WW1: Italy joins Central Powers, USA and Ottoman Empire stay Neutral.

Deleted member 94680

Italy literally cannot afford to join CP if Britain is in the Entente.

This has been covered many times on here.
 
For Italy there wouldn't be any point join to CPs Speciality if UK is still on the war. There is not much what Italy would want from France and UK would crush Italy with blockade. Best option for Italy would be remain neutral.

Neutral OE would change the war much. Brits and Russians have not deal with Ottomans so they can send more troops against Germans and Austrians. War would end quicker. And another thing is too that neutral OE would help keep supply lines of Russia through Bosporus. So Russia has much better situation and with earlier end of WW1 Russian revolution if not totally avoided at least delayed and it would be different.

In such situation USA has easy stay as neutral when war probably would end in 1916 or early 1917.

And earlier end of WW1 would mean lesser harsh peace terms to Germany and so no rise of Hitler. AH might still collapse anyway but probably Habsburgs can still rule Austria.
 
UK could crush Italy? I mean Austria and Germany did endure the blocade for 4 years. And a close blocade of Italy is very unlikely - the british still need their fleet in the North Sea to maintain an owerhelming supreiority against the germans - also the Ottomans remaining neutral most likely means that they did receive the ordered dreadnoughts from the british which would make the Admirality even less inclined to send further ships to the mediterranean. Im however unsure how the Austrian and Italian navy would compare with the French and whatever the british are willing to spare for the theater.

As for italian war goals: Nizza, Savoy and Tunisia, maybe Corsica. And maybe Austria agreed to hand over some of the Italian demanded territories in exchange for Italy keeping its commitments while promising all the above.

For effects:
1.Austria would be incredibly better off. No Italian front and without Italy and a new western front in the south the Western powers couldnt spare troops for Balkan adventures - also supplying them would be much more at risk with the Mediterranean contested so likely no Balkan front. This means that instead of 3 fronts Austria is fighting only against Russia.
2. Bulgaria has no enemy in sight - knowing the bulgarians they would be reluctant to transfer troops to fight Russia. They however would pose a threat to Romania who in this scnenario would be much more reluctant to join the entente because of the bulgarian threat. If they still join the entente I expect that they will loose swiftly.
3. Germany: That the british and french would need to send troops agains Italy to a southern front would weaken the line in the north considerably. However without the ottomans in the british could use the troops of OTL Ottoman fronts in Europe. Russia should too have additional troops available howeve I dont think that they would leave the Ottoman border undefended. If the need arises to prop up the Italians Germany could send the same troops it used OTL to prop up the otto's and austria in Italy so that should be enough to prevent an italian defeat.
4. Russia can trade with the other entente power though the mediterranean was already a very easy territory for U-boats OTL and with Italy on CP side likely much more so. So I expect very heavy shipping losses.

To summarize: Im not sure the war would end sooner and not at all sure the CP's wouldnt win.
 
UK could crush Italy? I mean Austria and Germany did endure the blocade for 4 years. And a close blocade of Italy is very unlikely - the british still need their fleet in the North Sea to maintain an owerhelming supreiority against the germans - also the Ottomans remaining neutral most likely means that they did receive the ordered dreadnoughts from the british which would make the Admirality even less inclined to send further ships to the mediterranean. Im however unsure how the Austrian and Italian navy would compare with the French and whatever the british are willing to spare for the theater.

As for italian war goals: Nizza, Savoy and Tunisia, maybe Corsica. And maybe Austria agreed to hand over some of the Italian demanded territories in exchange for Italy keeping its commitments while promising all the above.

For effects:
1.Austria would be incredibly better off. No Italian front and without Italy and a new western front in the south the Western powers couldnt spare troops for Balkan adventures - also supplying them would be much more at risk with the Mediterranean contested so likely no Balkan front. This means that instead of 3 fronts Austria is fighting only against Russia.
2. Bulgaria has no enemy in sight - knowing the bulgarians they would be reluctant to transfer troops to fight Russia. They however would pose a threat to Romania who in this scnenario would be much more reluctant to join the entente because of the bulgarian threat. If they still join the entente I expect that they will loose swiftly.
3. Germany: That the british and french would need to send troops agains Italy to a southern front would weaken the line in the north considerably. However without the ottomans in the british could use the troops of OTL Ottoman fronts in Europe. Russia should too have additional troops available howeve I dont think that they would leave the Ottoman border undefended. If the need arises to prop up the Italians Germany could send the same troops it used OTL to prop up the otto's and austria in Italy so that should be enough to prevent an italian defeat.
4. Russia can trade with the other entente power though the mediterranean was already a very easy territory for U-boats OTL and with Italy on CP side likely much more so. So I expect very heavy shipping losses.

To summarize: Im not sure the war would end sooner and not at all sure the CP's wouldnt win.

Italy requires much more resources to be imported than German and Austria so they would be in trouble quicker than the other central powers.
The combined Austrian and Italian fleets would be more than matched by the French and British fleets who OTL concentrated on bottling up the Austrians and keeping a close blockade of the Ottomans. Here they can play against the Italians and still not have to weaken the Grand Fleet in the North Sea.

Uboats where not the weapon they where a generation later. They where only useful when operating unrestricted against unconvoyed merchant ships. Most vital shipping was convoyed and attacking everything else risks US entry into the war as OTL. Further Austria had Uboats but siblings where never that significant OTL would Italy’s Uboats really be that much more decisive? Arguably it could accelerate anti submarine warfare including earlier depth charges.
 
Italy requires much more resources to be imported than German and Austria so they would be in trouble quicker than the other central powers.
The combined Austrian and Italian fleets would be more than matched by the French and British fleets who OTL concentrated on bottling up the Austrians and keeping a close blockade of the Ottomans. Here they can play against the Italians and still not have to weaken the Grand Fleet in the North Sea.

Uboats where not the weapon they where a generation later. They where only useful when operating unrestricted against unconvoyed merchant ships. Most vital shipping was convoyed and attacking everything else risks US entry into the war as OTL. Further Austria had Uboats but siblings where never that significant OTL would Italy’s Uboats really be that much more decisive? Arguably it could accelerate anti submarine warfare including earlier depth charges.

And how do you bottle up Austrian fleet if Italy is allied to Austria? Also the British had a very significant superiority in dreadnoughts against the germans - and still didnt dare to attack them in their home waters. And a quick search shows that Austria and Italy had 3 and 4 dreadnought in 1914 while the french 10. Thats a much smaller gap than GBR vs GER so the french too might be less inclined to seek battle. And OTL the Entente never really get its shit together even in regards of convoys in the mediterranean. The reason was that they created zones were different powers were responsible for the protection of the ships. Didnt work well OTL as the coordination between the warious navies was bad. Now with a lot of additional bases in Italy and much more freedom with added italian U-boats and contested naval superiority... Lets say that increased number of U-boats and better conditions to operate together with an increased traffic for Russia the U-boats will have a field day. And USA shipping in the mediterranean was much less than in the atlantic.
 
It depends on when Italy gets involved. If 1915 as OTL, that's fairly unrealistic, it's too easily for the Entente to block the coal and other imports Italy needs

Italy joining in 1918 say as France is collapsing is a more realistic scenario, but runs into the Ottoman neutrality problem. If the Ottomans are neutral the Russians get a lot more supplies and perform a lot better. The question is does the lack of the Italians cancel this out or not? If it does, then it's possible Russia could have to leave the war on time, and France be in a real bind in 1918, with an Italian entry to the war dealing a death blow is more plausible. If it doesn't then the Italians likely never join in, they would want to dogpile on a losing A-H but I presume the OP means they can;t
 
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