mario del pero, the united states and psychological warfare

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The United States and"Psychological Warfare"in Italy, 1948- 1955

Mario Del Pero

This article examines the covert and unofficial intervention by the United States inItalian domestic politics from 1948 to the mid-1950s, which was often referred to as"psychological warfare" (or "psywar").

Conventionally, the difference between regular and psychological warfare shouldcorrespond to that between the body and the mind of human beings. While normal-warfare aims at defeating the enemy through physical damage, psywar aims to con-quer the "minds and hearts" of the people in the symbolic conflict that always com-plements the military one. In the first years of the Cold 'War, there was a strongfascination in the ~ h i t e d tates with the idea of psychological warfare. The pedaIgogic belief that it was possible to influence and condition political allegiances, pri-vate and public behaviors, and even individual and collective identities was largely aproduct of the time. As the State Department official Albert I? Toner recalled, "Psy-chological was a fashionable word in those early fifties. You heard for the first time,or more than previously, about psychological warfare or strategy or whatever." TheKorean War popularized the Orwellian notion of brainwashing, which ended upexercising a wide attraction in American public opinion. I t also stimulated the beliefthat the diabolical techniques of mind control allegedly developed by Communismcould be virtuously reversed to promote and propagate Western democratic values.'

At the same time, the particular nature of the bipolar clash between the UnitedStates and the Soviet Union further legitimized psychological warfare as a necessarytool of American foreign policy. The Cold War was a total and absolute conflictbetween two antagonistic, but equally universalistic, models that did not acknowl-Mario Del Pero is a research fellow at the Forli Center of the University of Bologna. This essay received the DavidThelen Prize for 2000.

I wish to thank the Commissione del Premio Aquarone of Rome, the Lois Roth Endowment of Washington,D.C., the Gramsci Foundation of Rome, and the Gramsci Institute of Bologna for their generous financial sup-port. I am greatly indebted to Federico Romero, Anders Stephanson, and Giovanni Gozzini for their valuablecomments and suggestions and to the staff of the Truman and Eisenhower libraries for their help and patience.Obviously, the responsibility for the final form of the article is mine alone.

Readers may reach Del Pero at .'Albert I?Toner interview by Maclyn I? Burg, Nov. 19, 1974, transcript, p. 48, Eisenhower Library Oral His-

tory Project (Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Abilene, Kans.). O n perceptions of "brainwashing," see Abbot Glea-son, Totalitarianism: The Inner Histoy of the Cold War (New York, 1995), 89- 107.

1304 The Journal of American History March 2001
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1305he Un ited States and "Psychological Warfare" in Italy

edge each othe r as legitimate enemies, as jus t i hos tes . T h e totality and absoluteness ofthe war conflicted nonetheless with the impossibility of solving it by military means.Psychological warfare, therefore, rapidly became a surrogate for a war th at could no tbe fought-at least in the traditional way-and came to occupy a prep ond eran trole in the Un ited States anticomm unist a rsen al2But the absolute nature of the bipolar conflict comb ined also with the substantialopaqueness and amb iguity of the concept of psychological warfare in transformingit in to a sort of catchall formula. Since any thin g could have psychological repercus-sions, and since in a tmal war any act is automatically an act of war, any measureprom oted by the U nited States could be ascribed to the potentially infinite panoplyof psywar. "We can reach ou r objective no t solely, no t even chiefly, by means o f mil-itary force," maintained an internal document of the Psychological Strategy Board(PSB)of N ovember 19 51 , "so, our inten tion is to use all other conceivable means toreach our objective; means that are lumped together under the general heading of'Psychological Ope rations.' "3In the early Cold War the U nited States goals in Italy were to prevent a C om m u-nist takeover and, possibly, to reduce the appeal and electoral strength o f the ItalianCo m m unis t party (PCI, Partito Co mu nista Italiano). Most of the actions under-taken to those objectives were unofficial, since they involved intervention inthe internal affairs of ano ther sovereign country. T h e so-called psywar plans for Italyelaborated in the early 1950 s were consequently characterized by their emphasis o nthe necessity for resorting to unorthodox and clandestine instruments: on "specificactions," as it was explicitly stated, "rather than propaganda themes."*Psychological warfare was therefore most of the tim e unde rstood as synonym ouswith co;ert operations. But the measures provided for in these plans also consideredseveral other aspects, reflecting the catchall nature of the vague notion of psywar.Italian eco nom ic problems, the reform of the electoral law, an d Italy's trade with theSoviet Union and Eastern European countries were just a few o f the man y issues

See Anders Stephanson, "Fourteen Points on th e Very Concep t of the Co ld War," in Rethinking Geopolitics,ed. Geardid 6 Thuat ail and Simo n Dalby (New York, 1 998), 62-85; and Federico Romero, "Indivisibilit2, dellaguerra fredda: La guerra totale simbolica" (Indivisibility of the Cold War: The symbolic total war), Studi Storici(Rome), 38 (0ct.-D ec. 1997), 935-50. O n the justus hostis versus the absolute enemy, see Carl Schmit t, "D erBegriff des Politischen" (The concept of the political), Arc hivfi ir Sozialwissenschaft und Sozialpolitik (Tiibingen),58 (1927 ), 1-33; and Carl Schmitt , "Der Begriff der Piraterie" (T he concept of piracy), Volkerbund und Volker-recht (Berlin), 4 (1937), 351-54.Psychological Strategy Board (PSB ), Notes on a Gran d Strategy for Psychological Operation," Oc t. 1, 19 51,box 23, Staff Member and Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files (Harry S. Truman Library, Indepen-dence, Mo.). Established in April 1951 by a presidential directive, the Psychological Strategy Board had the taskof ind icating th e principal objectives of Un ited States psychological warfare abroad, def ining guidelines, and coor-din atin g the activities of the dep artm ents and agencies engaged in th e field of psychological warfare. PSB statutorymembers were its director, the undersecretary of state, the deputy secretary of defense, and the director of the CIA(Central Intelligence Agency). The presidential order creating the PSB is in Foreign Relations of the United States,1951 (10 vols., Washington, 197 9), I, 58-6 0. See also Joh n Prados, Presidents' Secret Wars: CI A and PentagonCovert Operationsfrom World War IIthrough the Persian Gulf( Chica g0, 1996), 84-87 ; and Rhodry Jeffreys-Jones,The CIAandAmerican Democracy (New Haven, 19 98), 69-85.4Psychological Strategy Board, "Terms of Reference for ad hoc Panel C," Sept. 26, 1951, box 2, P SB WorkingFile 1951- 53, Records relating to the Psychological Strategy Board (L ot File 62 D33 3) , General Records of theDepartment of State, RG 59 (National Archives, Washington, D .C. ).


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addressed by those plans. With little discrimination between what could and couldno t be a ttribu ted to the category of psywar, the plans were just Un ited S tates foreignpolicy in scale: expressions of a more general process they often simply (and pas-sively) reproduced.The Phase of Economic Determinism, 1948-195 1T h e Italian elections of April 1948 are considered a crucial turnin g point of the earlyC old W ar. T h e pro-Soviet Left was severely defeated at t h e polls, while th e m ainItalian anticommunist party-the Christian Dem ocrats (Dem ocrazia Cristiana, DC)-gained an absolute majority in the n ew parliament. B ut those elections were also rel-evant insofar as they constituted an important precedent for United States foreignpolicy. Du rin g the electoral campaign, W ashington had provided covert aid to dem -ocratic anticommunist parties: the Christian Democrats, the Republican party(Partito Repubblicano Italiano, PR I), and the Social Dem ocratic party (PartitoSocialdemocratico dei Lavoratori Italiani, PSLI).The electoral results were read inWashington as proof of America's ability to influence the domestic affairs of othernations throug h th e use of un conventional instruments: according to the Americanhistorian James Miller, "The results of the April 1948 elections created a generalconfidence in Washington that the United States had the right tools and the rightstrategy to effectively deal with the left."5This confidence intersected with a fascination for the unorthodox tools of powerpolitics, which struck a num ber of imp ortant figures in the Truman administration,including George Kennan, at the time head of the State Department's Policy Plan-ning Staff. T h e ability to p rom ote a whole range of measures short of open warseemed to offer what was needed in a C old W ar: instruments between total m ilitaryintervention and passive lack of a ~ t i o n . ~Nevertheless, no comp rehensive plan of w ha t would soon be called psychologi-cal warfare was activated in Italy after April 19 48 . T h e strength of Italian C o m -munism was interpreted by Washington in a double and ambivalent way: as theinevitable product of Italy's poverty and social backwardness, on the one hand,an d as a subversive an d mainly political phen om en on directed by M oscow, o n theother. In the late 1940s the first interpretation was clearly predominant: most

5 James Miller, "Roughhouse Diplomacy: The United States Confronts Italian Communism, 1945-1958,"Storia delle Relazioni Internazionali (Florence), 5 (no. 2, 1989), 295; see also James Miller, "Taking Off theGloves: T he United States and the Italian Elections of 1948," Diplomatic History, 7 (Winter 1983), 35-56. ThreeNational Security Council analyses of the Italian situation were elaborated before the elections: NSC 1, ForeignRelations of the Unitedstates, 1948 (9 vols., Washington, 1972-1976), 111, 724-26; NSC 112, i b id , 765-69; NSC113, ibid., 775 -79. Th e completely declassified versions are available in the R ecords of the National SecurityCouncil, RG 27 3 (N ational Archives). The best recent study on the foreign policy of the DC (Christian Dem o-crats) has convincingly shown the crucial role played by internal factors in determining the outcome of the elec-tions and the limited impact of international problems in their campaign: Guido Formigoni, La DemocraziaCristiana e l'alleanza occidentale (Th e Christian Democracy and the western alliance) (Bologna, 1996 ).Giles D. Harlow and George C. Maerz, eds., Measures Short of War: The George E Kennan Lectures at theNational War College (Washington, 1991). See also Anders Stephanson, Kennan and the Art of Foreign Policy(Cambridge, 19 89) , 308 - 10.


