LUCIO CEVA

Aspetti politici e giuridici dell’Alto comando militare in Italia (1848-1941)

n. 1/1984

 

Summary – After making a distinction between the technical and political character of the military command at the highest levels and the only technical character of the command at the lower levels, and after having investigated the different type of responsibility consequent to each of these activities, the a. focuses his enquiry on the problems as to who is entitled to the high command in the Italian military organization, in peace and in war. The theoretical analysis on the intrinsic nature of the actions of high command is carried out together with the study of the historical evolution. In 1848 the Crown loses the effective exercise of the power of command and till 1915-18 all the relative problems are settled by a set of legislative measures and of organizing praxis which allow more or less happy solutions in the relations among the Sovereign, the Minister of War and the Chief of Staff. Successively, the Fascist legislation offers only apparent solutions to the problem with the two figures of the Prime Minister and the Chief of General Staff. In effect, as the analysis of the laws of 1925, 1927 and 1941 shows, the dictatorship has merely complicated the situation instead of making it more harmonic. The historical analysis strengthens the a.’s conviction on the prevalently political nature of the actions of high command also in the present constitutional structure.