**Throwback** Italy's Devastating 'Years of Lead' w/ Patrick from Surviving Weimerika

92 Minutes

PG-13

Patrick is the host of the Surviving Weimerika podcast.

Patrick joined Pete to give an overview of one of the least talked-about periods of violent, terroristic revolution in the 20th century: Italy's "Years of Lead," which lasted from 1968 to 1988.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
I want to welcome everyone back to the Pequena Show.
I'm here with Patrick. Patrick. How are you doing today?

Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm doing good. Thanks for having me on.

Speaker 1 (00:11):
Yeah, man, tell everybody a little bit about yourself.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
First time on the show. Okay, first of all, this
is quite an honor to be on the show. Basically,
I host a little podcast which is sort of in
the deepest corridors I would say, the web. It's not
very well known, but I've interviewed some rather noteworthy people

(00:35):
on my podcast. I've had the fortune of doing that.
So what I do is, initially it started out as
kind of an identitarian podcast, and I decided to sort
of shift my analysis from identitarian politics to everything from
survivalism to stuff like more complex sort of metapolitical topics

(00:58):
and historical topics. But primarily that's that's sort of within
the realms of identitarian politics and also like extreme politics
as it relates to modern America.

Speaker 1 (01:12):
I've been really getting into history, obviously, having Thomas seven
seven seven, averaging like an episode a week for you know,
over a year now, and doing as much as many
other history podcast as I can. So when you reached
out and you wanted to talk about something that I

(01:32):
had heard of, but not something that I haven't I
didn't really dive deep into, and also something that you know,
I was alive when it was happening. Sure, yeah, I
want to hear about it, especially since the intrigue of
the parties involved. So you reached out and you said
that you want what I'd be interested in talking about

(01:55):
a little period in Italian history, the about nineteen sixty
eight to nineteen eighty eight, the main period called the
Years of Lead. How'd you get into it?

Speaker 2 (02:10):
Practically? I looked into the Years of Lead after getting
involved with this thinker by the name of Franko Freda.
I had heard about this thinker from a person I
had interviewed on my podcast by the name of that
was his name, Zero Schizo, And if you look at
my archives you can probably find that episode where we

(02:32):
try to discuss it. I'll bee it. Many of my
guests and broken English because they are from Peru and Mexico, respectively.
So I was interested in this period because of Franko Freda.
Primarily because Franko Freda, as I'll get into later, is
a very fascinating and interesting character and also a what

(02:54):
you would call a neo fascist. That's what scholars call them.
I don't think Freda himself would probably call him a
neo fascist. He would see himself in the mold of
a revolutionary both combining national socialism and maoism, two things
that are very contradictory. But he's also one, I would say,

(03:14):
the premier accelerationist, because I wanted to understand sort of
how accelerationism molds the political landscape as things start to
shift from the extreme right to the extreme left. It's
sort of like a pendulum, you know, it fluctuates and
oscillates back and forth in American society, and I think

(03:35):
America has never seen these sort of extremes. It's seen
sort of individual sort of extremes and third parties, but
it's never seen the extremes that Italy, you know, has seen.
It really fascinating me to be two because a lot
of the sort of neo fascist groups and even a
lot of the leftist groups have a sort of perspective

(03:57):
that I've seen on a lot of the more fringes
on the right. And that's why I sort of got
it into the years. I got into the years of lead. Well.

Speaker 1 (04:07):
I think probably the most interesting part of it is
when you start looking at who was involved, and for
lack of a better term, just the belligerents that were involved.
It was just far left, far right. Cia was in there.

(04:28):
Gladiol is a part of it. This kid, this could
be considered a part of the Cold War in essence.
And when you look at who allegedly supported some of
these people, some of the parties involved. I mean, this
goes as deep as anything I've ever seen.

Speaker 2 (04:46):
Absolutely, and that's part of why I got interested in it.
Because as America starts to get more gridlocked in terms
of in democracy, in my opinion, starts to fail, I
believe you're going to see more of the rise of
the extreme left in the extreme right to coincide into
potential violence. We haven't seen that now, but I believe

(05:08):
in that we have seen that to you know, a
small extent, and there have been you know, eras of
violence in American history from like the anarchists.

Speaker 1 (05:17):
Well, what's funny is people will tell you, people will
tell you, oh, Antifa and what happened the summer of
twenty twenty. I mean, that's just horrible. It's incredible that
that happened in the United States, there were literally terrorist
attacks all through the sixties and seventies in major cities.
People forget all of the freaking hijackings that happened in
the nineteen seventies. You know, take me to take me

(05:39):
to Cuba, take me to Puerto Rico, people hijacking play.
I mean, it was what we've seen so far in
the last few years has been you know, pretty or
at least since Trump or you could say Ferguson Missouri
really helped to kick this off. But seeing nothing compared

(06:01):
to well, it's compared to what could Yeah, and.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
I and I say that as could in And actually
there is a sort of an analog in Italian history
to what happened on January sixth. There was where the
neo fascists actually occupied the Minister of Interior and tried
to stage a coup. That was in nineteen seventy by
this guy named uh Borghese who was a former uh

(06:29):
former sort of squadron leader of the fascist His name
was Borghese, and he did they did stage a coup
and at the last minute minute it was sort of
cold off. And so I think there are a lot
of analogous kind of features of the years of lead,
which we will we see on both on both sides.

(06:52):
I don't know if you really could call, idealistically the
people of January sixth neo fascists in the same sense,
but yes, you definitely see these sort of parallels between
the two societies. The only thing I will say is
the way that the left and right are structured in
Italy is they're a little different than Americans in that
they sort of have a cultural landscape and a cultural

(07:14):
mollule to sort of tap into. Americans, no disrespect to anyone,
are sort of formless, and they sort of are just consumerist.
There really is no romantic notion of America anymore like
there was, let's say, you know, during the Frontier, even
like in the fifties, there is no And during the
fifties I think that's when sort of the romanticism of

(07:37):
America started to wane. The neo fascist and I'm just
calling them that just for the sake of brevity, and
the leftists saw Italy as something to culturally tap into,
and that's something I see that is different from America itself.
America itself, like I said, doesn't have the institution, he

(08:00):
doesn't have sort of the culture that Italy had at
the time. And I will say this that Italy itself
has a very rich history in revolutions, and that goes
back to the reseieg Ricogimento. That goes back to during
that period when there was a guy named Mazzini Garibaldi,

(08:23):
and there are many other sort of Italian patriots. Now
what's interesting about Geribaldi was, of course, I would say
the warrior faction of the Rissogimento. Mazzini was more of
the thinker. Mazzini was never appreciated within his time period,

(08:44):
but he took the formations of the eighteen forty eight
revolutions throughout Europe and he decided to put his uniquely
sort of Italian stamp on it. He was a big
proponent of secret societies. He was a big proponent of
something called the Carbonari. Not to be mistaken by the

(09:07):
Cabinii or they were. They were actually this kind of
mystical sect that people think may have formed many of
the mafias in Italy itself. So the lodge system in Italy,
and I will that will play a big part in
the years led because of course there was this this

(09:29):
lodge called the propaganda do. That was where a lot
of the sort of neo fascists and even some of
the Christian Democrats UH sort of hit out and was
able to, you know, front for a lot of the
state actors which were helping out both sides. Well. In
Italy there's a dual system. There's a dual lodge system

(09:50):
that is a visible lodge and an invisible lodge. So
unlike other forms of masonry, this had kind of a
unique stamp of Italian stamp on it, and Mazzini took
full advantage of that. Now, Mazeni is interesting because he
rejected the socialism of Carl Marx. He was a friend

(10:11):
of Adam wisehapp this has led to a lot of speculations,
such as the very sensationalistic letter that people often taaled
as Mazini and Albert Pike. That's largely a fabrication. But
Mazzini was motivated by the nationhood, by Italy finally overcoming

(10:34):
the hegemony of the Austrio Hungarian Empire. He was tired
of Italy being under the heel and Italy of course
was divided into sort of three zones. The only place
of course being free was the Kingdom of Piedmont, and
he assembled a group of people called the Young Italians.

