Black Brigades
Black Brigades were one of the
fascist paramilitary groups operating in
Italian Social Republic , during the final years of
World War II, and after the signing of the Italian Armistice in 1943.
Benito Mussolini had been arrested after the Grand Fascist Council, with the support of King
Vittorio Emanuele III, overthrew him and began negotiations with the Allies for Italy's withdrawal from the war. Mussolini was rescued by German paratroopers led by
Otto Skorzeny and installed as the President of the Italian Social Republic, a regime nominally administering the German-occupied northern Italy.
Encyclopedia
- For the 1970 film see Black Brigade
Black Brigades were one of the
fascist paramilitary groups operating in
Italian Social Republic , during the final years of
World War II, and after the signing of the Italian Armistice in 1943.
Benito Mussolini had been arrested after the Grand Fascist Council, with the support of King
Vittorio Emanuele III, overthrew him and began negotiations with the Allies for Italy's withdrawal from the war. Mussolini was rescued by German paratroopers led by
Otto Skorzeny and installed as the President of the Italian Social Republic, a regime nominally administering the German-occupied northern Italy.
As the
Milizia Volontaria per la Sicurezza Nazionale was disbanded by the terms of the armistice, the
Guardia Nazionale Repubblicana was formed on 24 November 1943 out of
carabinieri, ex-army, and others still loyal to the
fascist cause.
The Black Brigades were formed out the members of the Fascist Republican Party, with a law dated 30 June 1944. They not only fought the Allies, and Italian
partisans, but also fought against and murdered their political opponents and others whose support of "the cause" was less than exuberant. Many were killed in the fighting.
The Black Brigades were not actually brigade sized units, they were in reality only weak battalions or strong companies with 200 to 300 personnel each. There were 41 territorial brigades numbered one through 41, and there were eight mobile brigades, these were numbered one through seven plus the Second Arditi Brigade. Although they wore the standard Italian army uniform they tended to only wear a black sweater with the grey-green uniform pants and their badge or insignia was the jawless
death's head.
