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The Italian Social Republic (Repubblica Sociale Italiana, RSI) was a Nazi puppet state in German-occupied northern Italy. It was informally known as Salo Republic (Repubblica di Salò), after its capital, Salò, a small town on Lake Garda.
The context of RSI's creation
After the Allied forces invaded southern Italy, and began to advance toward Rome, the Grand Fascist Council, with initiative from Dino Grandi and the support of King Vittorio Emanuele III, overthrew and arrested Benito Mussolini on July 24 1943. The new government began peace negotiations with the Allied powers.
Nazi Germany quickly intervened, concerned that Italian forces would otherwise join the Allied troops. Germany seized control of northern Italy, and Mussolini was rescued by Otto Skorzeny in the Unternehmen Eiche, being brought to the German-occupied area to establish a new regime.
History
Mussolini declared on September 23 that the coup d'état had been defeated, and that his government was continuing as a republic, with himself as leader. The new authorities mounted a repression campaign against any opposition, notably by prosecuting all present and absent Fascist leaders who had backed Grandi in the Verona trial. Mussolini established his capital, and began to try and assemble the organs of State. Soon after its establishment, the Republic was forced to cede Trieste, Istria and South Tyrol to Germany.
While Mussolini contended that he was in control of the Republic, in practice, it was a largely irrelevant and ineffective puppet of the German forces. The Republic came to an end on April 24–26, 1945 (Liberation day) when a general partisan uprising and the Allied spring offensive managed to oust the Germans from Italy.
List of RSI Ministers
- Head of State and Minister of Foreign Affairs - Benito Mussolini
- Minister of Defence - Rodolfo Graziani
- Ministers of the Interior - Guido Buffarini Guidi from 1943-1945, Paolo Zerbino for 1945
- Ministers of Justice - Antonino Tringali-Casanova for 1943, Pietro Pisenti from 1943-1945
- Minister of Finance - Domenico Pellegrini from 1943-1945
- Ministers of Industrial Production - Silvio Gai for 1943, Angelo Tarchi from 1943-1945
- Minister of Public Works - Ruggero Romano from 1943-1945
- Minister of Communications - Augusto Liverani from 1943-1945
- Minister of Labour - Giuseppe Spinelli for 1945
- Minister of National Education - Carlo Alberto Biggini from 1943-1945
- Minister of Popular Culture - Fernando Mezzasoma from 1943-1945
- Minister of Agriculture - Edoardo Moroni from 1943-1945
- Leader of the Republican Fascist Party - Alessandro Pavolini from 1943-1945
See also
- Blackshirts (MVSN)
- Black Brigades
- Decima Flottiglia MAS
- Italian resistance movement
- Birth of the Italian Republic
Miscellaneous
- Pier Paolo Pasolini's 1976 film Salò o le 120 giornate di Sodoma was set in the Republic of Salò, and partly meant as an allegory of it.
External links
- Axis History Factbook - Italy
- Comando Supremo
- Historical flags of Italy
- War flag of Italian Social Republic
1943 establishments | 1945 disestablishments | Former countries in Europe | Italian Fascism | Military history of Italy during World War II | World War II client states
Italienische Sozialrepublik | República Social Italiana | Sociala Respubliko Itala | République sociale italienne | Repubblica Sociale Italiana | Italiaanse Sociale Republiek | イタリア社会共和国 | Włoska Republika Socjalna | Республика Сало | Salòn tasavalta | Salò-republiken | 意大利社会共和国
"Italian Social Republic"