ABSTRACT: The story of the period spent in a military prison by conscientious objector Roberto Cicciomessere. Secretary of the Radical Party, Cicciomessere is conducting a campaign for the acknowledgement of the right to refuse the military service. A few months after his arrest, thanks to the mobilization of the public opinion promoted by the Radical Party, the Italian Parliament passed a law on the 15th of December 1972 acknowledging the civil right to conscientious objection to the military service.

(La prova radicale, summer 1972, n.4)

On the 11th of March, after the demonstration of Piazza Lagrange in Turin, we hand ourselves over to the Carabinieri. There are three of us: Valerio Minnella, Gianni Rosa and myself. Alerino Peila has instead already been arrested, shortly before the beginning of the demonstration.

The Carabinieri spend many hours trying to find our arrest warrants. Toward evening, they take our fingerprints, take identification pictures of us and take us, without handcuffs, to the prisons of Turin, called Le Nuove. We spend the night in the isolation cells of the basement. They are single cells, very small and very damp, with a Turkish toilet. During the night the guard patrols the corridor regularly. He turns the light on and looks through the peep-hole to check the inside of the cell. It's difficult to get some sleep.

12 March - They take us aboard two cars to the military prison of Peschiera. I am handcuffed together with Alerino; Gianni and Valerio are in another car. The drivers are forced to circle around Peschiera before they manage to drive into the entrance of the prison. Peschiera is militarily occupied by Carabinieri and Police, the access routes to the prison are blocked by stands; an anti-militarist demonstration is about to take place. They remove our handcuffs and we sign the registrar (I manage to get a look at the number of prisoners contained in the prison: 202) and we are immediately escorted by officer Doni to our isolation cells. The rooms are 4 square metres wide, the main part of which is taken up by a plank-bed, with a small window on the corridor and a lamp that is always burning; the cells are quite cold and damp. We occupy four of the five existing cells; in the first one they keep the containment bed: the mattress has a hole in the middle to allow for the physiological functions, strong belts are

attached to the wall which are used for immobilizing the naked prisoner. Our spirits are high in spite of everything. We enter the prison well prepared, we have no regrets, we made a precise political choice. Valerio and Alerino, who are objectors for the second time, act as our guides and explain to me and Gianni, screaming through the spy-holes of their cells, how the prison works, which warders are "good" and which are "bad", reassure us as to the permanence in those cells, which are not too comfortable: "this evening at the most, after having our shower and getting dressed, they'll take us to the dormitory", they say. I look forward to meeting the other prisoners, to experience what I read in Pizzola's diary.

But reality will be different.

14 March - Instead, we spend two whole days in our isolation cells. We ask to be received by the commander, to receive some explanations for this special treatment. We even begin to refuse meals. Nestorini summons us one by one and explains that we have to remain in isolation until we are questioned by the military prosecutor. This rule is never applied, but just because there are few cells: therefore, he says, he is simply correctly applying the rules. Questioned about the reasons for this sudden zeal, he answers very vaguely. Addressing himself to me especially, he conveys the idea that to refuse meals is an offence that can be punished according to the military code, an offence which becomes even more serious if it is committed by more than one person and after a previous agreement.

As we walk back to our cells, escorted by officer Doni, I address myself to the other comrades, I tell them that they too must see commander Nestorini, and that they musn't "give up".

15 March - After the shower, Doni, while ordering to escort the others to their dormitories, informs me that I must continue to remain in my cell. He gives no explanations. I continue to refuse to eat, but it gets more and more difficult because there is no milk. I had already gone on a hunger strike for divorce and conscientious objection, but never before in complete isolation and never in a situation such as this, which appears to me more and more difficult every day.

19 March - The pains in my stomach have become unbearable and I am forced to interrupt my hunger strike. Today Captain Nestorini, Lieutenant Zanzottera, the medical under-lieutenant and the chaplain, the whole staff of the prison, that is, inform me, personally coming to the corridors where the isolation cells are, that I have been punished with ten days of isolation for that "don't give up". The decision is presented to me as an act of generosity, because the sentence contained the elements to be considered a more serious offence, such as instigation of military personnel to disobey, which is punishable with far stricter penalties. They want to give me the impression that they are concerned that my permanence in the cell be "comfortable", granting me the use of a mattress and blankets also during the day, as well as the possibility of smoking and reading. Claudio Bedussi, Giacomo Secco and Valerio Minnella even manage to reach my corridor to hand me milk, books and notes containing different news. The chapl

ain appears briefly every now and then, he appears to be very kind, he even gives me cigarettes. He has no wish to talk to me, even if, in my condition of isolated person, I would need it very badly. This special treatment is perhaps due to the effect of the telegrams sent by Loris Fortuna, Lino Jannuzzi, Ennio Bonea, which I receive in my cell: Nestorini understands that there are people, even organized forces, that keep up with the event even abroad, and it is therefore not convenient for him to be so harsh on me, running the risk of attracting the attention on the prison and on the way prisoners are treated. It is obvious that the "Prova radicale" also had its effect, with Mario's diary and the message that we would continue on this path. For much less serious things Nestorini had had no hesitations in denouncing other fellow prisoners before me.

21 March - I spend these days in my cell without too many difficulties, reading a lot (Bedussi has a vast selection of books and passes me some excellent ones every day); I am quite serene. I'm starting to get acquainted with the persons who are detained in the prison, talking through the spy-hole with the newcomers who pass through these cells before being sent to the dormitory. Renato Bianco, a "bersagliere" (1), is very worried and asks to talk to me: he is in prison for having taken home, while he was on leave, a military jacket experimentally assigned to his battalion. I also manage to talk to three "alpini" (2) who left their watch post during the night five minutes before the end of their shift.