(10:55):
The Young Italians decided to strike out. And that's one
like misconception people think they have about Italy itself. Italy
was always a violent place. It was always a place
of revolt. And this is like distinctly seen in Mazini's

(11:15):
revolution and Garibaldi's revolution, but also many of the early
sort of anarchist that made up the Italian landscape, they
always embraced the sort of notion of death, this notion
of like warriorhood, this notion of like these democratic ideals

(11:38):
could not overcome them. And this is like Mazzini, even
though he was sort of into democratic ideals, he was
also a Pan Europeanist, and I think he was probably
one of the first Pan Correct me if I'm wrong,
but I don't think the notion of Pan Europeanism really
became was prominent during the time during the late eighteen
hundred its correct me if I'm wrong. If that's the.

Speaker 1 (12:00):
Case, No, as far as I know that that movement,
if that movement existed, it would have been splinter Well.

Speaker 2 (12:06):
Yeah, Mazzini was a Pan Europeanist. He wanted to see
a unified Europe at that time, and I know in
our scene there's a lot of people that think that
canotes a kind of nefarious, uh sort of notion. And
also what's what's interesting about Mazzini is there was a
you're a younger person by the name of Bakunin, which

(12:30):
if you're familiar with like the early sort of history
of anarchism, Bakunin, Bakunin and Mazzini, what he actually was
inspired by Mazzini about the secret society. Mazzini didn't believe
in the pageantry or any of the metaphysics of freemasonry.
He simply used the Masonic lodge as sort of a

(12:52):
political tool. He saw it as like he secularized masonry
and saw it as a means to sort of rebel
against both the Vatican and the monarchy at the time,
which I think a lot of people in your audience
are probably reactionaries and they're pro monarchy. But this is
around the time during eighteen forty eight when monarchy was

(13:12):
sort of being questioned and these liberal ideals the nationhood
were coming to the forefront, and Italy was no exception.
Italy was a matter of fact, the last probably to
adopt any of these notions because it was seen as
the backwater like Italians. An Italian nationhood was sort of
just seen as under the heel of the Austria Hungarian

(13:33):
Empire and also the Vatican. And I think Evola he
mentions this, the Ghibbelin and the Guelphine, the Giffling they mentioned,
the Ghibelins of course being the Austro Hungarian Empire and
thee the Guelphines being sort of the Vatican being the Pope,
and those were the two sort of factions that were

(13:55):
controlling most of Italy's history after the fall of Rome
and after the follow of the Byzantine Empire. Then the
reason why I mention all this and I'm going to
move on, is because this set the stage for the
use of revolutionary violence. Revolutionary violence is very important throughout

(14:17):
Italy's history, throughout Italy's formation, and as you can see,
even many of the earlier people like the anarchist and
in fact, I have a thing I want to read
from this particular anarchist name, Renzo Novatore. If people are

(14:38):
not familiar with him, he was sort of the precursor of,
or maybe influenced by, sort of the Embryonic stages of futurism.
Futurism is a very strange, i will say, ideology, but
it is something that came within Italy itself and it's
something I believe set the stage for the ra cool

(15:00):
extreme on the right and the left in Italy and
it's it's stayed made his stamp proceeding that. Also, there
was a group of people, like I mentioned Bakunin, there
was a guy named Sergi Sergia Sergi ne Nitchev. Sorry
if I'm mispronouncing these words, but he was a nihilist.

(15:20):
He was this nihilist anarchist that spread all throughout Russia
during the mid eighteen hundreds, which was responsible for a
lot of different assassinations. They were also he developed the
cell system, which you see a lot of revolutionaries both
on the left and the right further use today. And

(15:44):
this guy was adapted by a lot of the sixties radicals,
including the Red Brigade, which I'm going to discuss. And
he pretty much said that the path of a revolutionary
is doomed. It's it's a person that they have to live,
breathe and sleep revolution. They don't see any other recourse

(16:08):
into developing this. Now, this is like I said, I
have not seen this sort of fervor in any other
form of you know, scenes in Europe. As a matter
of fact, I have not seen a parallel of the
violence that was escalated in the years of Lead in

(16:28):
any of the other sort of post World War two countries.
There was a little bit of radicalism with the Red
Army faction in Germany itself, but the Red Army Faction largely,
I think was largely a blip on the radar of
like in largely German speaking countries. But I think Italy

(16:51):
sort of has a unique sort of revolutionary stamp on that.
So anyway, let me read this from surrogaate name give Nicheff.
The revolutionary is a dedicated man. He must not be
driven by his personal impulses, but must be directed by
a common interest of the revolution. For him, the only

(17:12):
thing that is moral and that with contributes to the
triumph of revolution. All that obstructs that is immoral and criminal,
and that is like the words of Catechism of a
Revolutionary by Sergei Netzchev, that was part of the melliu
that contributed, I believe, to a lot of the early

(17:33):
impetus of anarchy. You know Italian anarchism, which would probably
manifest itself in later times in uh, you know, in
the Red Brigade and many I would even argue many
of the fascists sort of the divide between the fascism
and anarchism in Italy itself and the and sort of
how it's delineated is an interesting subject onto itself, and

(17:58):
many people that are in antifa will argue that the
fascist stamp on anarchism or the anarchist stamp on fascism
is a point of contention to a lot of like
modern day anarchists. Now, I'm personally not an anarchist myself,
but I do find the subject rather interesting, considering the

(18:19):
fact that this is sort of the framework that a
lot constructs a lot of the certain postmodern kind of left,
and especially the so called revolutionary left, which I said,
largely in America. It's based on liberal ideals, mainly about
identity as opposed to ideology. Now, this is something from

(18:41):
Renzo Novatore. He says, only the one who knows and
practices the iconoclast theory of destruction can possess the joy
born of freedom, of that unique freedom fertilized by sorrow,
is rise up against the reality and the outer world
for the triumph of the reality of my inner world.

(19:01):
I reject society for the triumph of I. I reject
the stability of every role, every custom, every morality, for
the affirmation of every wilful instinct, all free emotionality, every passion,
and every fantasy. I mock every duty and every right
so I can sing free will I score in the

(19:22):
future to suffer and enjoy the good, bad and present.
I despise humanity because it is not my humanity. I
hate tyrants, I detest slaves. I don't want, I don't want,
and I don't grant solidarity because I'm convinced the new chain,
and because i believe with Ibisin the one is the

(19:43):
most alone, is the strongest world one. This is my nihilism.
And further, he says, we have killed duty so our
ardent desire for free brotherhood acquires heroic valor in life.
We have killed pity because we are the barbarian capable
of great love. We have killed altruism because we are

(20:04):
the glorious egoist. We have killed philanthropic solidarity so that
the social man onearths his most secret eye and finds
the strength of the unique, and that is Renzo novatory
towards a creative nothing.

Speaker 1 (20:18):
In other writings, that sounds like it could be the
Shining Path in Peru could have adopted that. It was
probably the most nihilistic of all the communists in the
twentieth century.

Speaker 2 (20:32):
Oh yeah, Shining Path is an interesting anarchist group. But yes,
I think they probably did adopt a lot of the
Russian nihilist. The reason why I'm reading this is because
I'm trying to produce a backdrop of sort of what
influenced a lot of both the fascist and the leftist.

(20:54):
And I will say also another prominent thinker that is
very important is Surrill George Georgia Surreal of course and
his reflections upon violence. He emphasized that the violence of
the proletariat was a sort of measuring stick for class

(21:16):
and a strengthening and kind of a cleanser of sort
of the bourgeoisie. And I think this appealed to a
young Mussolini very much. Mussolini, who at the time was
a socialist, when he was reading Currell or Sorel, really
was impressed by this and really was impressed that there

(21:40):
was sort of a syndicalist thinker such as Cirell that
was embracing sort of Nietzschean you know, concepts of overcoming
and not not you know, emphasizing kind of you know,
the oppressed or that or sorrow should be a main

(22:03):
you know, staple of you know, kind of leftist thinking
or that you know, the oppressed.

Speaker 1 (22:09):
Well, Thomas uh has done two episodes. We've done two
episodes together on Sorel on Reflections on Violence. I keep
a copy of it on my desk with me. You know,
Thomas said, Sorell is what Nietzsche should have been.

