Dr No the book

I am being overambitious in wanting to experience again all the 29 James Bond Films and the Harry Potter series back to back before I depart for a Christmas and New Year Break, weather permitting, although in this instance the task is not as great as Montalbano or George Smiley as I only possess two Bond Books, but which fortunately includes the first filmed, Dr No, and the sixth novel in the series.

Having recently seen and reported on the latest film Skyfall I want to begin with considering how the films have evolved if they have! While there are several changes between the book and the film, the emphasis is on the story rather than the action and the thrills in part because of the limitation of the cinema craft back in the 1962 and also studio reservations about expensive gimmicks. This is demonstrated in Dr No by a simple opening although colourful there is no explosive opening sequence before the main film commences and the technology is much flashing lights and also models and back screen projections.

At one point a tower rises from the sea in the Caribbean which contains an atomic reactor driven ray able to disrupt the path of a rocket fired by the USA and which is clearly a model. When Connery is escaping from a chasing car it is evident that scenes of him at the wheel are studio based with a moving back screen projection used for trains planes, boats and cars over several decades. There is also no presentation of toys for Bond to use with him only presented with the latest commercially produced hand gun and told to leave his familiar and trusted weapon behind. A dragon turns out to be a crude mechanical vehicle fitted with an extra large flame thrower

The film does introduce us to M and Miss Moneypenny M’s Secretary, and Bond’s skill at cards and roulette although the opening Casino scene is not in the book. The film also begins the caricature of Bond’s ability for beautiful women to offer themselves to him, a feature which if my recollection is correct Roger Moore perfected whereas in my judgement Bond is written as a character with greater depth looking for an ongoing and meaningful relationship. The films always have an end sequence with him getting the girl before the eyes of the world so to speak as officialdom seeks to retrieve him from some impossible to survive situation. Similarly this film commenced the myth of his indestructibility and ability to get out whatever form of imprisonment or close to death predicament he is placed and my memory is that all the films including the first end with a big bang or potential big bang averted as he, sometimes with support, takes on a vastly superior force of mercenaries in terms of numbers and weapons. There is no specially written number 1 hit tune performed by the leading songstress of the day.

Now to the film story and the substantial difference between book and film mainly I believe in order to create a fast moving and exciting thriller not restricted to adults but also perhaps because the book ending is flawed. I have mentioned that the films begins with Bond winning a substantial sum from woman at a Casino before being called away to see M at 3 am in the morning. He flirts with the woman and agrees to compete again in a round of golf before learning that he has to immediately travel away which handicaps his opportunity when he finds that she got into his home and is practicing carpet golf wearing one of his shirts. They have time to have sex off screen before his 10 hour flight Jamaica. She has no role in the main story or is seen again. In the sixties such scenes were considered exciting and revolutionary.

The film is story of Dr No, product of a relationship between a Chinese and Western couple who after making $10 million as part of a Chinese Triad he takes the loot which he uses to becomes a lead member of SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counter Intelligence Terrorism Revenge and Extortion).

In the book he became a member of a Chinese Tong in the USA and written at the height of the Cold War Dr No he has done a deal with the Russians who help finance his lifestyle on the island purchased in 1943 from the British with his ill gotten gains. In book and film his sideline is disrupting the launch, direction and location of rockets launched by the USA although in the book the CIA and USA marines have no role as developed in the film.

In both as in the majority if not all Bond films, the chief villain is a ruthless maniac who has built at enormous cost a secret hideaway, strongly fortified with a huge number of expendable mercenaries and high tech weaponry but where his private quarters are luxurious, displaying his wealth with stolen works of art, commanding a superior chef and a cellar of the finest wines.

Whereas in the book the Russians fund and support with their technology in order to undermine the military capabilities of their enemy, the film skates over how the SPECTRE action will help their conquest of the world.