22 March - On the eleventh day of isolation, two days sooner than expected, they take me to the dormitory. The fellow objectors jokingly say that I have to thank my mother for this, who bothered Nestorini all these days and forced him to spare me the two days of isolation I still had. But in real fact, it is a gesture of "good will" on the part of Nestorini, to make me understand that if I avoid being a nuisance we can find and agreement. These tactics can work with many prisoners, and could unfortunately work with an objector, perhaps because of an excessive trust in oneself.

23 March - The dormitory I am taken to can contain 15 to 22 people. Its only windows face the street and are almost entirely closed by a wall. The lights, therefore, are always on. The furniture is made of military folding beds and metal cupboards. In a small room there are the usual Turkish toilets and a sink. In the morning we have to queue up to wash. There are no heaters, and it's quite cold and damp even in summer because of the nearby Lake Garda and the river Mincio, over which the prison is built, an old Austrian fortress. The dormitory is where we spend most of our time, 18 hours over 24. There are about six hours, three in the morning and three in the afternoon, in which we can go out in a reasonably large courtyard to "get" our portion of "air"; the courtyard is enclosed by a wall where the sentinels walk by and where there is a watch post with floodlights. Here it is possible to play Ping-pong, volley-ball and soccer (granted there are no Jehovah witnesses).

My first contact with the fellow prisoners in the dormitory is quite difficult, as I had expected. Just like in the barracks, the prisoners vent their repressed aggressiveness, they pick on the weaker ones, creating rules and fictitious hierarchies which have the sole effect of dividing the prisoners, making them weak and unprepared as regards their seniors, adding other difficulties to the hardships of life in prison. Thus, in my dormitory as well, there is a "chief of the dormitory", there are the senior prisoners who believe they have rights over the newcomers, and there is the habit of playing stupid practical jokes such as the "bucket of water" or "toothpaste" and other, even more cruel traditions taken from the military milieu which some prisoners want to re-create here. To eliminate this state of things, which hampers the acknowledgement on the part of the prisoners of the common causes of our condition of prisoners, is the most difficult but also the most important goal of our group of objectors. As

soon as I enter the dormitory, "Veneziano", the "chief of the dormitory", among the general mirth of the others informs me that there is tradition according to which the others introduce a suppository to each newcomer. He tells me that if I do not accept the suppository gently, the seniors will be forced to use harsh methods. In a firm but not spiteful manner, I explain to him the reasons why I refuse this, the need for there no longer to be divisions between the prisoners in the dormitory but a complete unity in order to better oppose the excessive power of the seniors, the basic identity of the reasons that brought us into the military prison. I state that I have no intention of reacting with violence to a possible act of force on their part. This reaction baffles them: unconsciously they were hoping in a violent answer, to which they could have opposed even more violence, a "winning" violence. And the very sense of the "game", not to mention other, more hidden and torbid implications.

The only objectors they have ever known are the Jehovah witnesses, and my speech, which makes no discrimination between "common" prisoners and political or religious prisoners, obviously beats them. For the time being they give up on carrying out this "operation". They will insist again in the next days, even if every day they are less convinced. I start to become acquainted with the fellow prisoners of my dormitory. Over half of them have penal precedents, with several years of "civil prison" behind them.

It's not difficult to start a dialogue with them: they appear to be the harder ones, but in fact, once the barrier of distrust has come down, they tell me about their life, their problems, the reasons for their present condition. Girolamo Gullace enters the prison a few days after me, and the others immediately try the suppository trick. Being used to the violent milieus of the criminal world, he "will not allow anyone to bully him" and, therefore, the prisoners understand that it could end up badly for them and leave him alone. I intervene in the discussion, supporting him. He is very grateful to me for this. He tells me that at 15 he made up for his parents' impossibility to provide him even with a few lire stealing with his friends in parked cars left open, or robbing a bit of money from shopkeepers. At 16 he ends up in a reformatory, the elementary school for "crime". Here he learns the different systems to break into cars, to bag-snatch and to carry out minor swindles. Once he is out, he decides to look

for a job. For about a year, in Turin where he migrated, he applies for any kind of job: but the answer is always the same. "there are no vacancies, try again in a couple of months". Nobody trusts a previous offender. He has no money, his family is far away and in any case cannot help in any way, and he therefore enters the criminal milieu, first carrying out orders, then starting to do some "jobs" on his own. In prison, where he periodically ends up, he improves and refines his technique.

These are the incredible stories (which I will soon have the possibility of verifying) of the inhuman conditions of the "civilian" prisons, of the bashing up, of the attempted suicide as the only means to no longer undergo further vexations, of the razor blades kept constantly in the mouth ready to be used or to threaten to use them, of the continuous imposition of homosexual intercourse, of the organized exploitation of this cheap labour force. He gets angry while he talks, and he curses his situation, he curses those who force him to steal and then send him to prison or has him beaten up by the police, refusing him any possibility of coming out of this situation. How can I blame him? I can do nothing else but repeat to him that it not fair to condemn a person who steals a couple of thousand or sometimes even some millions of lire when the legalized theft of billions of lire and mass assassinations are tolerated, that it is not possible to condemn a person who, from his birth is already condemned to a life

of misery and to be exploited, without condemning the causes and the reasons for this misery and exploitation.

He understands that I am basically on his side, and against those who forced on him a life which he himself understands has no future. We become friends. He concludes: "If I manage to carry out an important "job" I'll set up a shirt manufacturing laboratory with my girlfriend and I'll quit this life". He will probably never manage to do this. While he explains to me that he is in this prison because he did not reply to draft notice, two prisoners start to fight. They rapidly become rough, one of them takes a knife out. Valerio had warned me about the frequent riots, and had advised me never to intervene: one can easily get knifed! I try to separate them, with much caution, and to start talking about the conditions in prison. They send me to hell telling me not to bother with politics, but at least they stop fighting.

