Dear Director Feltri.
I was a Carabinieri Officer in Milan many years ago. These days I feel uneasy about those 3 Carabinieri who died in that explosion. However, I can’t understand how badly the whole action was conducted. The situation of those 3 brothers who had already distinguished themselves for serious facts was known. Couldn’t they have taken some precautions without sending thirty people to the slaughterhouse? Who was in command of the operation?
I would like to know his point of view.
Fabrizio Fumagalli
Dear Fabrizio,
I confess that I was very struck by the heartfelt tone of your letter. I understand, and indeed I fully share, that sense of unease, dismay and anger that assails us all when we remember what happened in Castel d’Azzano, where three Carabinieri lost their lives in a scenario that could and should have been avoided. And I don’t say this out of a polemical spirit. I say this as a citizen who still believes in the value of institutions and in the sacrosanct respect due to those who wear a uniform to serve the State. You asked a central question: how is it possible that an operation of this type was managed in such a risky way? And again: who was in command? We knew who those three brothers were, we knew their precedents. So why didn’t we act with the utmost caution? Why did an eviction turn into a human sacrifice?
Here, I believe that the tragedy of Castel d’Azzano is not only a huge wound in the body of the Army, but also something that must lead us to reflect on how to do better next time, avoiding the danger that our brave men and women of the Army or of any state force responsible for security will die at the hands of people who are not crazy, but are criminals.
I’m sorry to say it, but sometimes we realize that the management of public order is somehow harnessed by ideology and the fear of media judgement. And this is how, for example, it is accepted that policemen and carabinieri are beaten, mistreated, stoned and spit on during demonstrations, but it is not accepted that the State can react and not out of revenge but to ensure order and everyone’s safety. This is not the case, these are other circumstances, but I have the feeling that we give less and less weight to the safety of those who protect safety. I don’t intend to point the finger at anyone, however I cannot fail to point out that, in a normal country, an eviction ordered by the judiciary would have provided for an intervention device based on the dangerousness of the occupants, who were dangerous. Here I am. Here, however, we witnessed an ordinary operation for a danger that was not ordinary.
I was surprised, for example, that, although it was known that there were home-made explosives inside that dilapidated farmhouse, i.e. Molotov cocktails, perhaps the windows were not preventively smashed before the military entered, in anticipation of the possibility that the domestic environment had been filled with gas by three individuals who had already threatened suicide and massacre. Of course, it’s easy to talk in hindsight. But if you ask me if the tragedy could have been avoided, I can only answer: “Probably yes.”
Yes, because those brothers had previous records, they had shown evidence of aggression, they were reported subjects. The State could not fail to know. The State knew and unquestionably underestimated the risk, sending about thirty men with practically bare hands to the front line, without even suspecting that behind a closed door there could be a lethal trap. This is, in my opinion, an omission. And by revealing this I have no intention of indicting anyone. I just want certain mistakes not to be made again. And how is it done? Asking questions, reflecting, admitting mistakes. We can always do better. We must always do better. Even more so when the lives of our heroes are at stake. There has been a lot of talk about these three criminals and little about the sacrifice of the victims, criminals who were almost acquitted by a certain part of the left due to the social hardship they suffered. But social discomfort does not justify carnage, murder, crime. This is what outraged me most about the whole affair.
No, I can’t accept this.
In any case, I imagine that the details of the operation will be reviewed and discussed. It is not acceptable that in a civilized country the police, who should be protected, protected and honoured, are sent to the slaughterhouse without a real risk analysis. It’s a strategic mistake. It is repeated that anyone who wears a uniform accepts the danger of dying at work every day. Well. We don’t have to accept it. End. Point.
And now, dear Fabrizio, I come to the most painful point for me: the cultural climate. I want to reiterate this, although it is perhaps another topic. I’m thinking about this a lot. We live in a time where lawlessness is romanticized, where order is seen as oppression and the state as the enemy. In this toxic climate, law enforcement is no longer perceived as bastions of legality, but as instruments of repression. This is why, in cases like this, we proceed with fear, we act downwards, we avoid too strong interventions, in fear that someone will stand up and cry fascism. And so we die. We die for ideology, for cowardice and for propaganda.
We die due to underestimation of risk. We also die from underestimating life. Of safety. Or the criminals on the other side. A paradigm shift is needed. We never again want a policeman, a carabiniere, a soldier to die when it would have been possible to avoid it.
Thank you for your words, which deserved a response. And thank you for serving the Army and this country. There isn’t a day in which we don’t have to remember that behind every uniform beats a human heart that has chosen duty over self-interest.