We have to admit that faith is a very powerful force. People will believe in various religions, believe in the mysterious power of the underworld, in order to find solace or strength; People will also believe in their country and nation, and are willing to fight for it all their lives.
To some extent, the pope also represents such a faith, especially in Europe, where the pope can be said to have a huge influence. It is precisely because of this that Churchill talked to Stalin about the "position of the pope" in World War II, when Stalin uttered the famous phrase that is still used as a meme: How many divisions does the Pope have?
Perhaps it was not until later that Stalin really understood that the Pope might not even have half a division, but he also possessed a formidable power.
Pope how many divisions does he have?
World War II was a human catastrophe, and no matter which battlefield it was, the Allies paid a huge price to finally achieve victory. However, in World War II, in addition to the comparison of military powers, Western countries also paid great attention to one figure, that is, the Pope.
For example, Hitler paid a lot of attention to maintaining relations with the pope, after all, the pope could influence the policy of the German Catholic party, and even Hitler had to pay attention.
Therefore, when British Prime Minister Winston Churchill visited Moscow in October 1944, he also specifically mentioned the position and inclination of the Pope.
At that time, Churchill and Stalin discussed Poland, and Churchill told Stalin that Britain had entered the war for Poland's "independence and freedom", but that Poland was a Catholic country, so they would not allow developments in Poland to "complicate" their relations with the Vatican.
To put it simply, Churchill was worried about the position of the Vatican pope, he believed that the pope had a tendency to "lean" towards the Nazis, so he feared that "opposition" with the Vatican would affect Britain's own interests.
What Churchill wanted to do was to "win" the Pope from the Nazis.
But Stalin was completely unimpressed, he interrupted Churchill impatiently, and asked the famous saying that has survived to this day: Pope, how many divisions does he have?
Stalin would have asked this for two reasons. On the one hand, communists were atheists, for whom the pope could be said to be "insignificant", and most of the Soviet Union believed in the Orthodox Church, and they did not have any "worship" or "faith" to the Vatican pope.
The position of the pope had nothing to do with the situation in the Soviet Union, so Stalin did not care what kind of inclination or position the pope held.
On the other hand, Stalin only recognized strength in his negotiations, and he believed that it was natural to profit from it. Simply and crudely, if the strength of the Pope was enough to defeat the USSR, then Stalin, of course, would have taken into account the opinion of the Vatican.
In fact, in the memoirs of former Albanian leader Enver Hoxha "With Stalin", Stalin's views on the Pope are specifically mentioned.
The book writes that both Roosevelt and Churchill talked to Stalin about the pope, and they asked Stalin to stop fighting the pope, and asked Stalin why he attacked the pope and did not make the pope their ally.
At that time, Stalin replied that the anti-fascist coalition was to destroy the alliance of fascism and Nazism, and that this anti-fascist war was waged by soldiers, tanks, aircraft, artillery, and that since the pope had no army and weapons, it was "meaningless" to ally with the pope, because they did not need "empty allies."
Because of Stalin's firm stance, the United States and Britain no longer discussed with Stalin issues related to the Pope and the Vatican. Still, does the Pope really have no army and weapons? It is not true that at least the Pope was "broad".
There was also a pope of his own armed forces
Perhaps many people do not know that before the Vatican, there was a papal state that existed for more than 1,100 years, and at that time, the pope also had a large territory and its own armed forces.
In 751, Pope Stephen II offered his courtesy to Pepin, the leader of the Franks, not only approving Pepin to proclaim himself king, but also making him a Roman nobleman.
In return for Stephen II, Pepin led his army into Italy in 754 AD, not only pacifying a large part of Italy, but also handing over a large territory around Rome, Italy, to the Pope.
As a result, the Papal States were officially established in 756 AD, and all military and political power in the papal country belonged to the pope, and it can be said that the power of the pope is very enormous.
The area of the Papal States at that time included the former Byzantine viceroyalty of Ravenna, part of the Duchy of Benevento, and several cities such as Tuscany and Corsica.
Later, the Holy See also "produced" a document called "Constantine's Sacrifice", which tried to declare that Constantine the Great had dedicated Rome and the entire western half of the Roman Empire to the Pope on the fourth day after his baptism, and also gave the Pope the power to rule his secular rule.
Of course, such a large area needs its own armed forces to guard, and we can also think that the Pope certainly had its own powerful armed forces in the past.
During the existence of the Papal States, the Pope actually had a dual role, he was both the secular monarch of the Papal States and the spiritual leader of the Church, so he was actually able to mobilize the armed forces of those believers.
The "peak" of the papal armed forces was around the Middle Ages, when the papal power was so great that the pope was able to recruit troops and launch the famous "Crusade". Moreover, the three major knights of the Knights Hospitaller, the Knights Templar and the Teutonic Knights that appeared at this time were loyal to the Pope, and in a broad sense, this can also be regarded as the "division" of the Pope.
However, if from the point of view of the "secular monarch", there is almost no standing army in the papal state, and if the papal state clashes with other monarchs or Italian city-states, then the pope has to rely on mercenaries or other countries for protection.
At different times, the Papal States formed different troops.
For example, in the 15th century, the Pope recruited Italian Corsican knights to form a heavy cavalry company, later known as the Corsican Guard, which by 1637 numbered in the thousands.
The Pope formed this force mainly to improve the security situation in Rome, but the Corsican liked to cause trouble, often fighting in Rome, not only failed to improve the security of the Papal States, but also caused a lot of trouble for the Papal States, and eventually the Pope could only disband the Corsican Guard.
For example, in the middle of the 19th century, Italy launched a unification movement to "destroy" the Papal States and make Italy truly powerful. To this end, the Pope called on the faithful of the world to come and defend the Papal States.
