungarian gold — everything except what they took from the Italians when Italy entered the Allied camp. The Italians feel that Italy, after having been discouraged from active participation in the war, is even denied the status of victim.

Practically this situation makes little difference. Italy’s ninety-two tons of gold have been confiscated in Germany, and the monetary system will have to be stabilized and strengthened by foreign credit if the country is to enter the Bretton Woods system with a sound currency.

But the moral effect is not good. “The waste remains, the waste remains and kills.” To top it all, on the suggestion of the Western Allies, the Peace Conference invited Austria to present its views on the Italian treaty. This action was bound to look to the Italians, in whose memory the Austrians stand only for Wehrmacht divisions and for the most dreaded sections of the Gestapo, as a particularly feeble joke.

Again, Italians reason that if their assets are not to be handed back, this decision only reflects British and French interest in preventing too rapid an Italian recovery.

The Italians are puzzled by the weird notion of placing Austria among victorious powers. It might have made some sense in the light of the ultimate aim, which, according to Bevin’s plan, was the customs union of Italy and Austria; this would really have provided a long-range solution to both Italian and Austrian economy. But there is no chance of carrying the plan through against Russian opposition, and what will be left in the end will only be the memory of a preposterous and offensive suggestion.

That is, if all goes well. For it might happen that in the scuffle the question of the South Tyrol might be reopened and this time pressed through to conclusion by Russia. The shadow of Asia, which has already reached Stettin and Trieste, would extend into the Plain of Lombardy. One cannot be in Verona, the ancient imperial city, without feeling an unexpressed anxiety, as it were in the landscape itself; for this is the goal of untold break-throughs from the north through uncounted centuries, the crucial point where so much of history was decided.

What can the Western Allies do about it? Their only real weapon is prosperity and they don’t seem willing to implement it even in their own zone of influence. As Schacht conquered the Balkans by remote control with his economic policy, even so Russia has set Central and Eastern Europe flowing into her own economic circuit, and political passions can do little against natural needs.

Does it pay to be reasonable?

This is where Big Three tactics differ. The Western Allies entertain reasonable philosophies and earnest hopes, try to soothe and encourage, also contribute relief and hard cash in many inconspicuous ways, but they seem unable to fend off fate, unable to formulate constructive plans and integrate the waifs and strays of Europe into any kind of economic and political system.

The Russians, on the other hand, are ruthless in their tactics and hard in their demands. But once these demands are complied with, the victims are likely to see the other side, which is psychological perspicacity and real statesmanship.

Thus, after hitting the Italians over the head with Trieste, the Russians have given them to understand that their contribution to Central European economy would be appreciated. A steady flow of manufactured goods is already finding its way from northern Italy into Yugoslavia, to the undisguised alarm of American diplomats. Part of that exchange of goods will eventually go into reparations, but the Italians, who are by now desperate, think of it only as a guarantee of steady work and steady supplies.

It is true that it is the Western Allies who have poured in the coal and textiles that keep the machines humming, but this will be short-range relief with tariff barriers looming behind. It is the Western Allies who have tried to save Trieste for Italy, but the best they could achieve was an international monstrosity with small life expectancy. Common sense impels the Italians and even the Yugoslavs now to look for direct understanding with each other.

It is significant to hear the conservatives in Italy, and even the royalists, openly suggest rapprochement with Russia. This whole trend is creating a gulf between still uncertain Italian thinking and that of the Western Allies. Nothing much can happen so long as the Western Allies are in physical control. The danger is in relying on that control as a substitute for a real solution.

Colonies or else

For the Italian people there are only two solutions: either they are allowed to enter the Central European system and develop their economy to fit it, or they must be given an outlet by dumping ten million of their excess population into some other continent.

Providing such an outlet for the Europeans should have been of paramount concern to the Atlantic Powers long before now, and a world authority should have been set up to organize the finance of overseas colonization. Not only did nothing of the sort emerge, but we underlined our attitude by confiscating the Italian merchant marine, which was the pride of the people and the hope of a peaceful tie with the West.

