@vonLettowVorbeck1914:
@Suvorov:
Okay, guys. � You play whatever crazy alternative reality game you want to. � You can even roll for wormholes, through which AA1940 units can enter the game in a nod to The Final Countdown. � I’m going to play the game with the rules as written, in which Italy is a member of the Allied powers, because no other alternative is plausible. � Anyone arguing the contrary either lacks enough understanding of the political situation (despite the best efforts of many here to educate them) or is wilfully ignoring history.
Don’t act like some benevolent instructor who is helping us understand the keys to history, helping us idiots out of our ignorance. The question is not whether Italy would have jumped at easy, quick gains in North Africa in the case that Germany offered them after the war might have tipped decisively in CP favor, it’s whether or not Austria and Germany would have even bothered to make that offer to Italy.
I’ll make it simple. France is overrun, Russia is being pushed back. France cannot defend its North African colonies. Italian leaders have concluded that the CP is winning decisively, and the war will be over soon.
The CP offers those North African colonies to Italy if they help against the British in Africa.
Do you honestly still guarantee that Italy would have just snubbed the CP and said “no thanks?”
Well, based on what you and that other guy have posted here, I rather do see myself as a benevolent instructor attempting to help you out of your ignorance; the “idiots” part was not intended. I’ve cited respected and recognized works of history, I’ve even typed out excerpts, and I’ve done virtually everything possible at an intellectual level. After seeing the way that no one seems to want to listen to reason, I realized that I had two options: (1) reduce it to stick figure drawings in hopes of getting through, or (2) accept that the resistance has nothing to do with a lack of understanding but rather, simply the propensity of people with too much time to argue on the Internet for the sake of arguing.
You can make fifty hypothetical situations, but the likelihood of any of them is extremely low. You by your own admission left the standard at “plausibility”, and your hypotheticals aren’t plausible. France might have been overrun; it was touch and go for a while. However, Germany didn’t have the manpower to do that and push Russia back in a permanent way. The Germans were unable to follow up on the successes at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes, and they were only able to do what they did there because they pulled out vital troops from the Marne.
All of these points are the sorts of things that guys with nothing better to do start to argue about: would the Marne Offensive have succeeded if Hindenburg and Ludendorff hadn’t taken out the troops? Could the Germans have just held a defensive line in East Prussia? Would Berlin have fallen? We will never know, and the speculation about that is useless from a historical perspective (history does not know the conditional) but fun in the proper settings.
However, not all historical “what ifs” are as easily debated, because there is no evidence to support a hypothetical outcome. Italy entering the war on the side of the Central Powers is one such hypothetical outcome. I’ve pointed this out by citing sources. To review: 1. Austria was Italy’s sworn enemy, and Italy’s three prior wars (outside colonial wars) had all been against Austria. 2. Irredentism was a powerful force in Italian politics, because many felt that the goals of the Risorgimento, begun so long before, had not been met until Italy recovered South Tyrol, Fiume, Zara, the Dalmatian coast, etc. 3. No one in the government advocated an alliance with the Central Powers, except Sonnino, who changed his mind after the Marne. 4. Outside the government, those in Italian society who were not in favor of neutrality were vocally arguing for intervention against Austria, including the socialists, the nationalists and all major papers other than La Stampa (which advocated neutrality), and any attempt at approaching the Central Powers for an alliance would likely have caused the government to collapse. 5. Italy had only ever signed the alliance with Germany and Austria because Bismarck didn’t like Austria, and Italy saw Bismarck as a counterbalance; once he died and Germany realigned itself, Italy was looking for ways to ditch the alliance. 6. Italy HAD to remain neutral long enough to see the Germans fail at the Marne, because it didn’t have enough troops or equipment (cf. Montanelli quote from earlier post). 7. The Allies promised Italy so much more than Austria could bring itself to promise that there was no way, in any universe that could be replicated in game play, that Italy would join the Central Powers.
Please provide a source, a credible source, that can refute these points if you want to continue. Otherwise, all you’re saying is, “Well, it could have happened, so that makes it plausible”. Plausibility is not equivalent to possibility. If the Germans had miraculously destroyed the French Army and the Russian Army and the Ottoman Empire driven the British from Egypt, then perhaps Italy would have joined in the free-for-all that followed. However, that scenario is itself not plausible. To show something is plausible, you need to generally present evidence that would support that assertion. I’ve presented evidence to counter it. I have yet to see evidence for it.
Not only that, but if the Germans have destroyed the French and Russian armies, the Axis & Allies 1914 game has been effectively won, so from a game play perspective it makes even less sense.