Speaker 2 (22:26):
I actually agree, because Sorell was kind of proactive, unlike
Nietzsche was sort of not pro Nietzsche just sort of
wallowed and sort of is, you know, in his own
nihilism as much as he wanted to overcome. So I
kind of agree with that that Soirell kind of put
Nietzsche's thoughts into praxis as opposed to just you know,

(22:46):
lingering and lanterning. I agree with that about his observations
about Cyrel. But I think this inspired and this of
course inspired Giovanna a Gentilla who was also inspired by Hegel,
who came up with a concept called actualism, who soon
saw sort of the state as a necessary function to

(23:09):
move history as opposed to like class antagonism. So that's
a little backdrop about some of the foundations about, you know,
the ideological foundations I believe that are very essential to
the years of lead. That is bakunin Is concept of
you know, violence and the commune, the eternal commune, the

(23:33):
concept Georgia Sirel and his concept of like a heroic violence.
In addition to that, also the concept of Sergei Natschev
and the horror of course the nihilist revolutionary which would
later sort of influence the the Red Brigade. Also one

(23:57):
central feature that I've noticed with the left that's maybe
some commonality in America itself is the use of criminals,
which I believe, according to Marx would be called the
lumpen prol However, to the Red Brigade, the Rebrigade believed
that the prisons were fertile grounds for recruitment, for they're

(24:23):
the revolt against the state and their Marxist Leninist expression.
They saw the you know, prisons as a fertile ground
of sort of recruitment, and I believe that's that's some
commonality with the left in America, but I think there's
some vast differences there. Like I said, the Italian landscape
is a little different from America in that largely I

(24:47):
don't want to stereotype Italy, Italians or Italy because it
is a good culture. But there is some, uh, you know,
streams of corruption in terms when you know, the state
and criminals and politico radical politics come into play in
many cases, maybe the you know, Red Brigade and maybe

(25:09):
even the fascists themselves, who also recruited, I would say,
from the criminal underworld, really didn't have a choice in
terms of what the who their bagmen were. So let
me get into sort of the post World War two Italy.

(25:29):
Excuse me, now, Post World War two Italy is an
interesting study onto itself because you have, like I said,
the division between north, central and South Italy. These things
are important geopolitically, and this is an important portional meta history.

(25:49):
The Allied forces largely disposed of the Salo Republic. The
Salo Republic was the remaining public of the Fascist that
was still remaining in nineteen forty. In the early nineteen
forties to the mid nineteen forties, now at the same time,
and I want to say that in terms of the
years of lead, there's many different things in the backdrop

(26:11):
that's going on simultaneously in tandem with one another, and
there's many layers to this, and I want to illustrate
this to the audience that understand that there's many different
like layers to Italy and the foundations of Italy. Well,
the Americans, I believe, people like James Jesus Angleton, and

(26:34):
I don't want to get too too far into like
conspiracy territory, because you know, this topic can lead to
a lot of like conspiracy and a lot of different layers.
And Italians, from what I've researched and what I've looked into,
they really love conspiracies. They really love conspiracies. But anyway,
a very important player in Italy's sort of foundations of

(26:58):
all people is James Jesus Ingleton. James Jesus Engleton had
this notion because of his experience with Kim Philby, and
Kim Philby was this sort of spook that was, you know,
part of the British intelligence that was also a double agent.

(27:21):
And because of this this incident, James Angleton, James Jesus
Angleton decided that it would probably be a good proactive
measure to try to stop communism from spreading into you know,
portions of Western Europe. And at that time it was

(27:41):
really important to keep communism out of you know, places
like you know, it would it was rather failed, but
it was important to keep it out of like central
and you know, expreading any further into like a you know, uh,
you know, places like Yugoslavia, et cetera, of the Czech Republic.
They didn't want to spread there because Italy was a

(28:02):
very important sort of geopolitical position for them to have
to seize upon. Well, he decided because his father also
had many friendly relations with Bussolini. Now that fascism is
sort of condemned in America, it's important to note that

(28:22):
America itself used to be on friendly relations with Bussolini.
When Mussolini rose to power, many people thought he was
sort of a prodigal he They thought he was sort
of the answer to a lot of the problems that
was with socialism and democracy, so they sort of herald
him as you know, a figure. There was a lot

(28:45):
of friendly gestures to America. Well, Angleton's father was very
was a businessman. He established a lot of factories and
managed a lot of factories in Italy itself, and his
son lived there for a little while, and I think
this made an impression upon his son, just like the
Kim Philby incident. So what Angleton decided to do is

(29:07):
decided to collude with a lot of the former fascists
that were getting liberated by the resistance. So America was
using the resistance at the same time, it was sort
of working with the fascists. That's kind of how American
geopolitics work. It's anything that's Macchiavellian that can work on

(29:28):
either political extreme, they will utilize that to maximize that
to its fullest extent. And Angleton was doing this. He
devised and he was in charge of the Italian Desk
up until I believe nineteen forty six. I think he

(29:49):
was uninstalled, but still Gladio stay behind networks largely in Italy,
probably where the probably was the work of James Jesus Angleton.
Ever know for sure if that is like the definite
person who started this, because like I said, a lot
of Italian history around this part is kind of this point,

(30:09):
it's kind of murky on all sides. But we do
know that the intelligence agencies were heavily fixed into Italian
politics at this time, and the Communist we're gaining a
lot of foothold in the northern portion of Italy, there's
no doubt about it. Around post World War Two, there
was a lot of industrial development, you know, due to

(30:32):
the Marshall Plan, A lot of Southerners, a lot of
people from southern Italy who were more agrarian started to
migrate to places like Milan, Padua, all these different places
in northern Italy which later I believe will be hotbeds
to in Tuscany, which will be hotbeds of both neo

(30:52):
fascists and also like leftists sort of extremism. So it's
important to note that that is like these are like
the ground levels, these are the players. So what they
did is they divided these different parties. They made the
Christian Democrats. The Christian Democrats was sort of these moderate

(31:12):
They had a coalition of both center right, center left people.
There was of course the PCI, they were a Italian
communist group. They were largely sort of subdued. They were
kept out of like elections. It didn't stop their popularity
of course, because northern Italy, for whatever reason, has always

(31:34):
been a hotbed, with the exceptions of places like Venice
or Tuscany, of leftists, communists, sort of extremism. It's it's
always been a hotbed of that. I don't know why
that is. It always seems like the further closest to
the Germanic speaking you know, the Germans speaking sort of nations.

(31:54):
It seems to have sort of these progressive or liberal
ideas seem to appeal uh to a lot of these
these groups. I don't know whether it did. Maybe there's
a bio character, maybe there's something biological in there that's
intertwined with their politics. But this is a very hot
spot for that. This is a very so there also

(32:16):
was it In addition to that, the MSI, the ms
I was was a fascist group. It was a fascist group.
I will note, unlike Nazi Germany, there was never a
dnacific There was never any kind of a defascification, if
that's even a word of Italy. There was never any
kind of cleansing of the Italian infrastructure of fascist. Fascists

(32:39):
were ingrained and they were entrenched in all of the
military and all of the all the different sectors, you know,
the military sectors, the police sectors, and the state intelligence sectors.
So they didn't really cleanse, you know, if that's appropriate word.
They never really lends, you know, Italy of any of

(33:03):
the sort of fascist infrastructure. And this continued on the day.
That's why I think Angleton and some of the intelligence
agencies were able to sort of collude with one another
against the Communists. Well, nineteen nineteen forty eight rolls around,
and the Communists are gaining momentum. The Communists are gaining momentum.

(33:23):
This is the first time in Italy's politics they interfere
with the elections. Now, let me just emphasize I'm not
pro communists. I need to illustrate that I'm not pro communists.
I'm just stating what is a historical fact. America, for
better or worse, interfered with the elections of Italy. And

(33:45):
you know, I think this will probably set the trend
in America interfering in many different elections across the globe.
But part of the ground zero was in Italy and
they stopped. They put the Christian Democrats in a position
of power, and I believe this antagonized not only the
leftists who saw the the Communists, all the Christian Democrats

(34:07):
and also even the mainstream Communist Party as being sort
of interlopers and not true representation of their ideology. So
this like lock the system. This provided a type of
gridlock that we see in today's democracies. This provided a
kind of This paved the way for the years, the

(34:31):
years of lead and with the MSI. However, the initial
person they installed was actually anti Uit. Now the America
didn't like that. America didn't like and they didn't like
the fact that they were anti NATO, anti sorry not
anti anti NATO and anti Uit. They didn't like that

(34:53):
at all. They wanted to unstall him, so they did,
and they put in a more friendly sort of moderate
fascist candidates. So, like I said, this caused a lot
of splinter This caused a lot of derision in the MSI,
and like I said, all these things are going on
in tandem in the backdrop, and it just created sort

(35:16):
of a elaborateine sort of mess in Italy itself and
made sort of things kind of convoluted and really paved
the way for extremism. Fast forward, fast forward to nineteen sixty. Well, actually,
let me go back to nineteen fifty seven. Nineteen fifty seven,

(35:38):
there is a new party. This is a more extreme party.
This is called the Nuovo Ordaine. This is the National Order.
This was started by a guy named Pino to Ratu Ratui,
and he of course would have under his tutelage both

(36:04):
a guy named Stefano de la Chiai and also frank
Go Freda, which I'm sure people in your audience know
who Franko Freda is. They may not be that acquainted
with Stefano de la Chiai. Now the fashion the radical
faction of the the You.

