Kidnapping of Aldo Moro (1978): Italy's Years of Lead

The kidnapping of Aldo Moro was the abduction and murder of Italy’s most senior Christian Democrat politician by the far-left Red Brigades in 1978. On 16 March gunmen ambushed his car in Rome and killed his five bodyguards; after 55 days in captivity Moro was shot, and his body was left in a car in the city centre on 9 May. The “Moro affair” became the defining trauma of Italy’s Years of Lead.

Background: the Years of Lead

From the late 1960s Italy suffered a wave of political violence known as the Years of Lead (anni di piombo). Neo-fascist bombings, such as the Piazza Fontana attack in Milan in December 1969, coincided with the rise of far-left armed groups. The Red Brigades, founded in 1970, moved from sabotage and kidnappings of managers to the shooting of judges, police officers and journalists.

Aldo Moro, born in 1916, had been prime minister in 1963–68 and again in 1974–76, and as Italian prime minister had signed the Helsinki Final Act in 1975. As president of the Christian Democrats he was the architect of a “historic compromise” with the Italian Communist Party, the largest in the West. On the morning of 16 March 1978 a new government under Giulio Andreotti was due to win a confidence vote with Communist support for the first time since 1947.

The ambush in Via Fani

At about 9 a.m. on 16 March 1978 Moro’s car and escort were blocked at the junction of Via Mario Fani and Via Stresa in north-west Rome. A group of Red Brigades members, several dressed in airline staff uniforms, opened fire within seconds. Four bodyguards died at the scene and a fifth, Francesco Zizzi, died in hospital.

The five men were Oreste Leonardi, Domenico Ricci, Raffaele Iozzino, Giulio Rivera and Francesco Zizzi. Moro was unhurt and was driven away. The same day parliament gave Andreotti’s government its confidence vote amid national shock.

Fifty-five days

Moro was held in a hidden room in an apartment on Via Camillo Montalcini. The Red Brigades issued nine communiqués announcing a “people’s trial” and later demanding the release of 13 imprisoned militants in exchange for him. Moro wrote dozens of letters to his family, party colleagues and Pope Paul VI, urging negotiation and criticising his own party’s refusal.

The Christian Democrats and Communists held to a “line of firmness”: no negotiations with terrorists. The Socialist leader Bettino Craxi argued for a humanitarian solution. On 18 April a false communiqué claimed that Moro’s body lay in the frozen Lake Duchessa; on the same day police found a Red Brigades hideout in Via Gradoli. On 22 April Paul VI published an appeal to the “men of the Red Brigades” to free Moro without conditions.

Interior minister Francesco Cossiga’s police carried out tens of thousands of searches and roadblocks, but failed to find the prison. Later inquiries criticised serious failures, and the affair has given rise to many unproven theories about outside involvement.

The murder

On the morning of 9 May 1978 Moro was shot in a garage. His body was placed in the boot of a red Renault 4 left in Via Michelangelo Caetani, near the headquarters of both the Christian Democrats and the Communist Party. Mario Moretti later admitted firing the shots, and another member, Germano Maccari, was later convicted of taking part in it.

Moro’s family refused a state funeral and held a private service. A state memorial Mass was celebrated by Paul VI at the Basilica of St John Lateran on 13 May, without the family. Cossiga resigned as interior minister.

Aftermath

Most of the kidnappers were eventually caught, and several trials in the 1980s and 1990s handed down life sentences. The Red Brigades continued their attacks for some years, but tougher laws, special anti-terrorism units under General Carlo Alberto dalla Chiesa and laws rewarding “repentant” members broke the group in the early 1980s.

The historic compromise did not survive Moro; the Communists returned to opposition in 1979. Italian parliamentary commissions examined the case repeatedly, the latest reporting in 2017–2018. The affair remains a lasting reference point in Italian politics and culture, notably in Leonardo Sciascia’s essay The Moro Affair (1978) and in several films.

Timeline

• 1978, 16 March: Ambush in Via Fani; five bodyguards killed and Moro kidnapped.
• 1978, 18 March: First Red Brigades communiqué, with a photograph of Moro.
• 1978, 18 April: False communiqué about Lake Duchessa; Via Gradoli hideout discovered.
• 1978, 22 April: Pope Paul VI appeals for Moro’s release.
• 1978, 9 May: Moro’s body found in Via Caetani, Rome.
• 1978, 13 May: State memorial Mass at St John Lateran.

Why it matters

The Moro kidnapping was the most serious terrorist attack on the Italian Republic. It ended the experiment of bringing the Communists close to government, exposed weaknesses in the state and marked both the peak and the beginning of the decline of left-wing terrorism in Italy, a story that shaped European responses to political violence alongside events such as the Munich massacre.