Would independent Sicily become a Narco state under the right circumstances.

Title.

Please give honest answers(No jokes),

Please , i wish to right a timeline on it.
It wouldn't become officially independent , but it would be de-facto independent as the mafia controls it while the Italian government can do nothing about it.
 
That sounds as if they'd have huge plantations of drugs, and I'm not so sure about that. What'd grow in Sicily anyway? Marihuana? Opium? Cocaine??
 
That sounds as if they'd have huge plantations of drugs, and I'm not so sure about that. What'd grow in Sicily anyway? Marihuana? Opium? Cocaine??
It be a way station for Drugs from Asia, the golden cresent which stretches from Afghanistan to Turkey, to Europe and the US. It would not last if it did this. Internationally the backlash would be bad enough for a multinational task force to invade and keep peacekeepers there for a long time.
 

mad orc

Banned
Well basically, i wish for Sicily to become a failed state.
Please give me some ideas with that.
 
Well basically, i wish for Sicily to become a failed state.
Please give me some ideas with that.
The mafia. It corrupts the Italian government and turns Sicily into it's playground, along with much of southern Italy. Make sure the fascist never cone to power as they really made a point to hurt them, only not finishing the job due to world war 2.
 

mad orc

Banned
I liked your answer very much because

Its given me hope

I would like some elaboration though, i would surely mention your names.
 
For an independent Sicily you could have them be made independent in a CP victory scenario by Germany and Austria-Hungary as a base to control the Mediterranean and punishment for Italy's betrayal.
 
sicily actually has alot of interesting history since it was controlled by alot of different powers before it finally changed hands to Italy--it was part of Spain for a long time, iirc. i wrote down alot of notes about this somewhere, but i don't have them right on hand.

if you want to look into how Sicilian became so deeply connected to Cosa Nostra, i recommend John Lawrence Reynolds' Secret Societies--the mafia is covered in chapter 8, which is where i learned everything about this that i did. i have my copy right here with me if you'd like me to skim over it and give some quick notes.
 

mad orc

Banned
sicily actually has alot of interesting history since it was controlled by alot of different powers before it finally changed hands to Italy--it was part of Spain for a long time, iirc. i wrote down alot of notes about this somewhere, but i don't have them right on hand.

if you want to look into how Sicilian became so deeply connected to Cosa Nostra, i recommend John Lawrence Reynolds' Secret Societies--the mafia is covered in chapter 8, which is where i learned everything about this that i did. i have my copy right here with me if you'd like me to skim over it and give some quick notes.
I would like to have some notes my good man.
 