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The United States and "PsychologicalWarfaren n Italy 1307

Thii 1948Democrazia Cristiana (DC, Christian Democrats) poster reads "Wewould not have had thewar if you, mother, had been able to vote. Vote for the Christian Democrats." During the 1948elec-tion campaign, political forces competed for the votes of women (who had obtained the right tovote only in 1946).In this poster the DC tries to exploit the traditional maternalism of Italian soci-ety. Courtesy Gramci Irntitute, B o h p , Itah This poster and others can be #und at .

United States officials shared the belief that reforms, economic growth, and socialdevelopment represented the most effective tools for reducing the Communistpresence in the country.

The DC'S electoral~victory enerated a lot of optimism in the Truman administra-tion. The United States ambassador in Rome, James Dunn, stated his belief that thenew Italian government led by Alcide De Gasperi would promote those economicand institutional reforms necessary to modernize and democratize the country.American efforts were therefore predominantly aimed at facilitating this process: theItalian government was pressured to invest the Marshall Plan's funds, promote a vast


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T he Journal of American History March 2001

land reform in the depressed southern areas, and stimulate the ado ption of produc-tivity strategies in th e indu strial sector.'T h e scant receptiveness of D e Gasperi and his econom ic ministers tow ard Arner-ican projects and the consequent frustration of officials of the ECA (EconomicCooperation Administration) and the State Department is not of interest here. Inour context, it is important to notice that in 1948 the Un ited States approach wasprimarily based on an economic interpretation of Italy's problems. Furthermore,Washington still considered that clandestine operations, propaganda, and psycho-logical warfare were duties of the Italian government and the anticommunist par-ties; responsibility was therefore delegated to local actors, whom Washingtonproperly should only instruct.Q uite curiously, am ong the groups initially sup ported by the Rom e em bassy wecan find the C om itati C ivici (civic comm ittees) an d their leader, Luigi Ged da . Th eywere tied to the m ost reactionary circles of the C atholic world, strongly opposed toCommunism but also very distant from the reformism the United States wantedto pro m ote. It is likely that a sort of self-deception played its part in the Am ericandecision to help G edda a nd his Co m itati Civici: according to D un n , Gedda himselfwas "greatly concerned w ith social problem s" an d politically "left of enter."^That explanation might justify initial American support of the Comitati Civici

but not its lasting for three or four years. Anticommunism obviously constitutedone crucial comm on deno m inator linking G edd a to United States interests in Italy.It is significant, however, that such a link weakened in the early fifties, just whenanticom mu nism became the main-even the only-motivation of United Statespolicies in Italy. The crucial factor was Gedda's ability to present himself as one ofthe few in Italy who knew how to use the techniques of psychological warfare.Gedda's frenetic organizing zeal and his knowledge of the m ost m odern instru m entsof propaganda made him the local contact to whom the United States looked inorder to organize anticom mu nist psywar in Italy. His activism was a contrast to th eoperational passivity of the Ch ristian Dem ocrats party, which-at least in its earlyyears-did no t represent a political struc ture firmly rooted in the entire nationalterritory. The backing of the Comitati Civici, as much as that of the lay and anti-communist allies of DC, compensated for the Christian Democrats' weaknesses.

'Th e best study on American econom ic policies in Italy in the im mediate postwar period is still John L.Harper, America and the Reconstruction of Italy, 1945-48 (Cambridg e, Eng., 1986 ). See also Charles Maier, "T hePolitics of Productivity: Foundations of American Economic Policy after World War 11," International Organiza-tion, 3 1 (Autum n 197 7), 607-33; and Federico Romero, The United States and the European Trade Union Move-ment, 1944-1951 (Chapel Hill, 199 2). American reactions to DC'S electoral success and to the formation of a newgovernment led by Alcide De Gasperi were expressed in James Dunn to Dean Acheson, memo, April 24, 1948(865 .001 4-24 48), General Records of the Dep artm ent of State; Du nn to George Marshall, memo , April 26,1948 (865.0014-2648). ibid.; john Hickerson (director of the State Departmenti gffice of European Affairs) toMarshall, memo, May 4, 1948, General Records of the Office of the Executive Secretariat-Summaries of the Sec-retary Daily Meetings-1949-1952 (Lot File 58 D6 09 ), ibid; Dunn to Marshall, memo, May 6, 1948 (865.0015-648), ibid; Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), IA 5-48: "Review of the World Situation as It Relates to the Securityof the United States," May 12, 1948 , box 11, President's Secretary Files, Trum an Papers (Truman Library).Du nn to Departm ent of State, memo, May 17, 1948 (865.0015-1748), General Records of the D epartmentof State. The necessity of financing Luigi Gedda through the CIA is stressed in Edward Page Jr. to James JesusAngleton and George K ennan, Oc t. 11, 1 948 (865 ,001 10-1 148), ibid.


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W hile Washington assigned to the R epublican party (PRI) and the Social De m o-cratic party (PS LI) he responsibility to pressure D e G asperi from the left-forcinghim to ado pt United States-supported reforms-it was up to Ge dd a and his com-mittees to develop the instruments of psychological action deemed necessary tocounter th e propaganda of the very efficient Co m m unis t machine.'Covert Un ited States action in Italy in the late 1 940s did no t en d with th e finan-cial assistance to the Comitati Civici and the anticommunist parties. Italian intelli-gence services, disbanded after 1945, were reorganized with the help of James JesusAngleton when the country became a member of the Atlantic Alliance. Usually consid-ered as a proof of complete Am erican control o f Italian intelligence, this chronologicalcoincidence underlines instead how the logic of the C old War helped Italy to reassumeits sovereignty after the defeat of World War I1 and th e ensu ing punitive peace. oFinally, in the late 1940s, unofficial Unite d States intervention in Italian dom esticaffairs sought to weaken the Communist hegemony in the labor movement. Thispolicy was pursued with the cooperation of the Free Trade Union Committee(FTUC),a sort of foreign affairs department of the American Federation of Labor(AF L), eaded by Jay Lovestone and represented in Eu rope by Irving Brown. FTUC'SEuropean activities were financed by the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) throughthe Office of Policy Coordination directed by Frank Wisner. In Italy, Brown andLovestone suppo rted an ticomm unist labor, represented by the C atholic-dom inatedtrade union (Libera Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro, LCGIL,hen Con-federazione Italiana Sindicati Lavoratori, C IS L) , oun ded at the en d of 19 48 after asplit from the Italian unitary trade union federation. Brown and Lovestone soonconflicted with the CIA'S position, the policies of the American embassy in Rome,and the increasing international activism of the other American union federation,the Congress of Industrial Organizations (cIo )."

!On Gedd a and the Com itati Civici, see Istituto d i Studi e Ricerche Carlo Cat taneo, Lbrganizzazionepartiticad e l ~ c r della DC Th e party organization of the PCI and the DC ) Bologna, 196 8), 493- 548 ; Silvio Lanaro, Storiadell'ltalia Repubblicana: Dal la jn e delkzguerra agli anni novanta (History of republican Italy: From the end of thewar to the nineties) (Venice, 1992 ), 101-6; and Gedda's memoirs of the 194 8 elections: Luigi Gedda, 18aprile1948:Memorie inedite dell'artefce della sconfitta del Fronte Popokzre (April 18, 1948: Unpublished memoirs of theauthor of the defeat of the Popular Front) (Milan, 199 8). T h e Christian D emocrats were strongly suspicious ofthe American backing of Geddds activities; see Du nn to D epar tme nt of State, memo, Sept. 1 9, 195 0 (765.0 1 19-1950 ), General Records of the Dep artm ent of State.For a traditional interpretat ion tha t emphasizes American c ontro l of Italian intelligence services, seeGiuseppe De Lutiis, Storia dei servizisegreti in Italia (History of secret services in Italy) (Rome, 199 1), 40-4 3. O nAngleton see the sophisticated analysis of Robin Winks, Cloak and Gown: Scholars in America? Secret War (Lon-don, 1987), 342-428.

l 1 A vast amo unt of d ocuments o n American trade unions' activities in Europe duri ng the early Col d War hasbeen recently declassified at the George Mean y Mem orial Archives in Silver Spring, Maryland. T h e m ost relevantcollections are RG 18-00 2 (CIO nternation al Affairs Department's Files), RG 18- 003 (Jay Lovestone Files), andRG 18-0 04 (I rving Brown Files). I have dealt extensively with this topic in M ario Del Pero, "G li Stati Uniti e laDemocrazia C ristiana negli anni del centrismo, 194 8- 1955" (T he United States and the Christian Demo crats inthe years of centrism, 1948-19 55) (P h.D . diss., State University of Milan, 1999 ), 55-6 6, 93-9 9, 128-35. Seealso Anthony Carew, "The American Labor Movement in Fizzland: The Free Trade Union Committee and theCIA,"Labor History, 39 (no . 1, 1998 ), 25-4 2; Maria Eleonora Guasconi, Lkltrafaccia della meahglia: Guerrapsico-logica e diplomazia sinahcale nelle relazioni Italia-Stati Uniti durante la prima fase della guerra fie& (1947- 1955)(T he other side of the coin: Psychological warfare and tra de union diplomacy in the relations between the Un itedStates and Italy during the first ~e r i o d f the Cold War, 1947-1955 ) (Catanzaro, 1999); and Ted Morgan, ACovert Life: Jay Lovestone: Communist, Anti-Communist, and Spymaster (New York, 199 9), 195-2 43.