Speaker 1 (36:25):
Know Franco Freda is still alive.

Speaker 2 (36:30):
Yeah, he's still alive.

Speaker 1 (36:31):
Yes, he's eighty two.

Speaker 2 (36:33):
Yeah, it'd be really cool to the interview them, if
anybody could get an interview with them. That would be
really awesome if someone could do that. And I'm kind
of a I'm impressed. You know who Franko Freda is.
That's pretty awesome. But that's pretty awesome. But like I said,
people don't know who Stefano de la Chiai, and he's

(36:53):
actually kind of just as important as Frankofreda hisself because
they actually colluded with one another, and they also Now
I've heard people say Frankofreda was largely responsible for most
of the terrorist activity that occurred during the years. Let
this is actually incorrect. The guy who was largely the

(37:14):
bagman and is very elusive is Stefano de la Chiai.
And this guy is as fascinating as Franco Freda. So
Stefano de la Chiai. He decides to he wants to
start his own party. He doesn't like the MSI, he

(37:39):
doesn't like the Nuovo Ardine. He starts the avant Gardia.
He starts the avant Gardia, which is the the new
the new order, not sorry, not the new order, but
the let me find uh. Yeah. He starts at the
avant Gardia National Vanguard, National yes, yes, sorry, National Vanguard, yes, sir.

(38:04):
He starts to National Vanguard, and he decides he decides
to take politics in a more sort of extreme manner. Now,
I have held off on mentioning the strategy Attention, but
I'm going to mention here right now about the strategy Attention. Well,
Strategy Attention, there's some controversy about its its origins. You

(38:29):
could attribute it maybe to you know, the state actors
which were colluding with the ci and Glaudio. But I
think that's a little bit too simplistic, because people like
Stefano de la Chiai and Freda himself actually wanted to
They wanted to accelerate the destruction of the state. They

(38:52):
did not respect the sort of democratic republic which was
installed by America. They saw it as decadent, they saw
it as degenerate. They saw it as entrenched in sort
of Americanism and the purveyor of liberalism all across Europe.
They wanted something that is more heroic, they wanted something

(39:13):
that is more warrior like, and they believe the only
means that you could develop this society was through blood.
They didn't believe you could, you know, compromise with the state.
They didn't believe there was political action. They believed simply
that you had to attain this sort and they sort

(39:34):
of had a metaphysical understanding of attaining the statehood through
the works. And I'm sure your audience knows of Julius Vola,
and they were especially fond of a particular book called
Right the Tiger. They were which in that book, I
believe Evola says, and I have read it. Evola says
that a Holy Warrior basically is based upon war. The

(39:59):
person has to bring about a new order, bring around
a new sort of like what he said, aristocracy, you know,
of the soul through war. You couldn't like mince words.
And I think this fire that Ivola had and the
adaptation the adaptation of Ivola's principles too by Stefano di Lacchiai,

(40:22):
and also to fred it hearkens back to Sorel. It
hearkens back to people like Rinzo Novatore. It hearkens back
to you know, even I would say, even to Mazini,
to where there was like the spirit, to where the
modern day world democracy, Americanism is like a corrosive rot

(40:42):
in Italy itself. It's a rot, it's disease that's spreading
all throughout society. And I will contrast sort of the
notions of the fascists versus the you know, leftist sort
of the communist in that they kind of wanted the
same thing, but they wanted a different ideal. The communists

(41:04):
didn't care about aristocracy, they didn't care about sort of
a new spiritual sort of aristocracy. They instead wanted sort
of a proletariat sort of dictatorship. Based upon pure Marxist
Leninist praxist ideology. The communists in the state, they wanted

(41:24):
to do things, do more, They wanted to compromise, they
wanted to do it more through state action. People like
the Red Brigade. They wanted to strike the system, just
like Freda. And I think that's probably why Freda decided
it was good to strike up a relationship with the

(41:45):
left and the right. Now, Freda, of course didn't didn't
get much popularity. He was not very popular in his time.
And I think there's probably more people on the Internet
that sort of appreciate Treda, you know, an accelerate his
brand of accelerationism more so than anybody at the current

(42:08):
like contemporary like Freda was considered I think a nut
by most Bimel still left in the right, he was
sort of a marginal figure. Now let me go back
to strategy attention. The strategy attention came about in a
meeting between Penal Ratu Ratui, Stefano de la Chiai, Freda,

(42:31):
and a various other neo fascist They had a meeting
in nineteen sixty four and there and and there probably
were plenty state actors there. There were probably people from
the P two lage. There were probably people from the CIA.
There were probably various different like state actors that were
acting as you know, officials, and the sort of brokering

(42:53):
between the two sort of factions. As a matter of fact,
what's interesting is the MSI itself, you sort of use,
the neo fascist themselves has sort of broke as sort
of bagmen. They sort of saw the n O and
the AV as sort of like people that you could

(43:14):
they were actors upon the state, people from which you
could easily utilize and then discard. So they saw them
as bag men to dispense violence across Italy. And like
I said, this is all still very controversial, however, make
of what you will say about violence. But obviously at

(43:35):
this time they thought that was a very good strategy.
They thought the CIA state actors in Italy thought it
was all something that should be maximized to its fullest extent. Now,
strategy attention said that they would do terrorist acts and
they would blame it on the left. Now the left,

(43:56):
let me just stull you the left is no stranger
to islands. As we can kind of, as I discussed earlier,
sort of the dictates that it was based upon. You know,
the anarchist Italy's history of the left has you know,
been tremendously bloody, and they did not mind utilizing the
left and the left and did mine. The only pronounced

(44:19):
difference I will say between leftists and rightis sort of
strategy attention violence, was that the right tended to focus
on bombing public areas, and the left they liked to
kidnaped magistrates, public officials. They did something called kneecapping. Kneecapping

(44:40):
was where they would shoot someone in the kneecap. I
don't know where they got that method from, but that
was a very popular method amongst the left at the time.
They would they would they wouldn't They would actually kidnap
you know, these different middle management factory workers and engineers
and aimed them up to different factories. So it was

(45:02):
not unheard of because like simultaneously, as like the strategy
attention was unfolding, there was also like, you know, this
was soon to be the hot Autumn in nineteen sixty eight,
which was the spread of this sort of leftist these
leftist notions that were adopted from France and from America

(45:24):
itself kind of their equivalent of the nineteen sixty you know,
nineteen sixties in America. So they started to adopting, adopting
these like sort of radical you know, these radical ideologies
within their you know, within their milieu. So, like I said,
the use of violence was not unknown to the left.

