Many have heard of Il mondo al contrario, the surprise bestseller by Roberto Vannacci, a major general in the Italian Army, but few know the man himself. Roberto Vannacci was a major general, commander of Task Force 45 in Afghanistan; Commander of the 9th Parachute Assault Regiment “Col Moschin” and the Parachute Brigade “Folgore.” He participated in special missions in Libya, Somalia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Rwanda, Yemen, Ivory Coast, Iran, and Afghanistan, where he was chief of staff of NATO Special Forces. In January 2020, he was in Moscow as a military attaché, where he was declared persona non grata by Russian authorities and sent back to Italy, together with other compatriots expelled in retaliation for Italy’s position on the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In December 2023, he was appointed chief of staff of the Army Ground Task Force Command.
In August 2023, he self-published Il mondo al contrario, which was a surprise bestseller that catapulted him to popularity, also generating unusual political and media controversy in Italy, particularly due to his views on LGBT issues, immigration, relations between the sexes, and the green movement. His book was later picked up by the publishing house Il Cerchio. In March 2024, the public was treated to a follow-up, Il coraggio vince, an autobiographical book published by Editions Piemme of the Mondadori Group. Today he is running as head of the Lega Salvini Premier list for the 2024 European elections.
What led a military man, a general in the Italian army, to write a book like Il mondo al contrario?
The book was not born as such, but as a series of articles on energy, the environment, and urban planning that I started writing in the middle of the energy crisis, when we were told that we had to heat the pasta water with candles. After writing about a hundred pages, I decided to add some topics and publish it as a book—the common thread uniting all these reflections, I suppose, being paradox.
We are told that humanity must be saved. And yet humanity has never been better off on this planet. We are told that there are no identities of peoples. And yet each people is clearly distinguished by its own peculiar characteristics. We are told that the legal structure of the family must change. But the vast majority of homosexuals live as bachelors. We are told that hunting must be banned to save wildlife. Instead, there are areas where the number of wild animals outnumbers the biological density, causing great damage to agriculture and encouraging the spread of disease. We are taught that nuclear energy is dangerous. And yet statistics prove unequivocally that it is the safest form of energy production per megawatt-hour produced.
In your book you say that your friends warned you not to touch on ‘politically incorrect’ subjects, otherwise you would get into trouble. Were you aware of the storm that would ensue?
It’s absurd, but nowadays normality has become revolutionary. The book’s assertions are often trivial and have raised a stir that not even Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses unleashed. There are various ethnic groups characterised by specific somatic traits, those who do not recognise themselves as heterosexual represent a small minority of society, uncontrolled irregular immigration destabilises societies, and everyone is the child of a man and a woman. These are some of the truisms that have caused such outrage. Some cultural elites have attacked me harshly because they tend to reject the reality described in the book, and—aiming to impose a certain subjective perception of the world which they claim is ‘inclusive’—they want to undermine the principles on which Western society has been based, which have guaranteed progress, development, welfare, and wealth. Ordinary people, however, are not stupid and have perceived the deceitful tricks of these self-appointed guardians of morality, while recognising the correctness of my remarks and showing closeness and empathy towards me.
From the moment I published my first book, my life changed, and I found myself at the centre of a cyclopean controversy that I could not have foreseen. I tried not to get overwhelmed. I became a media figure, a target for many, or a reference for others. I had to expose myself to try to make the truth (and the genuine interpretation of what I had written in my book) triumph, and to unmask those who, often out of ignorance—because they had not read the book—out of bias, out of sloppiness, but also often out of bad faith, tried to make me appear homophobic, racist, xenophobic, antisemitic, Putin-loving, fascist, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The latest to try this was Mrs. Vittoria Baldino, who a couple of weeks ago, during the programme L’aria che tira, described me as an antisemite. Bear in mind that my book contains not a single word about Jews, Israel, or Zionism.
You were humiliated and maliciously attacked in the media, and even accused of a hate crime. Would you change anything you wrote?
No. I would not go back. No retraction. Nor anything to negotiate. I am sure that I have not said anything to offend anyone, nor have I offended anyone’s dignity and, as such, there is no reason to change even aesthetically what I have written and exposed. Ideas are fought on the level of arguments and not with censorship or in the courts.
In Il mondo al contrario, you say that the democracy of the majority is being replaced by the democracy of the minority. Is this the main reason for the media campaign against you? Are these attacks intended to hide the fact that, as it were, ‘the Emperor has no clothes’?