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Th is brief and sketchy illustration of Un ited States clandestine activities in Italydur ing the late 194 0s allows us to put fo rth som e tentative hypotheses.Covert operations in those years were still the second choice of Un ited States pol-icy in Italy. ?he 19 48 elections generated widespread op timism , nourishing the con-viction that economic development, social reforms, income redistribution, andconsolidation of democratic institutions would be sufficient to reduce the Commu-nist presence in the country. T h e years 194 8-19 50 were also a period of doctrinallegitimization of covert operations as necessary tools in the Cold War, but theu n it e d States governm ent still lacked the experience an d structu res to initiate a pro-gram of clandestine activities on a wider scale in Europ e a nd in Italy.12O nly ad h oc measures, destined to deal with contingen t problems, were pu t in to

place. The lack of planning and coordination, however, allowed for the develop-ment of autonomous initiatives on the part of various American actors operating inItaly (State Department, Defense Department, ECA,CIA, trade unions). The resultwas a lack of supervision an d the operative au ton om y of the d ifferent groups, whichcontinued in the following years and represented a paradigmatic expression of themore general pluralism of United States foreign policy.United States officials initially emphasized the necessity for the Italian govern-m en t an d anticom mu nist groups to assume direct responsibility for the implemen-tation of the m easures suggested by W ashington. But D e Gasperi and the DC wereextremely reluctant to und ertake those initiatives, for a variety of reasons tha t willbe analyzed in the last part of this article. Here it is im po rtan t to stress tha t the DC'Sposition was interpreted in Washington as further proof of its passive conservatism,which manifested itself in the unwillingness to promote United States-supportedsocial and economic reforms but also in the weakness and apathy with which theChristian Dem ocrats responded to the Co m m unis t "threat."The Psychologicat Strategy Boardand the Demagnetize-Clydesdale PlanT h e American decision to elaborate a comprehensive plan of psychological warfarefor Italy was made during the sum mer of 19 51. Th ree main elements contributed tothis decision. First of all, the intensification of Cold War antagonism led the Tru-man administration to look for new instrumen ts to employ against the C om m un istmenace. The Korean War was a crucial turning point: it nourished the convictionthat the Soviet Un ion was an expansionist power, ben t o n world domination and ableto rely, in th e Western bloc, on loyal fifth co lumns such as the Italian and the FrenchCommunist parties. United States foreign policy progressively shifted toward asymm etric-universalist ap proach to in ternatio nal affairs, which globalized Americaninterests and commitmen ts. A clear manifestation of this new line was NSC 68 . Expres-sion of a binary and dichotomous approach to world affairs, this National SecurityCounc il document made extensive use of a series of rhetoric symbols-freedom ver-sus slavery, dem ocracy versus autocracy, pluralism versus totalitarianism -to define

I2MarkLowenthal, US. Intelligence: Evolution andAnatomy (Westport, 1992), 22-29.


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the absolute conflict between Communism and the "free world." For my analysis,the m ost significant elemen t of N SC 68 is represented by its call to create a "healthyinternational com mu nity": it m eant removing those potentially contagious anom a-lies tha t still existed within the Western comm unity.13Second, the globalization of United States foreign policy intersected also with itsprogressive militarization. Fears that Soviet possession of the atomic bomb couldcombine with Moscow's conventional sup eriority to establish a "window of vulnera-bility" in Europe led Washington to promote the rearmament of European allies.This militarization of containment accentuated Washington's willingness to makeuse of un orthodo x tools. Above all, it contribu ted to reducing the appeal of the eco-nomic interpretations of Communist success in Italy. The main emphasis was nowon the subversive and conspiratorial nature of PCI and on its loyal subservience toSoviet expansionist designs.Finally, this interpretation was also stimulated by the disappointment of UnitedStates officials in the slow evolution of the Italian domestic scene. Italy in 1951looked distinctly different from wh at h ad been expected th ree years earlikr: despiteprevious hopes, th e lay center-left an ticom mu nist parties were unable to play a rele-vant role in th e D C-do minated government. T h e DC, apart from being weakened byinternal divisions, seemed too conservative to promote the reforms needed for thecountry's modernization and too weak to face the Communist threat. Corruptionwas widespread, and the success of the right-wing parties, the Monarchists (PartitoNazionale Monarchico, PNM)and the Neofascists (Movimento Sociale Italiano,M SI), eemed to pave the way to a polarization of political struggle that could onlybenefit the Left. Most of all, it was the size of the Communist (PCI)and Socialist(Partito Socialista Italiano, PSI)parties th at surprised and wo rried the U nited States.T h e results of th e local elections of M ay- Jun e 19 51, the first nationwide poll since19 48 , disappointed W ashington: thank s to a ne w electoral law, the DC was able toconquer many cities previously administered by the P CI,bu t the pro-Soviet left voteincreased from 3 3 percent t o almost 38 percent.14Within the Truman administration, many thought it was time to adopt a newapproach toward Italian C om m un ism . An analysis of the electoral results elaboratedfor the members of the Psychological Strategy Board (PSB) mphasized this point.

I3Amon g the vast literature o n ~ s c8, I have relied mainly on John Lewis Gaddis, Strategies of Containment:A Critical Appraisal of Postwar American National Securiy Poliolicy (New York, 1982 ), 89-1 26. I am indebted toProf. Anders Stephanson for having allowed me to see his article before its publication: Anders Stephanson, "Lib-erty or Death: The Cold War as us Ideology," in Reviewing the Cold War: Approaches, Interpretations, Theory, ed .O d d Arne Westad (Lon don, 2000 ). See also the essays in Ernest May, ed., American Cold War Strategy: InterpretingNS C 68 (Boston, 1993). N SC 68 can be found in Thomas H. Etzold and John Lewis Gaddis, eds., Containment:Documents on American Poliolicy andstrategy, 194 5-1 950 (New York, 1 978), 385-442.'* T h e American in terpre tation of the 195 1 local elections is in Division of Research for Western E urope(De part men t of State), "Factors in the Italian Elections," June 18, 1951 , box 3, Records of the Office of WesternEuropean Affairs Relating to Italy 19 43-1 951 (Lot File 54 D3 28), General Records of the D epart men t of State;Office of Intelligence and Research, Depar tme nt of State (OIR ), ntelligence Estimate 2 1, "C om mu nist Strengthin the Italian Elections," June 29, 1951 , box 64, Intelligence Bureau, Office of the Director: 1950- 1959 (Lot File58D 528 ), General Records of the D epar tme nt of State; James Bonbright (assistant secretary of state for EuropeanAffairs) to M atthews (deputy undersecretary of state), July 7, 195 1, box 11, Staff Member and Office Files, Psy-chological Strategy Board Files.


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Contesting the optimistic comments of the Rome embassy, the document under-lined the ability of the PCI to increase its strength despite the "amount of physicalreconstruction" a nd th e consequent "substantial economic improvem ent" that ha dtaken place since 1945. While economic growth "has had a tremendous effect onthe other countries of E urope, where the trend of post-war elections has reduced theCommunists to minor proportions," that had not been the case in Italy (or inFrance) where "mass supp ort for the Co mm unists continues virtually und iminished,even in the privacy of the election b ooth where people are not subject to C om m u-nist intimidation and coercion and need no fear of reprisal." The only conclusiontha t could be drawn was tha t American efforts in Italy had been a "failire" an d tha ttheir continuation wo uld no t weaken the PCI. "T he doctrine of economic determin-ism," the do cum en t main tained , "is too simple a hypothesis for France an d Italy." Itwas therefore necessary to apply new anticom mu nist instrum ents a nd m ethods, "forunless Com m un ist streng th is very substantially reduced, France an d Italy, regardlessof the pro-Western orientation of their governments," would constitute "weak,irresolute and nervous members of the Western Defense alliance in the absence ofwar" an d wou ld be "unreliable to th e poin t of being a positive danger to ou r strate-gic plans for Europe in the event of war." The Italian government was thereforeinvited to intervene in the labor movement and in the political field. In the labormovement, which represented the "major source of power" of th e PC I, t was necessaryto refuse "to negotiate with Communist union leaders in nationalized industries," todeprive Communist unions "by law of various [but unspecified] rights," to pressureemployers no t to negotiate with "unions under subversive control," and to forbid theirleaders "to sit on public or semi-public bodies." In the political field, it was themoment to reduce the organizational power of the PCI,deprive it of the buildingsand structures occupied at the end of the war, an d freeze the public funds going toCom munist (or fellow traveler) press, schools, and various organizations. T h e Italiangovernment's refusal to take such actions "on the g rounds they were 'undemocratic'-one of the reasons given by past Governments to excuse their inaction-[was]incomp rehensible." T h e actions did not need to be taken "at one time, but as a seriesof individual moves over a period of time" in order to reduce the danger of provok-ing a civil war. T h e possibility of outlawing the PCI was no t ruled o ut bu t was con-sidered too risky at the mom en t. Th at step could be taken only at a later stage, whenthe Communist party had been substantially weakened: "Whether this extrememeasure should or should not be taken is a practical question, not a question ofprinciple. It need not be considered until after one can see how much successattends the less drastic measures advocated above."'5

l 5 "French and Italian Elections," July 6, 195 1, box 11, Staff Memb er an d Office Files, Psychological StrategyBoard Files. The author of the document is not specified, but the minutes of the first PSB meeting, which tookplace on July 9, 1951, contain references to an analysis of the Italian and French situation elaborated by a StateDepar tmen t-CM comm ittee chaired by Sam Berger (special assistant of Averell Harri man at the M utual SecurityAgency) and presented to the PSB three days earlier. See Psychological Strategy Board, "Meeting re Official usPosition vis-a-vis French and Italian G overnments in Their Relation to the C om mu nis t Party," July 9, 1951, box11 , ibid A similar docum ent, sent by Berger to Har riman but dated July 5, is quoted in Leopoldo Nu ti, Gli StatiUniti e l'apertura a sinistra: Importanza e lim iti della presenza americana in lta lia (Th e United States and the open-ing to the left: Impo rtance and limits of the American presence in Italy) (Rome, 1999), 1 3.


