A new multi-episode podcast by veteran
American journalist Joe Kirwin explores the legacy of the
Allies' Gothic Line offensive during the liberation of Italy at
the end of World War II.
The series looks at how the most multinational, multiracial army
ever assembled, including soldiers from more than 17 countries
with persons of color from North and South America, Africa, Asia
and Oceania, drove the Nazis and Italian Fascists from their
mountain strongholds in northern Italy
Kirwin says that this retrospective story, which is a blank page
in many history books, especially in Italy, has important
political significance today, as U.S. President Donald Trump
throws the post-war transatlantic alliance into doubt, Vladimir
Putin's war against Ukraine rages and the European Union races
to build an independent defense capacity and boost economic
growth to finance it.
Kirwin, who spent the past year traveling coast to coast along
the Apennine Mountains in northern Italy interviewing
historians, academics, authors and
museum curators from around the world, will present the podcast
series with a press conference at the foreign press association
in Rome (via del Plebiscito 102) on May 15 at 11am local time.
As a founding EU member with the bloc's third largest economy,
Italy should be shoulder to shoulder with allies led by the
United Kingdom, France, Germany, the Nordic nations, Poland and
others that understand Europe faces the same kinds of challenges
the continent confronted in the 1930s before WWII, he argues.
He said that, while Italian President Sergio Mattarella stated
in February there is no difference between Adolf Hitler and
Putin, Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni is sitting on the
sidelines.
She is not alone, he says, with opposition to new EU defense
spending and military support for Ukraine widespread across much
of the Italian political spectrum and in public opinion.
"This lack of solidarity with European allies and Ukraine has a
lot to do with the ghosts of WWII that still haunt Italy because
of the failure to reckon with its past,'' said Kirwin,
In an effort to help Italy confront its WWII past, Guido
Molinari is spearheading a new Allies Museum in Rome that will
will open virtually in September.
''What is happening now brings home the importance of what we
are doing,'' Molinari stated in a podcast panel discussion.
"In trying to explain how the people from all over the world of
all racial, ethnic and religious backgrounds were able to come
together and liberate Italy, we are very certain the story of
history would be very different if those tens of thousands of
young men and women had not paid the ultimate sacrifice.
"And so we need to do work, even in these challenging times, to
honor their memory.''
For further information about the podcast and the May 15 press
conference, contact Kirwin: Tel. 00 32 478 277802 or
[email protected].
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