(45:47):
So like they thought this the State Department of Italy,
the State Intelligence and the CI and probably a lot
of the neo fascists said, well, they don't like one another. Okay,
they were very strange bedfellows. And oftentimes when I read
stuff about frieda Aras Staffano de la CHIAI I often

(46:08):
wonder the people that are examining, you know, these people,
just as their analysis to the left, do these people
really understand or truly want to understand why such terrorism
sort of manifests itself? What causes this? What central thing
about democracy seems to irritate people to the extent to

(46:33):
where they want to lash out at the system very violently,
to where they shut out any kind of let's just say,
heroic notions or any kind of notions of valiancy or
warriorhood or like it's it's like almost like neoliberalism and postmodernism.
It doesn't matter that these these notions. It's Italy is

(46:55):
a democratic everyone has represented it and everybody has a
represent and if everyone has their say, and therefore it
invalidates or nullifies any kind of tradition which any of
this country had. It doesn't mold or shape itself to
the tradition of the country. It simply sort of creates
this aberration for what I've seen of democracy. And they

(47:19):
don't have this notion that, you know, maybe there's something
wrong with democrat itself. Every single scholar I've read on
the years of Lead, they don't want to qualify what
causes this, you know, they're very vague about what causes this. Now.
One thing that's that's interesting, also preceding the years of lead,

(47:40):
which sort of shows state collusion, was this this incident
that occurred a coup and a nineteen sixty five called
the Piano Solo. This is where a neo fascist and
also some of the state actors wanted to destroy as

(48:02):
sort of the communist centers. They also wanted to destroy.
They wanted to they wanted to destroy, they wanted to
kidnap and hijack sort of the government at the time.
And what's interesting about that is that many people believe
this is kind of a false flag. I don't know
how people feel about false flags. But the Italian politician

(48:26):
of Aldo Moro, which in later times, which was kidnapped
by the Red Brigade in nineteen seventy seventy eight, they
tried to actually kidnap him. They tried to exile and
deport you know, filmmakers like Passolini, who was an Italian

(48:50):
communist filmmaker. He did the Salo Days of Sodom. They
wanted to hijack the television industry, the communications, and they
wanted to occupy government buildings. And this was largely the mastermind,
I would say, of the Italian State Department to Italian intelligence.

(49:13):
And of course again they were using the neo fascist
sort of as bagmen to utilize this. Excuse me, now,
what I wonder about this, maybe you can fill me
in on this, peat is, what do you think about
you know this this sort of a state intelligence in
Italy itself sort of utilizing the neo fascist as bagmen.

Speaker 1 (49:37):
I mean, it would seem to line up with Gladio,
with what we know about Gladio. You know what you know,
we asked the question, why was there not a denocification
in Italy. Well, I mean, I think it's obvious. I mean,
I think that's just if you know anything about Gladio,
that question answers itself.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
But I mean I've also wondered why. I mean, I know,
I understand Italy was a central sort of geo political point,
and this is saying I believe the same thing is
going on right now with Ukraine. I hate to veer
off topic, but I think Ukraine parallels a lot with
the years led in that they're sort of they're utilizing,
in my opinion, the far right to implement a lot

(50:21):
of the neoliberalism in America in Ukraine itself. That's very controversial,
I know, but that seems what they're doing. It seems
like the far right are always willing actors of sort
of the CIA or the State Department of Intelligence. They
always latch on. And I'm just going to say, I

(50:42):
believe that the far right has some healthy instincts about tradition.

Speaker 1 (50:47):
About well the right, I mean, Thomas talks about this
in our Spanish Civil War series. And there's no Fascist
internationale so but you have if you have a leftist
or a communist or any kind of leftist movement pop
up in a country, especially back then, there's international money

(51:10):
flowing in anything that would pop up from the right,
you know, and people are going to be like, well,
these guys weren't right wingers and everything. It's like that
these are European right wingers. It's a different thing. Have
some nuanced shut up. If they're motivated, they're basically willing
to take their money wherever they can get it. And

(51:31):
unfortunately it seems like a lot of the time, a
lot of the time when you know, I know Pinoch
basically for the coup, took help from the CIA, but
he immediately kicked them out. I mean, I have the CIA,
I have the CIA's file on him. They hated that guy.
He was not a CIA puppet. He used the CIA,

(51:51):
which is I mean, one of the reasons why, you know,
the man was brilliant. But I think it's just more
more of anything that you don't you don't have international support.
Right wing movements don't have international support like left wing
movements do. So right wing movements take support wherever they
can get.

Speaker 2 (52:13):
That's that's good assessment. But what I did discover, however,
when I was investigating in the years of lead is
Stefano de la Chiai actually was an international thinker. He
was a person that thought geopolitically internationally. Now, whether that
was by coercion, by by coercion by the CIA, or

(52:34):
by you know, other factors, he had to wherewithal to
strike out alongside the O A S. I don't know
if you're familiar with the if your audience is familiar,
I'm not going to underestimate the intelligence your audience, but
I think they're probably familiar with the OA S. O
S was this French sort of pro colonial force that

(52:58):
was going throughout Algae area and they were fighting against
you know, the former you know, anti colonialist movements. Well,
CHII actually struck up sort of a friendship or an
alliance with the OAS, which, of all places, was actually
going through this this particular publishing company called a Genter Press.

(53:23):
I don't know if anyone's heard of that, but a
Genter Press was this publishing company. It was really a
front for a paramilitary organization that many people think might
be a front for the CIA or some intelligence agency.
It was paced in Portugal, but Chiai had the sort
of tact tactum to you know, initiate a relationship with

(53:46):
them to use them to disperse his message. And this
also is interesting as he also struck up kind of
a There was no international but there was a group
of people in Spain and frank with Spain that was
largely sympathetic to the neo fascists in Italy that did
harbor them. This was made comprised of Otto Skorzeni. I

(54:08):
believe Degrell was a member. I believe Ramer I believe
many of these former sort of national socialists and fascist
were sympathetic to the Italian neo fascist so Stefano di
la Chiai especially and this will pertain to the Piazza
Fontana bombing. The Piazza Fontana bombing was a cataclysmic event

(54:33):
in Italy's history. This is the first time that we
sort of see the strategy of tension take root, and
largely this is considered to be The authorities at the
time didn't see it as the brainchild of Franco Freda,
although they will round it up later, and they also

(54:53):
rounded up Stefano Dilachiai. They saw it as the brainshot
of the anarchist. There was this particular anarchist from which
they threw out the window. They actually they interrogated him,
this officer by the name of Luigi Calibrazi. Through this

(55:15):
this anarchist out the window to his death and called
it a suicide. An investigation later proved that it was.
It was largely the Italian cops did throw the anarchist
out the window and during nineteen sixty nine. Now what's
interesting about Stefanodela Chiai, he put his money where his
mouth is in terms of the strategeum or the strategy

(55:38):
attention is that he was allegedly trying to utilize the
local this anarchist which was hopping from the neo fascist
to the anarchist to the leftist by the name of
I believe his name is Merlin Mary Linda Lindo. And

(56:01):
now Marilando claims that he was not a neo fascist,
he was not a part of that, but he belonged
to the same neo the same anarchist faction that this
particular anarchist that got thrown out of the window in
during due to interrogation. Now, of course, like Freda was

(56:24):
was was brought in for questioning and tried, and I
believe it was he in his entire sentence. They never
proved that Freda was responsible for the Piazza Fontana, largely
because they couldn't match the detonator that he used and
the sort of German leather that he used for the
bombs that was throughout you know, Padua at the time

(56:48):
or Milan. They couldn't like match up, you know, any
of these factors. And he claimed, of course there was
a particular Algerian that gave him the Debton. But what's
interesting about Freda is, you know, Freda sort of shows
that there was collusion with the State department. In the

(57:08):
State Department locked his you know, he locked the whole
information in kind of a box of security box to
where he could get to to prove that he was
colluding with like state actors. But nevertheless, nineteen sixty nine
sent kind of chills down you know, Italian spine. It

(57:29):
sent chills down their spine because like, oh, I think
over fourteen people died, eighty eight people were injured in
the entire blast. And while there had been like violence
and coups and especially left his violence in the north,
you know, in the factories and kidnappings, this was probably

(57:51):
the incident and the turning point in the years of lead.
This is what really kicked off the year's lad and
this this also inspired, didn't two are a lot of
leftists from from also practicing sort of their extremism. The
leftist section were motivated by this. The Red Brigade were
just gaining you know steam at this time, which was

(58:14):
founded in a university coincidentally in the same area of
trent Trento by Renato krush Karushi and also Margharita. Forgive
me if I'm mispronouncing Margharita Cagol, Yes, Cagol. They founded
the Red Army faction around in you know, nineteen seventy.

Speaker 1 (58:37):
But by the way, h Corzio, he's still alive too.
Who's that Renato Cortio. He's still alive too.

Speaker 2 (58:44):
Oh he's in prison. Yes, what an interesting story he has, though,
What an interesting story. I would even like to talk
to him if I could speak Italian proficiently. I mean,
the things he would probably tell me, because like I said, Uh,
some of the interesting fact facts about the Rebrogade is,
you know they had they had so many people that

(59:08):
were infiltrating them at the time. You know, they had
so many people that were influenced. I think this sort
of applies to our scene now, is there's all these
groups style that you know, people call them FEDS, they
call like Patriot Front FEDS, they call you know, each
other online feds. They they had this sort of discourse
to where there's like suspicion of everybody, and maybe that's justified.