Numerous believers responded to the call and formed a multinational force called the Legion of Afu, which consisted mainly of young unmarried believers from more than 20 countries and commanded by a Swiss colonel.
Statistics show that in 1868 the force numbered nearly 4,600 men, of which more than 1,900 were from the Netherlands and more than 1,300 from France.
They fought against the Italian Sequoia Army, showed heroism, and later expanded to more than 10,000 people, which really caused Italy a headache for a while. But in the end, they failed to withstand the siege of the Italian forces, lost Rome, and the legions of Af ceased to exist.
For example, in 1850, the Pope also formed a Palatine Guard, which was mainly responsible for patrolling the city of Rome, which was a "volunteer" who would only be given a stipend for the maintenance of clothes and equipment.
But this did not seem to prevent the Palatine Guard from being loyal to the Pope, and together with the aforementioned Legion of Af, they repelled the Italian army and defended the Papal States.
Of course, in the end, these mercenaries and volunteers failed to keep the Papal States, which were broken and destroyed in 1870, and the city of Rome and other places were annexed to Italy by referendum, and Rome became the capital of Italy.
After the fall of the Papal States, the Pope confined himself in the Vatican "in protest", for which the Palatine Guard was granted permission to surrender without disarming, but only on the condition that the Guard could only retain 500 men and could not leave the Vatican.
Therefore, at this time, the Pope still had 500 guards under him.
It was not until 1929, when Italy and the Vatican signed the Lateran Treaty and recognized each other, that the Pope lifted his self-confinement, and it was discovered that the Paladine Guard had expanded to 2,000 men.
But before everyone could deal with this problem, World War II broke out, and the Palatine Guard carefully patrolled the Vatican border during World War II to prevent German troops from entering, which can be regarded as playing a military role again.
After World War II, the Palatine Guard gradually began to be used only as an honor guard until 1970, when the Pope announced the dissolution of the Palatine Guard and only the military band, ending the 100-year history of the Guard.
Also disbanded at the same time as the Palatine Guard was the Pope's "Noble Guard", which consisted mainly of members of the nobility and was not responsible for fighting, but only for escorting the Pope on horseback when he traveled.
In addition, the Papal States had a naval force, which was formed around 875 AD to perform external defense, anti-smuggling, and river cruises. Although the navy of the Papal States did not make many "appearances", it also participated in naval battles, such as the Battle of Lepanto, and helped win the war.
However, when the Papal States fell and the Pope retired to the Vatican, the Pope had no coastline, and naturally did not need a navy, and most of the Pope's navy was incorporated into Italy and ceased to exist.
So it is really difficult to say how many divisions the Pope has, but at least under Stalin, the armed forces that the Pope had were really not strong, and it is no wonder that Stalin asked "the Pope with contempt" "how many divisions he has."
The influence of the Pope is still present today
Even now, we know that today's Vatican City State is just a country within a country with an area of only 0.44 square kilometers and only more than 400 citizens, so how many divisions does the Pope have?
According to the data, the pope himself only has the Pontifical Swiss Guard, which is provided by neutral Switzerland and has a staffing of about 110 people, which is responsible for the security of the pope and the church. Perhaps, we can think of this as the Pope's "personal bodyguard".
In fact, the Pope's Swiss Guard also has a very long history, this guard was established as early as 1506, originally built to protect the Holy See and the Pope, and fought fiercely in 1527 to cover the Pope's evacuation.
Today, however, the Swiss Guard has been transformed into the Guard of the Vatican City State, an important symbol of the Vatican's protective power and rituals.
A little more, the Vatican also has a Vatican Guard of about 130 people, who can be considered the police or gendarmes of the Vatican City State, including 30 firefighters.
That is to say, at best, the Pope has a total of about 240 men, and according to the calculation of 13,000 Soviet infantry divisions, the Pope has about 0.019 divisions.
This number is inconspicuous in any way, or even during World War II, when there were thousands of people under the Pope, Stalin would not have put such a force in his eyes.
But we have to admit that Stalin did underestimate the influence of the Pope, and the influence of the Pope on the West is not in how many guards he has, but in the influence on the majority of ordinary believers.
After the end of World War II, Italy had hoped that the Red Party would govern, but due to the influence of the Pope, the Italian Democratic Party eventually retained its position. This event may not have had much impact on the Soviet Union, but another thing had a more profound impact on the Soviet Union.
In 1979, when the Pope visited Poland, more than 6 million Polish citizens took to the streets just to meet the Pope, and they religiously smeared holy water on their foreheads to prove their "loyalty".
It has been pointed out that the ruling party "Solidarity" in Poland at that time had already been infiltrated into a "sieve" by the church, and in all respects, it had been seriously influenced by Western ideas.
But let's not forget that Poland was still in the red camp at that time, which was a rather dangerous signal. Sure enough, within a few years, Poland became the first country in the Soviet camp to "change color", throw itself into the arms of capitalism, and become the first domino to fall from the "collapse of the Soviet Union".
Even if the Soviet Union had hundreds of divisions and a million troops, it could not stop a change in the ideology of a country, which may be proof of the Pope's influence in the West.
Today, the Vatican's influence in Western politics can still be said to be pivotal, with some calling the Vatican "the world's smallest geopolitical superpower."
Because the Pope has billions of believers around the world, all of whom hold votes in their respective countries and can influence the politics of that country to some extent, politicians in Western countries, including the President of the United States, "have to" maintain respect for the Pope, after all, everything they do is meant to "vote", and there is no need to offend their own voters for it.
At the end of the day, whether religious or otherwise, we must not underestimate the power of ideas, which may be one of the most powerful and longest-lasting forces in the world.