The events of this day are not over: around midnight we hear someone shouting in the corridor and, through the bars of the gate I see some corporals who are carrying a prisoner, foam coming out of his mouth. After about ten minutes the same scene again. I manage to know from a nurse that the prisoner's name is Paolo Costantino - in prison for the second time for having refused to answer his draft notice - and that he swallowed some rat poison, taken from the kitchen where he works. He remains over half an hour at the entry of the prison, until the officer manages to find a car to transport him to the hospital of Verona. He remains in a coma for several days, but he survives in the end. Shy, introverted and gentle, he is defenceless: moreover, the other prisoners tease him, and exert their superiority at his expenses.

"Better to die".

Almost every evening I am the witness of hysterical crises and attempted suicides. The doctor, a conscription second lieutenant, is forced to come to the prison almost every night. A prisoner who works in the infirmary tells us the things he sees.

In the courtyard Claudio points to a prisoner who sits on his own, on a bench. His name is Sala. He is epileptic, and his symptoms have gotten worse since he had a car accident; he was sent to prison because he did not answer the draft notice, was hospitalized for ten days in the military hospital of Verona, and then sent back to prison. He suddenly has a fit of epilepsy. He writhes in his folding bed. Maseracchia kicks the bed. He threatens to shove him in a cell if he doesn't stop the crisis. Sala continues to cry and to writhe in a fit, he doesn't want to call the nurse because he is afraid of Maseracchia's threats.

(Valerio Minnella risks being charged with slander after the publication on Settegiorni of a diary in which this episode is reported and which is considered to have been written by him. Several witnesses were there when the fact that is hereby fully reconstructed happened).

27 March - During the hours of "air" I managed to see the fellow objectors detained in the eastern wing, Minnella, Peila, Rosa and Bedussi. Amari, Truddaiu, Bovi Campeggi and Reggiori are detained in the other wing, and we meet them only seldom and briefly in the kitchen or at the barber's. During these hours we exchange the experiences made in the dormitory, we discuss the problems we are faced with every day as prisoners. Nestorini's plan, to put us in different dormitories, because together we might have organized God knows what, proves to be a mistake: divided in different dormitories we manage to speak with almost all the prisoners and to know just about everything that happens in prison.

During the "recreation" hours we can also see each other at leisure and exchange information. The situation is different for Gianni Rosa and Valerio Minnella, who share the dormitory with the Jehovah witnesses. These latter (about 54 people, divided in three dormitories) are the only prisoners with whom we cannot manage to establish a contact. They are decidedly sectarian, they are privileged under many aspects, they profess their neutrality in the life of the prison. In vain we attempt to make them understand that there can be no "neutrality" faced with a patent injustice such as prison; and that, in the case of violence or abuses against other fellow prisoners, being on one's own basically means being on the side of the stronger ones, of those who carry out abuses, also because the latter rely on on other people's indifference, neutrality and fear. I try to make them reason on the meaning of these things, quoting a verse of the bible (which is their only "textbook"): "Those who are not with me are against

me". Nothing. For them prison is a sort of seminary which all the newcomers have to go through. They organize their daily schedule with the uttermost discipline, with courses of bible study, debates, manual work, religious functions. In their dormitory there is a blackboard with the schedule of all their activities and the hours in which they must be carried out. They have the authorization to receive their weekly, "La Torre di Guardia" (3), to make propaganda and to proselytize among the prisoners and warders, to keep all the tools they need for their manual work in prison, such as knives, saws, drills, looms, nails, ropes, to speak to their family whenever they want and as long as they want, to send "letters of testimony" to the addresses they get in prison in order to promote their organization.

The captain is only too glad to grant these privileges, which are absolutely forbidden for common prisoners, because these "model prisoners" represent the unsurmountable obstacle to any collective protest, to any attempt to refuse particularly hard tasks: the "witnesses" are always available for any work the administration asks them to do. They are therefore despised by all the prisoners, also because their dormitories are always full of food and other objects that the others can't even dream about. They also treat "common" prisoners with contempt, or at the most, the latter are the object of their conversation.

29 March - I come to know the prisoners of my dormitory better: The group of alpini denounced for having violated the orders, for having left the watch post, tell me about their terrible work in the artillery battalion in the mountains: "The mules were more important than us, if they got hurt or if they hadn't been brushed properly we were punished, whereas nothing happened when they kicked us in the face or in the balls"..."we prefer prison to that appalling life, mounting the guard, at night and when it snowed, for the mules and the empty powder-magazine, with the tenant that showed up suddenly to check whether we were awake and alert"...One of them says: "We would have killed him, if he had turned up again suddenly during the night guard shift; we had the order to shoot against any unidentified person who approached us"; Walter, a mason, had prolonged his leave by a week to stay with his girlfriend; Vincenzo Fortemurato, his body covered with tattoos, an emigrant to Germany, had been taken to Italy after

six months of prison, charged with theft, arrested for not having answered the draft notice and coming back to Italy. Gino, arrested for desertion; he had no family, no relatives, no friends, he was extremely shy and he couldn't bear life in the barracks, where everyone teased him and tormented him with the cruellest jokes. He never had a leave, he didn't know where to go and in any case he didn't have the money to go anywhere. He had found a job as a clerk in a bookshop in Turin and had deserted for over six months. Giuseppe, from Sardinia, had left the barracks without an authorization and had been caught by the patrol headed by a young lieutenant, but had managed to escape and get back to the barracks. The young lieutenant had looked for him and found him in the dormitory, and had insulted him. Giuseppe had reacted by punching him. Renato Bianco, the bersagliere denounced for having taken home an experimental uniform, tells me about the new utilization of his service: "At first we intervened in a high sch

ool in Rovigo. On the first day the demonstrators beat us up. The following day we waited for them in the classroom and we beat them up. The order was to strike with the butt of the rifle, but not so hard as to break it, in which case we would have been punished for having damaged the equipment. During the summer of 1971 they transferred us all to Bari and from there to Reggio Calabria on board of M 113 aircraft. I was really afraid, I was forced to strike first in order not to be killed. We even fired. On the 2nd of June we were in Sardinia and we intervened in a demonstration organized by the population of Sardinia who didn't want military parades, barracks or NATO bases. We fired in the air. My friend made a mistake and fired just a couple of centimetres above the demonstrators' heads.