In the Film the reason why Bond has to suddenly leave the private casino is because the agent stationed in Jamaica has failed to make his daily radio call and the channel had remained open although unanswered after his secretary assistant had began the connection to the British mainland Security Communications centre. Soon after arriving in Jamaica Bond visits the residence of the agent when the Police Commissioner shows him the dried blood identified as that of the female assistant. In the book the agent and the assistant disappeared three weeks before with the residence burned to the ground and the view of the Island’s Governor is that the couple ran off together with whatever funds were to hand. In the film we know the agent was gunned down by three Chinese Jamaicans posing as blind men while the tune Three Blind Mice is played in the background after he left the club where he played cards with a small group of men including the local analyst who quickly is rightly identified as the suspect, although again he has no role in the book. In the film Bonds finds a receipt for the analysis of rocks taken from Dr No’s island which the man later denies had any value or significance and which he had thrown away. Bond on the ball had guessed correctly and arranged for a radiation detection device to be sent from London which when applied to the place on a boat where the rocks had been reveals significant continuing radiation. Having gone to island against orders to inform Dr No of the development, he is told to take a caged Tarantula back with him and later there is a great scene where Bond narrowly escapes death from the creature, although in the book we never know who directly placed the creature or delivered, allegedly from the governor a bowl of fruit where Bond spots the syringe marks which when analysed reveal lethal quantities of cyanide.

In the film the governor is alleged to have sent Bond a car whereas in the book given his anonymity as an Import and Export agent there is understandably no official link and he is met by Quarrel, a local fisherman and boat owner who he had contacted before setting off on the journey having used the man on his previous visit to the Island five years before. In the film he makes a phone call to establish the car and its chauffer are fakes and when he confronts the driver after giving the slip to a following vehicle, the man commits suicide with a cyanide filled cigarette. There is a fight when he contacts Quarrel after someone advises that the man will take visitors to the outlying islands.

Quarrel is suspicious of the stranger and Bond is prevented from seriously harming the man by the CIA contact that had needed the help of the killed agent because Jamaica was then a British Colony and Dr No’s island a former British possession over which the CIA had no jurisdiction. In the film the CIA man ferries them and a canoe to the outer waters of the Island and then arrives with USA marines at the end of the film to rescue Bond.

In both there is an attractive Chinese Jamaican who attempts to take a photo when he arrives off the plane and again when he is eating and drink with Quarrel at a restaurant bar. She is rightly identified as an agent of Dr No whose hold over her is such that she is prepared to withstand pain for him. However there is significant difference between film and book over another Chinese Jamaican. In the film she is secretary to the Governor and Bond correctly suspects she is the informant who has given away his arrival plan as well as being involved in the death of his predecessor and assistant. In the book she is secretary to the representative of the Colonial office who he notes had been examining files about the Island and its owner which had then disappeared and while she is identified as another agent of Dr No she also plays no further part in the book while in the film she invites Bond to her isolated home and first Bond is attacked by men in a car which crashes into a burning inferno, then after having sex with the woman who has been ordered to keep Bond busy for a couple of Hours, he arranged for her to be arrested and taken away while he waits for the arrival of the next assassin, who turns out be the analyst who Bond takes great delight in killing after they fight.

The film and the book are in two parts with the second concerned with the island of Dr No and what goes on there and it is with this second part that the differences become fundamental although there are several similarities which as I have previously mentioned include the luxury hideaway. In the film the original business of the island is a front for the creation of an atomic powered reactor to fuel the ray which is able to disrupt American rocket launches.

In the book the business of the island remain a crucial part of the story and while the technical disruption of the rockets is stated as a purpose this plays no further part in the story. In the film Bond’s capture coincides with a rocket launch and is why he is sent to island so quickly after the death of the former agent. Bond is able to prevent the intervention by setting the reactor to explode which it does destroying the island in a spectacular finale after Dr No dies in the reactor cooling system. My main criticism of this ending is that amazingly there appears to be no long term consequence from the radiation on Bond and his rescuers. The is a dangerously politically motivated device used by the film, no doubt on behalf of the then embryonic nuclear energy industry to suggest that it was and is possible to immediately decontaminate people from a major exposure when Bond and the female lead enter contaminated land although how the land came to be so affected is not explained and this in turn brings me to most important difference between the book and the film, the role, the personality and the back story of the female lead.

