Thanks to it, Helper, joining us here this hour,

really happy to have you here.

It was almost exactly 100 years ago.

It was 1922, it was October 1922.

And the fascist party announced that they would march

into the nation's capital.

They would march on Rome.

And the Prime Minister at the time knew that

if they were gonna march on Rome,

this meant that the fascists were gonna try to take over.

They were gonna try to mount a physical fascist coup.

To defend against that, he wanted to call it the military,

to defend Rome, to stop the coup.

But the king at the time wouldn't agree to that.

So the military wasn't called up to defend the capital.

And instead, what the king did is he caved to the fascists.

He invited the leader of the fascists to form a government

to become the new Prime Minister.

And the head of the fascists enthusiastically agreed.

And the tens of thousands of his supporters,

who he had threatened would march on Rome

to seize power in a coup,

...