Activities
The ministry coordinated the search for missing persons and the repatriation of Italians from abroad, refugees, internees, and Italian prisoners. It managed 109 refugee collection centres, built accommodations for assisted compatriots, provided basic necessities, and dealt with the reintegration of war veterans into the Italian economy, including offering them jobs in public administration. It also provided social and health assistance. In 1947 the ministry drew up a report that calculated the number of Italians still held in prison camps around the world at 1.45 million.
The ministry included the Commission for the Recognition of Partisan Qualifications, which was responsible for the recognition of the status of "patriots," “fighting partisans”, and those killed, disabled, or wounded during the War of Liberation, the Italian name for the Kingdom of Italy's participation during World War II on the Allied side between 1943 and 1945, including operations by the Italian Co-belligerent Forces and the Italian resistance movement against the Axis powers during both the Italian campaign and the simultaneous Italian Civil War between the Kingdom of Italy and the Italian Social Republic.
The ministry had strong roots across Italy, with offices present in every provincial capital. Until 1946, a separate branch of the ministry in Milan coordinated its activities in northern Italy. Although the ministry itself was abolished in 1947, the provincial offices remained open until 1954, when they were abolished and merged into the Assistance Division of the offices of the prefectures.
A prisoner of war (POW) is a person who is held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610.
Operation Keelhaul was a forced repatriation of Soviet citizens and members of the Soviet Army in the West to the Soviet Union after World War II. While forced repatriation focused on Soviet Armed Forces POWs of Germany and Russian Liberation Army members, it included many other people under Allied control. Refoulement, the forced repatriation of people in danger of persecution, is a human rights violation and breach of international law. Thus Operation Keelhaul would have been called a war crime under modern international humanitarian law, especially in regards to the many civilians forced into Soviet work camps, many of whom had never been Soviet citizens, having fled Russia before the end of the Russian Civil War.
World War II was the deadliest military conflict in history. An estimated total of 70–85 million people perished, or about 3% of the 2.3 billion (est.) people that comprised the global population in 1940. Deaths directly caused by the war are estimated at 50–56 million, with an additional estimated 19–28 million deaths from war-related disease and famine. Civilian deaths totaled 50–55 million. Military deaths from all causes totaled 21–25 million, including deaths in captivity of about 5 million prisoners of war. More than half of the total number of casualties are accounted for by the dead of the Republic of China and of the Soviet Union. The following tables give a detailed country-by-country count of human losses. Statistics on the number of military wounded are included whenever available.
Nazism and the acts of Nazi Germany affected many countries, communities, and people before, during and after World War II. Nazi Germany's attempt to exterminate several groups viewed as subhuman by Nazi ideology was eventually stopped by the combined efforts of the wartime Allies headed by the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union, and the United States.
The Italian resistance movement is an umbrella term for the Italian resistance groups who fought the occupying forces of Nazi Germany and the fascist collaborationists of the Italian Social Republic during the Second World War in Italy from 1943 to 1945. As a diverse anti-fascist movement and organisation, the Resistenza opposed Nazi Germany, as well as Nazi Germany's Italian puppet state regime, the Italian Social Republic, which the Germans created following the Nazi German invasion and military occupation of Italy by the Wehrmacht and the Waffen-SS from 8 September 1943 until 25 April 1945.
The Bleiburg repatriations were a series of forced repatriations from Allied-occupied Austria of Axis-affiliated individuals to Yugoslavia in May 1945 after the end of World War II in Europe. During World War II, Yugoslavian territory was either annexed or occupied by Axis forces, and as the war came to end, thousands of Axis soldiers and civilian collaborators fled Yugoslavia for Austria as the Yugoslav Army (JA) gradually retook control. When they reached Austria, in accordance with Allied policy, British forces refused to take them into custody and directed them to surrender to the JA instead. The JA subsequently subjected them to death marches back to Yugoslavia, where those who survived were either subject to summary executions or interned in labor camps, where many died due to harsh conditions. The repatriations are named for the Carinthian town of Bleiburg, where the initial British refusal to accept the surrenders occurred, and from which some repatriations were carried out.
The Yugoslav Partisans, or the National Liberation Army, officially the National Liberation Army and Partisan Detachments of Yugoslavia, was the communist-led anti-fascist resistance to the Axis powers in occupied Yugoslavia during World War II. Led by Josip Broz Tito, the Partisans are considered to be Europe's most effective anti-Axis resistance movement during World War II.