In the film she is played by Ursula Andress as a beautiful woman in face and body while in book important difference is that she has a broken nose. Another female actor is a voice over as Ursula did not speak fluent English at the time and a second actor sings a song for her. In a travesty of the plot the film makers wanted a super look Bond girl of the type glorified in Baywatch and since its creation by female announcers on Fox News. It is woman as a sexual object par excellence although the film also does attempt to portray the character as a violated virgin who lives a solitary life since the death feather bird studying father on the island sometime before.

Bond discovers the girl when he wakes first thing after arriving on the island in the cover of darkness the night before as she comes also is a canoe from the main island to collect large sculptured sea shells which sells in Miami at $50 a time. In the book she comes for a small closed coloured shell favoured by collectors which she gets for $5 and which she is saving to go to the States to get a nose job which occurred when she was raped by a worker on the plantation where her family had been one of the oldest and wealthiest on the island. She still lives in the decaying family home because the decline in the business and was cared for a servant friend since childhood when she became an orphan. Every year when the plantation was cleared the creatures who inhabited some furry and some dangerous had taken to the house cellars until the clearance ended and they could go back to their life in open. Because she had her carers had taken refuge in the cellars she had learned to lived with and become friends with the creatures and because she walked about with snakes cuddling her body she had established the reputation of having dark powers and which in turn had added to her isolation. This ability is to prove crucial to her survival in the book although is also where the book has a major flaw.

In the book she comes out of the water naked except for a swimming belt omitted in the film to enable a teenage audience to attend the film and there is a well described tender love scene as well as other moments of nakedness in the book which the film skates over or avoids. In both she does describes giving the man who raped and injured her nose a low painful death over a week through a tarantula bite. In film she fires at Bond a series of questions in the form of little known information which is explained in the book that her education consisted of working through an encyclopaedia from A through to a letter towards the end of the alphabet, but not the end. In fairness the film does manage to communicate aspects of the naive, trusting, young girl personality of the book, although this is more to do with the voice over and script and my view Andress is miscast and sets the trend of using actresses as sex object par excellent in the part of the main female lead.

In the book the main business of the island is the production of fertilizer from bird droppings although the trade has its ups and down with the development of artificial manure by the Germans after the War. However it is another bird, flamingo like, which has led to the interest of the authorities in the Island. Representatives of a society concerned with the welfare and protection of these birds with rights carried over from the sale of the island to Dr No had visited and told him of their intention to open a hotel and associated facilities including an air strip in the area of the reserve in order to bring visitors to view the colony. They had never left the island and the dragon fire giving machine was developed not just to scare off other visitors but also to destroy and frighten off these particular birds.

In the book Dr No dies under a mountain of birth droppings spilt over him from a crane controlled by Bond and not in reactor core cooling fluid.

As in the book Bond and the 20 year old girl surrender to the men driving the dragon armoured vehicle after they have survived being machine gunned from a patrol boat, and being chased by pack of hounds by staying under water using cut reeds to breathe but give up when Quarrel is burnt to death by the advancing weapon. They are first cared for by Chinese Women who operate clinic built inside the mountain rock as front should officialdom come to investigate the island, under which are the quarters of Dr No and the atomic reactor and rocket disrupting technology.

In the book Dr No explains his purpose and his background in a forty five minute chat before dinner at nine after the couple have been drugged and spend the day sleeping. During this time he had inspected the naked bodies of the girl and Bond. He then makes it clear that Bond and the girl are not to leave the island. For Bond he has devised an assault course which Bond survives and where the book describes his effort in details as well as various painful injuries he sustains.