Minorities must be respected, but they cannot override the common feelings of the majorities. Democracy is the form of government in which the majority rules and minorities are respected, but conform to the majorities. The articulation of this truism has unleashed all the forces that in recent years have tried to destroy the Western way of life that has guaranteed wealth, prosperity, progress and development to our society. The cancellation culture, the woke culture, ideological environmentalism, and extremist feminism have as their ultimate goal the destruction of Western values. Thus, reaffirming the principles and ideals that bind the West together must be outlawed, banned, annihilated, repudiated, and possibly criminally prosecuted. Fortunately, the masses are not stupid, and many have instead embraced and shared the straightforward ideas that I have disseminated in my manuscript.
Despite the attacks you have suffered, Il mondo al contrario has been a great success. Do you think the media controversy has contributed to this, or is it due to simple curiosity, to the fact that many people think like you and do not dare to say so for fear of being marginalised?
If it hadn’t been for the indiscriminate attack on my book and on me, the ‘Vannacci effect’ would never have been created. The technique is simple: the thought and the person to be attacked are identified, what he said is misrepresented, his sentences are decontextualized, bookshops refuse to sell his writings, the author is described as the epitome of absolute evil, he is defined as a fascist-homophobe-misogynist-racist-xenophobe-putinist-denialist, he is banned from social networks, demonstrations are held against him and attempts are made to censor his presentations. However, when the masses realise the veracity of his expressions and agree with many of the principles outlined, all this uproar turns against the detractors and instead brings great notoriety and popularity to the falsely incriminated author.
If the world is upside down today, when was it ever straight? What is the world you would like to see?
A world in which a woman can go out anywhere day and night without fear of being assaulted and harassed; in which there is no need for bars on windows or armoured doors; in which graffiti artists, pickpockets, delinquents, squatters, and violent people are all put in a position where they can inflict no harm to society; where the right to demonstrate is respected and considered sacrosanct as long as it respects the rules of public order. I would like to see a world where everyone is free to follow their tastes and predilections without invading the spaces of others and without displaying in an exhibitionist manner their tendencies against the common sense of the majority; where the identity of peoples is recognised, exalted, and considered a founding element of society; where immigrants respect the norms of their host countries and integrate into them, accepting their customs and traditions; where in a homeland everyone—regardless of skin colour, religion, political beliefs, sexual orientation, or status—unites around the same principles and ideals and is willing even to die to defend them; where everyone is offered the same opportunities, but then each stands out on his or her own merits and abilities; where excellence is exalted and recognised; where wealth and prosperity are not considered negative, but an aspirational goal; where every idea can be expressed in freedom without fear of the crime of opinion; where diversity is recognised, exalted, and considered a wealth for society, not to be confused with discrimination which, instead, is based on the denial of rights and an attack on dignity.
Do you think we in the West still have a chance to restore common sense in political and social life?
Of course we do! We are at the end of the first half of a football match. In the dressing room, the team regroups; the coach gives the right instructions and tactics; the players concentrate and get motivated; the fans catch their breath and get ready to light up the stadium. The first half didn’t go well, but anything is possible. If we don’t like this Europe, then let’s change it!
Given the success of the book, why run for office? And what principles do you hope to defend from the European Parliament if you become an MEP?
300,000 copies sold—who would have imagined! But the satisfaction that comes from this doesn’t diminish the political commitment I have made, and I will fight with all the energy and determination that I can muster for the ideals of homeland, security, sovereignty, defence of borders, family, traditions, and identity.
I cannot stand the Europe of the banks and the directives that disowns Christmas and the crucifix, that disowns the father and the mother and wants to replace them with ‘parents 1 and 2,’ that aspires to multiculturalism without considering that it is antithetical to the concept of homeland, that erases all symbols of identity and wants to reduce us to an amorphous scrap, that wants to leave the countryside uncultivated instead of seeking biodiversity in the forests—which are only increasing in size—that wants to impose green mobility on us at exorbitant costs, which will not alter global greenhouse gas emissions one iota.
If elected, I will be a full-time MEP in Brussels and Strasbourg, while maintaining a connection with Italy. My candidacy—unlike that of others—is not cosmetic. I do not seek votes and then give up my seat for someone else to take it, and I will fight with courage and determination for the affirmation of these principles in which I firmly believe.