(59:32):
But the Italians at the time were no different. They
were suspicious of everybody and everybody that was in their group.
So I think the other person that founded the Red
the Red Brigade was a guy named Francissi. Francissi I

(59:52):
think it was his name. He was like one of
the earlier founders along with cagoul And and Renato Carucci,
and he he largely suspected there was this earlier adopter
of like the Red Brigade of and he quickly after

(01:00:13):
joining the Red Brigade decided to defect, defect to you know,
this was around the time when they were capturing, they
were kidnapping and capturing sort of magistrates and then we're
starting to get a little bit more violent. He defected
to France and he started this particular study, the school

(01:00:34):
called the Hyperion Language School, which sort of was the
leftist counterpart to the agenta press that I mentioned about
Stefano de la Chiai. And this has just been one
conspiracy theory after another when it comes to Italian politics.
No one could ever decide if you know, there was

(01:00:57):
a type of there was a type of infiltration in
the Red Brigade. But there is no doubt that there
was infiltration. You know, there was infiltration. I mean, I
guess that that's a dilemma that you sort of have
if you are an open sort of group and you
are a terrorist group at that and even if you
are like you know, practicing the cell system, which they

(01:01:21):
were doing in various these different cities they were in
the Italian north, they were doing, you still couldn't stop
sort of federal infiltration. And there was like in nineteen
nineteen seventy two, there was this person that infiltrated their
cell and they started they had to go underground because

(01:01:45):
a lot of their people were were getting locked up,
a lot of their people were getting a sort of
thrown in jail. And then and then what's unique about
you know, Italy is that it doesn't it didn't matter
if like you know, dissonance are people that were in
these extreme you know, political groups were getting locked up.
They were seen in prison as heroes. The people in

(01:02:10):
prison sort of saw them as heroes. And the prison
at the time was so lax. It was so lax.
There wasn't much infrastructure in keeping people in prison. So
literally literally in the Red Brigade, there were the leader Ranato,
he got locked He got like he got locked up
by the largely by the work of a guy named Dchasia.

(01:02:34):
D Chasia again, forgive me if I'm mispronouncing that name,
but this was a guy who was sort of battle
hardened by his dealing with the mafia and Sicily, and
they decided to hire him to try to get rid
of the minace. What the Italian States saw was the
minnesot the Red Brigade, and this guy sort of utilized

(01:02:57):
all the latest innovation of surveillance. Uh, he had everything,
he had, he had everything to surveil the Red Brigade.
He you know, he would wire he'd wire tap, he'd
say informants, and yeah, he's the one responsible for putting
krushi and jail. He's the one pro largely responsible for

(01:03:19):
disbanding that. Of course, it didn't disband the Red Brigade
because the Maria Margherita cagoul was able along with the
Red Brigade to bust him out of out of prison.
And the funny thing is is that while they were
in prison they were recruiting new people. They were just
getting adherents h left after rights, and they didn't have

(01:03:42):
a problem with like recruiting the people they was. It
was very popular. That's another central feature of like the
Red Brigade is people don't understand and TIFA isn't very popular,
but in in Italy it's it was very popular. The
the Rebrigade was extremely popular, and the neo fascist counterparts

(01:04:05):
as well were very popular too. They weren't. I mean,
people had this notion that people into like fascism or
national socialists are sort of from the margins, in the
lowest tiers of society. Well, in this case, the neo
fascists were recruiting from universities. The extreme left were recruiting

(01:04:25):
from universities. Freida himself was a lawyer and a well
educated man. He was not like a peasant. So the
leadership at least and even though they did draw from
a largely working class and even peasants on both sides.
The sort of like leading figureheads of all these factions

(01:04:50):
were largely educated. They were not.

Speaker 1 (01:04:53):
Ronaldo graduated, got a scholarship to the Institute of Sociology.
Oh and just and I know this is this one's
easy to forget. Renado was released from prison in nineteen
ninety eight. Oh was he? He's he's been free, know that. Yeah,
he's been free since nineteen ninety eight. He actually started

(01:05:14):
a publishing company and started publishing leftist literature while he
was in prison.

Speaker 2 (01:05:20):
Really yeah, I mean he also was like reading books
on explosives when they actually busted him out, when they
busted him out, when Margherita Kagoule busted him out of prison,
he was actually reading. He was right there reading, you know,
explosive manuals. In Marguerita Kagoule, she she wasn't so fortunate.

(01:05:41):
She got killed, I believe in nineteen seventy seventy five.
I believe she got killed then by by nineteen seventy five. Now,
let me discuss an interesting character. And I think a
lot of people should probably take heed to this that
are activist about the whole notion of filtration into groups.

(01:06:03):
Whether you're an extremist group or whether you're you know, whatever,
if I don't by the way, I don't endorse any
kind of violence, a disavowal, but if you're like just
an average sort of like you know group in America
and the American system, because they are for what I've
seen a lot of these security think tanks such as
Track and others. They are utilizing data they've extrapolated from

(01:06:28):
the years of lead and tracking different groups, not even
extremist groups, but just far right groups. I'm sure they
do it to the far left more so, but it
seems like, you know, conversely, in America, the far right,
the far left is probably given it more of a
free ride, just like they were kind of in Italy.
There is like typically more favoritism I think, to the

(01:06:50):
FBI and to intelligence agencies, probably to you know, people
like antifa or leftists. Maybe because they don't they see
them as harmless. I don't know, but they definitely were not.
I will say the left in America is nothing like
the Red Brigade. They are nothing like the Red Brigade.
You may not like their ideology or their politics, but

(01:07:11):
largely they were about their practice. They were they knew
their practice inside and out, and they didn't mine destroying
the system to try to implement a sort of Marxist
lenin estate. They they didn't want anything to do with Americanism.
And this is one of the differences I've seen with
the Italian left is and and sort of the European

(01:07:32):
left is they are more traditional. You know, we you
discussed the Spanish Civil War and just to you know,
contrast those two things, is they anarchists in the Spanish
Civil War largely were going around desecrating, you know, holy relics,
like they were desecrating and I believe, digging up you know, priests,
and they were destroying like churches, they were defecating. And

(01:07:54):
this was also a pretty common I think even in
Romania there were these like communists that were doing that,
desecrating sacred you know, sacred sort of items. They didn't
do this in amongst the the Red Brigade. The Reprigade
actually structured their practice through Catholicism. They actually structured a

(01:08:17):
lot of their practice and a lot of their early adherents,
a lot of their converts were Catholics, even though and
I wouldn't even say they were secular. I wouldn't say
they were secular materialists like a lot of Marxist Leninists were.
You know, they probably weren't the most adherent Catholics, but
they were definitely not averse to, you know, religion. That's

(01:08:42):
one of the contrasting things I've seen with like the
left in Italy. And they also wanted their sort of
Marxist Leninist expression to be provincial, meaning they wanted to
remain and confined to Italy itself and not to expand international.
They did sort of pay lip service to a lot

(01:09:03):
of deliberation movements around the time, a lot of the
anti colonialists at the time, a lot to other uh
sort of Marxist Leninist factions you know in communist states,
but nevertheless, they really didn't care about those. They only
wanted you know, Italy itself to adopt Marxist Leninist as
that you know, probably the dictatorship of the proletariat. The

(01:09:27):
other central feature I will say of like the left
is they had intellectual vanguards. They had people like Anthony Nigri,
who was outside of like Marx, considered to be probably
one of the most premier Marxist scholars, and many people
actually thought that Anthony Nigri was part of the kidnapping

(01:09:52):
of Aldo Moro. You know, they they actually thought he
was instrumental. And he openly advocated in most of his
publications that in order to bring about a Marxist Leninist
uh you know, republic, and they they kind of wanted
their own republic, They wanted to make the North sort

(01:10:12):
of their Marxist Leninist republic. That you had to strike
down the state through violence, through armed revolution. And as
a matter of fact, I find it interesting that they
sort of utilized, you know, Catholicism and I believe liberation theology.