For the girl he explains that once a year, fortunately coinciding with her arrival, there is the march of crabs from one side of the island to the other side and this phenomenon does exist in nature and hence the name Crab Island!

Because he is a sadist and a scientist he enjoys observing human pain admitting he admired the work of the Nazi doctors and experimenters claiming they made significant contributions to science and human progress. He had staked a black Jamaican girl naked in the pathway of the migrating creatures and observed how long she had survived which was short. Now he would take the opportunity of comparing her survival that of a white woman. In the film the young woman is given over to the guards for their pleasure and Bond does find her staked but in an area where will drown, a change I believe in part designed to protect the lower rating of the film to maximise the International audience.

I immediately made the connection between her experiences on the plantation and this planned death and I was not wrong for she explains to Bond that the creatures did not like meat and would only attack a human or other animal carcass if there was an open wound. She had lain there while they walked over and around her until they departed with the dawn and than she had freed herself from the stakes making her way to kill Dr No and where she had encountered Bond.

It is this aspect where the story in the book is flawed and which may explain why it was varied in the film. The man would have ensured that he had opportunity watch both trials and deaths as they happened in person and there was no need for them to occur at the same time or for his attention to be diverted by the arrival of a ship to bring supplies and take away the fertilizer and even then he could have arranged for the tests to be filmed and monitored by his guards so he could study and enjoy later. He would have added to Bond‘s horror and pain by making him watch the death of girl and in any event he would know the behaviour of the creatures and would have therefore given the girl an open wound to ensure she was attacked and eaten to death. This I suspect is the main reason for change in ending.

The book does not end with Bond having sex with the girl in the bottom of a boat which enables them to leave the island as it explodes and then releasing the tow rope attached by the rescue team of the CIA contact and American marines, Bond has to go to hospital, then needs to recuperate from his wounds and is cared for by the girl at her estate house which she fills with silverware which has been locked away unused and which again could have been sold to get her the nose job. Bond does arrange for the young woman to go to New York for the operation and for his contact and new friend from the Colonial Office and his wife to care for her when she first returns home while Bonds continues his adventures elsewhere.

In the book the Governor is portrayed as a reactionary figure, a portrait which I believe has some factual basis but while his inclination is for a complete cover up Bond persuades that by seeking anonymity himself the governor will be able to claim credit for aspects of the truth.

I enjoyed the film and the book any may obtain a few of the other books just to see if the book character has greater depth than portrayed by the original Bonds, something which the latter two Bonds have managed to achieve on screen.

Andrea Camillieri The Snack Thief part three and Italian Law Enforcement

One of the problems preventing full appreciation of Romanzo Criminale or the books and TV series about Montalbano is my lack of knowledge about the Italian police and criminal justice system and after reading up on Wikipedia I am only a little wiser. I was prompted to begin the study because mention was made that when Salvo runs out of petrol, in the Snack Thief, the third book in series by Andrea Camillieri, and the first to be shown as a 90 min TV film here in the UK, he has to be rescued by the Carabinieri, the Arma dei Carabinieri, to give their correct title and he pretends differently rather than admit he needed them. Why was this? I was also concerned by the different levels of superiors to which he was answerable, including any political involvement although I have decided to leave this aspect. The information is set out below*

 

It will be remembered that I ended part two of my writing about The Snack Thief as Montalbano was about to talk to a Secret Service officer an elf like Colonel with a video camera hidden and on. Salvo apart from the mobile phone admits ignorance of all things digital especially the computer, although at a time historically when the use as a communication and information tool by the majority of citizens was still to occur and to think that when I commenced as a salesman of office machines they were manual and one office in the still used the manual calculus. The book is written for a time before the use of phones as cameras, for Internet communication and the development of digital film and photography in general

Salvo does not reveal what his intentions are beforehand. I had thought when having returned to the restaurant where he had enjoyed a full lunch he had stayed to eat the red mullet that he had questioned the cook. What in fact he did was to purchase a couple of the fish and then prepare them as the Chef had instructed, eating in silence as is his standard and drinking wine without offering any to his visitor.

