Word: duced
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...valley of the Po, through Italy's richest industrial area, swept in mid-August a proud Italian Army, bent on repulsing an imaginary "Red" (French) invasion. Suddenly, mysteriously, the maneuver ended. As suddenly, Hitler invaded Poland, the Allies declared war. Il Duce disappeared from public view. It was rumored that he had had a heart attack. Whether or not he was sick, his heart was certainly sore. After 17 years of martial preparation for the second World War, he had been forced by his generals to realize that whether or not Italy wanted to fight, Italy could not fight...
...Ciano. After the Po maneuver's fiasco, Il Duce cleaned house. As his first step, out went his Under Secretaries for War and Air, Alberto Pariani and Giuseppe Valle, because they had concealed the true state of Italy's war machine from their boss. Out went violently pro-German Fascist Party Secretary Achille Starace and Minister of Popular Culture (Propaganda) Oboardo Dino Alfieri. These dismissals had the effect of raising the prestige of Il Duce's son-in-law, Foreign Minister Count Galeazzo Ciano, who loathed Ribbentrop and Hitler for treating him like a naive youngster...
...much-decorated Ettore Muti, appointed to Starace's job. Muti looks like a handsome U. S. gangster, and, not being too quick of brain or tongue, is the subject of merciless punning (muto = dumb). Last week Signor Muti had a gold medal pinned on his chest by Il Duce for having carried out 160 admirable bombing raids during the Spanish campaign...
Wants. Next step of Il Duce in his new frame of mind was to make perfectly clear that Italy's minimum aims remain in time of war what they were in peace: 1) Djibouti; 2) representation on the board of directors of the Suez Canal Co.; 3) guarantees for the Italian minority in Tunisia. He made it equally clear that anything above minimum would be in no sense repugnant to Italy...
Thereupon Premier Mussolini and Count Ciano punked the fuse of an extraordinary chain of diplomatic firecrackers. Italian envoys popped up all over Europe. Il Duce and his son-in-law played faction against faction, until no nation could be sure whether he was coming or going. At first the Allies were favored. Insulting press attacks on the Allies, particularly on Great Britain, were toned down; so was praise of the Axis. Friendly Giuseppe Bastianini was appointed Ambassador to the Court of St. James's. Trade talks with a British delegation were nurtured...