The end of WWII and the Italian election

Contrary to public opinion, World War II did not end in 1945. Proclamation 2714 declared cessation of all hostilities in World War II to be on Dec. 31, 1946. This is the reason the United States recognizes World War II veterans between Dec. 7, 1941 and Dec. 31, 1946.

My Story

I graduated from Hawthorne High, New Jersey, in June 1946 and enlisted in the Marine Corps on Sept. 20, 1946. I received the G.I. bill, which expired Oct. 1, 1946. After my boot camp at Parris Island, South Carolina, I was assigned to the 2nd Marine Tank Battalion and was a tank driver, and then was working in communications with the Tank Corps.

During the Italian election of 1948, when the communists had threatened to take over the country through the ballot box, the United States intervened covertly to support democratic parties. Less than a year after the National Security Act of 1947 was enacted, the Truman administration, confronted with the threat of communists coming to power in the Italian elections, decided to use the CIA to channel support to the non-communist parties opposing them. At the time, Italy was the country where communism had the most serious chance to come to power via the ballot box.

The 1948 general election was greatly influenced by the Cold War that was starting between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The Italian Communist Party (PCI) was being funded by the Soviet Union. According to CIA operative F. Mark Wyatt, "The Communist Party of Italy was funded ... by bags of money directly out of the Soviet compound in Rome; and the Italian services were aware of this."

For the 1948 election, scheduled for April 18, the PCI and PSI (the socialist party) united to form the Popular Democratic Front (FDP). In February the FDP won municipal elections in Pescara, with a 10 percent increase in their vote over 1946. The Christian Democrats ran a poor second. The prospect of the left winning control of the Italian government loomed larger than ever before.

It was at this point that the United States began to train its big economic and political guns upon the Italian people. All the good ol' Yankee know-how, all the Madison Avenue savvy in the art of swaying public opinion, all the Hollywood razzmatazz, would be brought to bear on the "target market." Pressing domestic needs in Italy, such as agricultural and economic reform, the absence of which produced abysmal extremes of wealth and poverty, were not to be the issues of the day. The lines of battle would be drawn around the question of "democracy" vs. "communism" (the idea of "capitalism" remaining discreetly to one side).

The CIA's practice of influencing the political situation was repeated in every Italian election for at least the next 24 years. A leftist coalition would not win a general election for the next 48 years, until 1996. That was partly because of Italians' traditional bent for conservatism and, even more importantly, the Cold War, with the United States closely watching Italy in their determination to maintain a vital NATO presence amidst the Mediterranean and retain the Yalta-agreed status quo of Western Europe. Americans provided aid by reducing the $1 billion debt the United States had from Italy. At this time France had ousted the communist party. Czechoslovakia was overrun by the communists. There was a write-in campaign by American Catholics and over 10 million pieces of mail was sent to Italians to prevent Italy from going communist. The United States stated that there would be no further assistance from the United States from the Marshall Plan and the Italians who joined the communist party were excommunicated by the pope.

The Christian Democrats eventually won the 1948 election with 48 percent of the vote. The PCI received 31 percent.

As to my participation in these events: On Jan. 5, 1948, I was now a corporal in the U.S. Marine Corps. I was sent by troop transport to help police the Italian elections with tanks and combat gear. At Malta I went off on cargo nets to the U.S. Midway aircraft carrier which held 5,000 personnel and I was in a Marine detachment on the Midway and we had combat troops in a separate ship and were ready to resist any communist takeover by the popular front. (That's PCF and PCI). We traveled to Toulon, France, and Taranto, Italy, and then up the Amalfi Coast to Naples where we landed. I was privileged to go with 40 Marines to visit Pope Pius XII. He threatened to excommunicate anyone who was a communist. At that time Italy was subject to object poverty. The garbage scow on the Midway was protected by the Carabinieri (an Italian police force) to prevent robbery of our garbage on the ship. Italy was desperate and starving after World War II.

After returning to the United States, I was discharged from the Marine Corps in August 1948. I received the GI bill and went to New York University where I graduated in 1951 and worked as a sales representative until 1954 when I went to California and started law school. I joined the Marine Corps Reserve in May 1949 to May 1952 and became a member of the Dover Marine Reserve Unit. I resigned to apply for a position as a U.S. Navy officer. At that time the Korean War broke out and my unit, the Dover Marines, lost 50 percent of their troops in North Korea.