This was spelling out the fact to the Italians that it was not a matter of mere absent-mindedness on our part, that we really did not want them in our Western economic circuit, and that our simple suggestion for them was to keep the peace and live on the dole.

Since there is only a negligible chance of our political bodies changing their minds on the subject, we may expect dense masses of Europe, now groping, tugging, and feeling their way in all directions like a feverish ant heap, to develop eventually a strong tendency away from the Western system. The forces of instinct, culture, tradition on which we rely so complacently may delay a change, but they cannot prevent it indefinitely.

The Communist Parties of Western Europe have very shrewdly appraised the situation; and instead of announcing foreign gospels, they present themselves in patriotic guise as the defenders of those very cultures and traditions that the blind forces of foreign capitalism would tend to enslave or to destroy. The debit side of this attitude is that they have also encouraged mutually antagonistic national feelings as an insurance against the Western bloc.

Can we re-create Italy in our own image?

Domestically the Italian people have shown admirable spirit in their first post-war attempt to exercise political rights. The voting was the heaviest ever and we should appreciate the amount of discomfort that voting entailed for large numbers of the people. But when it came to getting the Constituent Assembly to work under a difficult threeparty system, it became obvious that “democratic" activity did not go beyond the struggle of three party machines for the control of the state.

The state is still everything in Italy, as it is in France, and its present weakness makes it only more tempting for hijackers. The growth of new social tissue at the base is a process which takes time. How far do outside forces help or hinder?

For a time the monarchy and the old pre-Fascist groups seemed to fill the bill. Then the Control Powers had to cast around for new instruments. The Americans leaned towards the Catholic hierarchy, while the British hesitatingly backed the Socialists. There was never any doubt where Russia stood. Thus in the stream of domestic politics three parties became the moving reflection of three big entities outside. This fact again did not help to establish them in public consideration.

Now the Catholics with De Gasperi are carrying officially the burden of power — which means also bearing the cross of the humiliating peace treaty they must sign. They are carrying also, by their own choice, responsibility for the peace delegation made up of the very same people who managed Mussolini’s wars and are now trying to weasel their way, unchanged and unrepentant, out of defeat. Worst of all, the Catholics do not appear to be equipped to steer the country through the difficult rapids of economic rehabilitation.

The Left is not a solid block. The Communists and the Socialists are leery of each other, and as the Communists reflect Russia, the Socialists have been trying to fit themselves into the Bevin-Blum axis. Neither has fared well. Russia has its own business to mind. British Labor seems chiefly concerned with imperial interests, and Italian Socialists who would not take its suggestions, or rather commands, are now saying ruefully that Italian business bosses allow more leeway in socialist reform than Labor statesmen in London. Here we find again the tendency among Italian propertied classes to back the Socialist Party as the lesser evil.

It is no simple matter for a heavy mass party with considerable cabinet responsibility to come to a sensible agreement with business while holding workers in line, including two million unemployed and another half million in prospect, and at the same time having to compete with Communist allies who are developing a parallel action and have proved themselves to be expert statesmen. Also the Socialists will have to take the lead in drastic reforms now under discussion, which will substantially change the social picture of the country.

Land for sale

Take as one instance the capital levy, which, when applied to land, will confiscate major portions of medium and large estates. It is impossible to throw all that land on the market as was done in the French Revolution. It will fall back on the IRI (equivalent of our own RFC), which already controls most of Italian big industry and all the units of banking. Of course the avowed aim of such institutions is to restore the property gradually to private ownership.

But in the case of land this is today a horse-andbuggy scheme which does not consider the necessity of large-scale mechanization if forty-six million people are to live off the land. Hence the ultimate solution is bound to be something like kolkhozes, while industry will also become organized into semiautonomous combines under state supervision.

This is the way to state socialism, which in Europe is as inevitable as death and taxes — whatever honorific name it will take to please the Allies. The problem in this case shifts from party programs which are already losing most of their meaning to the formation of a class of managers and technicians able to direct the transition, and among them doubtless many capable former owners. The Italian Republic is still a pupa state. Politically insecure and relying only on infinite private ingenuity, the Italians prefer to let problems solve themselves, but this time they cannot escape a momentous decision.