(01:10:33):
They used that as a means to justify a lot
of their a lot of their violent acts. You read
a lot of like you know, Red Brigade stuff. They
had this fervor about them to where they were religious.
They were almost apocalyptic, they were, uh they had they
were practicing this sort of milleninary and sort of Christianity,
and you know, they they were integrating this with Marxist

(01:10:55):
Leninist and uh this I think the SOM's Anthony Negri.
Now Anthony Nagri of course was let off. He was
he was not convicted of the Aldo Moro kidnapping and
he guess what, like most Red Brigade, he went to France.
There again it highlights another like conspiracy.

Speaker 1 (01:11:15):
Theory Anton and teaching right alongside and Fuco And yes.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):
Yes, yeah, isn't that isn't that interesting? Isn't it interesting?
He did eventually go back to Italy and decided to uh,
you know, he decided to like serve out the rest
of his remainder of his sentence and in Italy and
he's remained like free to this day. But you know,
that leads a lot of I think a lot to

(01:11:45):
a lot of people in Italy. That leads a lot
of credence to the Hyperion schools. Might be might mean
more valid as sort of covers for you know, political
extremism and political violence. Because it was also ledge that Carlos,
the Jacko, Plo, the r A F they were all

(01:12:06):
getting trained at the Hyperion schools. There was this like networking,
just like there was networking with the extreme rights and
the fascist the neo fascist which Stefano de la Chiai
that I mentioned earlier utilized himself to escape a lot
of the investigations into the terrorist plots. And according the

(01:12:29):
Bologna Bologna bombings, which were probably the most devastating out
of all of the terrorists in bombings and bombing attacks.
He was able to like you know, be spirited away
somehow to Latin America into places, you know, I believe
in Bolivia. Uh, he set roots in Bolivia. And that's

(01:12:52):
kind of odd that they were able to like, you know,
transverse all across you know, Latin America. Maybe not, maybe
it wasn't so weird. But you mentioned there wasn't no
Fascist International. There may not have been a fashion International,
but I think there was kind of a informal agreement
amongst the fascists and amongst the extreme right, and I.

Speaker 1 (01:13:14):
Think I think de Grel helped a lot with that.
Oh yes, yeah, and definitely in the fifties it was
a lot. Yeah, in the fifties, people were still scrambling
and you know, basically hiding. And as as the years

(01:13:34):
went by, then there could be a little more people
coming out of the shadows and coming together and doing
some planning.

Speaker 2 (01:13:45):
Let me mention after the Red Brigade, after they were
after you know, Marita cagu was was killed. This of course,
the leadership went over to Mario Maretti. Uh, he was
the nuts believed that was the person behind the Aldo Moro,
you know, kept sort of kidnapping. And although Moray himself

(01:14:10):
is sort of a he was a beloved Christian Democrat
figure that still strikes a lot of mystery to this
day amongst Italian politicians and Italian citizens. They wonder exactly
what happened to Aldo Moro on that faithful day, you know,
as he was kidnapped in nineteen seventy eight and later

(01:14:33):
found in the boot of a car in later times.
And he left all these notes, all these notes in
the apartment, all these notes everywhere, and he actually implicated
I think the current the prime minister at the time
may have been behind his killing. Now you're wondering how

(01:14:54):
that he was acquitted, of course, but there was this
other journalist by the name of Percorelli that broke this story,
Carmine Purkle Perkoli, that broke this story into the mainstream
and sort of gave light to some of the political
corruption at the time. And he was he was fingered

(01:15:19):
as the culprit the prime minister at the time of
Aldol Morrow's sort of kidnapping. And what's interesting about Aldol
Morow is what made him such a controversial figure is
he wanted to integrate the Communist Party into the into
the mainstream of Italian society. He wanted to integrate them

(01:15:40):
into the Italian society. At the same time, he was
also a big proponent of the Arabs in the Middle
East crisis, and he pissed off a like quite a
bit of like Israeli and probably Massad as well. He
really made them angry about being taking a very pro
Arab stand and I can imagine, uh, he probably didn't

(01:16:03):
make the US intelligence too, you know, too happy about
that sort of geopolitical stance either, So that could that
could be some implications about all domorrow. It is a
really strange case. I will say that Aldomorrow is kind
of a new war for if you're really into the war,
if you're really into you know, I like to call
it parapolitics, even if you're into that. Although all the

(01:16:26):
Moro case has all the trappings of JFK and it's
it's it's very interesting, But the guy that's agreed that
did the whole ordeal was Mario Alretty and Marrow Molreaty
was less idealistic. I would say than Kayushi and also
Kagoul he was a bit more less idealistic. He was

(01:16:48):
more into violence, a little bit more into kidnapping, you know.
And that that is like, that's saying something considering what
the Red Brigades were into.

Speaker 1 (01:17:01):
UH.

Speaker 2 (01:17:02):
Let me also mention that the Red Brigades ideologically modeled
themselves off uh, the Uruguayan movements. UH. And also this
the the movements that were in South America at the time.
One of their cherished sort of possessions was something called
the Mini Manual of the Urban Gorilla Gorilla. This was

(01:17:26):
a very popular pamphlet UH. And this is something they
modeled a lot of their kidnappings off of. And you know,
they took a hard line, Maoist, third world this sort
of stance into implementing a lot of their measures. But
the Reprigade didn't. What's what's really surprising is despite jailing uh,

(01:17:51):
the main proponent of the you know, Red Brigade and
killing his his his wife and lover, they still did
not lose steam in Italy. They were they were doing
people were doing terrorist acts. Up until two thousand and three,
there was still you know, indications of the Red Brigades.
UH sort of terrorist acts in many of the Red Brigade.

(01:18:13):
After they lost a lot of their you know, they
lost a lot of their popularity in Italy, they fled, Oh,
they all fled to France. France had this policy where
it would welcome a lot of former you know, leftist
terrorists to where they would if they you know, if

(01:18:33):
they renounced their their extremism and their terrorism, they could
easily get French citizenship. I guess that kind of leads
more sort of ammunition to the whole Hygh period, the
languished schools thesis that a lot of people have constructed. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:18:53):
I mean what's interesting is, you know, even in twenty
twenty one, there were still a France arrested seven leftist
militants Georgio Pietro Stefani. Yeah, I mean there were This
is still going on, there's still looking for these I mean.

(01:19:14):
The thing is is that it's in such recent history
that a lot of these people are just still alive.

Speaker 2 (01:19:21):
And CHIAI was the neo fascist terrorist idealogue, was actually
still alive until twenty nineteen. Yeah, and you know you
could probably even like talk to him. And that's the
thing about it. CHIAII was never fingered for any of
the terrorist incidents at all, because he was rather elusive
when he gave interviews and probably had a lot of

(01:19:43):
the state protection as well a VI through the Agenter
press and through the Black Orchestra.

Speaker 1 (01:19:48):
Well, he did a lot of He also did a
lot of business in South America, so he spent time
down there.

Speaker 2 (01:19:53):
Yeah, there actually is a point of his life in
seventy five to seventy seven that's like unaccounted for that
we don't knowing that that leads up to the Bologna
train bombing. And and what's interesting is that the second generation.

Speaker 1 (01:20:08):
The craziest thing about the craziest thing about that bombing
is is that up until that point, that the few
years before, I mean you had the assassinator, that kidnapping,
an assassination of all Tomorrow, but it was just basically assassinations, assassinations, assassinations, assassinations,
and they were everyone was just asleep and then all

(01:20:29):
of a sudden, just boom.

Speaker 2 (01:20:30):
And it's because the Aldolmorrow kidnapping really open their eyes.
The Piazza Fontana bombing was important, I think to Italy,
but it was like such there was such distance between
the two but they started to pay attention when a
very prominent and beloved elected official started getting kidnapped and
ended up killed. And you know what's weird about the

(01:20:53):
Aldo Moro kiss. And I'm going to go here in
speculative territory. I'm sorry if like, if I sound the
I'm not trying to sound schizoid here, but this was actually,
this is actually practiced in like Italy itself, amongst the politicians,
supposedly amongst the educated politicians. They tried when he was missing,

(01:21:14):
they tried to do a seance to find out where
he was. I kid you not. And a prominent Italian
investigator and now politician, he tried to do a seance
to summon the spirit of Aldo Moro. That was something
that really happened on the Congressional War.

Speaker 1 (01:21:37):
That's nineteen seventy eight people.

Speaker 2 (01:21:40):
Yeah, nineteen seventy eight. That was going on in Italian politics.
That's crazy. That's probably one of the most craziest things
about you know, Italian politics itself. I didn't know there
was like some of those and it was some of
that superstition that was in Italian politics.

