When the loud, obnoxious teenagers of today turn 16, they continue to be loud, obnoxious teenagers until, one day, one of them stands up and realizes �Hey� I turned 16 a few weeks ago, now I can be loud and obnoxious in a car!� Such is the start of the 20^th century, in a way. It started off pretty smoothly enough, continuing the trends of the 1800�s, with new inventions and new entries in the realm of art and literature. And then, like a colossal meteor appearing from out of the blue and knocking the Earth into next Wednesday, World War 1 erupted across Europe. It was something the likes of which few had ever expected, nor were they prepared for. Even though it started in 1914, for many, including historian Eric Hobsbawm, World War 1 was essentially the �start� of the 20^th century. But why is that? What about the 14 years in between 1900 and 1914? Don�t they count for anything? Unfortunately, in comparison to an event as completely gargantuan as The Great War, it seems that these few years don�t count for much in the long run. In fact, due to the reinvention of military technique and technology, the extreme re-shaping of Europe�s territories and the near-nullification of war�s romantic perception, it is clear that WWI truly did mark the beginning of the 20^th century. 

Throughout the ages, from prehistoric man clubbing his neighbor to death, right up to the inconspicuously-uniformed British Redcoats� muskets and mayhem, war had always been a rather simple affair. It was as if the leaders were saying �I�ve got an army, you�ve got an army, let�s throw them together and see who has more left over when it ends!� When The Great War exploded, the armies still had this type of mindset, except that in this instance, they had a lot more weaponry than they could possibly know what to do with. As written on Wikipedia.org, �The First World War was different from prior military conflicts: it was a meeting of 20^th century technology with 19^th century mentality and tactics.� Before the eruption in 1914, the arms race of the era was already in full throttle. With tensions between them already building, the individual European powers were beginning to see the military strength of their peers, and in turn scurrying about to match them. With the era�s technology vastly improving, the possibilities in the development of offensive tools were endless, but it wasn�t until the war actually started that the armies began to learn what power they truly had, and how they could use it. For example, before the war, the armies could have had a couple of caterpillar tracks lying around, with a ton of  armour and some machine guns, but it wasn�t until they were smack in the middle of trench warfare that they realized �Hey, wouldn�t it be swell to have a fearsome behemoth-like machine to overtake these trenches and shoot people?� Because the war took place during such a period of rapid industrial advancements, this enabled manufacturers to grasp a better understanding of the new technologies, their uses and capabilities, and test them on the battlefield, where their worth would truly be shown. If anything, although World War 1 garnered such a shocking level of casualties, it proved to be very prosperous on technical front of everything.

Before and after the chaos of The Great War, Europe was two very different places. When all of the war was said and done, the notion of absolutist monarchy was at last defeated, Russia�s political status was in shambles, Austria and Hungary were split up, and the Ottoman Empire, reaching as far back as 1299, was shattered to pieces. These changes, and many others, ensured that, as the �new century� began, Europe would never be the same. 

Since the dawn of time, war has always had this �glorious� mystique about it. That�s one of the big reasons people sign up to fight in the battles; the whole aspect of fighting to defend one�s country, going on an adventure, seeing action and one day returning home to a hero�s welcome; this romantic aspect of war was what drove voluntary joining of the army. The problem is, when The Great War broke out,  those kids itching for excitement and adventure were met with a rude awakening: war is hell. It must have been very weird to see war like this; in old paintings and stories, wars are depicted as glorious crusades against the forces of evil, armies breath-taking in scope vanquishing all who oppose them. When these poor kids were thrown into the middle of trench warfare by a government that couldn�t care less about their well-being, but rather how many �bad guys� they killed, their perceptions of war must really have been rocked. When the massacres had temporarily ceased for the Christmas truce, the higher-ups were furious, swearing that nothing of the like would happen again, even ordering artillery bombardments on every subsequent Christmas Eve of the war! As the perceptions of the people began to morph, so did the notion of war altogether. Soon enough, for most, it wasn�t about shooting as many Germans as they could and �teaching �em a lesson!�; it had become about staying alive. Art had taken on a similar standpoint as well:  paintings once of the romantic glory and heroics of war soon depicted living skeletons in the depths of the muddy disgusting trenches, surrounded by fiery explosions and sometimes, if you�re lucky, Satan himself might have dropped by for a visit. So, as a direct result of the new collective perception of The �Great� War, the romantic properties of war in general were essentially vaporized, changing the face of war through the rest of the 20^th century.