It was only when the Inspector was enjoying a coffee did the man from Rome speak and Salvo delayed him further by taking the empty cup to the sink. The Colonel said he wanted to be above board but before the man’s mission is disclosed Salvo goes back into the kitchen and brings back a large slice of Cassata but asked his visitor to continue as he wanted the ice cream to thaw before eating.

The first point the Colonel made is that they had nothing to do with the death of Aisha which he said was an accident and if they had wanted to eliminate her it would have been done straight away. The man then enquired if Salvo knew the writings of Mussolini particularly in his last writings where he said that one had to treat people as donkeys with sticks and carrots. Salvo commented that his grand father, a peasant, had said the same thing. The Secret Service man said he understood that the faxes, the interrogation with the Captain and the Prefect’s Cabinet chief had been Montalbano’s sticks while the decision not to involve the authorities in the death of Lapécora by placing all blame on the man‘s wife was the carrot. They were not unappreciative about this decision but assumed he had some purpose, a price.

While he appeared calm Montalbano guessed his guest was worked up inside about what had happened and when asking for water, Salvo made the man go into the kitchen and get what he wanted himself. Returning the Colonel explained that two years before the opposite numbers in Tunisia had asked for cooperation in neutralizing Moussa. Salvo made the officer say out loud the name of the man for the camera and now he ensured that the man also said on the record that neutralizing meant killing. After consulting the government they told the Tunisians no, but there was a development (unstated) which led them to approach the Tunisian for help and as a consequence they had become morally indebted. Montalbano intervened that whatever it was it was not moral.

The Tunisian authorities had discovered that the Terrorists favourite sister, Karima lived in Sicily and had a large circle of acquaintances. Salvo again intervened to replace ‘large circle’ with ‘select.’ Ahmed’s right hand man Fahrid, unknown to his boss was being used by the Tunisian secret service, and suggested they should use Karima and her boss Lapécora. They communicated using the imaginary business company based in Tunis. It had been news to the service that Lapécora had written letters to his wife informing on himself as mentioned by Salvo at the press conference. Salvo explained that the man had become suspicious about what the shell company was about.

Salvo asked about the blond man who had showed up from time to time to visit Fahrid and Karima and this was admitted to be the link with the Italian Secret Service. The bait was a major supply of weapons and a meeting which had to take place just offshore. Moussa had not only accepted the bait but lit the cigarette at the meeting place which identified him so they were able to kill him and no one else. It was at this point that the Captain panicked because he had not been told his passenger was to be killed; Instead of returning to his home port he had made his way into Vigáta, having thrown the man’s papers overboard and divided the 70 million in his possession among the crew.

Salvo asked if the Captain had been right to fear that they would also be neutralised. The secret service man protests that such as massacre would have been without purpose. The man said this was all he had come to say.

Montalbano decided to finish the story for him saying that Fahrid had then gone to finish off Lapécora using Karima as Montalbano had worked out earlier but he arrived to find the man already dead and thought perhaps the Italian service had acted and uncertain what was happening he panicked. He had met up with Karima and told her the brother was killed and he murders her to ensure no one remained who could reveal the true story. The Colonel congratulated Salvo on the way he worked out things and commented that it was 2 am as if seeking closure. Montalbano made a move in telephoning Fazio pretending they had a prearranged visit in such a way that his assistant knew it was urgent that he came quickly using an official squad card. He would arrive in twenty minutes.

Salvo had set the limit of their talk and the Colonel came straight to the point wanting to know what Salvo wanted. His price which Montalbano said was cheap. First the body of Karima had to be identified. He did not to disclose that the body was needed so a trust could be formed for the money she had saved to go to the boy when he became a young man. Secondly he wanted a block on the promotion which his boss had said he had to accept and that he would be moved anyway if he did not accept. The Colonel was adamant they could not help would not help with the production of the body. It is then Salvo played his card about recording their conversation on camera tape. The man told Salvo he was making a mistake and went for his phone to ring for help. Salvo smashes the man, his glasses and his phone. Fazio arrives and is told to wait in his car and to be careful. Before he left, although a teetotaller Salvo made the man drink whisky.