In Sardinia they used to massacre us with training. They made us run for kilometres under the sun on the mountains". "But weren't you repelled by the idea of firing against the demonstrators?" Those were the orders, and if we hadn't obeyed it they would have sent us to Gaeta and we would have been beaten up by the demonstrators. Better them than us." In the following days, he will change many of his ideas.

1 April - Each newcomer, each personal case, the trials, the absurd convictions, the atmosphere of authoritarianism and of threat are the occasion to talk, to comment. Even the ones that are most unwilling to talk, like Veneziano, start to take part in the discussions in the dormitories. In moments in which the prisoners are really angry for some punishment, when the majority would want to at least verbally "break everything up like we did at Le Nuove", it's not easy to convince them that if we did so we would be doing the superiors a favour, we would be giving them the occasion for harsh punishments. I try to promote the ideals of non-violence, talking about the methods of collective civil disobedience, of there is for unity between the prisoners.

But everything seems to fade away very soon, and this is due to a mutual distrust. Each prisoner knows that the commander can blackmail him in a hundred ways: the report he will give the judges, the small jobs in the prisons, which are badly paid, censorship on mail, visits from the family, the possibility of purchasing goods outside the prison, and especially the regulation, which is like a sword of Damocles hanging on the military prisoners' heads. I come to realize that only a long and difficult work, with the risks involved in the fact that Peschiera is only a temporary prison, could allow for some results and the achievement of some internal rights. The fundamental element, the thing the administration of the prison fears most, is the organized connection with the outside world, the publicity of what is going on inside the prison.

3 April - In the courtyard I manage to strike up a conversation with Lieutenant Zanzottera: it is the occasion to create moments of collective discussion on the problems concerning our condition, and on the army. The lieutenant is quite kind, with a paternalistic attitude he circles the courtyard chatting with the prisoners. It's quite easy to stop him, induce him to enter the discussion with remarks on the army, and to involve many prisoners in the debate. This is a usual pattern, and each time the lieutenant says: "Now I'll have to punish myself for having allowed the prisoners to talk politics!" Bedussi is extremely worried about this activity of mine, which he considers too overt. He is still paying for his hard line toward the commander: he has been convicted to two months of prison for not having immediately detached two love poems from the cell's wall.

During the recreation I meet other prisoners: Onesti is the nicest guy of the prison. He seems to belong to the "beat generation" and succeeds in teasing the officers and even Zanzottera. Before he used to be a sentinel patrolling the prison, and therefore he could watch us and understand our life conditions. One evening he wrote this sentence on the wall: "this prison should not exist, because it is the symbol of antisocial repression and dictatorship. We are in 1972 and they can do anything except stopping time from flowing". He is now serving a sentence of seven months.

The two policemen arrested for the protest demonstration of the 500 security guards of Turin have now been accepted by all the prisoners. Bedussi tells me that in the beginning the prisoners, and especially the "common prisoners", wanted to beat them up. As time passed however, they succeeded in being accepted, changing many of their ideas. I speak with Trevi, who is the nicest of them and the most intelligent one: "I entered the police after having had a fight with my father, who runs a petrol station in Latina. I wanted to be independent and I was sick of that boring life". "What happened in Turin?". "The demonstration was completely misunderstood by the media. Perhaps that was a good thing. It had started off as a "right-wing" demonstration. My colleagues wanted to apply the regulation, to close down all the illegal activities, that is, the majority, fine drivers who committed infractions with extremely strict fines, go on a sort of white strike to protest against the limitations put to our prerogatives a

s policemen, and for the reform of some internal norms, such as the one that forbids policemen to marry before they are 26. I managed to convince them not to do all this, and instead to march on via Roma at night. Someone must have called a photographer and this is how the mess started. They arrested me and Papa because we were the seniors and the only ones not to be afraid of the commander".

After months of detention, in direct contact with the "thieves", he at least convinced himself that "it's not true that they don't like working and they prefer the good life". He still hasn't decided whether he wants to remain in the police.

The moment in which they hand out mail is the one we look forward to most. When the sergeant arrives in the courtyard with the pack of letters we all rush up, hungry, eager to receive something from the "world", to finally feel close to all that we left outside this prison. This sort of collective seizure affects even those who will never receive any mail, because no one knows, no one even suspects of their condition, in the "XXX May Barracks". These prisoners content themselves by asking "news" from the world to the lucky ones; Fortemurato..., Bedussi..., Peila...his sisters and his girlfriend write to him every day...; Minnella...it must be Ines with her beautiful Ginsberg-style letters and the psychedelic drawings, or one of his many girlfriends; Rosa...finally, he had been waiting for days.

