DBWI Napoleon III assists Italian unification

Napoleon III considered backing Sardinia in efforts to expel the Hapsburgs from the Italian peninsula. Supposing he had put the weight of France behind Sardinia in some big way?
 
Sardinia wont unite Italy, part of the reason for Italians to unite behind someone was that they were Liberal, and Nationalistic.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Well, if this results in French troops fighting on Italian ground and worse, losing Nice and Savoy to France, this might weaken Sardinia's legitimacy as the leader of Italy. IOTL, they fought by themselves in Italy. Prussia did join the war, but they fought in Germany and Bohemia.
 
Napoléon III could not have taken back the Sarland territories and put his cousin on the Luxembourg throne if Prussia did not need his support in the 1840'. Far more important than Savoy to France IMO.
 
Napoléon III could not have taken back the Sarland territories and put his cousin on the Luxembourg throne if Prussia did not need his support in the 1840'. Far more important than Savoy to France IMO.
Yes. Although you would probably have seen less concessions by the Italian government to the "Alpine minority" in Savoy and across the Alps in Aosta. These regions have remained predominantly Francophone to this day even with mountain tourism having boomed and brought in a lot of Italians in the region.
 
In case Nappy III go for the 'italian strategy' we will not see an unified Italy for a lot longer than 1861; his intention were never had a single italian nation...even as client state, but more a division of the penisula in sphere of influence with A-H.
The proposed Italian League with the Pope as nominal president was the mean to obtain that; Prussia instead needed a strong southern ally to counter both Wien and Paris...even if the sudden demise of the austrian backed nations in Italy and the utter defeat of the Hapsburg armies was a surprise even for them (but with hindsight, austrian rule in Italy was alwasy brittle)
 
Italy never had it in the first place.

Well it was a former genoan territory and speak an italian dialect; frankly it's ethnically more italian than Savoia and Valle d'Aosta; said that, well it was the minimum price that France had to pay to get their separate peace treaty in the great war
 
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