Tito's T 34-85s enter Trieste (Slovenia), 1 May 1945.
New Zealand tanks arrive in Trieste, Italy. Shows a Sherman tank and New Zealand soldiers from 4th Armoured Brigade on a street crowded with Italian civilians, 2 May 1945.
One of the most consistent areas of dispute over borders and
nationality was that of Trieste. A key city within the so-called ‘unredeemed’
lands after unification, Trieste became part of Italy after 1919, as part of
the post-war settlement. A city of rich cultural exchange, it attracted writers
and intellectuals in the early twentieth century – from Joyce to Svevo. Trieste
was host to many different peoples, from Slovenes to Austrians to Slavs. The
city was the site of national and ethnic conflict, and the Italian community
erected a monument to Dante there, which was destroyed in 1915 with the
outbreak of the war. The Italians took Trieste in 1918 and fascism was active
in the city from 1919 onwards. In addition, the city had an important Jewish
community, and was the only part of Italy to host a death-camp during World War
II. The ‘question of Trieste’ was also strategic, symbolizing the shifting
allegiances of an Italy torn between Austria, France and Germany.
The tragic events of 1943–5 saw Trieste occupied by the
Nazis, and then by the victorious Yugoslav armies (on 1 May 1945), who beat the
Allies to the city by a matter of days. Tito’s troops repressed dissent in the
city in brutal fashion. Reprisals took place against fascists but also against
many whose only crime was to be Italian, as well as some of those on the Left
opposed to Tito. These massacres – known as the Foibe massacres thanks to the
deep pits into which the bodies were thrown – remain the subject of bitter
debate. The Foibe events were used as propaganda during the Cold War, and the
number of those killed was exaggerated. On the other side of the divide, either
the massacres were ignored, or the victims were dismissed as fascists or
collaborators.
Trieste was a front-line state in the Cold War. The border
region was divided into two zones in 1947 and the city remained high on the
political agenda until the mid-1950s. Zone A, including Trieste, was governed
by the USA and the UK; Zone B by Yugoslavia. The Right called for the city to
be given entirely to Italy, and organized nationalist demonstrations within
Trieste, some of which were suppressed by the Allies. The Left prevaricated
(although the Italian communists pledged their support to Italy in the event of
a Yugoslav invasion). Meanwhile, the Slovenes demanded their own nation and
Tito claimed Trieste as Yugoslavian. Tensions in 1953 reached such levels that
war between Italy and Yugoslavia seemed a possibility. It was only with the
treaty of October 1954 that the ‘Trieste question’ was finally resolved, with
the city being handed ‘back’ to Italy and other land going to Yugoslavia. After
the Yugoslavian civil war in the early 1990s Slovenia finally gained
independence, taking in the former Zone B of the 1940s and 1950s.
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