The mail arrives with many days delay. It is often sent to the Prosecution Office of Turin to be censored, and from there it can take a month to return to Peschiera. From the answers we receive we can verify the incredible delays with which they are sent. The most political letters are normally photocopied by lieutenant Milano, who is charged with the censorship. In any case, all our mail passes through the commander's hands. They want to avoid news from the prison to escape, or in any case, co-ordinated actions. A letter by Magda in which she tells me about her cats and her flowers remains in the Prosecution Office of Turin for many weeks (censored letters in Turin bear a special stamp), they suspect that "cats" and "flowers" are part of a "special code" of ours.

I receive the first letter after two days of prison, on the 13th. It's by Fausta Mancini Lapenna. I had spoken to her only for a couple of minutes, in Udine, before a debate on conscientious objection which we had organized in February.

"...I'm writing to you to express you my friendship and my sympathy. To say the truth I would like to suggest we use the "you" form. I don't know if you know that now I'm part of the Radical Party. Moreover, for many years young people have adopted me as their aunt and call me Zifà. We don't know each other well, me and you, but it is in the essential features that mutual sympathy consist of. We experience the same fears, we fight for common goals, and this, much more than anything else, is what keeps people together by means of serious bonds..."

I receive in my cell and I'm very happy about it.

On the 14th I receive telegrams by Lino Jannuzzi and the Radicals from Reggio Emilia. The following day I receive telegrams from Ennio Bonea, Canestrini and Loris Fortuna. The corporal brings them to me and asks me what I have done to attract the attention of these members of parliament. On the 16th I receive a book, sent to me by Zifà: Vittorio Emanuele II", by Mack Smith. On the 24th, Nestorini summons me to personally give me a letter in which Marco tells me about all the new things in the party, the relations with "Il Manifesto" (4). I receive letters from Giancarlo and Daniela and the S.Paolo Community on the 30th. "...the trial, scheduled for the 2nd of June, has been postponed because not all the defendants had been informed...a few days ago I received a summon for the 25th of May...I think the housekeeper got scared, she always looks at me as if she wanted explanations: you in the military prison, me with the Carabinieri; as soon as I have time I will make a little assembly for her and all the gossip

s here..." Liliana writes to me on the 11th of April.

"...I'm glad you're "getting used" to this compulsory military service. I'm sure you will be strengthened by this experience, even if this makes me sad, because it means mythicizing or in nay case privileging the "sacrifice", which we tend to associate the strength and the quality of our personality and will to. You know that this reasoning is a "violent" reasoning with which people try to influence man from within, from his ego, to make him into a meek instrument of common morals, whereas non-violence should first of all be applied to ourselves.

Therefore I think that this experience will be useful for you not because of the sacrifice it implies, but only because it is managed and administered by you and by us Radicals with a true non-violent spirit and with the possibility of transforming it into one of the many libertarian and civil battles to which our commitment, stimulated by the immediate need, can give the perspective of a concrete and true victory...on the 10th of April you have been prosecuted together with Marco for the manifesto and the issue of Radical News relative to "When the homeland calls let's answer NO..."

Giuseppe Ramadori, 11th of April.

We hear screams coming from the isolation cells from our dormitory. "It must be Doni, training in Karatè", a prisoner says. Later I manage to know that it's Provenzano, from the West wing, who refused to leave for Gaeta. They tell me was brought by force to the cells, and "stroked" by Doni, Maseracchia and other sergeants. We discuss about this fact in the dormitory. What can we do? For the moment, nothing. I ask the senior prisoners if things like this happen often. They answer in the affirmative. And in any case, I had read about it in Mario Pizzola's diary. I begin to take notes; names, dates.

Angelino Giovanni comes back from the trial in very low spirits. I knew him only by sight. He was always playing volley-ball or football. He comes from Naples, he is illiterate, knows nothing about politics. The tribunal of Padua convicted him to one year and four months of imprisonment, for having mimicked a mosquito to a second lieutenant. In the jargon used in the barracks (and in prison), the "mosquito" is a beginner, a newcomer. During a meal Angelino has made this "sound" before a new, touchy second lieutenant. His companions had invited him to repeat this sound and he had done so.

The trial was extremely brief. The judge asked the witnesses how many times Angelino had made the sound "zzz"...The president also invited Angelino to repeat the sound. "...do I really have to do it?". "Of course you have to, it's an order!" "zzz"...". "Lieutenant, do you confirm this? Was it "zzz" or "sss"? How much time did it last?". "One year and six months in this place? I'll go insane, I'll kill myself!". We try to calm him down. I promise to write to a good lawyer to defend him before the Supreme Tribunal. This piece of news circulates around the prison, explodes like a bomb all around the prison. That's what class prejudice means. "I knew" what the "defense" appointed by the Court meant; for years within the party we had promoted juridical objections on this point. But I am equally surprised by the speed, the importance that this "service" which I had spontaneously offered assumed. This is the first spark. I speak a lot about it during our little "meetings" with Zanzottera. It seems to me that this i

s a case that explains the role of these tribunals perfectly, and not only these. Bedussi once again warns me that I'm going too far, that I'm risking too much. While I walk out of the dormitory, Sergeant Maseracchia, a slightly stupid "tough guy" who reads "Il Borghese" (5) ostentatiously, summons me to a corner of the infirmary. He says he needs to talk to me. "If you talk about politics once more I'll bash you up. I warned you". I'm petrified. I wasn't expecting this.

In the dormitory we get along better every day. I speak a lot with Renato, the bersagliere, and with Gerolamo Gullace. Girolamo tells me about his periods in prison, his thefts, his childhood. I help him to write letters to his girlfriend. "She's been following me to all the prisons of Italy. I make life impossible for her. At night she's afraid of every noise. She's always expecting the police to break in. We have a little girl. I ought to quit this shitty life".

