Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler were both inherently corrupt, desire-driven dictators who transformed democratic governments into vehicles for domination. But the two tyrants had even more in common than most realize — right up until their deaths.
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00:00Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler were both inherently corrupt, desire-driven dictators
00:05who transformed democratic governments into vehicles for domination. But the two tyrants
00:09had even more in common than most realize, right up until their deaths.
00:13Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler were fascists who adopted state capitalism, whereby the
00:18state controls markets and owns the means of production. If that sounds a lot like communism,
00:22well, you're not wrong. Think of it a bit like modern China. You still have government
00:27but there is some freedom, for lack of a better word, with the production. Vladimir Lenin
00:31was more of a straight-up communist inspired by the political theories of Karl Marx. Marx
00:36himself never used the term state capitalism, but one could make the case that to a degree
00:40the Soviets used it, even if it was just in small doses with some powerbrokers.
00:45Mussolini adopted the same state capitalist model as Lenin, only with a bit more access
00:49for private business. This was the third way that would bridge an oppressive past with
00:53an idealized future for Italy. And per Economic Affairs, Hitler wound up admiring this same
00:58non-free market model. Moreover, Lenin, Mussolini, and Hitler were bound by the same self-satisfying
01:04lust for power amassed as a path toward freedom.
01:06Lenin presented himself as a mythical leader who brutalized a segment of his society in
01:10order to profit his nation's real people, just like Mussolini and Hitler. To Lenin,
01:15those real people were the working class. To Mussolini and Hitler, they were the true
01:19proud Italians and Germans who'd gotten the short end of the stick following World War
01:22I.
01:24Speaking of World War I, Italy faced extreme economic problems as the Great War wrapped
01:29up. Inflation ballooned, unemployment skyrocketed, people went on strike, public services like
01:33railroads ceased, and the Italian lira dropped to one-sixth of its original value from 1913
01:39to 1920. Into this gap stepped Italy's Socialist Party, promising reforms and gaining support
01:44from the public. But in less than two years, it splintered into the original party and
01:48the Italian Communist Party.
01:50This allowed Benito Mussolini to come to power through the support of Italy's National Fascist
01:54Party.
01:55It's disastrous that men like that can be placed at the head of a nation.
01:59Ironically, Mussolini started out as a vocal member of Italy's Socialist Party, and editor
02:04of the socialist newspaper Avanti, which means forward. After getting kicked out of the party
02:08in 1914 for advocating Italian neutrality in World War I, Mussolini turned radical.
02:14He fell in with Italian fascists, who splintered from the political left and advocated for
02:17a strong national identity and state-controlled economy. They were anti-communist, but admired
02:22Lenin's revolutionary behavior.
02:24Come 1921, Mussolini got elected to the Italian Parliament's Chamber of Deputies. The next
02:29year, members of his own fascist party, dubbed Blackshirts, went around attacking and harassing
02:33socialist party members, union members, party member offices, etc.
02:37When Mussolini's supporting fascists marched on Rome, the Italian king Victor Emmanuel
02:41III dissolved the government and put Mussolini in charge of a brand new Mussolini-formed
02:46government.
02:48Much like Italy, Germany was in a tight spot following World War I. It had been humiliated
02:52by 1919's Treaty of Versailles, which left Germany accepting responsibility for the entire
02:57war, paying back $33 billion in war reparations and giving up colonies overseas.
03:02By the time the Great Depression flowed out from the United States in 1929, Germany was
03:06in shambles, and folks needed a literal wheelbarrow of cash to buy a single loaf of bread.
03:12The country's economic problems were exacerbated by its Weimar Republic, a forced and unstable
03:16democratic republic that allowed Hitler to rise to power. Hitler was a World War I veteran
03:21who joined the National Socialist German Workers' Party following the war's end.
03:25Much like Mussolini, Hitler rose through the ranks of the Nazi Party via legitimate means,
03:29propelled by the power of rhetoric and the defamation of marginal groups like Jews. The
03:33Nazis also promised restoration of German power, stabilization of the German economy,
03:38and a restoration of German jobs, and so forth.
03:40By 1923, the Nazis also had their own private army of 15,000 troops, similar to Mussolini's
03:45black shirts. The Nazis gained a party majority in German parliament in 1932, and Hitler became
03:51chancellor in 1933. Just like in Italy, an emergency situation hit when a communist supporter
03:56started a fire in parliament's Reichstag building. The German president declared a
04:00state of emergency, civil liberties were suspended, and Hitler gained absolute power.
04:06Just because Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler rose to power through parallel legal means
04:10and shared a common ancestor in Vladimir Lenin, the two men didn't necessarily see
04:14eye-to-eye on everything. Their alliance in the Axis powers during World War II was a,
04:18quote, marriage of convenience and expedience, rather than anything else. And because Mussolini
04:23became prime minister ten years before Hitler became chancellor, Hitler apparently admired
04:28Mussolini, one dictator to another. He especially admired the Fascist Party's March on Rome
04:32that gave Mussolini his power.
04:34Mussolini didn't share Hitler's sentiments. He praised Hitler in public when Hitler became
04:37chancellor in 1933, but he considered himself the better of the two. He thought Hitler was
04:41coarse and simplistic, and thought that the accomplishments of ancient Rome were superior
04:46to those of the Aryans described in Hitler's long-winded diatribes. By 1934, though, Hitler
04:50was by far the more politically powerful of the two. Bear in mind that all this happened
04:55before World War II broke out. Until then, Mussolini and Hitler made agreements in secret,
04:59including to not engage in open war until 1943. As you already know, Hitler violated
05:04part of the bargain in September 1939. Italy officially joined World War II on June 10th
05:09the next year, four days before the Germans reached Paris.
05:13Hitler and Mussolini rose to power through similar means, and similarly fell. But because
05:17Mussolini lacked Hitler's absolute governmental authority, he was vulnerable to legal recourse
05:22to remove him from power. And in 1943, a mere three years after Italy entered World War
05:26II, and four years after Hitler started it, Mussolini was simply boated out of office.
05:31The Allies had already landed in Italy, and shortly after Rome itself was bombarded, Mussolini's
05:35Grand Council kicked him out. Mussolini's removal from the Italian leadership is complicated
05:40and mostly forgotten. Here's a brief summary.
05:42The Germans freed him from his Italian captors, and he became a puppet leader of an area in
05:46northern Italy known as the Sallo Republic. Italy was basically in a civil war, with Allied
05:51troops also marching up the peninsula.
05:53The important part of this story is how Hitler essentially controlled Mussolini during this
05:57would remain linked. You probably know how that part of the story ends. Mussolini was
06:01executed by firing squad on April 28, 1945. The next day, his corpse was hung upside down
06:07in Milan for crowds to desecrate.
06:09The day after Mussolini died, and the day that he was hung upside down in Milan, Hitler
06:13married his mistress, Eva Braun. The next day, on April 30, 1945, Hitler shot himself
06:18in the head.
06:19Germany had been on the losing side of the war, and Hitler had fled to a bunker in January
06:23that year to live out his final days. Eight days later, Germany surrendered.
06:27Ultimately, Mussolini and Hitler were tied together in origin, and tied together in death.