At the outbreak of war even many white Americans, immigrants or children of immigrants, defined themselves in terms of the old-world national group to which they belonged, notably including almost 5 million Italian-Americans: until December 1941, their community newspapers hailed Mussolini as a giant. One published letter writer applauded the German invasion of Poland, and predicted that, “as the Roman legions did under Caesar, the New Italy will go forth and conquer.” Even when their country declared war on Mussolini, many Italian-Americans hoped for a U.S. victory that somehow avoided
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