The Gipsy, who was arrested while he was in a Luna Park after having ignored the draft notice, tries to write down his name. He's illiterate. Previously he used to attend school in prison, but he felt the teacher, who is also the mayor of Peschiera, treated him like a child and he quit. Vincenzo Fortemurato receives the usual letter from the counsel appointed by the Court, Roberto De Leo. It's a circular letter, with the name of the prisoner handwritten, which notifies: that the offence is punished with "..." two years imprisonment, (handwritten), and that the fee for the appointment to be his lawyer is "...40,000 Lire" (handwritten).

Vincenzo of course tears it up. Almost all the prisoners that I know are defended by the counsels appointed by the Court, both because they have no money and because this way there are counseled by their commander. It is for this reasons that the trials last only a few minutes. Very rarely is someone acquitted.

A new prisoner arrives, Roberto, an alpino, member of the Italian Communist Party. He had stayed 100 days in the CPR, then they sent him to Peschiera. He speaks little and reads a lot of comics. He has loads of them. The dormitory is filled with Diabolik, Satanik, Hessa, Lucrezia, and are the object of swapping between the dormitories and even with the corporals. The priest hands out Famiglia Cristiana (6), which is usually used as scrap paper to light the gas cookers in the dormitories. The internal canteen has two or three issues of "Il Giorno" (7) and "Il Corriere della Sera" (8). "ABC" is smuggled in and is swapped among the prisoners. I receive "Il Messaggero" and "Il Giorno", which I subscribe to, inside the dormitory. They are read and commented by every one. "Notizie Radicali", which we manages to smuggle inside, is so worn and torn that it's falling to pieces. I have to fold it and hide it under my clothes in order to let the highest number of prisoners to read it. Are they only interested in the fa

ct that there is a photograph of me and the announcement of an anti-militarist march? Renato, from Friuli, assures me that he'll be there. Valerio is enthusiastic about the pop-festival: "If they give me 4 and 20 days, like Scapin, I can come to the march!", he says.

We start wondering about the convictions and conceiving illusions. Some of the fellow prisoners of my dormitory ask me about the Radical Party, but out of sheer curiosity. We discuss a lot with Claudio, Valerio, Alerino and Gianni. The irreplaceable function of the Radical Party seems even more evident to us, from the inside. As for the party we consider it the reference point for every initiative, for every project. "But then, why don't you join the party?", we ask. "I'll think about it".

7th of April - Veneziano, the "chief of the dormitory", who until now had been a bit of a ruffian, taking care of cleaning the dormitory and organizing the shifts for the other services, even doing small tailoring jobs for the corporals, because he hoped in a good "note" of the commander of the prison for his revision trial, finally explodes: "The commander of my regiment had written to me not to appoint any lawyer, but only people expert of the milieu, because that way they would have put their good services, and I did so. Nestorini had told me that if I behaved well in prison they would have certainly diminished the conviction, and I always licked their feet, in these six months. Enough! I've been a complete fool! And I even cut my hair for the trial! Now do whatever you want to. And as far as I'm concerned, these bastards can ask the tailor to make their suits". I'm very glad about this decision. It's extremely important, it represents the first achievement of our strategy.

9th of April - De Simone is in the isolation cell. I'm told that he's been "stroked" twice. The technique is always the same: Doni, Maseracchia and another three or four petty officers enter the cell and with the excuse of searching the prisoner they force you to strip naked. The cell is narrow, the prisoner may feel that certain attentions are too much to bear, the petty officers may thus be forced to defend themselves from the prisoner's violence and to bash him up, out of legitimate defence, of course! Ten days in the cell will be enough to cancel the bruises on the body, and in any case to make the prisoner understand that he'd better not be hostile to the "superiors". In any case, six witnesses are always enough to have someone convicted for violence, affront, possibly even insubordination.

This time we try to do something.

I begin to act myself. I manage to send De Simone cigarettes, milk and comic strips. I write my name on the milk carton, to make Domenico understand that we're taking care of the thing. I manage to exchange a couple of words, through the narrow window above the cell's toilet, but I immediately have to leave because the officer is coming. Bedussi makes another attempt and De Simone confirms the ill-treatment. I talk about what's going on in the cells in an ever explicit manner, even with Zanzottera. I notice an increase in the petty officers' attention toward our talks: there is always a graduate nearby as soon as we get together to talk. We succeed in conveying these news to the outside world. A few corporals overcome their fears and give us a hand. But we also have other means to communicate with the outside world: prison makes people ingenuous. Eugenio Scalfari (9) sends us a telegram. Among other things, he urges us to continue to send the parliamentarians information concerning the prisoners' life condit

ions. Obviously, Scalfari is referring to Pizzola's diary and to the information generally delivered by the party. On the one hand we are glad of this interest and of the fact that we succeeded in establishing a contact with the parliamentarians, but on the other hand we are also afraid. Afraid that this reference can be interpreted as evidence of our internal activity, and that this could increase the controls which are already quite severe, and generally make our action more difficult. We are also concerned about the delay with which we receive the telegram: it had arrived at the post office of Peschiera on the 30th of March, and we receive it only today.

10th of April - Three "missionary" priests come to the prison for a series of meetings. In the morning, the youngest of the three introduces the assembly. He is also the most concerned about talking with us of our problems. Asked why we are detained in here, we all answer, about 80 of us: "We are objectors". It is a great success. The actions developed previously to induce the others to realize that we were all equal as military prisoners, rewards us with a first result. The priest is taken aback. We manage to establish a discussion schedule for the other meetings: Authority, justice, conditions and functions of the prison, testimonies, operative conclusions.

