Italy remains neutral in World War II. What happens to its territories and colonies?

Presumably under a now-democratic Italian government, I guess?

Also I think Italians would still form a significant minority, if not an even 50/50 with the Arabs in Libya.
Even a democratic Italian government is probably going to create some sham equality, like Zimbabwe Rhodesia.
 
Agreed. Also, AFAIK Germany made no pressure on Italy about that. it was entirely Mussolini's choice.
Very obviously, it was a signal of increasing pro-German alignment by Italy. But there are also deeper reasons, such as the increasingly racialist approach in the colonies that fed an increasingly racist Fascist outlook overall.
Mussolini is on record with extremely contradictory staments on this point, but a racist streak existed within Fascism from about the start.

Well said. I know, I could just like the post, but I also wanted to say I see you've done your reading.
 
Quite an assumption there, weather is not deterministic.

Right, it isn't. I'm just assuming the actual OTL weather in the spring of 1941.
That said, while that spring was indeed more rainy than usual, any year the initial planned date for the opening of Barbarossa would have meant severe mobility problems for the non-fully-tracked vehicles.
 

gurgu

Banned
well if Italy stays neutral in the main war this has a lot of consequences.
on the long period:
  • libya will keep Balbo as governor( died in the first days of wars from and "accident") and will be more italianized or will receive even full citizenship since Balbo was pressuring mussolini to accept it because of the glorious past of the region(under carthago and then rome) also with the discovery of oil there is no way the country could achieve full indipendence.
  • ethiopia was a mainly christian(coptic/orthodox) country with a good number of muslims until the solomonid dinasty lives there won't be peace so the country will probably be realesed in the 60's with a propably better economy and won't fall to communism
  • - somalia and eritrea were quietly peaceful as colonies since they were bought not conquered, and both had a lot of christianization, tech/dev improvement
  • the decolonization will probably happen but more on a english style with an italian commonwealth losing only ethiopia while the king would take the crown of eritrea/libya/somalia but giving local administration
on the ww2:
  • without italy delaring any wars hitler doesn't have to loose time by topling/invading jugoslavia and bulgaria in order to reach greece so this means Barbarossa would start on time
  • no Italy no african front ergo rommel and all the paratroopers stay in europe and probably will join war against Stalin
  • hitler won't win but the war will last even more maybe 1946? soviet union will fall down and the japanese would occupy the kamchatka region but partisans and the americans joining th war would make it impossible to win, also in this ATL Berlin or some important city woul be nuked( Munich? frankfurt?) with a following coup against hitler and surrender
  • the peace conference would be very different:
  1. the ussr has fallen so this means another civil war in russia or a republic restored and all the soviet republics released( poland, ucraine, georgia, armenia, azerbajan, afghanistan, mongolia, the baltic trio)
  2. no ussr no warsaw pact and no iron curtain, balkans with a greatly better economy since they havent suffered war and both bulgaria/jugoslavia would keep their monarhies while romania would become a republic alongside hungary( both still join axis)
  3. poland, ucraine and bielorussia would be devastated from war but helped with marshall plan and, there won't be any chernobyl disaster ( no kgb hiding the reactor problems)
  4. germany will be splitted in 3 areas and no berlin wall
  5. japan treaty( no changes, they merely had contacts with mussolini)
on the moment i can't think of anything else except that jugoslavia will probably still explode in civil war while bulgaria may regain after agreement the control over alexandropol( mainly populated by bulgarians) and acces to agean sea since it's good behaviour after ww1( only country defeated to actually try to regains it's territories by using only diplomacy and no army menace) and would probably try to annex macedonia after serbian collapse(without tito probably no brainwash about macedo-slavs).
Sry for eventual bad english nor grammar
 
I would like to have more information about the Christianization of Somalia. I'm not so sure it was that relevant.

As to the start of Barbarossa, already addressed previously. At most, a couple of weeks can be gained.

Yes, the Germans have more resources to pour in the East front cauldron, but they do not have more fuel, so supporting the additional forces might be difficult enough as to essentially rebalancing their contribution to little more than OTL.
Naturally, come the winter of 1942, somebody will have to man the lines that in OTL were held by Italian infantry. They were no more than speed bumps for the Soviet tanks, but nevertheless they have to be replaced in this ATL. Yes, the Germans can use the troops they had deployed to Greece, Yugoslavia, Africa etc., but the assumption as to the Balkans is that the British in this ATL don't manage to churn up mischief there. If they do succeed, on the contrary, then Germany has to intervene.

In 1943-44, the Germans don't have to commit forces to Italy - but the same will be true for the Allies.

So no, overall I don't think the war lasts one more year. There is a possibility the nukes get used in Germany, yes, because even a three-month delay might bring that about. A collapse of the Soviet Union, just no.
 

gurgu

Banned
I would like to have more information about the Christianization of Somalia. I'm not so sure it was that relevant.

As to the start of Barbarossa, already addressed previously. At most, a couple of weeks can be gained.

Yes, the Germans have more resources to pour in the East front cauldron, but they do not have more fuel, so supporting the additional forces might be difficult enough as to essentially rebalancing their contribution to little more than OTL.
Naturally, come the winter of 1942, somebody will have to man the lines that in OTL were held by Italian infantry. They were no more than speed bumps for the Soviet tanks, but nevertheless they have to be replaced in this ATL. Yes, the Germans can use the troops they had deployed to Greece, Yugoslavia, Africa etc., but the assumption as to the Balkans is that the British in this ATL don't manage to churn up mischief there. If they do succeed, on the contrary, then Germany has to intervene.

In 1943-44, the Germans don't have to commit forces to Italy - but the same will be true for the Allies.

So no, overall I don't think the war lasts one more year. There is a possibility the nukes get used in Germany, yes, because even a three-month delay might bring that about. A collapse of the Soviet Union, just no.

Eritrea reached a 60% of population as christian( 20% catholic) much lesser.
about the soviet collapse i considere it the best hitler could do in the war, still if the allies reach berlin first this would have a similar peace conference as i proposed(only poland get's free from urss) and still no warsaw on balkans which will instant join nato to avoid the soviet coup as in OTL
 

gurgu

Banned
I asked about Somalia.
sorry, grammar mistake:
Eritrea reached a 60% of population as christian( 20% catholic) *somalia much lesser.

Fine, but I don't see the Italian absence as such a factor to explain that.
well, hitler lost valuable months to help italy in greece so if he starts the barbossa earlier he might avoid problems like panzers division stuck because fuel frozen and even better logistic( the italian troops were so badly equipped hitler had to help them again)
 
well, hitler lost valuable months to help italy in greece

As mentioned, that's not the case. First, it's factually wrong; the planned date was May 15, so moving it up to June 22 isn't "months", is one month and one week.

But apart from that, the Heer units deployed along the Eastern Reich's borders were not ready on May 15, nor on May 30, regardless of Marita.

And, as already mentioned, if they had indeed launched the operation between May 15 and, say, May 30 or June 7, the Germans would have shown their hand prematurely while achieving no more headway than they did historically, because of the flooded rivers, muddy roads, waterlogged fields. This is not just my opinion; it's Halder's.

They could probably have launched Barbarossa one or two weeks earlier. But at that point, important negotiations were going on with a view to getting as much as possible of a participation out of the Finns and the Romanians, and both these negotiations and the preparations of these two powers took some additional time.
 
Top