Gian Galeazzo Ciano, 2nd Count of Cortellazzo and Buccari (/ˈtʃɑːnoʊ/CHAH-noh, Italian:[ɡaleˈattsoˈtʃaːno]; 18 March 1903 – 11 January 1944) was an Italian diplomat and politician who served as
Foreign Minister in the government of his father-in-law,
Benito Mussolini, from 1936 until 1943. During this period, he was widely seen as Mussolini's most probable successor as head of government.[1][2]
He was the son of
AdmiralCostanzo Ciano, a founding member of the
National Fascist Party; father and son both took part in Mussolini's
March on Rome in 1922. Ciano saw action in the
Italo-Ethiopian War (1935–36) and was appointed Foreign Minister on his return. Following a series of Axis defeats in the
Second World War, Ciano began pushing for Italy's exit, and he was dismissed from his post as a result. He then served as ambassador to the
Vatican.
In July 1943, Ciano was among the members of the
Grand Council of Fascism that forced Mussolini's ousting and subsequent arrest. Ciano proceeded to flee to Germany but was arrested and handed over to Mussolini's new regime based in Salò, the
Italian Social Republic. Mussolini ordered Ciano's death, and in January 1944 he was executed by firing squad.[3]
Gian Galeazzo Ciano was born in
Livorno, Italy, in 1903. He was the son of
Costanzo Ciano and his wife Carolina Pini;[7] his father was an
Admiral and
World War I hero in the
Royal Italian Navy (for which service he was given the aristocratic title of
Count by
Victor Emmanuel III).[8] The elder Ciano, nicknamed Ganascia ("The Jaw"), was a founding member of the
National Fascist Party and re-organizer of the Italian merchant navy in the 1920s. Costanzo Ciano was not above extracting private profit from his public office. He would use his influence to depress the stock of a company, after which he would buy a controlling interest, then increase his wealth after its value rebounded. Among other holdings, Costanzo Ciano owned a newspaper, farmland in Tuscany and other properties worth huge sums of money. As a result, his son Galeazzo was accustomed to living a high-profile and glamorous lifestyle, which he maintained almost until the end of his life. Father and son both took part in Mussolini's 1922
March on Rome.[9]
After studying
Philosophy of Law at the
University of Rome, Galeazzo Ciano worked briefly as a journalist before choosing a diplomatic career; soon, he served as an
attaché in Rio de Janeiro.[10] According Mrs.
Milton E. Miles, in the 1920s in Beijing Ciano met
Wallis Simpson, later the
Duchess of Windsor, had an affair with her, and left her pregnant, leading to a botched abortion that left her infertile. The rumor was later widespread but never substantiated and Ciano's wife,
Edda Mussolini, denied it.[11]
On 24 April 1930, when he was 27 years old, Ciano married
Benito Mussolini's daughter
Edda Mussolini,[3] and they had three children (Fabrizio, Raimonda and Marzio), though he was known to have had several affairs while married.[12] Soon after their marriage, Ciano left for Shanghai to serve as Italian consul, where his wife had an affair with the Chinese warlord
Zhang Xueliang.[13]
Political career
Minister of press and propaganda
On his return to Italy in 1935, Ciano became the minister of press and propaganda in the government of his father-in-law.[14][15] He volunteered for action in the
Italian invasion of Ethiopia (1935–36) as a bomber squadron commander. He received two silver medals of valor and reached the rank of captain. His future opponent
Alessandro Pavolini served in the same squadron as a lieutenant.