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1313h e U n i t e d S t at e s a n d " P sy ch ol og ic al W a r f a r e " i n I t al y

The belief that the success of Italian and French Communism was facilitated bythe local governm ents' passivity was widely shared in Washington. Du rin g the su m-mer of 1951 it was therefore decided to elaborate a comprehensive psychologicalwarfare plan for Italy an d France (the first PSB plan), based o n the recommendationsof the two American ambassadors (James D u n n an d David Bruce) and o n a projectof action drafted in September by the CIA'S depu ty d irector, Allen Dulles.16T h e PSB met du ring September to discuss the co m m on psywar plan for Italy andFrance (PSB~ - 1 6 ) . l 'An ad hoc com mittee (Panel C ) was instituted in W ashingtonto supervise the project, while the two ambassadors were invited to create similarbodies in their embassies. The plan assumed its final form in November when thedefinitive draft was elaborated by Panel C and approved by the PSB. It was dividedinto two parts, one concerned with France (Plan A) an d the o ther with Italy (Plan B).18T h e objective of the PSB plans was initially defined as "to reduce the strength andappeal of Com m un ist Parties in France and Italy, with the ultimate objective of ou t-lawing them." In order t o achieve this goal it was necessary to persuade th e govern-ments of the two countries "to undertake approp riate an d timely measures withintheir capabilities," while U nited States governm ent agencies could furnish a "coordi-nated su ppo rt." According t o th e State representative o n Panel C , Walter Walmsley,the Italian government should begin to "treat Italian Communists as Communistsrather than Italians, throu gh legislative and ad ministrative harassment, suppressionand control."19The measures provided for in the plan were divided into positive and repressiveactions. Among the former were the usual references to the importance of improv-ing working conditions through social security and labor legislation, strengtheningfree trade unions and the cooperative movement, and intensifying anticommunistpropaganda. T h e part on the repressive actions was more detailed an d significant. It

I q h e criticisms of the Italian and French governm ents, accused of being "not aggressive enough in using theirpowers to combat Communism," were expressed by Harriman during a meeting with Secretary of State DeanAcheson. See Sum ma ry of Meeting w ith th e Secretary, July 10 , 195 1, Sum ma ry of Secretary's Daily Meetin gs (Lo tFile 58D6 09) , General Records of th e D epartm ent of State. A first set of operational proposals for Italy andFrance was drafted by the R ome an d Paris embassies at the en d of July. See Du nn to D epartm ent of State, mem o,July 26, 1951, box 603, Clare Boothe Luce Papers (Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington,D.C .); and David Bruce to Depar tment of State, mem o, July 16-18, 1951, box 11, Staff Membe r and OfficeFiles, Psychological Strategy Board Files. The report drafted by Allen Dulles, "Analysis of Power of CommunistParties of Italy and France and of Measures to Co unter T he m," whose relevance to successive decisions is men-tioned in several doc um ents , is still classified at th e Trum an Library. Allen Dulles's report is discussed in Bonbrig htto Webb (undersecretary of state), Sept. 19, 1951, box 2, PSB Working File 1951- 53, Records Relating to thePsychological Strategy Board, General Records of the Department of State; and in Paul Davis (Department ofDefense) to Gordon Gray (PSBdirector), Sept. 20, 195 1, box 11, Staff Mem ber an d Office Files, PsychologicalStrategy Board Files.17See I11 Meeting PSB, Sept. 27 , 195 1, box 1, Bureau of European Affairs, Office of European RegionalAffairs, Records Relating to Psychological Warfare 1 951 -19 53 (Lot File 55 D1 37 ), General Records of th eDepartment of State.I8V Meeting PSB,NOV.15, 195 1, box 6, PSB Working File 195 1-5 3, Records Relating to the PsychologicalStrategy Board, ibid.

l 9 Psychological Strategy Board, Panel C, Sub-committee on Present Actions, "Reduction of CommunistStrength and Influence in France and Italy," Oct. 26, 1951, box 24, Staff Member and Office Files, PsychologicalStrategy Board Files; Minutes of Meeting of Sub-Panel to Panel C, Nov. 5, 1951, ibid


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was stated that the U nited States government could "help to discredit the C om m u-nist Party, Communist organizations and leading Communist figures by: a) Destroy-ing the respectability of th e Co mmunist Party. b) Compromising Co mmu nists inpublic offices. c) Discrediting Communist resistance efforts in World War 11. d) Play-ing up scandals concerning CP leaders."20To the Italian government was delegated the responsibility of promoting a vastarray of discriminatory actions against individuals (Com m un ist activists an d sympa-thizers), the Com mu nist trade unions, an d the PC I.According to the PSB plans, stepshad to be taken to "remove Communists from administrative positions in schoolsan d universities" an d from "posts of responsibility in public adm inistration a nd t henational economy." In o rder to reduce the Co mm un ist presence in the labor move-me nt, it was deemed necessary to "increase discrimination against firms employingCo mm unist labor in th e granting of Italian government contracts," while the indus-trialists' association (Confindustria) and other groups of employers should be pres-sured "to take anti-Communist positions" and support the Catholic trade union(CISL).Besides, the plan provided for an attack against PCI organizational strength,aimed at depriving it "of its material resources," such as former Fascist propertiesoccupied at the e nd of the war, Co m m un ist "schools, printin g offices, etc." Finally,following Allen Dulles's indications, Panel C members agreed on the necessity ofattem pting "to sow discord in Co m m un ist Party ranksn-promoting defections,divisions, and "diasporas" within the PC I, imilar to the one that dur ing the previousFebruary led two important party officials (Aldo Cucchi and Valdo Magnani) toleave the party-and to encourage and sup po rt private Italian antico mmunist orga-nizations (like Paix et LibertC in F rance), which could be activated in particu lar cir-cumstances under th e guidance and supe rvision of the local American embassy.21A few mo nths later PSB D-1 6 was formally divided into two separate plans, on efor Italy (PSBD-15, code name Demagnetize) and one for France (PSBD-14, codenam e Cloven). T h e two plans were approved by the P ~ Bn February 21, 1952. W iththe separation, Panel C was dismantled, and two distinct panels were instituted.This solution did not last long, as Washington still considered the Italian andFrench cases similar and complem entary . Panel C was therefore rapidly replaced by anew comm ittee, the Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating C om mittee, which in M aywas nominally transformed into the Lenap Co mm ittee. T he Lenap Co mm ittee waschaired by a representative of PSB; ts mem bers were officials of the State and D efense

20Psychological Strategy Board, Panel C , "Plan B," Dra ft Nov. 13, 1 95 1, ibid21 Psychological Strategy Board, "Scheme of attack, Panel 'C,"' Sept. 24, 1951 , box 2 , PSB Working File 1951-53, Records Relating to the Psychological Strategy Board, General Records of the Department of State; Psycho-logical Strategy Board, "Terms of reference for ad ho c Panel 'C,"' Sept. 26, 1951, ibid. Subcommittee on PresentActions, "Reduction of Communist Strength and Influence in France and Italy: Check List," Oct. 26, 1951 , box24, Staff Member and Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files; Panel C , "Plan 'B,"' Draft Nov. 13, 1 951 ,ibid Allen Dulles underlined the importance of supporting anticommunist organizations outside the Italian andFrench governments during 111 Meeting PSB,Sept. 27, 1951. O n the defection of Aldo Cucchi and Valdo Mag-nani, see Giorgio Boccolari and Luciano Casali, eds., I Magnacucchi: k l d o Magnani e la ricerca di una sinistraautonoma e democratica (The Magnacucchi: Valdo Magnani and the search for an autonomous and democraticLeft) (Milan, 1991 ).


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T h e U nited States a nd "Psychological Warfare" in Italy

departments, the MSA (Mu tual Security Agency), and the CIA. T he first chairman ofthe Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating Committee was Charles Norberg, while itsmembers were Walter Walmsley of the State Department, Townsend Hoopes ofDefense, and Sam Berger of MSA (the name of the CIA representative is still classi-fied). Finally, in M ay th e code names of the two plans were also changed: Clydes-dale (D emagnetize), a nd M id iron ( C l ~ v e n ) . ~ ~Demagnetize (PSBD- 15) was a developm ent of PSB D- 16.T h e m easures providedfor in the new plan were again divided into two parts, which corresponded to thetraditional division of positive and repressive actions. While illustrated in greaterdetail than in PSB D-16, they largely reproduced the proposals included in the planapproved the previous November. The most significant difference was representedby the definition of the objective of the plan. Demagnetize, in fact, contained no ref-erence to the possibility of outlawing the PC I. nstead, it was generically stated tha t itaimed at reducing "the strength of the C om mun ist Party, its material resources, inter-national organizations, influence in the Italian Government, and particularly in thetrade unions as well as its appeal to the Italian people, so that it will no longer consti-tute a threat to th e security of Italy an d the objectives of the U nited States."23Responsibility for implementing the measures approved by the PSB was largelydelegated to the Italian governm ent, althou gh with th e approval of Dem agnetize theauthority to supervise and c oordinate the operative phase was explicitly given to theAmerican ambassador, who chaired the ad h oc com mittee created in R om e.Most of the docu men ts concerning the operational aspects of PSB plans are stillpartially or entirely classified. Bu t the difficulty in evaluating the ac tions underta kenafter the approval of Demagnetize-Clydesdale is also caused by the extreme vague-ness of many PSB proposals. T h e first report of the Cloven-Demagnetize Coo rdinat-ing Com mittee in M ay 19 52 indicated som e of the results obtained in Italy, such asthe intervention of the Rome embassy against the appo intm ent of the C om mu nistunio n leader Giuseppe D i Vitto rio as labor delegate to the ILO (International LaborOrganization) conference and the stationing of one American expert "to work withthe democratic cooperative to eliminate Communist domination from the impor-tan t Italian cooperative movem ent."24

22Psychological Strategy Board, "Psychological Operatio ns Plan for the Reduction of Co mm uni st Power(Co de Name: D emagne tize)," Feb. 21, 1 95 2, box 24, Staff Mem ber and O ffice Files, Psychological StrategyBoard Files; "Remarks by the Department of State member of the Psychological Strategy Board on the Psycholog-ical Strategy Plan for the reduction of Communist Power in Italy," Feb. 21, 1952, box 1, PSB Working File 1951-53, Records Relating to the Psychological Strategy Board, General Records of the Department of State; Allen(second director of the PSB) o Charles Norberg (chairman of Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating Committee),Ma rch 18, 1 95 2, box 23, Staff Member an d Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files; Meeting Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating Committee, April 4, 1952, ibid.; Meeting Lenap C ommittee, May 9, 1952, ibid.;Bonbright to Ellsworth B unker ( new American ambassador to Italy), May 20, 195 2, ibid.23 Psychological Strategy Board, "Psychological Operations Plan for the Reduction of Communist Power in Italy(code name: Demagnetize)." The do cumen t is also published in the appendix of Guasconi, Altrafaccia delka rnedagia,203-19. Th e role of the Department of Defense in the PSB'S projects is illustrated in Joint Chiefs of Staff, 'Rep or t forthe Secretary of Defense on the Joint Aspects of Psychological Operations," Feb. 27, 195 2, box 371, Office of Admin-istrative Secretary: Correspondence, Records of the Secretary of Defense, RG 330 (National Archives).2 4 N ~ r b e r go Allen, May 8, 1952, box 1, PSB Wo rking File 1951 -53 , Records Relating to the PsychologicalStrategy Board, General Records of the Department of State.


