What should have internationalists done at WWII?

[Os Cangaceiros]

I'm not going to give any comment on fascism being a "normal dictatorship", that's non-sense...

Fascism in Italy wasn't nearly as fearsome as it was in other places. Indeed, the fascist state in Italy was in many ways a weak state, often so because of Mussolini's own megalomania and need for control over the Fascist Party:

Mussolini left a considerable part of the previous political structure intact, especially the system of local prefects. In a circular issued on January 5th, 1927, he ordered that the provincial prefects must be obeyed completely by all citizens, including Fascists. The result was that the prefects exercised more control over the party than the party exercised over the administration. Indeed, the Fascist Party contributed little to the formulation of policy, and Mussolini played off the members of the Grand Council against each other. He also insisted on widespread membership in the party, deliberately devaluing the privilege. Finally, he made the administrative machine more complex, increasing the number of department personnel and, in A. Lyttelton's words, "deliberately fostered untidiness and illogicality in the structure of government."

[...]

Is it therefore suprising that the fascist dictatorship was only half-implemented? The whole trend worked against effeciency, as Mussolini introduced new institutions but then refused to let them function properly in order to protect his own popular image.

Mussolini also failed to establish an hegemony over culture and societal ideas:

Attempts were made to institutionalize the control of culture through the Ministry of Popular Culture, which tried to regulate music, art, literature and the cinema. Eventually, however, the government had to reduce it's influence over cultural forms for a degree of political orthodoxy. This was a marked contrast to the more successful measures used by Goebbels to "Nazify" German art and literature and the "Socialist Realism" of Stalin.

[...]

The overall impression, therefore, must be that the fascist state failed to exert the type of control over ideas which is usually associated with totalitarianism. The more traditional liberal culture proved impossible to eradicate so that the authorities had to resort to a series of unsatisfactory compromises.

At no time, however, was coercion as systematic as in Hitler's Germany or Stalin's Russia. Torture was used more sparingly and the death sentence was rarely imposed for political offenses.

Certainly fascist regimes were characterized partly by their aggression towards working class organizations and militants. But it's also partly the characteristic of every other capitalist state that sees the working class as a potential threat towards the replication of the political and economic processes of the nation.

[Kowalsky]

some democratic factions of the bourgeosie had a non-interference pact but it by the emergence of WWII the democratic bosses were clearly aligned as an antifascist faction.

what democratic states did to stop fascism? did they supported anti-fascist factions in Italy, Germany or Spain? did they took any serious act to fight back fascist regimes?

the march on rome was a symbolic gesture, by that time landowners and industrialists were clearly aligned behind the fascists. this was the reason why the march to rome was not defeated.

that's exactly what i am saying, the Arditi del Popolo organized the fight against fascism AND against landowners and industrilists, but the internationalist faction refused to endorse that fight because of its sectarianism!

that is some gramscite trash. "working class organizations" by that time were agents of soviet imperialism.

by what time? by the time of the rise of fascism, the socialist party and general confederation of labor were led by reformists and the communist party was led by the internationalist faction! (I hope that no one here shall evere state that if a working class organization is led by a reformist faction that's not a working class organization...)

i think you could make an argument for german national socialism to be "special", but italian fascism was not particularly more brutal than the myriad of 20th century anticommunist dictatorships. it was played up because fascism was clearly an obstacle of the comintern.

that's funny, fascism as a soft dictatorship is a typical argument by the the post-fascists italian rightwingers!
well, i assume that you don't consider "brutal" the butchery of about 1 milion of ethiopians, the forced italianization of Istria and Dalmazia, the assaults on the labour unions' and parties' houses, the killing or the imprisonment of thousands of anti-fascists...

[Kowalsky]

by that time the left wing of the icp was ousted and defeated by stalin's men (togliatti and gramsci) so of course left wing militants were completely neutered.

although there were plenty of left communists in italy who did lengthy tenures in fascist prisons. also togliatti did consider the left wing dangerous, to the point that damen barely escaped death and the cowardly stalinists murdered atti in his sleep.

so? they could do class struggle only leading the Communist Party of Italy? Could not they build up a new party? (they did it, in 1943) could not they try to create internationalist-oriented class struggle? (they did it, after the end of WW2, when a non fascist stat was set on...)

[Kowalsky]

Fascism in Italy wasn't nearly as fearsome as it was in other places. Indeed, the fascist state in Italy was in many ways a weak state, often so because of Mussolini's own megalomania and need for control over the Fascist Party:

Mussolini also failed to establish an hegemony over culture and societal ideas:

Certainly fascist regimes were characterized partly by their aggression towards working class organizations and militants. But it's also partly the characteristic of every other capitalist state that sees the working class as a potential threat towards the replication of the political and economic processes of the nation.

anyone who say that living under a fascist stat or under a democratic state make little difference is simply living out of the world!
on friday a general strike will be held in italy, i know that we will be facing repressione and that the repressione is becoming more and more strong... but during WW2 those whose partecipated in a general strike were executed or deported in a lager...
(oh, i forgot that general strike is a counter-revolutionary tool and that only self-organization is good)

[Kléber]

For all their theoretical proficiency and impressive size for an "ultra-left" organization, the Bordigists wasted their political opportunities and behaved as sectarian abstentionists in WWII. They could have played a major role if they had stepped up and led the fight against fascism. Instead they politically struggled against antifa partisans and then tried to displace the partisan leadership from outside, after fascism had already been smashed by alien class forces, but the only way to ever beat the corrupt Stalinist leadership was to go where the advanced workers were and fight for leadership of the movement by organizing their own armed struggle against fascism, while preparing to transition the imperialist war into class war. The MLL Front in the Netherlands had a militant anti-fascist line, but I don't know if they can be called left communists precisely because of their anti-fascism, not to mention support for Indonesian independence.

Togliatti and Stalin on the other hand were not good revolutionaries who made giant political errors, they were simply traitors. The partisan movement controlled swaths of Italy at its height, but they cowardly disarmed their forces and surrendered to the imperialists and the bourgeois forces, pissing away any hope of establishing the proletarian dictatorship. The victory over fascism was handed to the Allies, and instead of leading the proletariat against the bourgeoisie, the Stalinists went around assassinating Bordigists and other communists who wanted revolution. Outside of Italy those reptiles did the same thing, murdered several thousand Trotskyist partisans in various countries, and many others just for taking a revolutionary line.

The Fourth International had the only correct internationalist perspective, opposition to all bourgeois governments plus defense of Russia and China against fascism. Its isolated forces were no more successful than the left communists in making a world revolution out of the war, but they fought against the Nazi-fascist scum in every country, and at the end of the war they fought against Allied imperialism and Stalinism in Vietnam, Greece, and Sri Lanka.