Foreign minister
Upon his highly trumpeted return from the war as a "hero" in 1936, he was appointed by Mussolini as replacement
Foreign Minister. Ciano began to keep a diary a short time after his appointment and kept it active up to his 1943 dismissal as foreign minister. In 1937, he was allegedly involved in planning the murder of the brothers
Carlo and
Nello Rosselli, two exiled anti-fascist activists killed in the French
spa town of
Bagnoles-de-l'Orne on 9 June. Also in 1937, prior to the
Italian annexation in 1939, Gian Galeazzo Ciano was named an Honorary Citizen of
Tirana, Albania.[16]
Before
World War II, Mussolini may have been preparing Ciano to succeed him as Duce.[17] At the start of the war in 1939, Ciano did not agree with Mussolini's plans and knew that Italy's armed forces were ill-prepared for a major war. When Mussolini formally declared war on France in 1940, he wrote in his diary, "I am sad, very sad. The adventure begins. May God help Italy!"[18][19] Ciano became increasingly disenchanted with Nazi Germany and the course of World War II, although when the Italian regime embarked on an ill-advised "parallel war" alongside Germany, he went along, despite the terribly-executed Italian invasion of Greece and its subsequent setbacks. Prior to the German campaign in France in 1940, Ciano leaked a warning of imminent invasion to neutral
Belgium.[20]
Throughout 1941 and thereafter, Ciano made derogatory and sarcastic comments about Mussolini behind his back and was surprised that these comments were reported to the Duce, who did not take them lightly; for his part, Ciano ignored well meaning friends who advised moderation.[15] On top of that, friends and acquaintances sought his protection and aid on various matters not having to do with his official position, which in turn resulted in further caustic remarks. In addition, two relatively minor incidents wounded his overblown self-importance and vanity. One was his being excluded from a projected meeting between Mussolini and Franco. The other involved him being reprimanded for a rowdy celebration of an aviator in Bari; he wrote a letter to Mussolini stating that the Duce had "opened a wound in him which can never be closed." His own self-worth seemed to cloud his judgement, forgetting that he had acquired his position by marrying Mussolini's daughter.[21]
In late 1942 and early 1943, following the Axis defeat in North Africa, other major setbacks on the Eastern Front, and with an Anglo-American assault on Sicily looming, Ciano turned against the doomed war and actively pushed for Italy's exit from the conflict. He was silenced by being removed from his post as foreign minister. The rest of the cabinet was removed as well on 5 February 1943.[22]
Ambassador to the Holy See
Ciano was offered the post of ambassador to the
Holy See, and presented his credentials to
Pope Pius XII on 1 March.[22] In this role he remained in Rome, watched closely by Mussolini. The regime's position had become even more unstable by the coming summer, however, and court circles were already probing the Allied commands for some sort of agreement.[19][23]
On the afternoon of 24 July 1943, Mussolini summoned the
Fascist Grand Council to its first meeting since 1939, prompted by the
Allied invasion of Sicily. At that meeting, Mussolini announced that the Germans were thinking of evacuating the south. This led
Dino Grandi to launch a blistering attack on his longtime comrade. Grandi put on the table a resolution asking King Victor Emmanuel III to resume his full constitutional powers – in effect, a vote leading to
Mussolini's ousting from leadership. The motion won by an unexpectedly large margin, 19–8, with Ciano voting in favor. Mussolini's replacement was
Pietro Badoglio, an Italian general in both World Wars.[24] Mussolini did not expect the vote to have substantive effect, and showed up for work the next morning as usual. That afternoon, the king summoned him to
Villa Savoia and dismissed him from office. Upon leaving the villa, Mussolini was arrested.[25]
Exile, trial and death
