Badoglio was born in 1871. His father, Mario Badoglio, was a modest landowner, and his mother, Antonietta Pittarelli, was of middle-class background. On 5 October 1888 he was admitted to the Royal Military Academy inTurin. He received the rank of secondlieutenant in 1890. In 1892, he finished his studies and was promoted to first lieutenant.
At the beginning of Italian participation in theFirst World War, he was alieutenant colonel (tenente colonnello); he rose to the rank ofmajor general following his handling of the capture ofMonte Sabotino in May 1916, and by the late months of 1917 – by now already alieutenant general – was named as vice-chief of staff (sottocapo di stato maggiore) despite being one of those mainly responsible for the disaster during theBattle of Caporetto on 24 October 1917.
With regard to the Battle of Caporetto, although he was blamed in various quarters for his disposition of the forces under his command before the battle, a commission of inquiry rejected most of the criticisms made upon him.[3] In the years after the First World War, in which he held several high posts in the Regio Esercito, Badoglio exerted a constant effort in modifying official documents in order to hide his role in the defeat.[4]
After the war, Badoglio was named as asenator, but also remained in the army with special assignments toRomania and theU.S. in 1920 and 1921. At first he opposedBenito Mussolini, and after 1922 was sidelined by being sent toBrazil as ambassador. A political change of heart soon returned him to Italy and a senior role in the army, as chief of staff from 4 May 1925. On 25 June 1926, Badoglio was promoted to the rank ofMarshal of Italy (Maresciallo d'Italia).
Badoglio was the first sole governor ofTripolitania andCyrenaica[a] (later amalgamated asItalian Libya) from 1929 to 1933. During his governorship, he played a critical part (withRodolfo Graziani, deputy governor of Cyrenaica) in the genocide of LibyanArabs, which was intended to quell allLibyan resistance to Italian colonial rule. On 20 June 1930, Badoglio wrote to Graziani: "As for overall strategy, it is necessary to create a significant and clear separation between the controlled population and the rebel formations. I do not hide the significance and seriousness of this measure, which might be the ruin of the subdued population ... But now the course has been set, and we must carry it out to the end, even if the entire population of Cyrenaica must perish."[5] By 1931, well over half of the population of Cyrenaica were confined to 15 concentration camps where many died as a result of overcrowding (and lack of water, food and medicine) while Badoglio's air force used chemical weapons against the Bedouin rebels in the desert.[5] On 24 January 1932 (the third anniversary of his appointment), Badoglio proclaimed the end ofLibyan resistance for the first time since the Italian invasion in 1911.
Badoglio (at left) and GeneralEmilio De Bono (at right) at Massawa
On 3 October 1935, because the progress ofDe Bono's invasion of Abyssinia was judged by Mussolini to be too slow, Badoglio, who had in the meantime launched a letter campaign againstEmilio de Bono, replaced de Bono as the commander. Badoglio asked for and was given permission to usechemical weapons, using the torture and murder of downed Italian pilotTito Minniti during the Ethiopian"Christmas Offensive" as a pretext for doing so. British historianSir Ian Kershaw wrote the "barbarous initiatives in the conduct of the warin Ethiopia" came as a rule from the military elite rather than from Mussolini himself.[citation needed]
On 11 June 1936,Rodolfo Graziani replaced Badoglio as viceroy and governor-general of Ethiopia. Badoglio returned to his duties as supreme chief of the Italian general staff. According toTime magazine, Badoglio even joined theFascist Party in early June.[6]
Badoglio was chief of staff from 1925 to 1940, and had the final say on the entire structure of the Armed Forces, including doctrine, selection of officers, and armaments, influencing the whole military environment. He did not oppose the decision of Mussolini and theKing to declare war on France and Great Britain. Following the Italian army's poor performance in theinvasion of Greece in December 1940, he resigned from the General Staff. He was replaced byUgo Cavallero.[7]
By early 1943, there was a widely held belief among the military elite that Italy needed to sign an armistice in order to exit the war. Mussolini needed to be removed, as he was not willing to sign an armistice, nor were the Allies willing to sign an armistice with him. The two men considered to replace Mussolini were Marshal Badoglio and MarshalEnrico Caviglia.[8] As Marshal Caviglia was one of the few Royal Army officers who was known to dislike Fascism, the king was unwilling to have him as prime minister. Victor Emmanuel wanted an officer who was committed to continuing the Fascist system, which led him to choose Badoglio who had faithfully served Mussolini and committed an array of atrocities in Ethiopia, but who had a grudge against Mussolini for making him the scapegoat for the failed invasion of Greece in 1940.[9] Moreover, Badoglio was an opportunist well known for his sycophancy towards those in power, which led the king to choose him as Mussolini's successor for he knew that Badoglio would do anything to have power, whereas Caviglia had a reputation as a man of principle and honour.[10] In a secret meeting on 15 July 1943, Victor Emmanuel told Badoglio that he would soon be sworn in as Italy's new prime minister, and that the king wanted no "ghosts" (i.e. liberal politicians from the pre-fascist era) in his cabinet.[11]
On 24 July 1943, as Italy had suffered several setbacks following theAllied invasion of Sicily, Mussolini summoned theFascist Grand Council, which afterDino Grandi's proposal overwhelminglyvoted no confidence in Mussolini. Thefollowing day, Mussolini was removed from government by KingVictor Emmanuel III and arrested after leaving the king's premises. On 3 September 1943, after lengthy negotiations with the Allies, GeneralGiuseppe Castellano signed theItalian armistice with the Allies inCassibile on behalf of Badoglio, who was thePrime Minister of Italy. Wary of the potentially hostile German response to the Armistice and German military countermeasures, Badoglio agreed with the Allies to postpone the formal announcement of the Armistice treaty until the moment the Allies would start to land in mainland Italy, which was planned for 9 September.[12]
On 8 September 1943, the armistice document was published by the Allies in theBadoglio Proclamation, while Badoglio himself had not informed the Italian armed forces. The units of the Italian Royal Army, Royal Navy, and Royal Air Force were thus generally surprised by the change and unprepared for swift German actions to disarm them. In the early hours of the following day, 9 September 1943, Badoglio, King Victor Emmanuel, some military ministers, and the chief of the general staff escaped by car from Rome toPescara and then sailed on corvette "Bayonetta" toBrindisi seeking Allied protection.[4]
Pietro Badoglio:Italy in the Second World War, memories and documents. (Transl.: Muriel Currey). Oxford University Press, 1948. Repr. 1976, Greenwood Press:ISBN0-8371-8485-1
Pietro Badoglio:The war in Abyssinia. (Foreword:Benito Mussolini). London, Methuen Publishers, 1937.
^abQuirico, Domenico (2006). "I vinti".Generali. Mondadori.
^abGrand, Alexander de (May 2004). "Mussolini's Follies: Fascism in Its Imperial and Racist Phase, 1935–1940".Contemporary European History.13 (2): 131.
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