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From the beginning, therefore, there was an evident discrepancy between thebombastic rhetoric of the plan and the effective actions undertaken in Italy. In prac-tice, the most relevant change introduced by Dem agnetize-Clydesdale was the am bi-tious attempt to use Mutual Security Program offshore military procurement (OSP)contracts to pressure Italian entrepreneurs and politicians t o adop t a tougher standagainst Communist-dominated trade unions. This practice intensified with theadministration of Dwight D . Eisenhower but was conceived by the PSB and put intoeffect for th e first time in April 1952, when an OSP order to th e Galileo firm of Flo-rence was canceled d ue to the strong Co mm unist presence in that f a c t0 r ~ .~ 5T h e political use of osps was probably the most m anifest form of A merican inter-ference in Italian dom estic affairs. It pro duced tensions and friction between Un itedStates officials, the Italian government, and Confindustria. Pessimism about Italy'swillingness to adopt the PSB'S proposals had earlier been expressed by several mem-bers of Panel C.26In the following months the scant Italian cooperation was fre-quently denounced by the Cloven-Demagnetize Coo rdinating Comm ittee. Du rin ga meeting that saw the participation of the new American ambassador to Italy,Ellsworth Bunker, and of the State Departm en t official W illiam Kn ight (of the Ital-ian desk), the De Gasperi government was accused of being "less receptive" toAmerican "political pressures" than it "had been a few years ago" and "not o ur n atu-ral allies in this cam paig n."2 7A strong sense of frustration for the scant results obtained by Demagnetize-Clydesdale rapidly arose among PSB officials. Many of them tended to blame theItalian gov ernm ent and anticom mu nist parties for their alleged lack of c ooperation.The "informal protests" of the Italian government against the handling of the OSPorder to Galileo confirmed the skepticism of many United States officials aboutItaly's willingness to cooperate with American psywar plans. Those protests werepresented by Sam Berger as an example of the "many cases in which we wa nt th eItalian go vern me nt to act and it is reluctan t to d o so": according to the represent-ative of the MSA , taly's behavior raised "a general question " t ha t nee ded to be dis-cussed with D e G a ~ p e r i . ~ ~As already mentioned, most of the measures planned by the PSB were based onthe assumption th at they would be carried ou t by the Italian governm ent (while theUnited States, after the first phase of elaboration and planning, would only coordi-nate the plan and, if necessary, provide some form of external support). The ten-

2 5 T h econtract was assigned only after the dismissal of Galileo's personnel manager, Gianfranco Musco, aformer leader of the Italian resistance and a PCI member: see Lorenza Sebesta, L'Europa indifesa: Sistema disicurezza atlantico e caso italiano, 1948-1955 (Europe undefended: The Atlantic security system and the Italiancase, 1948-1 955) (Florence, 19 91) , 21 1-12; and Meeting Cloven-Demagnetize Coordina ting Comm ittee, April4, 19 52 , box 23 , Staff Member and Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files. T h e necessity of rewardingGalileo for the dismissal of M usco is pleaded in Walter Walmsley to Norberg , M ay 13, 1 95 2, box 7, Staff M emberand Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files; and Norberg to Allen, May 16, 1952, ibid.26 M ee ti ng ~ub-Panel to Panel C, Oc t. 31, Nov. 5, 1951, box 23, Staff Member and Office Files, Psychologi-cal Strategy Board Files.

27 Meetings Cloven-Demagnetize Coord inating Comm ittee, April 18, 25, 195 2, ibid.28 Meeting Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating Committee, May 2, 1952, ibid.


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sions between United States officials in charge of PSB'S projects and the Italian- - ,government were one element characterizing Washington's attempts to promote amore radical attack against Italian Co m m uni sm . Although a com m on feature of therelations between the U nited States and its European junior partners during the Co ldWar, those tensions were exacerbated by what Washington considered an unjustifi-able, passive resistance by D e G asperi tb th e a dop tion o f the measures provided forin Demagnet ize-Clyde~dale .~~

A second im por tan t element characterizing PSB'S activity was represented by t hedispute that im mediately arose am ong its statu tory mem bers (State, Defense, CIA,and MSA) nd between them and the PSB staff. Psychological warfare activities-because of their very natu re im plyin g secrecy a n d the necessity of leaving discre-tiona ry power to the operatives wo rking in the field-tended to escape rigidsupervision from above. From the be ginning PSB'S members were extremely reluc-tant to coordinate their actions better; that would have meant losing the opera-tional autonomy achieved during the early Cold War (such was the-case of theCIA)or, worse, accepting a new aEtor in wa shin gton 's bureaucracy (th e P S B itself),which seemed bent on usurping the prerogatives of the traditional subjects ofAmerican foreign policy. The State Department, in particular, assumed immedi-ately a critical stance toward the PSB,while several of its officials denounced theopposition of the Defense De partm ent, the ECA (and then the MSA), nd the CIAto the principle that the ambassador was "th e undisputed director an d controller"of the operations planned in Italy.30T h e "confused start" of the P S B an d its staff's"excursions in to policy fields already covered" were already being discussed in Sep -tember 1951 during a meeting of the undersecretary advisory com mittee. O n thatoccasion, Paul Nitze criticized the tendency of P S B to act as "a sort of high com-m an d for US ac tions against the Soviet bloc," w hile C . B. M arshall, also of th ePolicy Planning Staff, caustically remarked that the ambition of the P S B was to"remake US policy rather th an to th in k abo ut [its] psychological effects." Un der -secretary of State James We bb (who represented the State D epartm ent on the PSBboard) noticed the complete lack of coordination between State, Defense, andCIA, while Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Ed wa rd Barret ma inta inedtha t "there was n o theoretical reason for the establishm ent o f PSB"; it had beencreated in order "to mee t the D efense dem and for a neutral fo ru m for the discus-sion of psychological policy" and "the popular and Congressional cry for moreaction in the psychological field."31Similar complaints characterized the two years of life of the PSB. Stimu lated alsoby the scant successes of the PSB plans for Italy and France, they reechoed in the

29 O n the complex dialectic between Italy and the Un ited States during the 1950s see Alessandro Brogi, L'ltaliae I'egemonia americana nel Mediterraneo (Italy and Ame rican hege mony in the Mediterranean ) (Florence, 199 6),67-104.30 Edward Barret to Webb, Nov. 17, 195 1, box 2, PSB Wo rking File 1951-5 3, Records Relating to the Psycho-logical Strategy Board, General Records of the D epa rtme nt of State; Barret to Bo nbright and W almsley, Nov. 20 ,1951, ibid.; W. K. Scott to Webb, Nov. 23, 195 1, ibid.31 Meeting of the Undersecretary Advisory Co mm ittee, S ept. 18 , 19 51 , box 5, ibid.


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Lenap Co m m itte e, where State's representative, W alter Walmsley, openly polemizedwith the ch airman , Charles Norberg, an d with Sam Berger of th e M S A . ~ ~In M ay 195 2, a second ro un d of the Italian administrative elections confirme d toa great ex ten t the results of th e previous year, which-as we have seen-had cons ti-tuted one of the primary reasons for the decision to implement new psychologicalwarfare activities in Italy. The success of the parties of the Left and the troubling

growth of the Monarchists and Neofascists corresponded to a clear defeat of thosecenter-left parties that constituted the natural interlocutors of the United States.Washington now feared a polarization of the Italian political picture along a fascist-antifascist division, which could have crushed the parties of the center and furtherbolstered the PCI,whose antifascism was on e of the central elements of its politicaland cultural identity.33Ambassador Ellsworth Bunker and the State Department intensified their pres-sures on D e Gasperi, inviting him to im pleme nt a t least some of the measures con-templated by the PSB plans. Nevertheless, the reluctance of the Italian governmentto put into practice Demagnetize-Clydesdale continued during the months preced-ing the crucial general elections of Ju ne 195 3. Responding to Bunker's e xhortationsto ad opt a tougher stand against Italian Co m m uni sm , D e Gasperi reaffirmed thenecessity of acting within the law and the C ons titutio n. Th e prime m inister of Italyobjected to American requests to remove Communist organizations from publicproperties, stressing the fact that they had signed regular contracts with the govern-m ent. T h e same negative answer was given to th e request of Bunker t o prevent PCI'Sability to secure large-scale financial support through the payments industrialistswere forced to m ake in order to trade with the Soviet U nio n an d the Eastern Euro-pean countries. According to D e Gasperi, there was little the gov ernme nt could d o,an d in an y case that trade was too im po rta nt for the Italian textile industry.34T h e sum m er of 19 52 was characterized by an intensification of the conflicts

