Pietro Nenni

First World War When the First World War broke out, Nenni advocated the intervention of Italy in the war. In 1915, he volunteered for the Isonzo front. After he was wounded and sent home, he became an editor of the republican paper Mattine d'Italia. He defended Italy's participation in the war but tried not to alienate his socialist friends. In the last years of the war Nenni served at the front again. He was the co-founder and the political commissar of the Garibaldi Brigade. After the defeat of the Spanish Republic and the victory of General Francisco Franco he returned to France. In 1943, he was arrested by the Germans in Vichy France and then imprisoned in Italy on the island of Ponza.

Nenni's third daughter, Vittoria, was active in the French resistance. She was captured and deported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered on 15 July 1943, aged 28. She is commemorated in the writings of Charlotte Delbo. After being liberated in August 1943, he returned to Rome to lead the Italian Socialist Party, which had been reunified as the Italian Socialist Party of Proletarian Unity. After the surrender of Italy with the Allied armed forces on 8 September 1943, he was one of the political officials of the National Liberation Committee, the underground political entity of Italian Partisans during the German occupation.

Postwar politics In 1944, Nenni became the national secretary of the PSI again, favoring close ties between his party and the PCI. After the Liberation, he took up government responsibilities, becoming Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for the Constituent Assembly in the government of Ferruccio Parri and the first government of Alcide De Gasperi. He was Minister for the Constitution, and in October 1946 he became Minister for Foreign Affairs in the second De Gasperi government.

The close ties between the PSI and the PCI caused the Giuseppe Saragat-led anti-communist wing of the PSI to leave and form the Italian Socialist Workers' Party in 1947 (later merged into the Italian Democratic Socialist Party, PSDI). During the early stage of the cold war he opposed Italy's entry into NATO fearing that it could drag the country into a war between the two Superpowers and reignite the Italian civil war and instead favoured a policy of Neutrality. In 1951 he was awarded the Stalin peace prize.

In 1956, Nenni broke with the PCI after Soviet Union's invasion of Hungary. He returned the award and donated the Prize money ($25,000) to the International red Cross. He formed a centre-left coalition with Saragat, Aldo Moro and Ugo La Malfa, and favored a reunion with the PSDI. From 1963 to 1968 he was Deputy Prime Minister in the three successive governments led by Moro and in December 1968 he became Minister for Foreign Affairs in the first government of Mariano Rumor, but resigned in July 1969, when the center-left alliance collapsed.

Although the reunification attempts between the socialists and Giuseppe Saragat's breakaway Social Democrats resulted in the formation of a joint list Unified PSI–PSDI, both parties fared poorly in the 1968 Italian general election. In 1969, a disillusioned Nenni virtually retired and Francesco De Martino took his place. He resigned as head of the PSI and was made a senator for life in 1970 and in 1971 he ran unsuccessfully for President of Italy. He died in Rome on 1 January 1980. He was an atheist.

Electoral history ElectionHouseConstituencyPartyVotesResult 1946 24,961 1948 Chamber of Deputies Rome–Viterbo–Latina–Frosinone FDP 57,020 Elected 1953 Chamber of Deputies Rome–Viterbo–Latina–Frosinone PSI 53,435 Elected 1958 Chamber of Deputies Milan–Pavia PSI 30,138 Elected 1963 Chamber of Deputies Milan–Pavia PSI 38,458 Elected 1968 Chamber of Deputies Milan–Pavia PSI 53,483 Elected