In the afternoon, obviously after having talked with Nestorini, who understands the danger inherent in such debates perfectly, the eldest missionary priest, having completely "forgotten" the schedule laid down before, delivers a speech on the existence of God for over an hour, of a surprising banality. Some of the prisoners, whom we had convinced to take part in the meeting instead of playing football, start to leave or to give visible signs that they are bored. I try to interrupt the priest, but there's nothing to be done. He goes on for another half hour. Bedussi takes notes on the debate, here they are:

First priest: We have come to bring you a word of understanding, of fraternity on the part of Christ; and we want to be clear and honest. We will accept your remarks and your contradictions. We sense your bitterness and we try to do our duty, first of all before God and then before man. We do what we can, but it is up to neither us nor you to change things. You young people are full of that ideal impulse of justice, and we hope you will continue in the future. We must preach Christ outside of and above every thing. Even though we share your ideals of justice, we try to see things more from a religious point of view. But at least you will know that there is a friendly voice and face out there. I never asked any one which party he belonged to - you are a brother -, I used to say, and this immediately created a warm and friendly atmosphere. Everything passes: prison and the military service, but what remains is the brotherhood, man, with his constant need for love. Then we leave it to God to develop the seed th

at we place in your hearts. We talked to prisoners, to old people, to girlfriends, to parents, and these meetings were the source of an inner enrichment for us.

(What does inner enrichment mean? a prisoner sitting next to me asks me.)

We are admired - the missionary continues - before some people who are paying personally, but you do understand that grief manifests itself in many ways in life. It is for this reason that we must ask ourselves:

- Was it God who wanted this? Was it God that wanted grief? Has it always been this way in history? Why grief? What is the sense of my life? Even if I had everything, including love, would my existence be explained and fulfilled?

Of course, material goods are wonderful, but we see that they are not enough. It is difficult to say this to young, inexpert people like you, because young people generally stop at the momentary values and do not see beyond these. I am asking you, is there not something more?

Do you know Pavese? (10) Well, with his "Mestiere di vivere", he failed and he committed suicide. And maybe he even wanted to teach other people this profession of living. And Ardigò, a philosopher, said: Why life? and he committed suicide in spite of his philosophy, which was incapable of helping him to live. Unfortunately, when you stop people in the street and you ask them what the sense of life is, they answer: more justice, and so on.

But what I'm saying is, this is not enough. The human soul goes beyond this, it contains deeper yearnings, that go beyond a human target. And you are asking me the reasons for many things that are wrong, you understand that you must solve these problems personally, ah, but don't misunderstand me, I'm not talking about social problems: but of spiritual and religious problems, which are the key to understand the existence of grief in the world.

You might object: we have immediate problems which we must solve. Oh no, that's not the point. Each one of you at a certain point of his life wonders at the reasons for these injustices, and then, given the impossibility of answering, tackles other questions: why do I live?

And to these questions, some shrewd persons always find

an answer. Let's go back to the origins: I was born from my parents and my parents were born from their parents, and so on, until we have to stop and say: okay, but what about the beginning?

(Examples of a bar, pantomime, anatomy, digestive tract, ear, to prove how every effect corresponds to a primal cause).

Someone answers: the world created itself on its own.

He answers, you see, according to this reasoning, even the cigarette you hold in your hand created itself on its own.

The prisoner then answers: Ah, it's not fair, you priests have studied, and one can't reason with you.

At this stage the speech has being going on for a long time, and from what I can see the prisoners are no longer paying attention.

Intervention by Cicciomessere: But this should have been a debate, not a speech.

First priest: okay, I'll finish now.

Ciccio: this is a clear manner of teasing us. One can understand how religion is the support of power.

Jesus convinced the ignorants and the illiterate because he lived among them, without making speeches on cause and effect.

Let's verify, therefore, if turning to the problems of immediate justice is not talking about faith. No one in here is looking for wealth, but just for bread. You proved that in this prison it is impossible to talk, given that this morning we had established a different schedule, but then you talked with the officers in here and...

Other priest: This morning we tried to plan the discussion the way you wanted to. But then, speaking among us, we decided to privilege the religious aspect and the the social aspect, which might have emerged later on in the discussion. Everyone has his problems, and those who wish to can stay longer.

Ciccio: We all have the same problems, given that we are in here.

First priest: you are speaking about something that does not concern us, that is alien to us, our interest is RELIGIOUS.

Another prisoner: but it wasn't like this this morning.

Another priest: yes, but thinking deeper, speaking among us, we decided to talk about our perspectives, to help you.

Ciccio: but in real fact: what have you to say to us?

First priest: You consider Christ only from a sociological point of view, and this is not correct. Christ did not come to solve the problem of extra bread, but to carry out a religious reasoning.

At this point, let us read some passages from the book by Libanio (an epistolary book written bt the a Dominican monk incarcerated in Latin America together with four other monks for having given shelter to politically persecuted persons. The book talks about a church of the prison, of incarceration in the social reality of the believer, about help toward a brother, no longer considered in terms of charity - pat on the shoulder - that is, inviting the rich to give charity, but as a concrete commitment to modify those economic and social structures-causes which lead to exploitation. We will read a letter.)

First priest: We agree with Libanio perfectly.

Ciccio: But how can you say that you agree when not one of the sentences we read corresponds, not with your actions, but not even with the words you uttered until now.

Here there are people who are married, who have children, who have never had a job, a family, who are in here for a trifle, look, there's one person here who got 16 months of prison for having imitated a mosquito sound to a tenant. There are people forced to do their military service and who must desert to support their families. And then there is the fact of prison itself. Do you have a faint idea of what happens in the cells? Why don't you come and have a look at our dormitories, at the conditions we have to live in, without anything to do all day. No papers are allowed apart from "Il Corriere" and "Il Giorno" (now not even that).

Unfortunately I can't manage shorthand and therefore I miss the main part of the intervention, when Cicciomessere starts to analyse the function of the army and the results in terms of prison reality which it means for most people and for the people here especially. In the mean time I intervene as well.

