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The Volunteer Army of Freedom (CVL, Corpo Volontari della Libertà) was the first general coordinating structure of the Italian resistance during the Second World War, recognized officially both by the Allies and the second government of Pietro Badoglio.

History
Beginning in September 1943, irregular partisan formations began to work to topple the fascists who had allied with Italy’s Nazi occupiers and had created the Italian Social Republic in northern Italy. Various partisan forces organized into a united group in order to present a common political and military front. The Volunteer Army of Freedom (CVL) was founded in Milan on June 9, 1944 (with its formal declaration not coming until June 19).

On September 7, 1944, delegates of the Committee of National Liberation (CLN) signed an agreement with the Allies, referred to as the “Protocols of Rome,” which spelled out Allied recognition of the new unified organization of partisan groups. The agreement definitively transformed the partisan forces into an armed unit under a supreme military command headed by Rafaele Cadorna, a general in the regular Italian army, with deputy commanders Ferrucio Parri (Partito d’azione) and Luigi Longo (Italian Communist Party), Giovanni Battista Stucchi, and for a brief period Guido Mosna and Sandro Pertini (Italian Socialist Party), Enrico Mattei (Christian Democratic Party) and Mario Argenton (Liberal Party and independent formations).

The CVL carried out the role that had led to its establishment, in other words the organizing under a unified command of antifascist combat forces active in northern Italy.

As stated in the agreements with the Allies, after the surrender of Nazi forces in Italy, the CVL turned in its weapons, dissolving as an armed entity and ceding all powers to the Allied authorities and the Italian government.

According to Italian Law 258 of March 21, 1958, the CVL was legally recognized under law as a regular unit of the Italian armed forces.