Nenni's 'Opening to the Right'

...Pella got his chance because the first-choice candidates of the Christian Democratic party, to which he belonged, failed to muster a Parliamentary majority...

...While Communist party boss Palmiro Togliatti has gracefully retired to the background, Nenni, more in tune with the times, has taken over first fiddle...

...Pella and Scelba both had their Fanfani, and Segni could profit by their example...

...Until rather recently, American policy planners tended to take Italy too much for granted, as though $5 billion worth of American aid had given the U.S...

...The regional government of Sicily, for example, has no working majority in the Sicilian Parliament and owes its survival to the sufferance of the Left, which has consistently abstained on no-confidence motions moved by the Right...

...Whereas most of the key ministers were holdovers, Vanoni, though he failed to win the Premiership, became by far the strongest figure in the government after Scelba's replacement by Segni...

...But now, when the Government has failed to provide the opening, Nenni himself has apparently decided to go ahead and cut through his own "opening to the right" in the Government's direction, like Mohammed going to the mountain...

...The Chairman promptly agreed...

...It was also necessary to be nice to Marshal Tito, lest just for spite he jump off the fence on the Soviet side...

...But once politics emerged from the summer doldrums the Segni Government, like the Pella Government, showed a will to survive...

...But on the vote the Communists followed Nenni's lead and the Government piled up the biggest majority of its existence...

...The recent Rome stopovers by Secretary of State John Foster Dulles and Presidential Adviser Harold Stassen en route to Geneva suggest a new, if belated, concern over Italy on the part of Washington...

...Moreover, they stressed that the amendment would have passed without this unsolicited support...

...To do so, he would have to clasp the outstretched hand of Nenni...

...This was not the first time the Socialists on their own initiative had lent the Government a hand...

...Communist Senator Ottavio Pastore rose and announced that his group would vote against the budget...

...Nevertheless, the general mood of "relaxed tension" has affected the Italians no less than their neighbors...

...Events in the Italian political ring unfold against a changing international background...

...Italy is a land of ancient civilization where not even the hottest political battles and factional intrigues are allowed to interfere with the holidays...

...It is a paradox of Italian politics that governments are overthrown not by their avowed opponents but by their presumed friends and supporters...

...a permanent lien on Italy's foreign policy...

...But on many previous occasions it had assisted the Center parties on a local scale...

...All this is largely the natural consequence of reviving national self-respect and a healthy sign that the country's spiritual recovery is keeping pace with its economic recovery from the ashes of defeat...

...The resulting deadlock threw the Premiership to frail, elderly Antonio Segni, generally respected but politically weak...

...To date, there has been no tangible deviation of Italian foreign policy from the pro-Western course to which this country has cleaved steadily for a decade...

...Once in office, Pella contrived to stay on for a time by recruiting the support of the rightwing opposition, namely the Monarchists...

...After working hand in glove to topple Scelba, President Giovanni Gronchi and Christian Democratic Party Secretary Amintore Fanfani fell out over who should succeed Scelba...

...Segni, likewise, came in as a stopgap "caretaker" Premier after the fall of the Scelba Government...

...He probably figures that in the long run it matters little whether the opening is breached from right to left or left to right, so long as contact is established...

...There has been much lively speculation as to the motives behind Nenni's new tactics...

...When the Minister sat down and voting time arrived, the Center section had thinned out to the point where the Government was without a majority...

...Segni may survive even longer, thanks to the backing of the Left opposition, even if a portion of his own party should desert him...

...She pointed out that, were Dulles to by-pass Rome but call on Marshal Tito, the Italians would construe this as a deliberate snub...

...This was the first time the Left had backed the Government in the national Parliament...

...It was only added on the insistence of Ambassador Clare Boothe Luce...

...The main result of the change in government was the elimination of Scelba's forceful, dynamic personality...

...Italian fellow-travelers support Center government Nenni's 'Opening To The Right' By Edmund Stevens Rome On the last Friday in October, the Center coalition cabinet of Premier Antonio Segni was rescued from the jaws of Parliamentary defeat by its most powerful opponent, the pro-Communist bloc...