32 T h e lash between Walmsley and Norberg is reported by Walmsley in a letter to the undersecretary of state,David Bruce: Walmsley to Bruce, May 7, 1952 , box 2, ibid. Berger criticized the State Department for not consid-ering Demagnetize-Clydesdale a radical departure from previous United States policies in Italy: see Wallace IrwinJr. (acting secretary of the Cloven-Demagnetize Coordinating Comm ittee) to Norberg and Richard H irsch(Defense's representative on the PSB) , May 7, 195 2, box 23, Staff Member and Office Files, Psychological StrategyBoard Files. Th e docum ent is quoted in Nu ti, Stati Uniti e l'apertura a sinistra, 14.33T his preoccupation is expressed in Llewellyn Tho mps on to D epart men t of State, memo, June 19, 19 52(765,0016-1 952), General Records of the Dep artment of State; Thom pson to D epartment of State, mem o, June23, 1952 (765,0016-2352), ibid.; Bunker to Department of State, memo, July 8, 1952, Foreign Relations of theUnited States, 195 2-54 (16 vols., Washington, 1979- 1989), VI, 1581 84; and especially in OIR (Office of Intel-ligence Research), Intelligence Report (IR) 5802 , "T he M ay 2 5 Italian Administrative Elections," May 19, 1 952,General Records of the Office of the Executive Secretariat-Summaries of the Secretary Daily Meetings-194 9-19 52, General Records of the D epart men t of State. O n the 1952 elections see also Francesco Malgeri, "DeGasperi e I'eti del centrismo (194 8-19 54)" (D e Gasperi and the age of centrism, 1948 -195 4), in Storia dellaDemocrazia Cristiana: De Gasperi e l'etd del centrismo (1948-1954) (History of the Christian Democracy: DeGasperi and the age of centrism, 194 8-19 54), ed. Francesco Malgeri (2 vols., Rome, 1 987) , 11, 150-57; andPietro Scoppola, La repubblica deiparti ti: Evoluzione e crisi di un sistemapolitico, 194 5-1 996 (Th e parties ' repub-lic: Evolution and crisis of a political system, 1 945 - 1996 ) (Bologna, 199 7), 263- 74.34M em oran dum of Conversation Bunker-Alcide De Gasperi, Sept. 5, 1952 (76 5,0019-185 2), GeneralRecords of the Department of State. The quoted passages are still classified in the document published in ForeignRelations of the United States, 1952-54, VI,159 1-95.


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with in PSB, which reached their ze nith after its decision to pro m ote a detailedproject evaluating the results obta ined by Demagnetize-Clydesdale. T h e representa-tives of the Department of State denounced the vagueness of the project and thegeneral tendency of PSB members to draw up political projects that overestimatedthe American ability to c ond ition Italian d ome stic affairs. T h e CIA proposal to sendan election expert t o Italy (which was supported by the chairman df the LenapCommittee, Charles Norberg) was opposed as counterproductive by the Depart-ment of State. Paul Nitze expressed his opposition to any form of direct Americanintervention in Italy that could weaken the Italian government. Writing to Under-secretary of State David Bruce, Walmsley reaffirmed that "the genu ine local charac-ter and spontaneity of initiative and actions against the internal threats ofCo mmunism " were "essential to the success of the fight."35In m any ways, the situation had reached an impasse. T h e PSB seemed unable toperform its task of coordinating the activities of ;he various agencies and depart-ments of the United States government engaged in the field of psychological war-fare. The representatives of the Department of State clashed frequently with thoseof the Department of Defense, the MSA, nd the CIA,while the staff of the PSB,rather th an mediat ing those bureaucratic s truggles , tended to take part in the m ,siding predom inantly against the D epa rtm ent of State. O n the operational side, theawareness of the necessity for local subjects to act on their own initiative conflictedwith the refusal of the Italian government to adopt many of the measures providedfor in Demagnetize-Clydesdale.Am ong calls to resort to "unethical methods" t o coun ter the C om m un ist menace,worried reports o n the increase of neutralist and anti-American tendencies in west-ern Europe, and open invitations to avoid counterproductive "overt pressures" onthe Italian government, American involvement in the 1953 electoral campaignended up being much more restrained than that of five years earlier.36The main(and probably most effective) tool used by Washington to influence the electoralou tcom e was again represented by the OSP contracts. Ambassador Bunker, in partic-

35Walmsley to Bruce, Aug. 6, 1952, box 2, PS B Workin g File 1951 -53, Records Relating to the PsychologicalStrategy Board, General Records of the Department of State. Paul Nitze's position is reported in Sherman to Cox,June 30, 195 2, box 23, Staff Memb er a nd Office Files, Psychological Strategy Board Files. T h e State Department'shostility toward the evaluation project for Italy proposed by the PSB is expressed in Robert Joyce (Policy PlanningStaff) to Joseph Phillips (d eputy assistant secretary of state for Public Affairs), July 28 , 195 2, box 4, PSB Working File195 1-5 3, Records Relating to the Psychological Strategy Board, General Records of the Dep artm ent of State.S6T he necessity of resortin g even to "unethical meth ods" was stressed by then undersecretary of sta te DavidBruce during a conversation with Daniel Horowitz (labor expert of the Department of State's Office of EuropeanRegional Affairs). See Memorandum of Conversation Bruce-Horowitz, Oct. 2, 1952, box 7 , PSB Working File195 1-5 3, Records Relating to the Psychological Strategy Board, General Records of the D epar tment of State.T h e increase of n eutralist an d anti-American tendencies in western Europe is emphasized in Psychological Strat-egy Board, "Status Report on the National Psychological Effort and First Progress Report of the PsychologicalStrategy Board," Aug. 1, 19 52 , box 5, ibid.The necessity of avoiding an overt United States intervention similarto that of 1948 is indicated in PSB D-38 , "Psychological Strategy Planning for Western Europe," Jan. 15, 195 3,box 1 3, W hit e House Office, National Security Council Staff: Papers 194 8- 1961, PSB Cen tral Files Series (Eisen-hower Library). T he D epartm ent of State lectured the new ambassador, Clare Boothe Luce, before her depar tureto Rome, on the necessity of avoiding "overt pressures" during the electoral campaign: see Department of State toLuce, memo, March 18, 1953 (865.0013-1853), General Records of the Department of State.


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ular, did no t m iss any opp ort un ity to stress the political an d psychological relevanceof American procurements, which would have given "ocular evidence" to Italianworkers that they were benefiting from Italy's alliance with the United States andmem bership in NATO (Nor th Atlantic Treaty O r g a n i~ a t i o n ) .~ ~The position of Bunker illustrates a systemic situation that had emerged duringthe Cold War: the ability of America's junior partners to make use of their weaknessand d ependenc e to impose their goals and priorities on Washington. Th e fact that th econcession of OSP contracts was subordinated to electoral considerations irritatedDefense Department officials, who obviously reasoned in military terms and wereno t particularly happy to buy Italian p roducts for the sake of political imperative^.^^In spite of those objections, the n ew secretary of state, John Foster Dulles, asked tha tthe osps destined for Italy be given "absolute administrative priority." Consequently,in the first six month s of 19 53 an unprecedented num ber o f o sps was accorded toItaly, in the vain attempt to help the DC an d o ther governm ental forces at the polls.39The Elections of 1953 and the Arrival in Rome of Clare Boothe LuceThe election results were not what had been hoped and expected in Washington.T h e DC an d its allies were no t able to obta in th e absolute majority of the votes nec-essary, with the new electoral law, to seize two-thirds of the parliamentary seats inthe lower chamber (Camera dei Deputati). The right wing slightly increased itsvotes (Monarchists and Neofascists received 7 and 6 percent of the votes, respec-tively), while the Left (Socialists, PSI , an d Co mmu nists, PC I, run nin g separatelyunlike in 19 48) remained around 35 percent.40T h e elections of 19 53 were a crucial turnin g point. Th ey caused a reappraisal ofAmerican policies in Italy, determined both by the often unorthodox approachof th e new American ambassador, Clare Boo the Luce, and by the more general atti-tude held by the Eisenhower administration toward E ~ r o p e . ~ '

Th is reappraisal was in som e way anticipated by Luce dur ing the last weeks of theelectoral campaign. T h e new ambassador to Italy manifested her perplexity tow ard

37Bunker o Acheson, memo, June 4, 1952 (76 5.5MS Pl6-452 ), General Records of the Department of State;Bunker to Acheson, memo, July 9, 1952 (765.5MSPl7-952), ibia!; Bunker to Acheson, Aug. 14, 1952(765.5MSPl8-1452), ibid.38 O n the effects of the M utua l Security Program in Italy see Sebesta, Europa indifesa, 147-242; Luciano Seg-reto, "Gli investimenti americani in Italia (1945-19 63)" (American investments in Italy, 1945 -19 63 ), StudiStorici (Rome ), 37 (Jan.-March 199 6), 273-316 ; and L uciano Segreto, "Americanizzare o modernizzare I'econo-mia? Progetti americani e risposte italiane negli anni cinquanta e sessanta" (Americanize or modernize the econ-

omy? American projects and Italian responses during the fifties and sixties), Passato e Presente (Florence) (no. 37 ,1996), 57-83.39JohnFoster Dulles to the Embassy in Rome, memo, Jan. 23, 195 3 (765.5 MS Pll-2 353 ), General Records ofthe D epa rtmen t of State; Stassen (director of MSA) to John Foster Dulles, March 2, 1953 (765 .5M SP l3-25 3), bia!40 O n the 195 3 elections see Carla Rodoth, Storia della Yegge truffa" (History of the "swindle law") (Rome,199 2); and Paul Ginsborg, A Hijtory of Contemporary Italy: Society and Politics, 1943-1988 (London, 1990),141-45.4' O n Clare Boo the Luce see Sylvia Jukes Morris, Rage for Fame: The Ascent of Clare Boothe Luce (New York,1997 ), which unfortunately stops at Luce's election to Congress in 1 942 ; and W illiam Sheed, Clare Boothe Luce(New York, 1 982 ).