Speaker 1 (01:22:01):
Well, let's well talk about the Bologna massacre and then
and then we'll start wrapping up, and we'll see if
we can pick up pick up another time, and yeah,
do a little bit more.

Speaker 2 (01:22:14):
Okay. The Bologna massacre was largely a train station. It
was this this nexus that was going to between Rome
and Milan. By the way, there was that was not
the only bombing. There also was the Italicus bombings as well.
But the people they believed was behind that, they speculated

(01:22:35):
for a long time that it might have been Carlos
the Jackal, considering it coincided with a lot of the
sort of violence in Rome with the PLO at the time.
But however, and that was decided in two thousand and
five by some investigators. However, it's believed that the Italian
neo fascist group, the second generation neo fascist group called

(01:22:59):
NAR and I'm not going to even try to pronounce that, yes, yes, Revolutionari, Yeah, yeah,
I just believed they were behind the culprits behind the bombing,
and they largely were the people that were uh, they

(01:23:20):
were the largely the people that were isolated for you know,
for investigation for that it was they were I don't
know if they were cleared or not of that bombing,
but it was largely speculated that the guy that was
behind that was either Stefano de la Chiai or a
guy named Mario Tuti or which by the way, has
a connection to Freda and a pro Libyan fascist group,

(01:23:45):
which you know that there was a whole network. I
think that Freda and some of the people like his
associates like Claudio Multi, they they sort of formed this
like pro Kadaffi sort of group. So Kadafi was dabbling
and sort of the left and the right at the time,
so it was like believe that those were the main
culprits in the hole Boloya bombing.

Speaker 1 (01:24:07):
Yeah, it was. I think initially it was Francesca Mambro
and Valario fier Theoreti. They got life in prison, and
then in twenty seventeen, in two thousand and seven they
confirmed the They looked at Luigi u Ardini and who

(01:24:35):
had close ties to turns up. This is one that
I have trouble pronouncing. Posizione.

Speaker 2 (01:24:43):
Yeah, third position, the third position, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:24:45):
Third position. And he got thirty years thirty years in
prison for that one.

Speaker 2 (01:24:51):
And one more thing before we wrap it up, I
want to mention that. And this is like for further
maybe for a further show. But there was a particular
Roman crime syndicate and if people are not familiar, Roman
is sort of the way it's structured. It has these
these different sort of gangs in its city, and I
think it was called the Bonda. The Bonda were largely

(01:25:17):
considered responsible also potentially for the bombings as well, and
they also tried to implicate them potentially in the Oldo
Moro kidnapping because they actually knew the guy who was
the leader of the Bonda in Rome actually knew where
Aldo Moro was and tried to contact the Italian authorities,

(01:25:38):
but they disregarded his tip and which I said I
mentioned earlier, it's it's not an unusual function in you know,
Italian politics to kind of use the underworld.

Speaker 1 (01:25:49):
Yeah, well, I mean in the future, I mean I
think we could do a dedicated episode propaganda do Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:25:57):
I'd like to. I didn't mention that, but there's a
lot into that. I didn't know if you wanted me
to go into like conspiracy territory, but yeah, I'd love
to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:26:04):
Well, I mean, is it really conspiracy territory?

Speaker 2 (01:26:09):
Not really, but I mean there's some people that consider
it to be speculative, sure, but they consider Glaudio to
be speculative, even though there's like there's the wes Moore papers,
there's a lot of evidence that it's it did exist.
Oh man, Well, before I go off your peed, let
me ask you why why do you think people in
our MILIU don't like to tackle Gladio Because whenever I

(01:26:31):
bring it up, there's there's a lot of trepidation that
is met in you know, in this millium about Gladio.
What do you think they dislike it?

Speaker 1 (01:26:39):
I don't know, having maybe having some kind of sympathy
for sympathy for it, so they don't want to get it.
Nobody wants to believe that, you know, people that they
may have had a yeah, may have leaned towards, you know,

(01:27:03):
given a choice, was operating and being controlled by you know,
the West, by the the CIA, which you know, I
mean we basically know who controls the CIA.

Speaker 2 (01:27:16):
So I want to say, also, this doesn't implicate you know,
neo fascism or implicate national socialist that if that's your
particular practice and that's your political expression, I will say
that it does sort of show that fascism and national
socialism probably until it has a proper rejuvenation in society
is largely a corpse that, in my opinion, was used

(01:27:39):
by the CIA and used by the US. The US,
you know, they're also like the Italian even the State Department.
It shows kind of that it was dead ideologically. But
I mean, I don't want to never mind, I'm not
going to say what I'm gonna say.

Speaker 1 (01:27:56):
Well, there were people who tried to keep it alive, Yaki. Yeah,
you have to try to keep it alive, and you
know it just uh, yeah, it was just too much.
You know what Thomas calls the Nuremberg regime. I mean
we you know, we still normy Khan conservatives suffer when

(01:28:19):
they say something just a little bit right, when they
get they get shot down. So and that's how that's
how far it's gone. Yeah, it's kind of uh, that's
a yeah, that's one hundred pounds.

Speaker 2 (01:28:33):
That's it's a fifth rail.

Speaker 1 (01:28:35):
It's a fifth well, it's you know, it's it's also
right now, it seems like an impossibility to even uh,
you know, to challenge or to even just.

Speaker 2 (01:28:45):
I mean, why couldn't they do it again? My question
is about Gladio and all this, and I'll let you go,
but why couldn't they do it again in places like Ukraine?
Like I have been met with a lot of like
scoring because I said that potentially there, you know, Ukraine
could be another Gladio No two point oh or three
point oh, depending on how many do you believe there
really are speculation.

Speaker 1 (01:29:07):
I wouldn't worry too much about scorn. What is scorn.
Scorn is what people people in the comments on Odyssey
and bit Shoot, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:29:16):
They think I'm crazy for just even suggesting that as possibility.

Speaker 1 (01:29:20):
Yeah, I'm like, okay, yeah, whatever. They're so smart. They're
so smart. It's like I said, I've said this before,
the comments on your videos. That's where intellect goes to die.
It's everybody. It's all the you know, it's it's all

(01:29:43):
the people who are sitting out there and you know,
just it's like the fans, the fans at are sports,
you know, watching a sporting event, screaming at the screaming
at the athletes and saying, oh I could do it
better and everything. Okay, well, sure, let's see you do
it Monday morning quarterbacks. Yeah, let's see it. But tell

(01:30:03):
people how they can find your work deep down there
in the recesses of.

Speaker 2 (01:30:09):
Okay, first of all, I want to thank Pete for
bringing me on to to a show to discuss the
years of LAD. I enjoyed this discussion. I love discussing
this topic. If there's anybody else out there that wants
to discuss this topic with me, I'm free. Uh it's
my My podcast is Surviving by America, which I will
admit it, it's not the most polished podcast. It's it's

(01:30:32):
at times, you know, I've had to like work with
what I have in terms of guests and in terms
of technical uh you know, in terms of like technical
sort of ability. Let's just say not on my part,
but I'm part of like the you know, the the
YouTube and due to my limited resources. But yes, nevertheless,

(01:30:53):
I kind of like the low scale production because it
does show a certain authenticity. It harkens back to sort
of like the Raid of the Pirate radio days. And nevertheless,
you can find me at Surviving by America on Odyssey,
on bit shoot and also on YouTube as well, and

(01:31:14):
hopefully people will put my uh YouTube in the descriptor.

Speaker 1 (01:31:18):
Yeah, if you just send me whatever lengths you want
me to to include, and I'll include and when I
release this.

Speaker 2 (01:31:24):
And again I want to thank Pete for giving me
a chance to speak on uh, you know, Years of Led,
one of my one of my favorite subjects because it
has so much i think relevance to the political terrain
we're going into in the modern era.

Speaker 1 (01:31:38):
It's also very European. I mean, it's it really shines
a light on European politics, on the fact that right wing,
right wing and left wing are different in Europe from
whatever you know, we want to call it. I mean,
there's just it really shows that you know that mhm, yeah, language,

(01:32:03):
language and labels, their inter they're interchangeable, and they're they
mean different things in different parts of the world.

Speaker 2 (01:32:12):
Yep, there's a lot more nuanced in Europe.

Speaker 1 (01:32:14):
I can tell you that, that's for sure. Thanks Patrick,
thank you, thank you, Pete.