...Twenty minutes later, when the session reconvened, the Left benches, both Socialist and Communist, were empty and the budget passed without difficulty...

...But, in the case of the Senate vote on the Interior Ministry budget, no one could deny that the Government had been saved from serious embarrassment, if not from being overthrown, by the voluntary leftist abstention...

...Nor is there any reason to doubt the sincerity of this policy...

...Even thought at the outset the Government appears to scorn Nenni's support as unwanted and unneeded, Nenni is probably playing for a time when, as dissension increases inside the Center coalition, Segni will more readily accept leftist support to stay in power...

...Up to then, both the Socialists and Communists had violently denounced this same amendment...

...Pella had been able to carry on for a time thanks to the support of the Right opposition...

...Even those Senators who troubled to attend were far more interested in their impending eight-day recess than in Tambroni's report...

...These questions are accompanied by growing complaints that Italy is being treated by her Western allies as a poor relation, that she is denied an equal voice in the councils of NATO, whereas the Italians are convinced that their contribution to Western defense entitles them to a full partnership and a place on the first team...

...A curious parallel may be drawn between the present Segni government and the cabinet of Giuseppe Pella, which was in power from August 1953 to January 1954...

...Gronchi's choice at that time was Budget Minister Ezio Vanoni...

...As Government supporters were frantically seeking some way to postpone the ballot until they could rush in reinforcements, veteran Left Socialist Senator Carmine Mancinelli got up and moved for a recess...

...Tambroni, for example, a little-known protege of President Giovanni Gronchi, might conceivably be replaced by ex-Premier and longtime Interior Minister Mario Scelba, whom the leftists regard as their worst enemy...

...Interior Minister Ferdinando Tambroni had just presented his ministry's budget for approval to an apathetic, half-filled Senate...

...This was technically true, though more than once in the Italian Chamber of Deputies members of Government parties have bolted party discipline under the cloak of the secret ballot...

...The previous day in the Chamber of Deputies, their party leader, Pietro Nenni, had astonished friends and supporters alike by suddenly declaring he would vote for a Government-sponsored amendment to the law defining the peacetime jurisdiction of military courts...

...In fact, Nenni's new tactic, which some have facetiously dubbed "Operation Kill with Kindness," is a sort of application to the home front of the "Spirit of Geneva...

...How belated may be judged from the fact that Rome was not on the original Dulles travel schedule...

...One explanation offered is that he wants to keep the present cabinet in power because a reshuffle might produce a lineup less to his liking...

...It was Nenni who recently fellow-traveled to Peking via Moscow and who brought back constructive proposals for establishing diplomatic and trade relations with Communist China and improving contacts with the Soviet Union...

...When this happens, Nenni will become indispensable and be able to name his conditions...

...At the same time, it should be a warning to the other Western powers, especially America...

...But Italy, despite an active and resourceful leftist movement within and the siren songs of neutralism from without, was deemed securely anchored to the West...

...But it will take more than flying visits by top American officials to keep Italo-American relations on an even keel...

...Why can't we be in on the East-West dialogue, especially since the French are in on it...

...Ever since the Geneva summit conference, more and more Italians ask: If America can sit down and talk things over with the Russians, why can't we do the same...

...France was the skittish and temperamental ally, to be humored like a small child...

...While the above reasoning may be valid, there are indications that Nenni is pursuing a plan of much longer range...

...On the way home, he de-toured to Yalta for a taste of Crimean sunshine and a tete-a-tete with Soviet Party Secretary Nikita Khrushchev—the first personal contact between the Kremlin and the leader of the Italian Left since the heady "Spirit of Geneva" was distilled...

...Fanfani would have preferred almost any other aspirant, including himself...

...But then, because Parliament was eager to go on summer holiday and Government payrolls, including the salaries of Deputies and Senators, would be held up unless a government was formed and a budget approved, Pella was installed as caretaker Premier...

...Both before and after takeoff, Nenni huddled lengthily with President Giovanni Gronchi and Foreign Minister Gaetano Martino...

...Government spokesmen promptly disavowed the leftist votes and strongly denied any backstairs dealings with Nenni...

...In the past, he campaigned vigorously for an "opening to the left," whereby the Government coalition would admit the Socialist party...