Displaced persons camps in post–World War II Europe were established in Germany, Austria, and Italy, primarily for refugees from Eastern Europe and for the former inmates of the Nazi German concentration camps. A "displaced persons camp" is a temporary facility for displaced persons, whether refugees or internally displaced persons. Two years after the end of World War II in Europe, some 850,000 people lived in displaced persons camps across Europe, among them Armenians, Czechoslovaks, Estonians, Greeks, Poles, Latvians, Lithuanians, Yugoslavs, Jews, Russians, Ukrainians, Hungarians, and Belarusians.
Italian prisoners of war in the Soviet Union is the narrative of POWs from the Italian Army in Russia and of their fate in Stalin's Soviet Union during and after World War II.
The National Legionary State was a totalitarian fascist regime which governed Romania for five months, from 14 September 1940 until its official dissolution on 14 February 1941. The regime was led by General Ion Antonescu in partnership with the Iron Guard, the Romanian ultra-nationalist, and anti-communist organization. Though the Iron Guard had been in the Romanian Government since 28 June 1940, on 14 September it achieved dominance, leading to the proclamation of the National Legionary State.
The Ministry of Defence is the government body of the Italian Republic responsible for military and civil defence matters and managing the Italian Armed Forces. It is led by the Italian Minister of Defence, a position occupied by Guido Crosetto since October 2022.
The Anti-Communist Volunteer Militia were paramilitary auxiliary formations of the Royal Italian Army composed of Yugoslav anti-Partisan groups in the Italian-annexed and occupied portions of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia during the Second World War.
Large numbers of German prisoners of war were held in Britain between the outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939 and late 1948. Their numbers reached a peak of around 400,000 in 1946, and then began to fall when repatriation began. The experiences of these prisoners differed in certain important respects from those of captured German servicemen held by other nations. The treatment of the captives, though strict, was generally humane, and fewer prisoners died in British captivity than in other countries. The British government also introduced a programme of re-education, which was intended to demonstrate to the POWs the evils of the Nazi regime, while promoting the advantages of democracy. Some 25,000 German prisoners remained in the United Kingdom voluntarily after being released from prisoner of war status.
The Togliatti amnesty was an amnesty declared in Italy on 22 June 1946. Named after the then-Italian Minister of Justice, Italian Communist Party (PCI) member and leader Palmiro Togliatti, it pardoned and reduced sentences for Italian fascists and partisans alike. The amnesty covered common crimes as well as political ones committed during World War II. Fascists and their collaborators benefited more from the amnesty than the partisans.
Poland–Yugoslavia relations were historical foreign relations between Poland and now broken up Yugoslavia.
The Ministry of the Navy was a ministry of the Kingdom of Italy from 1861 to 1946 and of the Italian Republic from 1946 to 1947. Under the Kingdom of Italy, it oversaw the Regia Marina, while under the Italian Republic, when its name became Ministero della marina militare, it oversaw the Marina Militare. The ministry was abolished in 1947, when it merged with the Ministry of the Air Force and the Ministry of War to form the Ministry of Defence.
The Ministry of War was a ministry of the Kingdom of Italy from 1861 to 1946 and of the Italian Republic from 1946 to 1947. Under the Kingdom of Italy, it oversaw the Royal Army, while under the Italian Republic it oversaw the Italian Army. It was abolished in 1947, when it merged with the Ministry of the Air Force and the Ministry of the Navy to form the Ministry of Defence.
The Badge of Honor for the "Volunteers of Freedom" Patriots is an award established by the Kingdom of Italy to recognize those who participated in the armed struggle of the Italian resistance movement or Italian Co-belligerent Forces against Axis forces in Italy during World War II or who refused to collaborate with Axis forces after being taken prisoner by Nazi Germany.
The Ministry of Occupied Italy was the government body of the Kingdom of Italy responsible for affairs in portions of Italy under Axis occupation during World War II. The ministry existed from December 1944 to July 1945.
The Ministry of Aeronautics was a department of the Kingdom of Italy, and subsequently of the Italian Republic, with jurisdiction over both military and civil aviation. Established in 1925, it was abolished in 1947 when it merged with the Ministry of War and the Ministry of the Navy to form the Ministry of Defence.
