Benito Mussolini

Benito Mussolini was an Italian dictator who founded fascism and imposed it on a nation, and no chart reading should soften that record. Born in 1883, he began as a socialist journalist before turning to violent nationalism, founding the National Fascist Party and, after the 1922 March on Rome, seizing the office of prime minister. He crushed opposition through secret police, banned strikes, and by 1927 had built a one-party dictatorship. His regime waged brutal colonial wars: the Pacification of Libya, the bombing of Corfu, the conquest of Ethiopia with poison gas, intervention in Spain for Franco, and finally the Axis alliance with Hitler that dragged Italy into the Second World War. Deposed in 1943, installed as the puppet ruler of the Salò Republic, he was captured and executed by partisans in 1945. His Leo Sun in the ninth house speaks of a will to dominate wearing the mask of ideology and philosophy; his Gemini Moon of the propagandist's fluent, detached persuasion; his Scorpio Ascendant of control, secrecy and menace. A natal signature describes temperament only. It never excuses the terror, the wars, and the deaths that his choices caused.