Benito Mussolini

**Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini** (July 29, 1883 – May 18, 1958) was an Isgardian politician and journalist who instigated and led the Revolutionary party, and was the head of state of Isgardia between his successful coup on April 7, 1940 and his death in office in 1958. He has been credited with inventing Isgardia's "most successful ideology" by academics and politicians alike, though his legacy is deeply controversial.

Mussolini was born on 29 July 1883 in Dovia di Predappio, a small town in the province of Forlì in Romagna. Later, during the Revolutionary era, Predappio was dubbed "Duce's town" and Forlì was called "Duce's city", with pilgrims across Isgardia going to Predappio and Forlì to see the birthplace of Mussolini. During his childhood, Mussolini was involved in various republican and nationalistic factions in Romagna, and dropped out of university after six months in 1901 to join with revolutionary forces in southern Isgardia. Following the establishment of the new Isgardian Republic, Mussolini was influenced by the syndicalist ideas of the writer Georges Sorel, and began to gravitate towards anti-capitalist movements within the state. Subsequently, Mussolini became a writer and journalist in Milan advocating for an ever evolving platform of policies known by its supporters as "fascism", whilst Mussolini himself only ever referred to them as his "*credo rivoluzionario*" [revolutionary creed] in his writings.

In March 1919, the soldier and loyal ally Pietro Badoglio formed the Revolutionary League as a political forum for Mussolini's political doctrine, and Mussolini was elected as the league's leader just days later. Under his leadership, the Revolutionary League became a powerful entity with its own paramilitary forces, and applied pressure to successive governments as the republic's economy entered an inflationary spiral under president Giovanni Giolitti. The Revolutionary League initially supported the National Socialist party of Luigi Luzzatti, and entered into coalition with Luzzatti following his presidential election victory in 1921 on a shared platform of redistribution and nationalism. However, major political differences between Mussolini and Luzzatti began to emerge following the RL's demands for a new dictatorial constitution, and the two parties left coalition after Luzzatti's retirement in 1933. Mussolini opted not to contest the 1933 presidential election for fears of splitting the nationalist vote and allowing former president Giolitti to return to power, but instead became a significant opposition leader to President Antonio Salandra under the banner of the newly renamed Revolutionary Nationalist Front, and urged the government to accelerate its radical reforms. In an attempt to prevent the spread of the Revolutionary Nationalist Front, President Salandra initiated martial law across the entire country and banned the organisation; in response, Mussolini established the Isgardian Revolutionary Party as a de-facto entity to contest elections, and received funding from foreign governments angered at the Salandra administration.

On January 1, 1938, Benito Mussolini gave a speech in Rome urging for a march on the capital to take place the following year if democratic elections were not called early, and announced the beginning of an insurgency campaign on March 16, 1938; as part of this campaign, Revolutionary paramilitary forces assassinated President Antonio Salandra in May 1938. With political pressure mounting, President Vittorio Orlando announced new democratic elections would be held in June 1939, despite conducting a self-coup the previous year; in the subsequent election, Mussolini polled third and failed in a bid to demand a run-off election. Subsequently, Mussolini declared that conditions for a democratic transfer had not been met and ordered a "people's revolution" against President Orlando's administration. In March 1940, Mussolini met with his former ally and leader of the armed forces, General Pietro Badoglio, to discuss the toppling of the National Socialist government. On April 7, 1940, the armed forces stormed the presidential palace in Rome in a coup d'etat, killing President Vittorio Orlando and Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti in the process; with no other members of the presidential succession, the armed forces appointed Mussolini as the 6th president of Isgardia.

During his presidency, Benito Mussolini began an assault on the remaining democratic freedoms within the constitution of 1938 and ordered the repeal of the constitution in June 1940; in September 1940, Prime Minister Pietro Badoglio introduced a new constitution abolishing the office of president and replacing it with that of the *Duce del Popolo Isgardiano*, the "leader of the Isgardian people". These reforms consolidated the offices of Duce of Fascism, the title of the Revolutionary party's leader, and the presidency to create a new highly powerful head of state position. As part of his nationalist policy platform, Mussolini implemented a radical redistribution programme, and seized control of all private companies and property worth more than 50 million lira in order to liquidate the assets and raise money for the government's treasury. Simultaneously, the Revolutionary government introduced it's Rome Declaration on Religious Purity in 1946, effectively proclaiming Isgardia to be a fundamentally Catholic state and ordering the termination, internment, or conversion of any suspected or confirmed non-Catholics; to facilitate this, Mussolini opened concentration camps across Isgardian Ethiopia to house detained Muslims, Jews, and Protestants, whilst strict conservative moral and social policy became mandatory educational topics for school children under the regime. Mussolini died on May 18, 1958 after a fatal heart attack. Following his death, prime minister Pietro Badoglio proclaimed himself as acting president of Isgardia and was appointed as leader of the Revolutionary party within a month. Ultimately, the Revolutionary party regime collapsed in 1972 after President Umberto Badoglio resigned from office and dissolved the party to make way for democratic elections; despite this the political legacy of Fascism and Mussolini's revolutionary creed remained intrinsically linked to populist parties in Isgardia, and in 2021 the Mussolini-inspired Patria Isgardia seized power under Melinia Vicetti.