Ciano was dismissed from his post by the new government of Italy put in place after his father-in-law was overthrown. Ciano, Edda and their three children fled to Germany on 28 August 1943 in fear of being arrested by the new Italian government. The Germans turned him over to Mussolini's new government, the
Italian Social Republic. He was then formally arrested on charges of treason. Under German and Fascist pressure, Mussolini had Ciano imprisoned before he was tried and found guilty.[25] After the
Verona trial and sentence, on 11 January 1944, Ciano was executed by a
firing squad along with 4 others (
Emilio De Bono,
Luciano Gottardi,
Giovanni Marinelli and
Carlo Pareschi) who had voted for Mussolini's ousting. As a further humiliation, the condemned men were tied to chairs and shot in the back, though Ciano managed to twist his chair around at the last minute to face the firing squad before uttering his final words, "Long live Italy!"[26]
Ciano is remembered for his Diaries 1937–1943,[27] a revealing daily record of his meetings with Mussolini,
Hitler,
Ribbentrop, foreign ambassadors and other political figures. Edda tried to barter his papers to the Germans in return for his life; Gestapo agents helped her confidant
Emilio Pucci rescue some of them from Rome. Pucci was then a lieutenant in the Italian Air Force, but would find fame after the war as a fashion designer. When Hitler vetoed the plan, she hid the bulk of the papers at a clinic in
Ramiola, near
Medesano and on 9 January 1944, Pucci helped Edda escape to Switzerland with five diaries covering the war years which were then buried beneath a rose garden.[28] The diary was first published in English in
London in 1946, edited by
Malcolm Muggeridge, covering 1939 to 1943.[29] The complete English version was published in 2002.[4]
Children
Gian Galeazzo and Edda Ciano had three children:
Fabrizio Ciano, 3rd Conte di Cortellazzo e Buccari (Shanghai, 1 October 1931 –
San José, Costa Rica, 8 April 2008), married to Beatriz Uzcategui Jahn, without issue. Wrote a personal memoir entitled Quando il nonno fece fucilare papà (When Grandpa Had Daddy Shot).
Raimonda Ciano (Rome, 12 December 1933 – Rome, 24 May 1998), married to Nobile Alessandro Giunta (born 1929), son of NobileFrancesco Giunta (Piero, 1887–1971) and wife (m. Rome, 1924) Zenaida del Gallo Marchesa di
Roccagiovine (Rome, 1902 –
São Paulo, Brazil, 1988)
Marzio Ciano, 4th Conte di Cortellazzo e Buccari (Rome, 18 December 1937 – 11 April 1974), married Gloria Lucchesi
One of the most recognisable voices in German radio and television,
Sky du Mont, played Ciano in the 1983 mini-series The Winds of War, whereas in the 1989 sequel, War and Remembrance he played a different Count, Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, of the bomb plot fame.
Raul Julia played Ciano in the 1985 television mini-series, Mussolini: The Untold Story.
In Serbia there is a proverb: "Living like Count Ciano" – describing a flamboyant and luxurious life (Živi k'o grof Ćano/Живи к'о гроф Ћано).
Ciano's diaries were published in 1946 and were used by the prosecution against Hitler's Foreign Minister, Joachim von Ribbentrop, during the post-war
Nuremberg Trials.
Curzio Malaparte - Kaputt: After he wrote Coup d'État: The Technique of Revolution, Malaparte was jailed by the Fascist regime. He was freed on the personal intervention of Count Galeazzo Ciano. In Kaputt, Malaparte refers to Count Ciano and his wife Edda. Like Edda Ciano, Malaparte spent time in forced exile on the island of
Lipari.
Count Ciano was mentioned by name in
Sofia Vembo's song about Mussolini, his father in law.
^Palla, Marco (10 January 1982). Rapone, Leonardo; Höbel, Alexander; Larussa, Alessandro (eds.).
"Mussolini il fascista numero uno". Studi Storici (in Italian). 23 (1). Rome, Italy: Fondazione Istituto Gramsci: 23–49.
ISSN0039-3037.
JSTOR20565036. Retrieved 27 July 2021.
^Moseley, Ray (1999), Mussolini's Shadow: The Double Life of Count Galeazzo Ciano, New Haven: Yale University Press, pp.
9–10,
ISBN978-0-300-07917-3
^Di Rienzo, Eugenio (29 November 2018). Grossi, Davide; Mazzuchi, Andrea; Malato, Enrico; Spadaro, Cetty (eds.). Ciano: Vita pubblica e privata del 'genero di regime' nell'Italia del Ventennio nero. Profili (Salerno editrice) (in Italian). Rome, Italy: Salerno Editrice.