okay, these'll just be quick notes in part because i already took a sleep aid about an hour ago and only just saw this, but i'll try to be concise
  • being right at the end of the Italian Peninsula and smack in the middle of the Mediterranean, Sicily has been of strategic importance throughout history both militarily and economically
  • after the Fall of Rome, Sicily was invaded by many different powers and these all shaped Sicily and what would become Cosa Nostra into what they are today; particularly, Islamic forces that invaded in 826 shifted family dynamics in Sicily into putting more emphasis on the men, whereas before women in families had a relatively important role like in other Judeo-Christian cultures (that's how Reynolds puts it, at least) but also brought a sense of internal justice where, in a setting that lacks proper law enforcement, the people need to take personal responsibility to avenge crimes, which is where mafia vendettas come from
  • when the Normans invaded in 1000 AD, they brought in a feudal system that the Sicilians didn't appreciate all that much and so they started looking further inward in their society for trust and support, which is where the idea of the mafia as a family originated (hence "crime family", "godfather", etc.) and the concept of loyalty before death within the mafia
  • the principles of the mafia were strengthened as control by outside powers continued; incidentally, Pope Clement IV and Charles of Anjou (now the King of Sicily) made up a story about where the term "mafia" comes from in 1265, saying that it was an acronym for the Italian for "Death to the French is Italy's cry!" (the other theory is that it comes from the Sicilian Italian for "bragging" or "manly", but that's beside the point)
  • the French occupation forces started getting more extreme in their attempts to control Sicily as Charles' army started brutalizing the natives, coming to a head when some French soldiers accosted a young woman in 1282 and a bunch of Sicilian men attacked and murdered them all for it, which sparked a huge revolt across Sicily against the French (see "Sicilian Vespers")
  • with the above revolt in mind, the Sicilians knew it was only a matter of time before the French came back so they appealed to Peter III of Aragon--who was Charles' sworn enemy--and willingly became a Spanish protectorate, which led to Sicily being Spanish territory for the next 500 years; whereas the French were just brutal to them, the Spanish went about censoring in Sicily instead, isolating them from everything that was going on around them in Europe so they essentially missed the entire Renaissance and stayed under the Norman feudal system long after the Normans themselves weren't a thing anymore in part because the Spanish were basically using Sicily as a tax haven, with some Spanish lords operating out of there so that they could avoid paying taxes to the king but, in exchange, had to impose huge demands on their Sicilian subjects to make up the difference, and got all the bad parts of the period up to and including the Inquisition while lacking the cultural advancements of the same period. you'll find that alot of crime syndicates started off well-intentioned, fighting oppressors to protect themselves and their people only to become the oppressors themselves and Cosa Nostra is no exception.
  • around 1500, one aspect of contemporary Europe seeped into Sicily and they started forming trade guilds just like on the continent, but this also saw the rise of bandit gangs not unlike Robin Hood, robbing the Spanish lords as one of the only ways they could get back at them, taking not only their coin but also any food they were transporting and redistributing that to the starving villages past Palermo; they even had their own noble bandit folk hero named Saponara from the late 16th century.
  • as bandit activity escalated, the Spanish started withdrawing to Palermo and left gabelloti in control of their country estates to rake in and transport the taxes to them in the city, using heavies to collect them; ironically, this would be the groundwork for the mafia structure of bosses and their enforcers going around collecting protection money.
  • finally, the Spanish left Sicily in the mid-19th century, leaving a power vacuum that the mafia filled. Garibaldi showed up in 1860 to bring Sicily into the newly-unified Italy, but the mafia kept on ruling from the shadows even after he did mainly because of their strict code of silence, the omerta ("There is no such thing as the mafia" "snitches get stitches" and all that)
that's about everything Reynolds wrote in the Cosa Nostra's history in their section of Secret Societies, boiled down to its essential elements. after this he goes into detail on mafia structure and activities, then some of their more recent history (but i imagine you're more interested in where the mafia came from up to the modern period), and also mentions similar groups such as the Camorra, but this is all i'll post for now. sleep aid's starting to kick in ;) :p
 
An independent Sicily might be a transshipment point for smuggling everything imaginable into Europe with a "street tax" ruthlessly enforced. The island itself would be a quiet, peaceful place and would remain so because anyone rocking the boat would end up very dead.
 

TruthfulPanda

Gone Fishin'
It be a way station for Drugs from Asia, the golden cresent which stretches from Afghanistan to Turkey, to Europe and the US. It would not last if it did this. Internationally the backlash would be bad enough for a multinational task force to invade and keep peacekeepers there for a long time.
WOW!
Your faith in the International Community is refreshing!

As to the OP - IMO any state can become a narco state in the right circumstances.

To start with you need an independent Sicily, right?
Without going too far back:
1815 - Murat does not side with Napoleon during the 100 days, keeps the Napolitan throne, hence the local Borbons are stuck with Sicily only.
1860 - the Napolitan Borbons hold out on the island while losing the mainland to Piemont, the so-called Kingdom of Italy.
1944 - in return for its support of his unprecedented 4th bid at the Presidency FDR promises Mafia an independent Republic of Sicily. And manages to set it up before he croaks.

As to what drug - opium -> heroine? Poppy can grow anywhere ...
Then designer drugs/chemicals.
Marijuana is also a possibility - unpenalised production should cut down on overheads - no bribes - hence a competitive edge ...
 

mad orc

Banned
Another problem is that Sicily is too much smaller than Mexico and Colombia.

We need a deterrant which will prevent either Italy, NATO or Soviets from invading or intervening in it.

A Communist nation nearby should do the trick.
 
The answer is clearly yes, the more interesting questions are what are those circumstances and how likely are they to arise. One way would be for ASB to descend, which is pretty unlikely.
 
Didn't the Mafia frown on drugs? You're going to need a change in their business practices or another group to seize Sicily.
 
Didn't the Mafia frown on drugs? You're going to need a change in their business practices or another group to seize Sicily.
The mafia in America might have frowned upon drug dealing at one point but the Sicilian Mafia engaged in large scale heroin trafficking from the 50s onwards.
 
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