-2-                             
 
                                                            
 
 
Italy in the war. By consensus of opinion Mussolini had become   
increasingly difficult, laboring under "delusions of grandeur", his   
efforts at empire building in Ethiopia and elsewhere having met with some   
success. In this state of mind, while had had previously opposed Hitler's   
ambition to some extent, he fell a victim to abelief in the "invincibility   
of Hitler's armed strength." He believed Ribbentrop's declaration to the   
Pope, in April, that the "war would be over by Spetember 1, and Britain   
laid low and Germany dominating Europe." As the season wore on, your final   
warning to Mussolini, coincident by agreement with one from the Holy   
Father, evoked only the response to His Holiness that Mussolini envisaged   
"Italy's place in the sun" as having "windows looking out on the Atlantic   
on one side, and on the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean on theother." Soon   
after this definite and bad tempered rebuff, Mussolini entered the war   
with the "stab in the back" of France. ( Memorandum reports at the time to   
       you disclose the detaials of these affairs).         
 
                            1941                            
 
                                                            
 
 
Our next effort was to illustrate to His Holiness our attitude   
toward the war, our sympathy, interest and support of the British Empire,   
           then sorely pressed, and of our actual