Shameful sympathy: Mussolini's attitude towards Stalin and hopes for a separate peace with the USSR in the last period of fascism

The attitude of the fascist regime towards the Soviet Union and Stalin was twofold. Propaganda always condemned the USSR as the main enemy of the West, the international terrorist center, the opposing power par excellence. Communism was the main enemy for fascism. Yet during the twenty years of dictatorship there were 126 also more particular positions, which analyzed with particular interest the Soviet society, the five-year plans, the figure, the authoritarianism and the charisma of Stalin. All this had a particular development in the final phase of fascism, that is, during the 600 days of the Italian Social Republic. The Duce had illusory hopes for a separate peace between Germany and the USSR. During this time there was a growing sympathy of Mussolini towards the victorious USSR and above all towards the Soviet dictator, considered by the Duce as the real winner of the war. This sympathy emerged above all in some articles published by Mussolini. Eventually, the old Italian dictator had to admit that Stalin had surpassed him in his plan to militarize the Soviet people. Something that the leader of Fascism had not succeeded in with the Italian people.