A former president of the Council who disappears in the middle of Rome, kidnapped by terrorists. This is the scare that the Italians experienced, 45 years ago to this Thursday, with the kidnapping of Aldo Moro on March 16, 1978. The strong man of Italian politics at that time will not reappear until 55 days later, but without life, a mere bullet-riddled body thrown into the trunk of a red Renault 4L. Two months of kidnapping and a terrible soap opera that amazes Italians, already taken hostage by the extreme right and left who, refusing liberal democracy, multiply the attacks.
One could think of those past “years of lead”, and the memory of Aldo Moro buried with them. They’re not here. Newspaper articles, books, cinematographic works always follow one another, refusing to let the soul of the Christian Democracy rest in peace. A week ago, Arte put the series online sterno night by Marco Bellochio -broadcast a few months earlier on the Italian Netflix-, a filmmaker who had already dealt with the case 20 years ago with good morning note. Sign of a past that, decidedly, does not pass. Specialists in Italian political life explain to BFMTV.com why this trauma is so hard on the peninsula.
A scare that strikes the imagination
The first reason is as obvious as it is ignominious. If the episode continues to haunt you, it’s because the story is strong. “We condemn the violence but there is everything for this story to remain in the memory, it is a great imaginary film”, says Fabien Gibault, an expert in linguistics, professor at the universities of Bologna and Turin, specialist in Italian political life. .
On March 16, 1978, Aldo Moro went to attend the inauguration of the new Christian Democrat government. But a different vibe surrounds this one. In fact, he should be supported by the communists for the first time. Aldo Moro supports the consecration of the “historic compromise” for which he worked so hard, most of the time against his own political family: a rapprochement between the center right and the left dominated by the overwhelming PCI. The tug of war is supposed to pull the country out of the democratic deadlock and cycle of violence in which he is embroiled.
Car depuis la fin des années 1960, una extreme droite avide d’en finir avec la démocratie pour mieux resusciter le fascisme, et une extreme gauche qui craint de voir communism sombre dans le reformisme, posent bombe sur bombe, fomentent des attaques, ciblées or not. And on March 16, 1978, it was the Red Brigades that blocked Aldo Moro’s way, assassinated his entire escort, and then kidnapped him. If the Italian state wants to see him alive again, they say, it will have to release some of his imprisoned comrades and agree to political recognition of the terrorist organization.
But the ultimatums of the Red Brigades and the intercession of Pope Paul VI will not change anything. Too many Christian Democrats are wary of “historic compromise” to act, and communists fear appearing complicit in negotiating with these Marxist dissidents. At the bottom of his prison, the hatred of the Catholic Aldo Moro grows against his friends from yesterday. He first expresses his resentment in his letters. Then in his will. Upon his death, no executive of the Christian Democratic Party will have the right to attend his funeral.
Moorish symbol
Likewise, for Lorenzo Castellani, it is necessary to do a double reading of a tragedy where horror leads to the bankruptcy of the regime. “Aldo Moro has become the symbol of the dark age of terrorism and the sign of the weakness of the Italian state,” confides the assistant professor of history of political institutions and parties at the Luiss University in Rome.
The wound turns out to be even deeper when you scratch a little. Indeed, the evil revealed by the Moro case attacks Italian identity, the idea that Italians have of themselves. And at the same time questions the relationship with that violence that sticks to their skin, despite themselves.
“In itself, the assassination of a President of the Republic is always something that marks. It is the head of the institution who is assassinated. But without a doubt, it leaves a stronger mark on Italy, because it has a reputation for being a violent country. “, underlines Fabien Gibault, who immediately refutes a received idea:
“That does not mean that violence is accepted there. On the contrary, life is particularly bad, Italians suffer from it. And then, that perception of crime is accentuated because Italy, today, is a fairly safe country.
a ghost story
The Aldo Moro affair is, then, a story full of ghosts. In addition to the largely swept spectrum of violence, we find those responsible for the drama of the time. Not only are the individuals involved dead, but also the political apparatuses at work. One would almost be surprised at the event’s lingering resonance on a stage whose actors have long cleared the floor.