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T h e United States an d "Psychological Warfare" in Italy 1321

This 1953Comitati Civici (civic committees) poster reads "Symbol of Malenkov." This poster associ-ates the Partito Comunista Italiano (Italian Communist party) both with Soviet Prime MinisterGeorgi Malenkov and with male (evil). Courtesy Gmmsci Institute, Bologna, Italy.

Bunker's decision to concede a vast amount of osps to Italian firms without bindingthem to concrete measures aimed at reducing the Communist presence in thosefirms. Luce in particular criticized the assignation to Fiat of an OSP contract for theproduction of fifiy F-8GK planes.42Above all, the new ambassador rejected the cau-tion to avoid flagrant American intervention in Italy's domestic affairs, and just afew days before the elections-during a speech at the Chamber of Commerce inMilan-explicitly tied the continuation of American aid to the outcome of the immi-nent elections. This declaration was certainly coherent with the policies promoted bythe United States in Italy since 1947.Expressed so openly, however, it embarrassedthe State Department and strongly annoyed De G a s ~ e r i . ~ ~

42ClareBoothe Luce to John Foster Dulles, memo, May 21, 1953 (765.5MSPl5-2153), General Records ofthe Departmen t of State.43O n the episode see the not entirely reliable reconstruction of Luce herself in Clare Boothe Luce i n t e ~ e wyJohn Luter, Jan. 11, 1968, transcript, p. 31, Colum bia Oral History Project (Eisenhower Library). A copy ofLuce's May 28, 1953, speech in Milan is available in box 686 , Luce Papers.


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Luce's behavior clearly reflected a nayve overestimation of America's ability toinfluence Italian domestic affairs, but it was the first evidence of the new Americanapproach toward the anomalies of the Italian situation. Two points are especiallyworth emphasizing here:First, criticizing the ease wi th w hich osps h ad been gran ted to Italy was also a wayof underlining the necessity for Italy to assume its responsibilities in the anticom-mu nist struggle. Italy, in othe r words, could no longer rely on the strategy of depen-dence that had frequently allowed it in the past to escape the responsibilities entailedby its membership in the Atlantic community while obtaining economic supportand external military security.44Second , in order to have a stronger a nd mo re responsible Italy with in a federatedand autonomous Europe, it was vital to resolve once and for all the problem repre-sented by Italian Communism. For Washington it would have been simply suicidalto support the integration of Europ e with th e prospect that on e of its main m em-bers could legally (tha t is, thro ug h the electoral process) go over to th e e nem y side.The new administration therefore intensified the pressures on the Italian govern-ment asking for the implementation of the measures outlined in Demagnetize-Clydesdale. Italy was, along with France, the most favorable theater of the ColdWar where W ashington could apply the idea of roll-back, initially destined for East-ern Europe: if containment seemed too passive and morally repugnant, and inter-vention in the "captive" countries too risky, vanquishing Communism in an alliedcountry integrated in the western bloc was an excellent way for the ne w republicanadministration to distinguish itself from the foreign policy of H arry S. Tru man a ndDean Acheson.Following the indications of his special assistant C . D . Jackson, Eisenhowerdecided to replace the PSB with a new body, the Operations Coordinating Board(OCB).OCB'S statutory members were the undersecretary of state (who was also itschairman), the deputy secretary of defense, the director of the Foreign OperationsAdm inistration (FO A), he director of the CIA, and a special representative of thepresident (Jackson himself). Eisenhower's goal was to have better supervision andcoordination of the various United States agencies and departments involved in thefield of psychological warfare. The nomination of a presidential special assistant forpsywar reflected this goal and the intention of the new president to centralize theforeign policy process in the W hit e H ou se.45

OCB was more powerful than its predecessor. The terms of reference of the newbody were "considerably broader than those of the PSB" since OCB also had the taskof "coordinat[ing] the carrying ou t of N ational Security Co uncil policy by all agen-cies while recognizing tha t responsibility for this action rests wi th the agencies them -44 O n Eisenhower's conviction of the necessity for greater western Europ ean participation in the struggleagainst Com mun ism and the Soviet Union see Marc Trachtenberg, A Constructed Peace: The Making of the Euro-pean Settlement, 1945-1963 (Princeton, 1998), 146-2 00.4 5 T he xecutive order that instituted the Operations Coord inating Board (OC B)n Septem ber 1 953 is in For-eign Relations of the United States, 1952-54, 11, pt . 11,455. O n the creation of OCB see also H. W Brands Jr., ColdWarriors:Eisenhower? Generation andAmerican Foreign Policy (New York, 1988 ), 119-21.


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The United States and "Psychological Warfare" in Italy 1323

This 1953 Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI, talian Communist party) poster reads "Prevent the elec-toral swindle. Vote Communist." A new electoral law used in the 1953 electionswas denounced bythe leftist oppositionas a leggemffa (swindle law). Here, the law is presented as the hidden and fraud-ulent card of the Democrazia Cristiana (DC,Christian Democrats) card player. The other cards repre-sent the lesser allies of the DC: Partito Liberale Italiano (PLI, talian Liberal party); Partito SocialistsDemocratiw Italiano (PSDI, talian Social Democratic party); and Partito Repubblicano Italiano (PRI,Italian Republican party). Courtesy G r a d Institute,Bo+ Ikzly.

selves." Initially, OCB decided not to abrogate the plans previously approved by thePSB and continued to supervise them. Demagnetize-Clydesdale was handled inWashington by an "interdepartmental group" (presumably similar to the LenapCommittee) chaired by Col. Richard Hirsch of the OCB staff, who had also been amember of the PSBIn November 1953, however, a single working group was instituted that wouldbe responsible for the supervision of the plans for France (PSBD-14c, "PsychologicalOperations Plan for the Reduction of Com mu nist Power in France"), Italy (PSBD-15b, "Psychological Operations Plan for the Reduction of Communist Power inItay"), and western Europe as a whole (PSBD-38,"A National Psychological Strat-egy Plan for Western Europe"). The chairman of this new working group was JohnWesley Jones (director of the Department of State's Office of Western European

46John Foster Dull a to the Rome Embassy, memo, Nov. 20, 1953, box 33, Records relating to State Depart-ment Participation in the Operations Coordinating Board (Lot Fie 62D430), eneral Records of the Depart-ment o f State; I Meeting OCB,ept. 17, 1953,box 1, ibid


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The Journal of American History March 200 1

Affairs), while its executive secretary was Charles Norbe rg o f the OCB staff. Its othermembers were William Blythe of Defense, Sam Linch of the U ~ I A(United StatesInform ation Agency), and S tuart Van Dyke of FOA; the name of the CIA represent-ative is still cl as ~ ifi ed .~ 'T h e creation of this OCB working group and the subsequent unification of thethree plans into a single do cu m en t were relevant because they reflected the connec-tion mad e by the new administration between the struggle against Com m unis m andefforts toward European unification. The importance of thinking in terms of aregional approach to European problems, and not just on a country-by-countrybasis, was immediately stressed by the new working group. The objectives of thenew plan of psychological warfare for western Europe were therefore defined as:"a) To reduce the power and influence of the Communist Party in Western Europe,particularly in France and Italy, and b) To encourage the developmen t of Europeanunity of a political, econom ic, cultural and m ilitary nature."48W ith the exception of the emphasis o n the theme of European unity, the oper a-tional proposals of th e new plan were almost identical to those of Dem agnetize-Clydesdale, although it no longer provided a formal distinction between positiveand repressive actions. T he part o n Italy stressed the need to "greatly i n t e n s i y the "useof various U.S. aid programs" (direct economic aid, o s ~ ,nd counterpart funds) inorder to oblige the Italian government to undertake several anticommunist actions.Am ong these actions were the

c) Elimination of Co mm unists from executive positions in governm ent-controlledindustries, and adoption of a policy of preference for non-Communist labor insuch industries . . . ; e) Initiation of vigorous legislative an d administrative actionto dry up Communist sources of income in Italy, especially those derived fromcommercial transactions with Soviet and Satellite countries and from other busi-ness enterprises; f) Initiation of a program to harass and if possible close C om m u-nist "activist schools."

I t was also deemed necessary to use o s ~ontracts to bring about "analogous anti-communist actions" in the private sector: Italian employers (criticized for being"almost impervious to the message that increased productivity should mean increasedwelfare for labor") were consequently asked to "grant preference to the greatestextent possible to non-Communist unions in negotiations for collective bargainingagreements, in hiring and firing, and in all matters relating to labor-managementrelations." O n th e positive side, the plan p rovided for the usual measures in the fieldof propaganda and included references to the necessity of supporting the European

47 Meeting of the Working Grou p for D-38 and Related Matters, Jan. 1 9, 1954, box 82, Whi te Ho use Office,National Security Council Staff: Papers 1948-1961, PS B Centra l Files Series. O n the unification of th e threeplans see John Foster Dulles to the Rome Embassy, memo, Nov. 27 , 19 53 , box 33 , Records relating to StateDepartment Participation in the Operations Coordinating Board, General Records of the Department of State.48 The objectives of the plan can be found in "Checklist of Courses of Action to Enhance Progress towardNational Objectives for Western Europe" attached to "OCB Progress Report on PS B D-14c, P S B D-15b, and PSBD-38," Feb. 23, 1954, box 82, White House Office, National Security Council Staff: Papers 1948-1961, PSBCen tral Files Series.


