The Italian Far Right from 1945 to the Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Nicola Guerra

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2023
• Print ISBN: 9781032566252
• eBook ISBN: 9781003828976
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political History & Theory
• Index: Politics & International Relations

The Italian Far Right from 1945 to the Russia–Ukraine Conflict provides a comprehensive account of the postwar parliamentary and extra parliamentary far right in Italy.

This book explores the ideology, movements and activism of the extreme right and neo- fascists. The recent victory in the Italian parliamentary elections of the 'post-fascist' party Fratelli d'Italia and its leader Giorgia Meloni highlights the importance of such research. The book examines why some of these movements participated with CIA- backing in the 'Strategy of Tension' in the years of the Cold War where terrorist actions aimed to keep Italy in NATO and prevent the Communist Party from coming to power, while other extreme- right groups vehemently opposed this and what they considered the dangerous 'Americanization' of the country. It debunks the myth that there was a unified postwar fascist movement in Italy, but instead excavates the complex battles within the extreme right as well as with their opponents from the left, and the authorities. This study is necessary to clarify the history and ideological dynamics of a political area still too often shrouded in mystery and whose geopolitical role is still poorly understood and generally underestimated. The analysis is contextualized in the present day by looking at the different perspectives of the Italian far right on the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The book will be of interest to researchers of political history, the Cold War and Italian history and politics.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Introduction: The Complexity of Italian Neo-Fascism and the Extreme Right after the Second World War
• 1 Ideological and Political Inhomogeneity of the Italian Far Right During the Years of Lead
• 2 Conceptual and Operational Structure of the Strategy of Tension: Ordine Nuovo (ON), Avanguardia Nazionale (AN) and the Italian and American Secret Services
• 3 Redating the Strategy of Tension to 1947 and the Los Angeles Net Project: The ‘Bands of Revolutionary Action’ [Fasci di Azione Rivoluzionaria] and the American Intelligence
• 4 Hate Speech of the Opposing Extremisms During the Years of Lead: A Late and Precarious Truce
• 5 Giovane Europa (GE): An Ideological Classification to be Corrected – The Origin of National Bolshevism
• 6 The Second Neo-Fascist Generation of the Nuclei Armati Rivoluzionari (NAR) and Terza Posizione (TP): Anarcho-Fascism Versus Extreme Right-Wing Hierarchism
• 7 The Esoteric Neo-Nazi Group Ludwig and Its Relations with Other Far-Right Organizations
• 8 Eowyn Magazine (1976–1982) and the Personalizing Feminism of Neo-Fascist Women
• 9 The Russia–Ukraine War Explodes the Historical Contradictions of the Far Right: Militants of Different Radical Groups Fight Each Other at the Ukrainian Front
• 10 Italian Foreign Fighters of the Extreme Right and Left on the Ukrainian Front
• 11 Ideological, Historical and Methodological Conclusions: Three Neo-Fascist Generations Between the Atlanticist Extreme Right, the Europeanist Anti-American and Third-Worldist National Bolshevism, the Anarcho-Fascism and the Nostalgic Neo-Fascism
• Index