            When you�re dealing with an event as completely enormous as World War 1, and taking into account just how much changed because of it, the 14 years before the war don�t seem like much. Well, actually, that isn�t completely fair to say. After all, everything in history is, for the most part, related to something else in history, right? Here�s one final example then, of the years leading up to the war in comparison to the war itself. Imagine a zit: the years before the war, chock full of tension, disloyalty and rivalry are represented by oil and grease beneath the surface, and as this oil and grease builds up, it becomes so unbearable that everything ruptures, causing, in this case, war. What this revolting example proves is that although the years leading up to the war contributed greatly to everything as a whole, when examined individually, they do not compare to the cataclysmic levels of change brought on by The Great War; the true dawn of the 20^th century.

World War One had an immense impact on every country involved in it. Revolutions were created, casualties were shockingly high and the views of people towards war had drastically changed. A great example of such a victimized country was Italy, a nation that suffered dramatically from the corollaries of the Great War. Italy was failing economically and politically and was falling apart as a country. All hope was faltering until one man stepped in and promised to unite them with national glory and to end their fears of future insecurities. One man stepped in and promised to restore the country�s pride and to relieve any economic distress. This one man was Benito Mussolini, the first leader of the National Fascist Party, the first dictator of Italy.  

Italy had been a poor nation even before the First World War due to the fact that they had always been ruled by greedy politicians who would rather satisfy their financial desires as opposed to the country�s financial needs. As a result, social, economic and foreign problems developed. First off, Italy had been segregated into two parts: the poor and the rich. The south consisted of bankrupt people and the north was filled with the wealthy. The pope was infuriated by the government because they had failed to win over Rome and the papal land and the peasants in the countryside did not support the government. A large amount of Italians were illiterate which caused major problems in Italy�s society and their tax structure seemed to favor certain classes of society as opposed to others. To add to the social stress, only a portion of the citizens of Italy had a right to vote. 

Secondly, the country was under a large debt and lacked a number of natural resources. They nearly failed to even have an industry and transportation services. This resulted in severe poverty causing industrial progress to remain slow and a large unemployment rate. Thirdly, Italy had been fighting to conquer new land such as Ethiopia, but was defeated at Adwa in 1896. Italy had also engaged in a war against Turkey to obtain Libya in 1911 called the Italo-Turkish war and was able to conquer the Libyan coast. The country had also joined the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria in the hopes of enhancing their international power and reputation. However, once World War 1 started in 1914, Italy had remained neutral for a year until it was decided that they would join the Allies after being promised that they would be given a large amount of territories. They were unprepared for such an extreme war and along with their large amount of losses of men, their confidence was drained.

What worsened the country�s depression was that they had engaged in such a war because they were promised large territorial gains. Yet, at the Paris Peace Conference, to show how little respect the other countries had for Italy, they were given only about half of the territory previously promised to them and the Italian government had grudgingly accepted it. It was a terrible disappointment to Italy causing the citizens to be infuriated at the weakness of their rulers and the government�s lack of determination to fight back. To escalate their resentment and lack of respect to the government, Italy had ended up in even more economic debt because of the war loans. The Italian tourist trade and export trade halted, increasing unemployment which worsened when the soldiers returned from their battles. Runaway inflation increased causing the poor to be poorer. The disappointment and anger in the government caused citizens affected by the economic downfall to look somewhere else for hope. Thus, the weak governments helped the fascists rise into power. Mussolini stepped in, promising economic prosperity, a secure future and restoration of Italian glory.

