WI: Central Italy

There was a thread on this a couple years ago. I recall there did not seem to be a big change in the short run. As one French General is supposed to have remarked: 'If Italy is with us we will send ten divisions to fight with them. If Italy is against us we will send ten divisions to fight them. either way we will send ten divisions to fight.' In the longer run there were some interesting arguments that this was a serious problem for the Entente, and probably a war looser for the Entente. However I don't recall any economic analysis in those proposals.
 
CP Italy would help Austria-Hungary greatly. One front lesser so it can fight against Serbia and Russia better.

France would has bit problems when it has divide its forces to two fronts.

But Italy too hasn't easy times too. British blockade and possible landing to Sicily cause muche of problems to Italy. Altough Brits have too divide their navy but it hardly has much singifant for them.
 
How viable is Italy aligning with the CP and would it change the outcome of the war, with differing POD’s, if possible?

According to the terms of the Triple Alliance, Italy would either need to be promised compensation for the presumed Austrian gains of territory in the Balkans, or the Hungarian demands pre-war for no annexations needs to be more highly publicized and adopted rather prominently as official government policy. The issue with that is that there's nothing regionally that Italy wants that isent Austrian sans Albania, over which the international community has already reached a formal understanding. And Vienna can't afford to cede their border territories to Italy for all her interests baring that of the shortest terms: it's the best and arguably last easily defendable line between their rival and the Danubian plains upon which their capital and economic center sat, contained one of their only large scale commercial port, and would be a huge dent in the shield of prestige that kept the demands of the other minorities to a reasonable level. This makes a 1914 entry problematic.

With an earlier POD, I could see a British intervention in the Italo-Turkish Crisis over Libya: either preventing the war via threats, open guarantee of Turkish rule, calling for an international conference on the issue, ect., or once the war started using the Royal Navy to limit/prevent Italian naval activity, allowing the Ottomans to send troops and supplies through Egypt, ect.: hamstringing Italian imperial ambitions. This could drive Italy closer to Germany while keeping the Ottomans stronger and more liberal/pro-Entente stance under the Freedom and Accord Party, meaning the later dosent sign on with Germany. Of course, this produces substantial butterflies in the Balkans, which very well could get rid of WW 1
 
Italy plays both sides off of each other in exchange for ever-larger promises of territory and eventually joins in 1917 in exchange for Corsica, Tunisia, Malta, parts of Dalmatia, Nice, perhaps Djibouti and/or another colony, and a random small chunk of southeastern France.
 
Italy plays both sides off of each other in exchange for ever-larger promises of territory and eventually joins in 1917 in exchange for Corsica, Tunisia, Malta, parts of Dalmatia, Nice, perhaps Djibouti and/or another colony, and a random small chunk of southeastern France.

Malta is pretty implausible. At least Italians should conquer that. And Austria-Hungary never would accept give Dalmatia or other territories to Italy.
 
in 1914 italy will never enter the war, not enough stockpile, army in retraining and so on, if you have perhaps giolitti in power you can at least have a firmly neutral italy with a pro-CP stance, that will capitalize greatly at the end on 1915 with the probably complete collapse of Serbia that, without the evacuation through Italian occupied Albania, will result in the destruction of all the serbian veteran, maybe the declaration of Italian neutrality and hostility to the Entente will push Bulgaria to join the fray earlier securing the southern part of Serbia. closing of the Balkan front will probably make Greece even more Neutral. the absence of the Italian front and the Serbian one for the Austrians means A LOT, firstly hundreds of thousands of men that will not need replacement, guns, ammo, supply on the alpine front and the balkan one, logistic will have a huge boom so the push into russia in 1915 could become even more stellar, like getting Kiev,Riga and maybe getting near Minsk, a carnage on the Russian soil. In 1916 means that the blockade on the CP will not gain strength, but will be as lousy as it was in 1914-1915, the German will have Italian flagged mercantile vassels to sells high value goods on the US market, also food and some raw materials will be more available, meaning that Germany will not start USW, and so no angering the US so much, in 1916 the German could launch bigger offensive on the western front or capitalize more in the east, maybe with the objective to knock out Russia ASAP. at the same time the OE will have an easy access to the resources from the CP and will behave way better. if at the end of 1916 Russia folds i can see clearly Italy join the fray asking Nice savoy maybe, tunisi and Corsica, the plan will probably be the 1913 one, an army on the Alps and one in Alsace, to free on German Army, so i think that the German with a whole Army can do wonders on the 1916/17 front, so war won for the CP.
 
My reading was that on many levels the Italians are sympathetic to the CPs due to the long relationship in the Alliance but they had more leaning to Germany than A-H and at the highest levels the leaning was more French since the reality is that Italy gains little in an A-H versus Russia war. As it expands the Italians have more to gain from France but less likely to get any of it unless Germany vanquishes France so the best option was to throw in with Britain and try to take what they wanted from Austria as they hoped France beat Germany who could undo it all. My opinion is that if we improve the performance of A-H and have Germany not appear so stretched than you get neutral Italy and that is at least as good as her joining the war with the CP. Italy is a hole in the blockade and a wildcard that needs to be wooed so the Med is less hostile, she gains from being a broker and trans-shipper, and does not have the war losses a much better play. For Italy to get any territory she had to conquer it and that is dubious, even less likely is Germany trading away her wish list to give Italy anything, Italy in the CPs will be as hateful of the peace as OTL.
 

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Financially Italy cannot join the CP. She is far too dependant on British and French capital to survive outside of the Allied orbit.

The best the pro-CP lobby could manage was neutrality.
 
