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Concept
Foreign relations of Pope Pius XII
Summary
Foreign relations of Pope Pius XII extended to most of Europe and a few states outside Europe. Pius XII was pope from 1939 to 1958, during World War II and the beginning of the Cold War.
Foreign relations of the Holy See
Between the loss of the Papal States in 1870 and the signing of the Lateran Treaty in 1929, the diplomatic recognition of the papacy had actually increased, with eighteen accredited members of the Vatican diplomatic corps in 1890, fourteen in 1914, and twenty-four in 1921. This did not represent international support for the papal position in the Roman Question, however, as these nations also recognized the unified Kingdom of Italy, whose diplomatic corps in Rome developed over a similar trajectory.
In 1936 (three years before Pius XII became pope), there were thirty-four ambassadors, ministers, or chargé d'affaires to the Holy See. However, several of these diplomats spent much of their time in other European capitals—either for personal reasons or because they served multiple embassies (Argentina, Estonian, Latvia, Liberia, Peru, and El Salvador), were merely sinecures (Belgium), or were unpaid (Honduras). Others represented micronations that "hardly counted" (Monaco, San Marino, and the Order of Malta). The Spanish ambassador was driven out by a "tragi-comic siege" in the Piazza di Spagna. Nicaragua's ambassador was senile, and Panama's ambassador had not been seen since 1929.
In March 1939, Pius XII inherited thirty-eight diplomatic missions to the Vatican: thirteen at the "ambassadorial level", and the rest at the ministerial level; there were also papal representatives in thirty-eight countries, but the exchanges were not always mutual. At the time there were also twenty-three Vatican envoys without diplomatic status in their host state.
In contrast to the various sinecures, Diego von Bergen was a high-ranking member of the German diplomatic service, who twice turned down the office of Foreign Secretary to remain in Rome.
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