After seeing how Russia had given into the Communist Revolution, Italy feared that the same consequences would befall upon them. After seeing how internationally influential communism was, how the workers were taking control of the factories and how the peasants were claiming land belonging to large estates, many started fearing the first signs of communism. It was known that supporters of the Russian Revolution were splitting up to form Communist Parties and attempting to obtain the support for it from many countries. People feared Marxism because they saw the miserable state that Russia was in and how communism brought along chaos, anarchy and general insecurity.  The wealthy did not want to stoop down to those they considered their inferiors� level. They wanted to remain on top of the social society and be recognized there. They feared the working class� rise in power. Thus, this fear caused fascism to appeal to the capitalists and industrialists. The aristocrats and conservatives gave their support because Mussolini was a physical manifestation representing the strength of the society. They liked the obvious division between the wealthy and the poor, the weak and the strong, and they wanted to remain on top. Mussolini, to them, represented the strong as a whole. The main reason for such appeal would be that the fascist theories were not yet clear to the citizens of Italy, thus, they consented to a dictatorship they did not know much about. Basically, after the event of such a war that had caused disastrous problems, they just needed someone to lead them and show them the way to build their economy without leaning to towards the communist ways. They did not know much about Fascism, however, it seemed more promising than the weak government that was in control and it offered security from the unwanted Communist parties that seemed to be gaining more and more power. The fascists� violent hate for communism won the support of many Italians, causing them to go into rule. Thus, by playing on the people�s fear of revolution, the fascists were able to gain nationalist sentiments while showing that they were for law, order and religion.

 Italy had never been recognized or respected as a proper country. It had become a nation in 1870, but was constantly in economic distress. Tired of misery caused by the lack of organization and the weakness of the government, many Italians felt they needed a new party to take over Italy, stabilize its politic position and restore its pride. At the same time Mussolini was coming out with his fascist ideas, which he strongly believed would alleviate the country�s problems. However, the only secure way of winning Italy was by obtaining the majority of the country�s respect, support and defeating any threats. Considering how most of the citizens were Catholic, an excellent way to do this was to win the support of the Church. It was in the early 1920�s that the Catholic Party, Partito Popolare, was in the middle of arranging a coalition with the Reform Party, which had the potential of gaining power and thwarting Mussolini�s Party. However, in 1922, Pope Pius XI sent out a letter to clergy, ordering them to not participate in any party, but to stay neutral. In 1923, the Vatican�s Secretary of State ended the Partito Popolare for exchange of Mussolini�s promise concerning Catholic education and institutions. Pius XI denounced any coalitions formed between Catholics and Socialists and the Vatican ordered all priests to leave the Partito Popolare. The Vatican then formed an organization which forbade any participation in politics and opposition to fascism called Catholic Action. Pius XI ordered the Catholics to join Catholic Action which caused hundreds of thousands of people to leave Partitio Popolare. Mussolini�s threat disappeared and he had the support of hundreds of thousands of people. However, Mussolini realized the true power of the Church when he ordered the Catholic Action to close down and was rejected by the Catholic Church. Realizing how putting the system before God would cause much chaos with Catholics, Mussolini was forced to compromise. Nevertheless, it was from the additional support from the Pope Pius XI and the Vatican, who saw how the Fascists could normalize the State-Church relationships, that Mussolini was able to be as powerful as he had become.

Mussolini came out and won the support of thousands of Italians through his appealing parades, propaganda and speeches. He promised the country that under his rule, he would turn Italy into a leading power, the fascist party would be strong and dedicated, thus, economic problems would disintegrate. Many of the Italians did not pay mind to find out what the government was up to, all they wanted was to better the conditions they were in. The move to dictatorship did not immediately cause any anxiety to the Italians until it was too late. Through the means of violence and brutality, the King gave in and fascists gained control of Italy.

 �Believe, Obey, Fight� was Mussolini�s motto. With his notorious elite party militia, the Black shirts, he violently forced Italians to believe in the Fascist government and his brutal dictatorship. As a consequence of his promises of sheltering Italians from communism and winning international prestige for Italy, the citizens were not allowed to have any say for themselves and were only supposed to do as they were told, no questions asked.  Although it must be noted that however brutal Mussolini was on his country, he came through in his pledge and Italy turned into one of the strongest nations in the world.