Benito Mussolini (1883–1945) was Italy’s prime minister from 1922 to 1943 and Europe’s first 20th-century fascist dictator, often called Il Duce (“The Leader”). He began as a socialist journalist, then shifted toward wartime nationalism during World War I and organized fascist paramilitary groups after the war.
After the 1922 March on Rome, he was appointed prime minister; by 1925 he had dismantled democratic institutions and ruled as a dictator. He invaded Ethiopia in 1935, allied with Nazi Germany, and entered World War II in 1940; after Italy’s military setbacks he was dismissed in 1943 and executed by Italian partisans near Dongo on April 28, 1945.