He called Fazio back in later to find the visitor drunk and singing having vomited over himself. Fazio was told that on arriving home his boss had found this man drunk in his car and without papers and had brought him in to sober him up. Fazio would drive the man in his car to the station and put him a cell for the rest of the night. Salvo would follow in squad car. When Fazio brought Salvo back to his home they burnt the man’s documents and placed them in a hole made in the garden and in a separate hole the smashed spectacles and mobile phone. After this he attempted to play the Cassette tape of the admission made by the colonel. It was blank. He had pressed the wrong button.

Salvos response was to get undressed and go for a cold water middle of night swim, returning to bed tired and wet. His next reported action the following day was not to visit his dying father but to go away, staying at a Trattoria to eat well, relax and think on his own. He is pleased when asked to share a table with someone of my age the man makes the point that he too likes to savour the food without conversation.

He describes the pasta with crab graceful as a ballerina and the stuffed bass with saffron leaving them breathless. I enjoyed some porridge this morning and for lunch two scrambled eggs with a little pepper and shrimps on one thick slice off white toasted bread. And this evening a chicken breast from the roasted whole chicken, bland as was the already prepared mashed potato covered with beans and tomato sauce from yesterday’s lunch with a battered white fish.

The two men agree that their cook is a genius and not surprised that the owner of a famous Parisian restaurant had tried to prize him away. His companion came for two weeks at a time to enjoy the food and was doubly delighted not just to find someone with a similar appreciation but who also played the game of Chess. I stuffed up again on reach 41 games then with my run of over 200 games of Free Cell. The man was a Professor of Philosophy who as with everyone else knew who Montalbano was from his TV appearances but pretended they did not know as he must have some reason for being there privately.

It was the following day that he was contacted by Valente his friend from Mazára who had been trying to contact him to express delight at getting his long sought transfer, another part of his deal with the Colonel. He was moving to the area of his wife’s family. Salvo reminded him that he had said something good would come from the affair.

His boss also contact to say he was upset, felt offended, because his request that Salvo should be promoted had been blocked for no reason which meant Salvo would be staying in his present position. Salvo confessed he was not just happy but doubly happy, He did not explain that this was because he felt the authorities were moving in the direction he had requested as the price for his silence about what had gone on.

The following morning he went fishing at the invitation of the Professor and found himself talking about his father and his imminent death. He admitted he could face going to hospital to see him. The Professor mentioned that he had followed Salvo‘s involvement in the case of the Terracotta Dog, an earlier book although I have seen the TV show and therefore appreciated the context in which the Professor now argued that he had noted that Salvo had abandoned his involvement in an important current case to solve one fifty years old. He suggested that this was Salvo’s way of coping with a challenging and stressful job. He cannot cope with every day reality at times hence the decision to escape to this retreat with good food and as it transpired good company. The Professor then looks the Inspector straight in the eye and asks “When will you decide to grow up” To which I would have quoted back T S Elliot, human being cannot cope with too much reality, and this is not to a sign of immaturity, the opposite is to recognise human limitation.

For lunch the Professor expressed his horror and amazement at what appeared to be meatballs. Salvo reacted differently making sure he savoured the mixture of fish, onion, hot pepper, whisked egg, salt, pepper breadcrumbs cumin and coriander. And so this bliss continued for a total of five days.

