jan 1, 1922 - Fascist Italy

Description:

After the March on Rome by fascist Italian supporters, Benito Mussolini becomes Italian Prime Minister. He consolidates his power and the power of the Fascist party throughout his tenure, becoming known as "Il Duce" and the most powerful man in Italy. He would come to an agreement with the Pope which provided the continued existence of the Vatican City as an independent state and the vatican in turn recognised Italian authority over Rome.

He would attempt to make radical social and economic changes across Italy, with mixed success. As well as colonial expansion in Libya and Ethiopia, with brutal results. Mussolini would ultimately ally with Nazi Germany in 1938 and begin endorsing anti-Semitic policies, to the chagrin of moderate Fascists who opposed antisemitism. This would see attempts at expanding the Italian Empire into French, Yugoslav and Greek territories.

Ultimately Mussolini would be overthrown in 1943 after the allied invasion of Italy began though he would be rescued/kidnapped by German paratroopers and brought to German-occupied Northern Italy to lead a rump state as a puppet of the Nazis. The rest of Italy not occupied by the Nazis would attempt to align with the Western Allies. The Fascists would fall from power and the monarchy would be ended after a referendum in 1946.

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