Week 22

 

While on the Eastern front the last German push against the allies, the Kaiserschlacht, was in its first stages, on the Italian lines the first issue^1 of the “army review” of the Third Army - “La Tradotta” (the troops train) - went out. Probably the most famous of the Italian trench newspapers (periodicals in fact, as most of them were issued weekly or biweekly or even monthly), it was a satirical issue, with obvious propaganda “undertones”; of remarkable quality nonetheless, enjoying the contributions of big names of Italian journalism, artists and illustrators (names such as Simoni, Rubino, Fraccaroli and Sacchetti) in an array of humorous rimes, short jokes, vignettes, comics and some more serious intermezzos, dealing with topics such as the fate of the Italian prisoners or the condition of the populations under Austrian occupation^2 .

Writers, illustrators, artists, journalists, intellectuals of the most different formation, already politically committed or at all indifferent before the war came; they had taken part to the glorious effort for the Italian intervention: the “radiant days of May” as they were remembered. But soon after, this composite carousel of ideology, money and personal initiative had been left behind. The Army had taken the reins of the war; and – argued Chief of Staff Cadorna – there was no “public opinion” among the ranks. Rather the presence of intellectuals, of men coming often from questionable background (either too socialist or too artistic) could disturb the simple minds of the soldiers, disrupting the precarious balance of the front-life held together by discipline, discipline and discipline alone. Nor the men had any reason to like the intellectual interventionists, who had called the war upon them but were dispensed from suffering the worst of it: “If Barzini croaks, we'll throw a party!” commented the anonymous soldier, talking about the most famous war correspondent.

And that was in fact the role of the intellectuals in Cadorna's Army: to pass on the High Command bulletins, changing a word here and there to make them sound good, in a basic but deliberate and somewhat successful attempt to control the nation's morale. Those who had gained that privilege (with the decree of May 23^th 1915) had to become executors of the Army's commands. No room for initiative was left for them.

But those men had not asked for the war as a chance to become cogs in an abstract machinery.

Their purpose had been to reclaim the “educational function” of the war, of that collective endeavor that allowed the vast amorphous masses an opportunity to find their own social identity. Their action therefore was often more ambitious that the mere propaganda function – the immediate needs to react to the morale crisis signified by Caporetto – demanded; hoping for a post-war continuation of their activity^3 . Attempts that would prove unsuccessful, with the fascist regime later re-purposing the experience of war time propaganda for its own idea of national identity and education of the masses^4 .

Wrote historian Gioacchino Volpe (September 16^th 1918) that “the war offered an apt environment to establish a closer intimacy between those men who were still far apart on a spiritual ground. […] Such intimacy, a good and natural prerogative of the human kind was precious also on a political ground. The long history of Italy required, even more perhaps than for any other people, a continuous effort to fill, close, remove, gaps, cracks, divides, conflicts of the national life: necessary precondition for the development of the latter was the development of the State authority, of the idea of public good, in everyone the will to place the general interest before the particular one.”

 

For over two years – from the intervention to Caporetto – this function of education to the national values had been supplied by the most unlikely group: the military chaplains. The institution had been reintroduced by Cadorna for the specific purpose of assisting the troops' morale, thanks also to the deep religious feelings of the Chief of Staff and his personal relation with the High Command Chaplain, Father Semeria; but in many cases it had moved forward of its own will, and of course with their own understanding of what national ideals were needed to the soldiers – the most prominent example the organization of “Soldier's Houses”, meeting points for various activities, that included reading^5 , music, conferences and a few shows, driven by the energetic approach of Don Giovanni Minozzi. Their purpose, much more down to earth, since the grandiose, rhetoric speeches had very little impact on the soldiers according to Minozzi: Semeria himself, the most inventive, capable, quick, inspired of all speakers had four or five speeches ready in his mind that he always repeated , without changing one syllable, one motion, one accent. […] To the point where as soon as he [started speaking] I quickly wandered away, to avoid being bored and annoyed by his dull repetition. Not speeches were needed: let the men rest, distract them, comfort, reassure, reconcile them with life […] The largest amount of kindness was required, brotherly care and attention for anything concerning them and their families; quick immediate understanding; sincere genuine affection […] The rest would have come by itself.

After Caporetto – facing the real and perceived “moral and morale crisis” of the army – the High Command, now under General Armando Diaz, made the choice to call back to arms the intellectual world, following that creeping infiltration that had persisted during the years under the guise of individual initiative (such as the experiments of talks to the troops held during 1917 in the II Army with the approval of General Luigi Capello and the support of the many personal relations of lt.c. Count Alessandro Casati).

Many of those men – those of lesser stature at least – had been wintering in the warmer climate of the rear, where, according to G. Prezzolini The State […] had subsidized directly or indirectly many, too many, publications of all sorts, from large bindings to gift booklets, from pamphlet to leaflets, from calendar to postcards […] The parties, the influence groups, the peoples aspiring tho new forms of State […] had increased this output of one might say non commercial publications, in the meantime providing the ends meet for many “intellectuals”, called upon to serve as solicitors in the face of public opinion, for this or that cause. […] Also many private citizens had been moved by different pleas but often also by their own ambition to give their contribution to the paper war […] Thus polemics, poetics, conferences, memoirs […] giving a chance to un-publishable authors to impose themselves onto the public's wallets with the excuse of charity and patriotism.

But there was also a natural inclination among the men to seek both self-expression and some autonomous way of establishing their “group identity”. Thus the many small and smaller periodicals, edited and printed (when not handwritten) by a few men at most, distributed around one Division, one Brigade, even – as was the case of the “Mount Crostis Gazette” - one lone artillery piece. Of course, this freedom of expression was granted as long as the improvised editors were self-censoring themselves, avoiding any subject that could be interpreted as criticism, of the war, the army, the men's condition, or turning those into small humorous annoyances^6 ; especially omitting the actual news. An interesting example of that general process that broadly affected the men under arms in their social manifestations.