His name entered, willingly or unwillingly, in the history of Italy. And, in many ways, it has burned into one of the most impenetrable and violent secrets of the island of Sardinia. Of him, born Mario Scelba, President of the Council of Ministers from 10 February 1954 to 6 July 1955, immediately after De Gasperi, they have said and written everything and more. For the communists he was a devil on earth, the father of the fraudulent law, a bloodthirsty beast, a lackey of the fascists, a truncheon, a servant of the American imperialists. They told him all sorts of things. Many recognized him as the putative son of Don Sturzo, others, daring beyond measure, idealized a paternity that was not only political. On the other hand, his most demanding and secret signature has remained in obscurity, the one that even today in the Palaces of Rome, they struggle to pronounce.
Top Secret deal
The abbreviation of that document is in code, with a clear stamp: Top secret, maximum degree of secrecy. It was he, Mario Scelba, the interior minister with an easy truncheon, and at the same time President of the Council of Ministers, who signed the
The tender is now open, with sixty days to submit bids. Giulini: "This time, the future must become reality."
Mauro Madeddu
Bilateral Infrastructure Agreement (BIA
)
on 20 October 1954.
A secret pact with the United States of America to manage and build NATO and American military bases in Italy. A bilateral agreement signed, on behalf of the stars and stripes flag, by Clare Booth Luce, the US ambassador in Italy. We are talking about the most unconstitutional of secret pacts, given that the Italian Parliament has never ratified it. A legal boulder that undermines state power in immense portions of the national territory, with the establishment of real free zones where nothing is denied, even killing is not a crime.
Cermis massacre
The Cermis massacre, the Cavalese cable car, in the heart of the Dolomites 40 km north-east of Trento, in Val di Fiemme, is a dagger still stuck in modern history. It was February 3, 1998. A US military aircraftGrumman EA-6B Prowlerof theUnited States Marine Corps, flying at a lower altitude than allowed and in violation of the regulations, severed the cable car cable, causing the cabin to fall and causing death of twenty people. They weren't actually exercising, but enjoying themselves with breath-taking challenges. Joseph Schweitzer, one of the two US pilots involved in the accident, only confessed in 2012 that, on his return to base, he had destroyed the video tape that would have allowed the truth about the accident to be revealed. They were tried in the United States and acquitted of manslaughter and manslaughter charges. On that occasion, it was the Italian judges who demanded the declassification of that "very secret" agreement. There was nothing to be done.
Salomonico Mattarella
The chronicles of those years tell of a Sergio Mattarella, the current Head of State, then Minister of Defence, intent on mediating between a robbed national sovereignty and multiple homicides at home. The position of the Italian state was Solomonic enough to continue to cover that agreement. The only concession is circumscribed in a statement in the records of the commission of inquiry into that massacre: Basic infrastructure agreement (BIA) of 20 October 1954 has a high level of secrecy, but nevertheless the Government, with an innovative act, has partially made available of the competent judicial authority on the Cermis case.
land of conquest
On January 21, 2003, Defense Minister Antonio Martino reiterated that "absolute secrecy" was not touched upon by the defense commissions of the House and Senate: these are agreements that have a high level of secrecy and cannot be unilaterally declassified. In other words, if the Americans don't want to, they must remain secret. And, in fact, the Yankees don't want to hear about it for any reason. It is within that agreement that Sardinia becomes a land of conquest, of bombs and missiles to be thrown relentlessly "against the coast" and beyond, of environmental devastation with serious risk to the health of military and civilians. Now, however, the scenario has radically changed. The untouchables are no longer untouchables, the free zone of Teulada where everything was allowed marks significant failures, the Prosecutor's Office investigates and the judges of Cagliari indict the defense leaders for trial. It will be difficult to invoke Scelba's pact with the Americans, even if in the end they will try.
