Absolutely nothing is published in the Italian papers or reviews
concerning military or naval operations until the result of a given
movement is known. Meanwhile, what are Italians reading and what is
the intellectual food given them to sustain the wonderful sentimental
enthusiasm with which they welcomed the war?
Previous to Italy's declaration of war against Austria-Hungary, on May
24, the press in general dealt with the negotiations between the two
Governments from the point of view of domestic politics, which gave
foreigners the impression that Italy was only waiting to receive her
price to remain neutral until the end of the war. Austrian intrigue
and dilatoriness were alike criticized. Little was said about Germany
in regard to Italy, although her military methods in Belgium and
northern France, her raids on the defenseless coast towns of England,
and her submarine activities in the War Zone were severely condemned.
This censure, however, was entirely academic and objective. The
reviews republished a quantity of English, French, Russian, and even
American articles as to the causes of the war, and the illustrations
which accompanied them could hardly be considered pro-Teutonic. Only
the comic press--and this in spite of its augmenting circulation which
should have indicated to observers the sentiment that was elsewhere
suppressed--gave full vent to popular emotion.
The moment war was declared there was a complete change. To be sure
the "Green Book" was published in numerous 20-cent editions and sold
by the hundreds of thousands and the closing speeches of Italian and
Austrian diplomats were given in full with comments, yet little time
was wasted with explanations of the failure of the Italo-Austrian
negotiations and the meaning of the Seventh Article of the Triple
Alliance. The daily press, the weekly periodicals, and the monthly
reviews suddenly changed their objective expositions of Germany's
conduct in regard to others and began to expound, explain, and
elucidate, in an intimate subjective manner, how that conduct affected
Italy.
Austria was almost ignored. The anti-German riots at Milan and other
cities, where thousands of dollars worth of property was
systematically destroyed before the authorities could interfere,
showed the volcano that had been lying dormant beneath the surface.
Articles which must have been prepared months before suddenly appeared
in the press and reviews showing how Germany had come to control the
banks and steamship lines of the Peninsula and how German capital,
under the guise of promoting Italian enterprises, had laid hold of
vast industries whose profits went to fill the pockets of the Germans;
and, worst of all, how the savings of Italian immigrants in America
had gone, through the German-conducted banks, to enrich the same
persons without any contingent benefit to Italians.
Indeed, it almost seemed as though the press and reviews alike had
been organized as completely as had the army and navy for the
prosecution of the war with the sole object in view of preventing
Germany ever again from using the Peninsula as a territory for
exploitation. The propaganda for _Italia Irredenta_ suddenly sank into
insignificance beside the determination to throw off, once and for
all, the German commercial, industrial, and financial yoke, revealing
the abiding faith of the Italian people that their army would attend
to the former as completely as desirable and without the advice and
criticism of civilians. Faith in their King and their army and in
their ultimate success is not a matter for argument among Italians.
Meanwhile, the staffs of all publications, from editors to
compositors, have felt the weight of conscription--sacrifices they
enthusiastically make for the common cause. Their pages may be fewer
and some favorite contributors may be heard of no more, but they are
sure that the public will bear with them. On the other hand, a new
periodical has sprung into existence called La Guerra d'Italia nel
1915--The Italian War of 1915--the first number of which has just come
to hand. Its introduction accompanied with several well-made portraits
constructs the basis of Italy's action--how Italy having been tricked
through a fancied fear of France and the apparent unresponsiveness of
England into entering the Triple Alliance in 1882, had been forced to
remain there, possibly protected thereby from actual Austrian
aggression, but ever a prey to German exploitation. Then comes an
analysis of the Italo-Austrian negotiations, conducted directly and
through Prince von Buelow, the Special German Ambassador in Rome,
showing why these negotiations could not possibly have succeeded. Like
the Government itself the new periodical is in no haste to describe
military operations.