Lorenzo Castellani sees in him for the first time the aura of a historical change: “In many ways, Moro’s assassination marked the end of the Italian ‘first republic’.” “And with his death the possibility of a good-natured institutional change between the Christian Democrats and the Communist Party expired,” he adds.
Not to mention that in this country sown with churches, duomi, shared with the papacy in its own capital, the metaphysical and even religious factor is never far away. “It is a very Catholic country, there is always a sanctification of death, a sanctification of the victims, a martyr side somewhere. It is the idea of a sacrifice for the homeland”, says Fabien Gibault.
But time flies, and the new generations, of course, carry less and less with the memory of that cursed fortnight that rotted the lives of their parents and grandparents between the late sixties and early eighties.
“In fact, what remains is precisely the sacrificial side, and unfortunately what is erased is the political analysis of the act and its critical approach.”
The Commander’s Statue
At the risk of a permanent hagiography. In the works that explore his end, Aldo Moro is described as a loving husband and father, a sincere believer, in politics driven solely by the general interest. In a word, the man of the “historic compromise” would have died without any compromise, despite all these years in power or in negotiations.
“Moro was an honest and intelligent man, it is a fact that cannot be denied. He was also a strategist and a political visionary ”, assures Lorenzo Castellani.
However, the expert on transalpine institutions and the political formations that serve them admits: “However, most of his ideas -particularly that of advancing towards a bipolar system that foresees the crisis of communism- had failed in practice even before of his death”.
What “Aldo Moro” means today
The professor encourages us to make an inventory of the patrimony bequeathed by Aldo Moro to the contemporary Italian political world in this light. “Moro has shown that normalization and institutionalization with a tough political opponent are always possible,” slides Lorenzo Castellani before balancing: “But today, Italian politics is too far from Moro’s era for his legacy to continue. ”.
Fabien Gibault agrees. To evoke the case of Aldo Moro in today’s Italy is, without a doubt, to think of something more than the character. But it is always about talking about oneself, that is, about Italian society as it is.
“Today’s reception is closely related to Italian political news,” says the Bologna professor.
“Basically, we are not talking about his assassination but about extremism. There is an extreme right-wing government led by Giorgia Meloni that shows signs of moderation on the one hand and very tough signals on the other. And it is about looking at this risk.” Yesterday, Aldo Moro was the distorting mirror of the violence that ravaged Italy like the plague, now it reflects the threat of his return. Like a portrait of Dorian Gray from the land of the Mona Lisa.
The damn memory of the Red Brigades
This is where the influence of Aldo Moro’s trauma casts its last ray over our time. In Italy, his memory still goes a long way in defining the boundaries of what is acceptable and what is not in public debate. More than four decades after his death, no one – except on the fringes – would think to defend his murderers and his arguments.
“The Red Brigades are completely condemned by Italian public opinion. And then the intellectuals who were close to the Red Brigades are considered ‘radioactive’ in the debate.”
“Recently, in an interview, the philosopher Umberto Galimberti said that the Red Brigades had killed for an ideology, that it was not a mafia crime, that it was more noble, that they had exposed their lives. Words that shocked public opinion a lot. , illustrates his French colleague.
As a challenge to the left
Thus, while all of Italy submits to the examination of conscience, this is particularly valid for the left, and weighs in particular on the conscience of this generation that took up arms for a revolution that never came, sending crime in its place. “Far-left activists had to review their political position from that moment on. They had to normalize politically and condemn the terrorism they had helped fuel. Remembering Moro’s death is a way of conceiving a dramatic break in his life”, judge Lorenzo Castellani.
A problem that also colors the discussions in these political families, even the traditional ones. “The general secretary of the Democratic Party has just relaunched a debate, who wants to return to a line more to the left. And although it is obviously not about returning to the Red Brigades, he simultaneously reopens the chapter of extremism and violence “, details Fabien Gibault who ends:
“It’s a complex balance to find for the left.”
The late Aldo Moro is apparently not done with his country’s future.
Source: BFM TV
