Italy. 12 August 1848

Italy.

* With the same rapidity with which the Austrians were driven out of Lombardy in March, they have now returned in triumph and have already entered Milan.

The Italian people have been sparing in no sacrifice. With their goods and their blood they stood ready to carry through the work they had begun and to fight for their national independence.

But nowhere did the courage, the enthusiasm, the capacity for self-sacrifice correspond to those who were at the helm. Openly or secretly they did everything, not to use the means placed in their hands for liberation from Austria’s brutal tyranny, but to paralyse the people’s strength and, in point of substance, to bring back the old conditions as quickly as possible.

The Pope, daily more worked upon and won over by the Austrian-Jesuit policy, placed every obstacle in the way of the Mamiani ministry that was at his disposal in alliance with the “Blacks” and the “Black-Yellows”. The ministry itself made very patriotic speeches before both chambers, but lacked the necessary energy to translate its good will into deeds.

In Tuscany the government came forward with fine words, but with still fewer deeds. But the chief enemy of Italian freedom among the native princes was and is Charles Albert. The Italians should have hourly repeated and heeded the saying: “Heaven protect us from our friends; from our enemies we shall protect ourselves!” They had but little to fear from the Bourbon Ferdinand; he was long since unmasked. On the other hand, Charles Albert had panegyrics sung to him everywhere as la spada d’Italia (the sword of Italy) and was praised as the hero whose sword’s point offered the surest guarantee for Italy’s freedom and independence.

Italy. 12 August 1848

His emissaries went out to all the places of Upper Italy and depicted him as the only man who could and would save the fatherland. In order that he might do this, the formation of a kingdom of Upper Italy was of course necessary. Only thus, they said, would the power be placed in his hands that was needed not merely to resist Austria, but to throw her out of Italy entirely.

The ambition that had earlier induced him to ally with the Carbonari, whom he later betrayed; this ambition had awakened more strongly than ever and made him dream of a plenitude of power and splendour before which the lustre of all the other princes of Italy would very soon have to pale.

He believed he could confiscate the whole popular movement of the year 1848 for the benefit of his wretched person. Filled with hatred and distrust of all truly liberal men, he surrounded himself with people who were more or less devoted to absolutism and inclined to promote the royal ambition. He placed at the head of the army such generals whose intellectual superiority or whose political views he had no reason to fear, but who possessed neither the soldiers’ confidence nor the talent required for the successful conduct of the war. Pompously he called himself the “liberator” of Italy, while imposing his yoke as a condition on those he was to liberate.

Circumstances were as favourable to him as they are to few men. His greed to have a great deal and, if possible, everything finally made him lose what he had already gained. As long as the incorporation of Lombardy with Piedmont was not yet fully decided, as long as the possibility of a republican form of government still existed, he remained motionless within his entrenchments facing the Austrians, however weak they were relatively at that time. He allowed Radetzky, d’Aspre, Welden, etc., to conquer one city and fortress after another in the Venetian provinces: he did not stir. Venice proved itself worthy of help in his eyes only after it had taken refuge under his crown. The same with Parma and Modena. Meanwhile Radetzky had reinforced himself and had taken all measures for an attack and, in the face of the incapacity and blindness of Charles Albert and his generals, for a decisive victory.

The outcome is known. From now on the Italians cannot and will no longer place their liberation in the hands of a prince or king; for their salvation they must rather set aside this spada d’Italia as unserviceable as quickly as possible. Had they done this earlier, pensioned off the king and his system together with all its partisans, and established a democratic union among themselves, there would probably be no Austrian left in Italy today.

Instead, they have not only in vain endured all the sufferings of a war furiously waged by their enemies