The first review to devote almost its entire space to the war was La
Vita Internazionale of Milan. The opening article is by the well-known
publicist E.T. Moneta. He begins:
Without boast but with self-esteem secure, Italy has taken
her place in the combat among the nations which for ten
months have been fighting for the liberty of the people and
the cause of civilization. The enthusiasm with which this
announcement has been received in France, Russia, and
England, and especially in martyred Belgium, is enormous.
For they have all understood what decisive effect our army
would produce on the destiny of the Great War.
The fighters for liberty and civilization who have always
hoped for an ultimate victory, today feel the certainty of
that hope, and that the duration of the war with the loss of
millions of other lives will be shortened. For this reason,
from those governments and people, from their parliaments
and from their press, from workingmen's societies and from
institutions of learning there have come to our country warm
words of admiration and of social unity. All these things
form an added inspiration for us to do our best to hasten
the end of this slaughter of men.
Signor Moneta goes on to compliment the diplomacy of Premier Salandra
for resigning from office and thus giving the people the opportunity
to show through their demonstrations that they desired war and to
silence once and forever the propaganda of Giolitti who had declaimed
in vain that the people did not want war, as they could secure by
negotiations unredeemed Italy--as though that were all.
Another article is by D. Giuseppe Antonini and is entitled "The German
Madness." Its subject, full of quotations from Treitschke, Nietzsche,
and Bernhardi, is not new to Americans. For Italians it may come as a
revelation. It demonstrates the formative influences which have found
expression in what is called "Prussian Militarism," as an attitude of
mind which believes in the supremacy of force over all things--over
goodness, virtue, kindness, and all else that make life worth living.
It declares that Prussian Militarism has so possessed all Germans that
not only their moral but their logical point of view has become
distorted, so that they behold nought but virtue in applying science
to bring about Mediaeval results. The conflict, he declares, is
between absolutism which pretends to be sufficient unto itself and
democracy which receives its power from the people, and that the
latter must win unless centuries of the power, by revolutions without
number, for the benefit of the masses are to end in failure.
Paolo Baccari deals with "The Supreme Duty." He says that the
intervention of Italy was not merely to complete Unification by
uniting all Italians of the Peninsula and the Adriatic littoral under
one flag and government, but to register herself as standing for
justice, law, and humanity against organized barbarity, injustice,
illegality, and inhumanity, which, if victorious, would not rest until
it had conquered the world. He calls the peace propaganda at this time
a "vile lie of conventionality" because its success could only mean
the victory of those forces which all honest nationalities and persons
condemn.
As to the other serious reviews, such as the Nuova Antologia and the
Rivista d'Italia, their June numbers, aside from expounding Italy's
relations to Germany, have not gone beyond academic discussion of the
causes of the war and the economic phases as revealed by the budgets
of France, England, and Russia, and the sacrifices that Italy must
endure in order to make her a worthy ally of these countries, all
putting forth their greatest efforts in the battle for the world's
salvation.
There are in Italy a large number of popular, well illustrated,
monthly magazines, which, taking it for granted that their readers
have already been thoroughly instructed as to the diplomatic phases of
the war, have started a campaign of education in regard to the war
itself. There are articles contrasting the armies of the days of
Garibaldi and the great King Victor Emmanuel with those of the
present. There are also articles, historical and descriptive,
sociological and economic, on Trieste, Trent, and other cities of
Unredeemed Italy, and historical monographs showing the bonds that
formerly bound Italy to England and to France which have now been
cemented anew, free from all Teutonic influence.
Among the magazines of this class are the Secolo XX, the Noi e il
Mondo, and La Lettura; all, whenever the occasion offers, deal
generously and enthusiastically with Italy's allies.
In all this published matter one thing has been revealed since Italy
entered the war. Previously all the Italian writers placed in the same
category of contempt the alleged attempts that were being made to
influence Italy by the Central Empires as well as by the Entente
Powers and unblushingly declared that if Italy ever entered the war it
would not be for the benefit of one party or the other but for the
benefit of herself alone. Now they frankly confess that the Entente
Powers made no attempt to influence Italy, knowing all the time that
when she was ready she would line up on their side.