Documents from the Nixon administration – declassified and made public by the United States in recent years – show that the Italian coup movement, in the early 1970s, had a broad reach and deep roots in the military, more than we knew. This sheds new light on various aspects of the history of Italy: not only the events of the strategy of tension, but also the relations between the Italian government and the army, the history of political parties, the relations between Italy and the USA.