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Italian Para-Military Groups

Between 1968 and 1982, Italy was a major stage for terrorist practices and counterpractices. Ideologically motivated terrorist violence perpetrated by clandestine formations has marred the Italian political landscape for over a decade. It is estimated that 14,613 acts of terrorist criminality were committed between 1968 and 1982 by highly structured organizations and by occasional groupings of individuals in the name of ideologies, or in the pursuit of goals, variously classifiable as Communist, neo-Fascist, anarchist, separatist, nationalistic/ counterseparatist, ecological, feminist, internationalist, and trans-national.

The often thin "ideological line of demarcation between these groups, which in some cases profess multiple ideologies, induced most observers to distinguish more simply, but, somewhat less accurately, between terrorism of the left on one hand and terrorism on the right on the other. The near totality of terrorist crimes perpetrated on Italian territory is the work of domestic terrorist formations, but there are also cases on record of terrorist operations conducted jointly by Italian nationals and aliens or by aliens alone.

Aggregate statistics on terrorist criminality generally reflect intensity as well as intermittent escalation trends. In point of fact, as opposed to less than 150 incidents recorded in 1968, several hundred per year took place during the period 1969-75, over 1,000 in 1976, and over 2,000 per year during the 1977-79 timeframe. A constant downward trend ranging from over 1,000 to several hundred incidents was recorded, instead, between 1980 and 1982.

While these figures constitute undeniable proof of the extensive terrorist presence in Italian society, the statistics can be deceiving if not properly considered. In the first place, notwithstanding the meritorious efforts displayed by the major law enforcement agencies - State Police and Carabinieri - in compiling them, aggregate statistics are admittedly not fully accurate because of the clandestine nature of the terrorist phenomenon, which often prevents the attribution of a precise paternity to criminal actions. Secondly, as a rule, a comparatively small percentage of the annual statistics relates to significant terrorist acts such as murders, woundings, and abductions. Moreover; even though statistics pertaining to specific categories of terrorist crimes may serve as a more reliable indicator of the threat posed by terrorist formations, allowance should be made for multiple deaths and injuries resulting from the detonation of explosive devices during a single terrorist incident. While understandably disquieting, this type of action does not reflect structural or operational sophistication on the part of a terrorist group.

Indirect evidence of the numerical strength of terrorist elements active in Italy is offered by the statistics compiled at various intervals by the Ministry of the Interior on imprisoned and wanted terrorists and/or subversives. On March 1, 1980, the prison population included 604 inmates of the left and 239 of the right. On the same date, 70 members of the left and 48 of the right were on the wanted list. Nearly 2 years later, on October 31, 1982, the prison population included 1,357 inmates of the left and 480 of the right. At the same time, 274 members of the left and 79 of the right were on the wanted list. These figures do not include unidentified terrorists and supportive extremists found among the general population.

many people in Italy believe that the Red Brigades are black, that is Fascist, that they are controlled and manipulated by extreme rightwing groups that are supported and funded by CIA. For many people in Italy, it was a very logical connection between the two. The initial response of the Italian and the Western press was that it was the Red Brigades who murdered Aldo Moro, and the Red Brigades were far leftists who had ties with the Soviet Union. Stories cIrculated in Italy at the time that these Red Brigade members were trained in Czechoslovakia. The Soviets then, in reaction to this, wrote an article analyzing the situation in which they said that it was CIA that was secretly manipulating the Red Brigades who murdered Aldo Moro.

Separatist organizations, whose extremist fringes had from time to time resorted to violence since World War II, included those active in the islands of Sicily and Sardinia and in the German speaking South Tyrol area of the region of Trentino-Alto Adige, which borders with Austria. By the 1980s, however, only Sardinian and South Tyrolean separatists occasionally created law enforcement problems. Sicilian separatist trends practically disappeared in the late 1940s.