It all depends on when. The most reasonable case for Italy joining the CP is similar to their joining WWII OTL, jumping in at the last second on a collapsing France. That's probably the most beneficial for Italy, get a few years of making money hand over fist as a neutral, then short march through Southern France to grab territory and concessions at the victors table

Italy being neutral helps the CP a great deal. For one Italy is a hole in the blockade, Italy can serve as a middleman for goods to the CP, taking its own cut of course, this helps the CP quite a bit. Without Italy A-H has the troops free to finish off the Balkan front in 1915, and is able to properly shore up their lines in 1916 vis a vis Russia, preventing the Brusilov disaster and keeping Romania neutral. As such without the Brusilov disaster Germany has a reserve to use in the west, and either keeps up at Verdun or does the counterattack at Arras. This is probably their best shot at winning the war, if they feel confident enough that the long term situation favors them, and don't do anything stupid to get the US in the war. Assuming that happens, Russia is probably off the board by early summer 1917, if not spring, and Germany can launch a major fall offensive in 1917 and still have a reserve left for a spring offensive in 1918
 
How dependent was Italy on imports? Would they suffer from the blockade?

My understanding is the biggest import was coal from the UK and I have no good notion if Germany can get her coal to Italy so I believe Italy is unwilling to risk going cold. This is why Italy is deemed dependent on Britain, if Britain is at war then Italy can be pushed to join the Entente.
 
It all depends on when. The most reasonable case for Italy joining the CP is similar to their joining WWII OTL, jumping in at the last second on a collapsing France. That's probably the most beneficial for Italy, get a few years of making money hand over fist as a neutral, then short march through Southern France to grab territory and concessions at the victors table

Italy being neutral helps the CP a great deal. For one Italy is a hole in the blockade, Italy can serve as a middleman for goods to the CP, taking its own cut of course, this helps the CP quite a bit. Without Italy A-H has the troops free to finish off the Balkan front in 1915, and is able to properly shore up their lines in 1916 vis a vis Russia, preventing the Brusilov disaster and keeping Romania neutral. As such without the Brusilov disaster Germany has a reserve to use in the west, and either keeps up at Verdun or does the counterattack at Arras. This is probably their best shot at winning the war, if they feel confident enough that the long term situation favors them, and don't do anything stupid to get the US in the war. Assuming that happens, Russia is probably off the board by early summer 1917, if not spring, and Germany can launch a major fall offensive in 1917 and still have a reserve left for a spring offensive in 1918

I would agree but unlike WWII the odds of Germany vanquishing France fast enough are too low for Italy to have such an open door. But I will agree if the war looks more favorably a CP show and eventual win then I think Italy is a fickle girl to the end and suddenly tries to show her loyalty for Germany.

Neutrality is the most plausible and really the best scenario for Germany. Italy might get Germany to pressure the Austrians to concede some things if she were neutral to the end, make money, sit out the war, and thereby not simply help the CPs win but be on the winning side who can pay the reward.
 
My understanding is the biggest import was coal from the UK and I have no good notion if Germany can get her coal to Italy so I believe Italy is unwilling to risk going cold. This is why Italy is deemed dependent on Britain, if Britain is at war then Italy can be pushed to join the Entente.

She can, via railway access through the Swiss and Austria, but it'd take time for Italy to pivot and tune up her economy/infrastructure so it can get through quickly and efficiently. That means she can't "go cold" by jumping in 1914 without having done an earlier shift towards Germany and away from the UK prior to the war starting... a few years would be good. Hence my proposal for an Italo-Turkish war POD being the best shot for such an early entry.
 
How about Italy's African colonial empire? Undoubtedly, the Ethiopians would declare war on the CP in order to annex Italian Eritrea with financial and material support from the Entente and you might see a joint Anglo-Ethiopian invasion of Italian Somaliland. The Ethiopian Empire might send European-trained Expeditionary Forces to German East Africa, North Africa and perhaps even Europe, the latter being attached to the French Army.
 
How about Italy's African colonial empire? Undoubtedly, the Ethiopians would declare war on the CP in order to annex Italian Eritrea with financial and material support from the Entente and you might see a joint Anglo-Ethiopian invasion of Italian Somaliland. The Ethiopian Empire might send European-trained Expeditionary Forces to German East Africa, North Africa and perhaps even Europe, the latter being attached to the French Army.

Ethiopia might declare war to Italy but would it be strong enough doing much?

But Italy surely would lost all of its colonies.
 
Ethiopia might declare war to Italy but would it be strong enough doing much?

But Italy surely would lost all of its colonies.
Ethiopia certainly has the manpower to do so and it could send at the very least, a regiment of European-trained men to other fronts. Could Italy retain any of her colonies? Perhaps Italian Somaliland?
 
Ethiopia certainly has the manpower to do so and it could send at the very least, a regiment of European-trained men to other fronts. Could Italy retain any of her colonies? Perhaps Italian Somaliland?

How would it be supplied? The Entente firmly control the Suez and Aden and rule the waves on all fronts outside MAYBE the Med. and Baltic. Italy's colonial holdings are hopelessly isolated.
 
How would it be supplied? The Entente firmly control the Suez and Aden and rule the waves on all fronts outside MAYBE the Med. and Baltic. Italy's colonial holdings are hopelessly isolated.
Could the Italian colonial government in any of the colonies successfully negotiate with the Entente? I don't think the Entente will be too willing to use more men and material in another African Theatre, Ethiopia has probably already declared war on Italy and seized Eritrea but Italian Somaliland and Libya might be able stay relatively intact if their colonial government is willing to stay neutral in World War 1.
 
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