When George VI became King in 1937 his Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain sponsored a secret backchannel to Mussolini via Italian Maltese Adrian Dingli, and the relationship with Mussolini was key to the four power pact at Munich in 1938. In January 1939 Chamberlain visited Rome to see Mussolini in person and in 1940 when US envoy Sumner Welles visited 10 Downing Street he found Neville Chamberlain had a signed photograph of Mussolini on his mantlepiece.
George VI's connections with Italian Royalty and Fascist Italy predate all of this when in 1923 King George V visited Rome, King Victor Emmanuel III visited England in 1924 and interestingly King George V seemed unalarmed to have a British Fascist guard on honour for his train.
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