Der schönen Tyrol 1939

Sud-Tyrol (alto adige) is a region in northern Italy mainly inhabited by ehnical germans which was annexed by italy after the Great war.
The matter was NOT done by plebiscite and a lot of people in the area felt more links with Austria-Germany than with Italy.
The rise a fascist regime in Italy worsened matters, since that regime was not able to deal with minorities with flexibility.

In OTL, Hitler never rose the question until '44, for three reasons:
1) alliance with italy (and with UK, but he never managed to forge one) was essential in his mind to "break the entente"
2) he felt obliged with Mussolini on the Austrian affaire
3) he was in the middle of a World War and it would not be wise to bicker with his main ally on the european theatre.

Now imagine something different.

Ciano does not become Foreign minister and the germany-italy pact is not signed. (Mussolini distrusted Hitler at first, since he felt being copied by him)
Anschluss is performed against Italy will (apart from bombastic speeches, Mussolini had little to prevent it).

Next target is not Sudetenland, but Tyrol (which, after all was, a part of austria before Versailles, and is mainly inhabitated by german-speaking people).

1) Are those POD enough?
2) what the consequances?
3) how you would plan a Tyrol campaign if you were in Runested's shoes?
4) what would you do if you were in Mussolini's boots?
 

Susano

Banned
Actually, South Tyrol is Alto Adige+Trentino, though only Alto Adige is in majority ethnic German. But thats just a naming nitpick :p

And as few people liked Mussoloni, I think Hitler could profile himself there. Hell, it might even be more strategical to go for the Sudetenland, and then for South Tyrol - as a way of showing that Nazi Germany doesnt go only against democracies, and of course Europe wouldnt shed a tear for Italy... and heh, Hitler would even get his war out of that!

Of course, strategically clever as it might be, he might be ideologically against it. In Mein Kampf he had even wrote that the centuries old Germanic desire to push and migrate southwards (blah, blah, blah) needs to be redirected, that is, eastwards... so there was also an ideological component in not bothering Italy. After all, just like all the East European German minorities had been resettled into occupied Poland, the South Tyroleans can be used to settle the Crimea (that was the plan, anyways).
 
First of all, it would be 'Das schöne Tirol'. - Second, only the Trentino is were Italian was spoken predominantly; today's 'Alto Adige' was the then German part of Südtirol (the Trentino was known as 'Welsch-Tirol').
Third. Although a nice countryside, getting this part of former AH wouldn't have enhanced Hitler's standing in Germany (like almost always when looking south-east, nobody really cared about these lands).
Stomping over Italy perhaps wouldn't have been a problem, but for what reason?
 
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