I'm sorry, but I really think you're speaking to a desert. Not only you use terms that are often not understood, but even the text of the speech is good enough only for a fat bourgeois who sits in an armchair after a good meal and wonders about the origins of the world.

Third priest: We want to proclaim Christ. The number of those who will want to accept this word depend on the grace and the will of each of you. But from this moment on, I would like these talks to have a specific direction. Our father suggests a topic and the discussion must focus on this topic only. We do not want to be used or driven into discussions that go beyond our directions.

We are not concerned about remaining with 5 or 6 people, because we will always be able to say: "We went to Peschiera and we talked about Christ and the soul". At this stage they summon Valerio to speak. I think they are conducting the fragmentation of the talks very well. Their fear that a talk with 4 objectors at the same time, as it should have been, could bring about some "inconvenience".

In the mean time, the speech continues.

A prisoner: Father, this person here comes from the same place as I do, he is married and has a child, who is very ill these days, do you think it is fair to keep him in here?

Another objector: How can you call yourselves our friends, share our pains, if you have never been, if you have never tried to understand what it means to feel impotent day by day, and incapable of deciding for your own life, because there is always a rule, an imposition which continuously robs you of your capacity of being a man.

First priest: Yes. Yes...yes...

Third priest: Enough, it's useless to discuss, I said...

Ciccio: This is a clear invitation for us to go, when you say: "enough, it's no use discussing, either you stick to our schedule or no one is forcing you to stay".

Another objector: Always on the same line.

First priest: Enough, I said, it's useless to discuss...

Someone if getting up...everyone is getting up...everyone is going out. Collective exit. One prisoners lingers on, on his own.

Outside in the courtyard we are all excited about what happened: without any previous agreement, we expressed a collective refusal; we publicly expressed the criticisms we had long since being thinking inside us, or which we were discussing among few; we denounced what happens in the cells; we proved our unity to the commander. The two proposals we made to the priests before going out, to go to the isolation cells to talk to De Simone and let him tell them what happened, and to come to our dormitories and to speak freely, have not been accepted; this makes the subordinate and accessory function of the prison oppression of these managers of the state religion clear to all prisoners. The military chaplain of the prison is very angry. In the courtyard he doesn't even say hello. The young priest tells me that he accused me, saying I was a trouble-maker, and what's more an atheist trouble-maker, who has no right to talk about religious things. He probably realizes he is the main responsible, also for the role he

has in here, of the serious prison situation. For years he has seen what happens in prison, but cannot find the words or the actions to prevent it. The only thing he manages to do is to take some cigarettes to the prisoners in the cells.

I return to the dormitory after the meal. Doni orders me to take my folding bed and to move to the dormitory where the Jehovah witnesses are. Vincenzo and Girolamo vaguely protest. When I go out for the afternoon recreation I'm told that Nestorini has started to question the fellow prisoners of my dormitory. With threats to convictions of "5 to 15 years", with personal blackmail, with lies and double game, he manages to obtain some confessions about my supposed attempts to organize a revolt among the prisoners. I sense that the situation is becoming dramatic. In the Witnesses' dormitory I start writing a letter to Marco, to inform him of what's going on. I write about the events occurred in the isolation cells, of the attempted suicides; I give him names and dates...I tell him about the missionaries, I list some cases of convictions that deserve being made public more than others.

I foresee they will search me, and therefore I ask Lorenzo Gallo, a Jehovah witness with whom I had managed to talk a few times, to keep the letter until I make it out of prison. He starts talking about neutrality as usual. And the usual refusal to take up any position whatsoever: apart from anything else, he is also afraid of losing his privileges. I get mad, I remind him that one of their "brothers" has been a witness of the abuses in the cells, when I hear the door being opened and officer Doni coming in, ordering me to follow him. I put the letter in the cupboard, staring at Lorenzo. In the corridor, one of the cells is open. I understand I have to go in, even before Doni tells me to do so. I find myself in the cell in my slippers, without anything lese. I understand now what Claudio wanted to tell me.

This time they respect the prison regulations completely: no mattress or blankets for the day, no cigarettes, no books, no contacts with the outside, with other prisoners. I am the only prisoner in the cells. I think I can hear the noise of my cupboard being shifted from the dormitory. I start hoping that Lorenzo took the letter from the cupboard, he knows what the contents are.

I am no longer self-assured or calm. The cell is cold, the table is hard, I'm worried and therefore cannot sleep. I can do nothing else but stare at the wall, with the graffiti graved by all the prisoners before me (many pacifist symbols, curses for the prison and the warders, named and dates of detention) and think that the situation appears to me more and more serious. To manage to go to the toilet I have to shout for a long time, and then wait for Doni, who has become the only detainee of the key to the cells. Already this first day, I draw a line on the wall in order not to lose trace of time. The delivery of the tray with the food gives me a rough idea of the time. I insistently ask to speak with the captain to know the reasons for this isolation. No answer. They want to leave me in a complete ignorance of the charges against me, let me torture myself with doubts and with fear. It's appalling.

Translator's notes

(1) Bersagliere: Italian light-infantryman.

(2) Alpini: member of the Italian Alpine troops.

(3) La Torre di Guardia: The Watch Tower.

(4) Il Manifesto: Italian Communist daily newspaper.

(5) Il Borghese: Italian extreme Right weekly (no longer published).

(6) Famiglia Cristiana: Religious-oriented weekly.

(7) Il Giorno: Italian daily newspaper.

(8) Il Corriere della Sera: Italian daily newspaper.

(9) Eugenio Scalfari: Italian journalist, founder and editor of "La Repubblica".

(10) Cesare Pavese: Italian writer and poet (1908-1950).