ISBN9788869733420.
^Kristof, Nicholas D. (19 October 2001). Baquet, Dean; Louttit, Meghan; Corbett, Philip; Chang, Lian; Drake, Monica; Kahn, Joseph; Kingsbury, Kathleen; Sulzberger, A.G.; Levien, Meredith Kopit; Caputo, Roland A.; Bardeen, William; Dunbar-Johnson, Stephen; Brayton, Diane (eds.).
"Zhang Xueliang, 100, Dies; Warlord and Hero of China". National news. The New York Times. Vol. CL, no. 210. p. C13.
ISSN0362-4331.
OCLC1645522.
Archived from the original on 24 October 2009. Retrieved 25 July 2021.
^
abGuida, Francesco (2016). Andreides, Gábor; Juhász, Balázs (eds.).
"L'Ungheria, gli ungheresi e Galeazzo Ciano" [Hungary, the Hungarians and Galeazzo Ciano]. Öt Kontinens (in Italian). 13 (2). Budapest, Hungary:
Eötvös Loránd Tudományegyetem, Új-és Jelenkori Egyetemes Történeti Tanszék (Eötvös Loránd University, Department of Modern and Contemporary Universal History): 75–85.
ISSN1589-3839. Retrieved 27 July 2021 – via Central and Eastern European Online Library GmbH (CEEOL).
Ciano, Galeazzo (1947) [1943].
Muggeridge, Malcolm (ed.). Ciano's Diary, 1939–1943. Translated by V. Umberto Coletti-Perucca (3rd ed.). London: William Heinemann Ltd.
Ciano, Galeazzo (1948) [1943].
Muggeridge, Malcolm (ed.). Ciano's diplomatic papers: being a record of nearly 200 conversations held during the years 1936–42 with Hitler, Mussolini, Franco; together with important memoranda, letters, telegrams etc. Translated by Stuart Hood (1st ed.). London: Odhams Press.
LCCN49019765.
OCLC1085348.
Ciano, Galeazzo (2002) [1943]. Pugliese, Stanislao G.; Miller, Robert Lawrence; Gibson, Hugh (eds.). Diary 1937–1943. Translated by Miller, Robert Lawrence; Coletti-Perucca, V. Umberto (2nd ed.). New York: Enigma Books.
ISBN9781929631025.
LCCN2004-266790.
OCLC49545875.
Ciano, Galeazzo (2000) [1946]. Gibson, Hugh (ed.). The Ciano Diaries, 1939-1943: The Complete, Unabridged Diaries of Count Galeazzo Ciano, Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs, 1936-1943. Garden City, NY: Doubleday.
ISBN1-931313-74-1.
Ciano, Galeazzo (2010). Дневник фашиста. 1939–1943 [The diary of a fascist. 1939–1943]. Primary sources of recent history (in Russian). Moscow: Platz. p. 676.
ISBN978-5-903514-02-1.
Moseley, Ray (18 March 2014) [2000]. Berk, Adina Popescu (ed.). Mussolini's Shadow: The Double Life of Count Galeazzo Ciano (2nd ed.). New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press.
ISBN978-0300209563.
OCLC41497106.
"Galeazzo Ciano's Last Reflections before Execution." World War II Today RSS. Accessed 25 March 2015.
"Galeazzo Ciano – a Summary – History in an Hour." History in an Hour. 10 January 2014. Accessed 25 March 2015.
"Gian Galeazzo Ciano – Comando Supremo." Comando Supremo. 14 February 2010. Accessed 25 March 2015.
Smyth, Howard McGaw; Ciano, Galeazzo (22 September 1993) [1969]. Smyth, Howard McGaw (ed.).
The Ciano Papers: Rose Garden(PDF). CIA Historical Review Program (Center for the Study of Intelligence) (Report). Vol. 13. Langley, VA:
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). pp. 1–50. Archived from
the original(PDF) on 19 January 2021. Retrieved 25 July 2021.