When he got back home he found that there was no meal prepared for as the note from the housekeeper explained he had not said when he was coming back so she had prepared meals each of which had been eaten so she was not prepared to do anymore until he returned. He therefore had to make do with a few olives, wine from his father’s vineyard and bread. This bring back the memory of one of the great days when I was alone at a hired villa in the South of France with its own private pool which was not overlooked. I had swam naked at regular intervals throughout the day, enjoying freshly baked crusty bread, olive, salami, pate and wine when ever I fancied throughout the day until required to go to the local railway station in late afternoon. I had taken decisions which were to affect the rest of my life in several profound ways and apart from my body in the water and the sounds of the insects there was silence occasionally broken by distant noises from the valley below. I would be back there writing this if circumstances had been different.

After finishing what was available to eat he switched on the local news for the announcement that the body of Karima Moussa had been found in a decomposed condition. She had been strangled and thrown into a deep well with her belongings. The investigating Inspector suggested she could have been killed by her pimp although here were many questions still to be answered. Salvo could not contain his excitement but soon fell into the sleep of the just, long and deep, in the chair where he was sitting.

The following day he had dinner with his boss and told him the full story. The man was disappointed to have been left out so close to his retirement.

Salvo then wrote a very letter to Livia in which he asks her marry and for them to bring up the child Françoise.

He then receives the news he had been dreading that his father’s life was coming to an end and that he should visit without delay. When he arrives at the clinic a doctor explains that his father had died two hours before. Salvo said ‘Thank you.’ The doctor did not understand this was meant for his father.

　

* The Italian Police

There are five national police forces and two local

The Carabinieri have two functions in that they serve as police to military, that is the separate army, navy and Air forces whereas here in the UK and the USA, the services have their own police divisions. In Italy the military police are independent of the armed forced which I regard as a very good thing. The other role is described as military units akin to the Gendarmerie which begs the question of what is a Gendarmerie.

Over thirty countries have this armed military controlled force and in France, the gendarmerie has crowd and riot control units (the

Gendarmerie Mobile, along with some corresponding units in the civilian police), counter-terrorism and hostage rescue (GIGN, again along with some corresponding units in the civilian police), maritime surveillance, police at sea and coast guard (Gendarmerie maritime), control and security at airports and air traffic police (Gendarmerie des transports aériens), official buildings guard, honorary services and protection of the President (Garde Républicaine), mountain rescue (Peloton de Gendarmerie de Haute Montagne) and security of nuclear weapons sites. This still begs the question about their role in Italy. Wikipedia states

“Special Tasks Departments are outside the ordinary organisational framework and are used for special missions:

Corazzieri (Cuirassiers) are an elite corps and honour guard of the President of the Italian Republic, located in the Quirinal Palace. They are distinguished by their uniforms and height (the minimum height for admission is 190 cm, or 6 feet 3 inches). They have almost no other everyday duties, although they may be seen patrolling occasionally. Other departments are in service to constitutional bodies such as the Presidency of the Republic, the Senate, Parliament, the Judiciary, the Prime Minister and the National Council of Economy and Labour. Carabinieri also perform military police and security duties for the Ministry of Defence, military high commands, the offices of the military judiciary and allied military organisations in Italy and abroad. They also have personnel attached to the Department of Public Security in various departments, as well as anti-Mafia and anti-drug investigative task forces. Carabinieri officers are charged with surveillance and security at Italian embassies and consulates abroad, performing the same services entrusted to the United States Marine Corps in US diplomatic and consular offices. Together with the Polizia di Stato and the Guardia di Finanza, the Carabinieri is also responsible for border control.”Because they are military trained and employed they have been used in Italian Peace and other International Missions including in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Iraq.

The second National Force is the Guardia di Finanza which Wikipedia states

is a corps of the

Italian Army under the authority of the Minister of Economy and Finance, with a role as police force. The Corps is in charge of financial, economic, judiciary and public safety: tax evasion, financial crimes, smuggling, money laundering, international illegal drug trafficking, illegal immigration, customs and borders checks, copyright violations, anti-Mafia operations, credit card fraud, cybercrime, counterfeiting, terrorist financing, maintaining public order, and safety, political and military defence of the Italian borders

The

Guardia di Finanza has around 68,000 militaries among agents, NCOs and officers. Its agents are in service in the Europol and the European Anti-Fraud Office. Its Latin motto since 1933 is Nec recisa recedit (English: Not Even Broken Retreats). The Guardia di Finanza also maintains over 600 boats and ships and more than 100 aircraft to fulfil its mission of patrolling Italy's territorial waters.”