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1325h e Un ited States and "Psychological Warfare" in Italy

Federalist M ove ment (M ov ime nto Federalista Europeo, MFE), a moderately progres-sive interparty political organization whose ability to attract consensus was widelyoverestimated.*9T h e decision to con tinue , o r even intensify, United States psychological warfarein Italy was therefore based again on the recognition that a strictly economic orsocial explanation of the reasons for Communist success in Italy (defined by theDepartment of State's labor adviser, Daniel Horowitz, as "belly Communism") waspartial and insufficient. In particular, Communist strength in the labor movementhad to be attacked by pressuring Confindustria and the Italian government to stop"treating all unions equally" and to recognize "the fact that the Communist domi-nated union" was "foreign c0n trolled ."5~The main means Washington had in its struggle against Italian Communismcon tinue d to be the offshore military procuremen ts. But th e use of osps as politicalleverage joined with the new, mo re radically anticom munist direction o f the Eisen-hower administration and of its representative in Italy, Clare Boothe Luce. Th is direc-tion manifested itself in the way American military aid was managed, in the newattitude of the Rome embassy toward the Italian government, and in the embassy'swillingness to cooperate with non-D C conservative political groups and figures.os p aid to Italian industries was in fact tied to the effective reduction of the C om -mu nist presence in the concessionary firms. In ma ny instances an OSP contract des-tined for Italy was postponed or canceled because of political considerations. Themost im portan t (and famous) case was that o f the F-86K order to F iat, which was fro-zen until the internal shop steward elections took place. T h e Co mm unist trade unionswere soundly defeated. In the run-up to the elections, Fiat managem ent adopted sev-eral discriminatory measures against pro-Communist workers and unionists, whowere often dismissed or transferred to isolated departmen ts in the firm. Th e anticom -mu nist organ ization Pace e LibertB and Irving Brown were allowed to operate withinFiat, promoting propagandistic actions a nd organizing anticom mu nist lab 0r.5 ~At the same time, Clare Boothe Luce assumed a more intransigent attitudetoward the Italian government, denouncing on several occasions its apathy andineptitude. T h e political career of D e G asperi had en ded with the 1953 elections.After its electoral failure, the DC formed several precarious minority governmentsthat tried to follow De Gasperi's path and rely, in their relations with the Americansenior partner, o n the traditional strategy of dependence. Luce was very outspoken in

4 g " o ~ ~ PSB D-15b, and PS B D-38," Feb. 23, March 1, 31, 195 4, ibid. Some rel-rogress Report on PS B ~ - 1 4 c ,evant portion s of the OCB collections available at t he Eisenhower Lib rary are still partially o r entirely classified.5OMeeting of the Working G roup for D-38 and Related Matters, Jan.19, 1954, box 82 , ibid.

51 Fiat's adoption of many of the measures requested by Washington is illustrated in Memorandum of Conver-sation Clare Boothe Luce-Vittorio Valletta (Fiat's managing director), March 11, 19 55, box 6, Bureau of Euro-pean Affairs-Office of Western Europea n Affairs-Records of the Officer in Cha rge of Italian and AustrianAffairs-Subject Files Relating to Italy 1953-195 6 (Lot File 58D 71) , General Records of the Departme nt ofState. T h e best illustratio n of this episode is still Sebesta, Europa indifesa, 218 -33 . See also Guascon i, Altrafacciadella rnehglia, 126-33; and Gian Giacom o Migone, "Stati Uniti, Fiat e repressione antioperaia negli ann icinquanta" (T he Un ited States, Fiat, and repression of workers in the fifties), Rivista di Storia Contemporanea, 3(April 1 974 ), 232-8 1.


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This 1953 Partito Comunista Italiano (PCI, Italian Communist party) poster reads "Enough of theDC!Vote Communist!" It denounces the Democrazia Cristiana (DC,Christian Democrats) with theimage of a strong Communist broom sweeping out "taxes, corruption, graft, scandals, violence, hate,and the swindle lawn along with roaches that have the DC symbol on their backs. Courtesy GmmciImnmtute,ohgna, Itu&

denouncing this situation: according to the American ambassador, "anti-Communism"was "Italy's most profitable business," but, in order to stay in this business, the DC had"to keep the Commies in it" because Communist strength represented an "indirectsource of U.S. ollars." Luce therefore openly urged the end of covert aid to the Italiangovernment becausea "strongly anti-Communist governmentnwas "impossible in a sit-uation where theverymaintenance of the Communist threat"was "the only thing that"could "be safely relied upon to put into the hands of 'anti-Communist' politiciansgoodly sums of money forwhich they" needed "render no public a~counting."5~

This loss of confidence in the ability of the Christian Democrats to deal with the

52Clare Boothe Luce to Henry Luce, Oa. 31, 1954, box X22, Luce Papers; Clare Boothe Lute to HenryCabot Lodge, June 1,1955, box 634, ibid;Clare Boothe Luce to Eisenhower, John Foster Dulles,Men Dulles,and Herbert Hoover Jc, June 6, 1955, ibid.


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The Un ited States and "Psychological Warfare" in Italy

"Communist menace" corresponded to a more general radicalization of Americanapproaches tow ard Italian C om m un ism , clearly expressed in the new N ationa l Secu-rity Council paper for Italy, NSC 54 1 1 12, which superseded NSC 67 13, the 1951plan for Italy. Approved in April 19 54 , NSC 541 11 2 was a significant departure fromprevious American positions on Italy. The document was characterized by a bom-bastic and binary rhetoric but also by the ambiguity of many of its formulations;nonetheless, it explicitly dismissed the traditional equating of leftist and rightistauthoritarianism, maintaining that even "an extreme rightist government," while"almost certainly authoritarian, probably ultra-nationalist a nd opposed to Euro peanunity," would have been "far less dangerous than a Communist regime." Besides,NSC 541 11 2 partially accepted the requests of the Joi nt Chiefs of Staff (J CS ), tatingthat "in th e event the Com mu nists achieve[d] control of the Italian government byapparently legal means, the United States, in concert with its principal NATO allies,should take appropriate action, possibly extending to the use of military power, toassist Italian elements seeking to overthrow the C om m un ist regime in Italy."53This stronger resoluteness and the increasing lack of confidence in the DC'S reli-ability as an ally progressively led Clare Boothe Luce to establish ties with non-Christian Democrat anticommunist groups who seemed more receptive toward herproposals to adopt a hard line against the pro-Soviet left. Among them were theformer minister of defense, the R epublican Randolfo Pacciardi (who suggested openlyprovoking the Communists, as it would have been easier to defeat them in the streetsthan at the ballot box); the head of the political intelligence (Ufficio M a r i R iservati)of the Min istry of the Interior, Gesualdo Barletta; journalists such as Ind ro M ontanelliand Leo Longanesi; and several conservative industrialists led by C ount Cini.54T h e American ambassador was certainly aware tha t it was impossible to create acredible and strong conservative alternative to DC. What she hoped was to use themost pro-Western and anticommunist Italian elites to pressure the government andthe C hristian Dem ocratic party toward th e right. Ma ny of those figures attempted

53Thi~oint was included following an explicit request of the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS),Adm . Arth ur W. Radford, and of Secretary of Defense Charles E. Wilson, w ho had criticized an earlier version ofthe document because it did not provide for United States military intervention in the case of PCI'S access topower through electoral means. Perplexities on the possibility of intervening militarily in Italy were insteadexpressed by Eisenhower and Joh n Foster Dulles. See 1 90th M eeting NSC ,March 25, 1954, box 5, Ann Whitm anFile, NSC Series (Eisenhower Library); and 193r d Meeting N SC ,April 1 3, 1954, ibid. Th e position of the JCS wasalso a consequence of the increasing geopolitical relevance of the Italian theater. O n this aspect see En nio D iNolfo, "Italia e Stati Uniti: Un'alleanza disuguale" (Italy and the United States: An unequal alliance), Storia delleRehzioni Internazionali (Florence), 6 (no. 1, 1990 ), 3-28 ; and Brogi, Italia e l'egemonia amerirana nel Mediterra-neo. An entirely declassified copy of NSC 541 112 is now finally available in box 79, Records relating to StateDep artm ent Participation in the National Security Council 1947 -196 3 (Lot File 63 D3 51 ), General Records ofthe Departm ent of State.54Memorandumof Conversation Clare Boothe Luce-Randolfo Pacciardi, Feb. 27, 1 954 (765.0 013- 254) ,General Records of the Dep artm ent of State; Me mo rand um of Conversation Luce-Giuseppe Pella, April 10 ,1954 (765.0014-1254), ibid.; Me mo rand um of Conversation Luce-H enry Tasca-Leo Longanesi, April 18, 1954(765.0014-2154), ibid.; Me mo rand um of Conversation Luce-Eugene Durbrow-Pacciardi, May 14 , 1954(765.0015-1454), ibid. O n the Ital ian non -DCconservative groups see the brilliant a nd caustic com me nts inLanaro, Storia dellIItalia repubblicana, 11 1-28. See also Mario Del Pero, "A nticomunism o d'assalto: Lettere d iIndro Montanelli all'ambasciatrice in Italia Clare Boothe Luce" (Storming Communism: Letters of Indro Mon-tanelli to ambassador to Italy C lare Boothe Luce), Italia Contemporanea (Milan) (no. 212, 1998), 633-46.


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1328 T he Journal of American History March 200 1

to use Luce's inflexibility to promote radical actions against the Communist party.In M arch 19 54 , for instance, Barletta sough t (throug h a Un ited States military intel-ligence channel) and obtained American endorsement for his project of outlawingthe PCI throu gh th e application of the section Reati contro lo stato (crimes against thestate) of the o ld fascist penal code. According to the M inistry of Interio r official, thedisturbances caused by PCI'S representatives during the debate on the EuropeanDefense Co m m un ity and th e consequent impossibility for the Italian parliament toact as a norm al legislative body w ould have provided the fo rmal pretext for th e arrestof Co mm unist leaders. Th e extremely incomplete and fragmentary documentationseemed to indicate that, despite wha t Luce an d American officials tho ug ht, Barletta'splan was no t backed by the Italian governm ent. M eeting Ambassador Luce, in fact,Prime Minister Mario Scelba refused to incorporate the measures proposed by Bar-letta and supp orted by the Un ited States.55The episode is nonetheless significant for at least three reasons. First of all, itshows the willingness on the p art of the U nited States to sup por t extrem