Benito Mussolini

7 Pages 1766 Words

st Party expelled Mussolini. Italy entered the war in 1915, and Mussolini served in the army until he was wounded in 1917.

FASCIST DICTATOR In 1919, Mussolini founded the Fasci di Combattimento(Combat Groups). This movement appealed to war veterans with a program that supported government ownership of national resources and that put the interests of Italy above all others. After failing in the 1919 elections, Mussolini at last entered parliament in 1921 as a right-wing member. In 1921, he transformed the Fasci into the National Fascist Party, adopting a more conservative program to gain the support of property-owning Italians. When the liberal governments of Giovanni Giolitti, Ivanoe Bonomi, and Luigi Facta failed to stop the spread of anarchy the Black Shirts, armed squads who supported
Mussolini, used violence to combat anti-Fascist groups. In 1922, the Black Shirts staged a March on Rome and forced King Victor Emmanuel III to appoint Mussolini prime minister.

DICTATORSHIP In 1925, Mussolini declared a dictatorship. He abolished other political parties and imposed government control on industry, schools, and the press and police. Skillfully using his absolute control over the press, he gradually built up the legen...