"It is difficult to know what Togliatti was like, because Togliatti left no memoirs, no diary. No one ever knew what Togliatti thought, not even his partner Nilde Iotti. It can be said that he was a faithful executor of Stalin's orders. He always was, and for this reason he enjoyed Stalin's trust. [...] Interviewer: Was he a great diplomat? Montanelli: He was a diplomat in his own right, above all because he was a man who survived twenty-five or thirty years in Moscow without ending up in prison, on trial, or against the wall. Well, that makes him one of the great figures. There are few of them. Interviewer: Was he not a statesman, for example? Montanelli: He could not be a statesman because communists do not have the state in their blood; communists have the Party. Stalin was never head of state, nor even head of government; he was head of the Party. Power in communist regimes lies neither in the state nor in the government, but in the Party."
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Palmiro Togliatti
1893 – 1964
Palmiro Michele Nicola Togliatti (1893 – 1964) was an Italian politician, who led Italy's Communist party for nearly forty years, from 1927 until his death. Born into a middle-class family, Togliatti received an education in law at the University of Turin, later served as an officer and was wounded in World War I, and became a tutor. His supporters gave him the nickname il Migliore ("the Best"). In 1930, Togliatti renounced Italian citizenship, and he became a citizen of the Soviet Union. Upon h
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