[VideoView]
Dipl.-Vw. Dr. Ludwig Steiner
Not a word of German
interviewer:
Ruth Deutschmann
photography:
Benjamin Epp
copyright location:
Wien
date of recording:
2008-04-29
English translation by:
Sylvia Manning - Baumgartner
Italian translation by:
Nicole D´Incecco
???iuimd_video_v_zeit_zuordnung_en???:
1922
transcription:
That is one of the huge and absolutely incomprehensible things that fascism did here ? the de-nationalisation which was simply stupid in every respect. You can't fail to notice that there were South Tyrolean senators and delegates in Rome from 1918 until 1922. And of course the first discussions with Mussolini in the Italian senate took place openly with Reut-Nicolussi and others. Those discussions were very interesting in this conflict. Only that afterwards the fascist tendencies for de-nationalisation took on ludicrous dimensions. It surely was unbelievable. And obviously the good things the Italians had implemented in South Tyrol from 1918 to 1922 were destroyed. In those four years the Italians did try to find a modus vivendi. The occupying forces weren't so excessively numerous, not like the subsequent military presence when there was an entire army corps in South Tyrol. The Italians also were in Innsbruck once, as an occupying force. That shouldn't be forgotten either. That is actually ? no one talks about it. Because Italian soldiers were present but there was no military government. There was only one incident. The Italian consulate was on Bozner Platz in Innsbruck with the Tricolore flag. I think in 1919 someone ripped the flag down during a demonstration. Then the Austrian national police, made up of very few people anyhow, had to attend the hoisting of the Tricolore with an Italian army detachment. But that was the only real demonstration of power there. Otherwise the Italians were present without interfering directly. That's also quite an interesting approach. After the war, when the French were here, people often said: "Well, with the Italians it was better." Interesting to hear people say that, who had experienced 1918-19. But the situation in South Tyrol only changed after 1922. The march, which Mussolini spent in the sleeping car... The others marched. And then the situation in South Tyrol changed drastically.