Historical reversal
In an almost astral coincidence, if it weren't for the increasingly imposing pressure of Sardinian public opinion and beyond, three unprecedented boulders loom over the Teulada range, one heavier than the other. The first is linked to the investigation and the trial that from 25 January 2024 will see the number one of the Italian defense in the dock, all accused of disaster. The second is the rejection by Comipa, the Joint Joint Committee between the State and the Region, of the six-monthly calendar of exercises.
unexpected constitution
The third is a milestone that falls without appeal on Teulada, but also on the other two military polygons of Sardinia, those of Quirra and Capo Frasca: the Italian Constitution in May 2022 definitively introduced the Environment as an absolute, priority value and untouchable. Three unexpected facts, which not only intersect each other, but become an explosive conjunction capable of blowing up the American agreement and the very functionality of the military bases in Sardinia.
Pebble in Defense
The pebble that ends up in the gears of the warmongering defense is the rejection by the Comipa of the next exercises. The law, the 898 of 24 December 1976, provides: «If the majority of the members designated by the Region expresses itself in the opposite direction, the Minister of Defense decides definitively on the training activity programmes».
Decree outlawed
This is where the other two elements are triggered. The scenario is marked: to authorize the new exercises, the Minister of Defense will have to adopt his own decree, an administrative act, without the coverage of the joint joint committee. This time, however, it will not be an easy decree to sign, at least for two reasons: an investigation and a criminal trial for an environmental disaster weigh on that range and, for the first time, that area of Teulada, already classified as a Community importance, it will enjoy priority protection by the Constitution which puts environmental protection first.
Region, the dilemma
A marked crossroads, given that the Region, which has filed a civil action in the criminal trial for the Teulada disaster, will be unable not to challenge the TAR and the Constitutional Court itself against the Minister's decree for the resumption of bombing precisely in those areas where prosecute environmental disaster. A decisive passage, such an unprecedented crossroads, that it would be very serious for the Region to let the historic opportunity slip away, becoming, if it did not challenge that Minister's decree, blatantly conniving with that disaster. The luck is that that of the Minister of Defense will be a "simple" administrative act and as such can be contested before the TAR by any citizen or association entitled to do so.
Tar & High Court
It will then be the administrative judges, if they deem it necessary, to possibly request an incidental pronouncement from the Constitutional Court itself. And, for the first time, but the same judges of Piazza del Carmine could already do it, those of the Regional Administrative Court of Sardinia, the new constitutional provision inserted in the Charter of Laws on 8 February 2022 would apply when it was decided to integrate the value of the environment in the list of fundamental principles (art. 9) and in the first part (art. 41) of the Constitution. The third paragraph added to article nine of the Constitution seems to have been written ad hoc for the Teulada case:«[The Republic] protects the environment, biodiversity and ecosystems, also in the interest of future generations».
Before the bombs
It is a change with unprecedented repercussions on the state and regional legal system, given that the value of the environment becomes priority and absolute with respect to everything, let alone the environmental devastation by bombs and missiles of a naturalistic site, recognized as such by state and community standards.
Supreme principles
The importance of this new constitutional provision is underlined by the highest Court itself: «the Italian Constitution contains some supreme principles which cannot be subverted or modified in their essential content not even by constitutional revision laws or by other constitutional laws». To be more explicit: having included the protection of the environment among the fundamental values assigns a "reinforced" and prevailing weight to environmental values in reconciliation with other constitutional interests. In summary: the environmental protection of the bombings on the coastal and protected areas of Teulada comes first. The first consequence is relevant and immediate: no law, let alone a decree by a minister, can be applied if it is in conflict with these new constitutional principles. The synthesis is without appeal: there is no law, authorization or sector discipline, Ministerial decree or so that can ever overcome the constitutionally guaranteed prohibition of undermining the right to cause damage to the environment, biodiversity or the ecosystem. In a nutshell, with reference to the atavistic conviction of the Ministry of Defense and its Generals, there cannot be a legitimate and permitted environmental disaster. In short, the end of impunity.
Protected area
Teulada is to all intents and purposes a protected area and the Judges of Cagliari are prosecuting the crime of environmental disaster: today more than ever, in no case, therefore, can it be hypothesized that someone could attack constitutionally protected assets. To stop an "abusive" conduct, it will be enough to recall the sure contrast with the new constitutional norms. A final note on the last paragraph of the new constitutional law: the Republic protects the environment«also in the interest of future generations». In other words, the future of Teulada and her children cannot be built with bombs and missiles, causing devastation and environmental disaster, forever undermining their future.