“The Polizia di Stato (State Police) is the civil national

police of Italy. Along with patrolling, investigative and law enforcement duties, it patrols the Autostrada (Italy's Express Highway network), and oversees the security of railways, bridges and waterways. It is a civilian police force, while the Carabinieri are military. While its internal organization and mindset is somewhat military, its personnel is composed of civilians. Its headquarters are in Rome, and there are Regional and Provincial divisions throughout Italian territory. A program Polizia di Quartiere has been implemented which increases police presence and deter crime. Pairs of poliziotti (policemen) or carabinieri patrol areas of major cities on foot. Its critics contend that these efforts are ineffective, as the areas with the greatest concentration of crime are being neglected.”

“The Polizia Penitenziaria (Prison Guards, literally Penitentiary Police) operate the Italian prison system and handle the transportation of inmates. The training academy for the Polizia Penitenziaria is located in

Aversa.”

“The Corpo Forestale dello Stato (National Forestry Department) is responsible for law enforcement in Italian national parks and forests. Their duties include enforcing poaching laws, safeguarding protected animal species and preventing forest fires. Founded in 1822, the Corpo Forestale dello Stato is a civilian police force specialised on the environmental protection. A recent law reform expanded its duties to food controls. In Italy it has the responsibility to manage the activities related to the CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species)”

If you understand the above and are convinced that everyone works together and there is no duplication, then you will be confident about the two other forces which are controlled at local level.

The “Polizia provinciale

are small police organisations and their main duties are to enforce regional and national hunting and fishing laws but have also expanded into environmental protection. The forces' vehicles are usually white with a green or blue stripe along the side. As they are not considered national Police organizations, armaments (when allowed) is left to the initiative of the individual officers, and as such most of polizia provinciale members have to rely on firearms normally sold on the civilian market; seen the normal duties of such organizations, most of the firearms used by their members are hunting rifles or shotguns. However, when on-duty, the provincial police officers can be issued with some kind of equipment normally not available to civilians, such as

generation-3 and above night-vision devices, used especially in anti-poaching operations.

The polizia municipale are the

municipal police of Italy responsible to the mayors of the various municipalities of Italy. Traffic control is their main function in addition to enforcing statal, regional and local laws regarding commerce, legal residence, pets and other administrative duties. They also have all other police duties, with the exception of public safety, because this is an exclusive duty of the Polizia di Stato and Polizia Municipale has just an auxiliary function.

The Italian polizia municipale (PM) forces have 60,000 employees, Rome having the largest at several thousand. PM uniforms and vehicles have many different liveries depending on regional laws and local tastes and traditions.

Some municipal police, including those of Rome, are known as the vigili urbani (urban watch), and thus derive their name from the

vigiles of ancient Rome. In other regions of Italy, these forces are also called polizia comunale, polizia urbana, and polizia locale. In the autonomous province of Bolzano/Bozen, where German is an official language, the municipal police is also called Stadtpolizei or Gemeindepolizei. Municipal police vehicles in this region have both Italian and German names on them.

In the autonomous region of

Aosta Valley, where French is an official language, the municipal police is also called police municipale. Municipal police vehicles in this region have both Italian and French names on them.

Municipal police officers are still referred to as vigili (singular: vigile, meaning watchful, alert) but the official name is agente di polizia locale (APL), meaning 'local police officer'. In some regions, especially while regulating traffic, they wear white

custodian helmets similar to the black helmets worn by British police officers”

I will try and find out about the Italian Secret Service and the political system at local level in relation to other Montalbano Books as well as writing about Sicily.