Those who generally attend an intervention by Marco Bertolini may or may not share sometimes "fortine" statements - especially in a respectable Italy and with their head stuck in a hole in the ground -, but they certainly do not discuss the military experience in which they are accrued.
We are talking about a man who was responsible (just to name a few) for the 9th "Col Moschin" assault regiment, the "Folgore" paratroopers brigade, the Interforce Command for Special Forces Operations and the Interforce Summit Operational Command .
The military world has often been criticized as the "excellent and abundant" homeland of the Sordians. Personal experience made me think again about many fellow citizens in uniform and their ability to tell the truth, even when unpopular, or to indicate what would be right for the country, even in the face of the wrong politician.
As a rule, given the caliber of the second republic (today at the last gasps), those who sincerely express themselves do not go far. Marco Bertolini is one of those who, despite his extreme frankness, has had a brilliant military career.
As soon as we learned of the release of his first book, it was impossible not to ask for an interview ...
How did you come up with writing? Did he let himself be tempted by the reductionism that fills many books with memories?
No reducismo, also because I believe - sincerely - that my generation, at least the Italian one, has not lived experiences that deserve to be the object of memoirs. We did not fight a war like our fathers and grandparents and the operations outside the area in which we participated are not comparable with what was done by the soldiers of the time, even if they were certainly less professional than those of today. On the contrary, we became protagonists of that 68 from which the involution of our country began and the reversal of our reference values. In short, we are above all responsible for having wasted what had been left to us by the generations that preceded us, in economic and value terms.
More than anything else, I accepted the offer of Alessandro Amorese's Eclettica publisher to put on paper what I think about many topics not only of a military nature, thanks to a series of questions by the talented Andrea Pannocchia, always starting from the soldier's perspective Italian, with its characteristics and also its frustrations.
Sovereignty appears in the book's subtitle. Do you want to anticipate something?
Yes, sovereignty is one of the victims par excellence of this era, reduced to a negative ideology obviously fought by the good thought that is governing our present. Instead, it is the supreme value for which Presidents of the Republic and Ministers commit themselves, but also the military. And this crisis consequently involves the Armed Forces, affected in their deepest raison d'etre and in the identity pride of what they serve.
Therefore, it is not only an economic question, the crisis of our military instrument, but above all an identity crisis, which is emphasized by a systematic recourse, at home, for uses of low "operational" labor on orders from other administrations and deprivation minimum resources in terms of time, infrastructure and training "procedures". Not to mention the substantial absence of a foreign policy for which they are called to operate. In fact, they are not simply a defense instrument, but also and perhaps above all a foreign policy instrument, without which we are literally unable to protect our interests just a few strokes from our shores. We saw it, in an emblematic way, in Libya, where we first became "violated" by the sudden decision of some of our allies to eliminate Gaddafi and then by the European lack of interest in the problems that arose also, but not only, in terms of illegal immigration. I wonder if those European countries would have behaved with the same open-mindedness if in our incomparable "boot" there had been one of them, France for example with its Force de Frappe, or even Germany.
In short, if Italy renounces being strong, it will not be able to survive in the center of a Euro-Mediterranean continent in which very strong frictions develop.
What is the reason for choosing the title "Militarily incorrect"?
I chose "Militarmente incorrect" as the title for the book-interview because I am convinced that being free in this time means first of all being incorrect also starting from language, using the language that has been taught to us by children, in the family, at work , at school and in the barracks.
Ours has been reduced to a society of the show, in which it is fiction that has won it and in which a wise use of words manages to make the unfair and the opposite pass right, as we see. This has transformed the sovereignty of which I was saying into negative values and makes possible that conceptual inversion in which violence to our security would be positive and even legal, such as that in which the rastuta commander of the Sea Watch was the protagonist, instead bringing the minister to trial who dared to oppose illegal immigration.
Semantic camouflage itself is responsible for other absurdities, such as the transformation into victim of the attacker who attempts a robbery in a house and the criminal pater familias who reacts with force in deference to what had always been unquestionably considered his first duty: the defense of his family.
It will also deal with problems associated with the current geopolitical situation, I imagine.
Yes, I will have my say above all on what happens in our part of the world, modestly but above all trying to interpret the experiences I have had in 44 years at arms.
The book is already on sale? How can you buy it?
Due to the closure due to COVID-19, printing and distribution have been slow. The book is in the final printing phase and, for now, is available from the Eclettica publishing house. References are indicated in the following link:
http://www.ecletticaedizioni.com/prodotto/prevendita-militarmente-scorre...
