Why is Italy an allied power?

Nah, Italy doesn’t need to be neutral a turn.  It is already at the very end of the turn order.  One could argue the end of turn 1 is already pushing into 1915 anyway.  The Ottoman Empire goes one turn earlier and they entered the war late 1914.  It makes chronological sense to me.  Romania and Portugal can both be activated in turn one but they didn’t enter the war until 1916.  This a board game based on World War I, not a simulation of World War I.

Let’s get real. If the Italian decisionmakers felt it was more in their interest to join the CP than the Allies, they would have.

There are plenty of things that could happen in the game that did not happen in the war that would influence Italy; plenty have already been posted.

Does that mean that Italy should be allowed to switch sides in the official game? Probably not, IMO. However, it’s not like a WWI game that allowed that would be like it was allowing sharks with laser beams.

@vonLettowVorbeck1914:

Let’s get real. If the Italian decisionmakers felt it was more in their interest to join the CP than the Allies, they would have.

There are plenty of things that could happen in the game that did not happen in the war that would influence Italy; plenty have already been posted.

Does that mean that Italy should be allowed to switch sides in the official game? Probably not, IMO. However, it’s not like a WWI game that allowed that would be like it was allowing sharks with laser beams.

You mean if Germany doesnt invade Belgium first round, Britain would still declare war against them? Thats disgusting!

Any notion that Italy was serious about potentially joining the Central Powers is completely misguided.  Salandra’s government was actually worried that the Austrians might provide major concessions to Italy because the press was already so anti-Austrian and whipping the middle class into a frenzy demanding war against Austria, and Italy had already made serious promises to France and Britain.  The military may have had plans for all sorts of eventualities, the same way that I’d bet the Pentagon has some dusty old plan for invading Mexico that no one would ever seriously use as evidence of aggressive intent, but it was clear from the beginning who the enemy was going to be.

As I mentioned earlier, the only reason Italy even entered the Triple Alliance was because after the crushing French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, Italy wanted to have Bismarck on her side, and saw Germany as a valid counterweight to Austria.  Because Bismarck had no interest in the Balkans (cf. his famous quote about them not being worth the bones of a single grenadier), Italy and Germany saw eye to eye while Bismarck was in power.  However, as soon as Bismarck left and German foreign policy changed in a variety of ways (all of which were to prove disastrous for Germany in the end), favoring Austria over Russia and alienating Italy in the process.  From that instant, Italy was looking for ways to graciously bow out of its Triple Alliance.  Giolitti, Salandra - basically, every government of every stripe - all were trying to realign Italy with the traditional ally, France.  The only issue was whether or not Italy would join the war.  The “notabili” seemed to want to stay out, but due to changes in Italian voting laws party politics were beginning to count for more than personalities.

I’m sure there’s some author out there who has tried to make the case that Italy might have stayed out, because of course that’s the nature of academia.  However, I haven’t seen any respected or compelling arguments to that effect.  In addition to Montanelli (his 22-volume history of Italy is truly epic), reading Martin Gilbert’s history of the war, or Hew Strachan, or any of the other noted historians of the war, will quickly impress upon the reader the impossibility that Italy would join the war as an ally of Austria.

Really? So if the German attack on France worked the Italians would have still switched?

It’s only misguided if you consider Germany taking Paris in 1914 to have been impossible in all possible worlds, in which case that possibility in the game should also be frustrating to you.

If Germany won in 90 days and France was defeated, Italy might stay out of any war. Still don’t think they join the central powers unless the Allies provoked war first in some obvious fashion.

Once again, we need to think realistically. If the CP dangled colonial gains out in front of Italy after success in France, it’s not hard to imagine what Italy would do.

@vonLettowVorbeck1914:

Once again, we need to think realistically. If the CP dangled colonial gains out in front of Italy after success in France, it’s not hard to imagine what Italy would do.

But they did.  Italy still refused.  Again, Italy never seriously considered joining the Central Powers.  If Germany had won in 90 days, Italy would have just stayed out of the war because it would have been over quickly.

@Suvorov:

@vonLettowVorbeck1914:

Once again, we need to think realistically. If the CP dangled colonial gains out in front of Italy after success in France, it’s not hard to imagine what Italy would do.

But they did.  Italy still refused.  Again, Italy never seriously considered joining the Central Powers.  If Germany had won in 90 days, Italy would have just stayed out of the war because it would have been over quickly.

How could they have dangled colonial gains after success in France when the CP did not have their success in France? How do you know the war would have ended so soon?

This is the same old assumption that plagues the study of history: That things happened as they did because that was the only way they could have happened.

Changing causes change effects. Italy joined the Allies when Allied victory was more in doubt than CP victory would have been if the CP had taken France.

Another thing that isn’t doing anyone any favors is this belief that Italy in an act of nobility of soul stayed out of the war at the start because the CP were the aggressors. Sometimes there is a difference between why countries say they are doing something and why they actually do something.

Ok, well this sounds like an interesting house rule, but the game’s politics are unlikely to be changed.

Like I said before, I don’t expect or even want this to be in the official game.

But some on here are acting like Italy joining the CP is more ridiculous than the Germans replacing their subs with sharks that have laser beams.

Considering Italy switched sides in both World Wars, I don’t think we need to have any illusions about them being particularly stalwart in international commitments.

Both sides held postwar goodies for Italy, but they wanted disputed areas which Austria-Hungary controlled and not dried up desert in Africa.

I could accept that Italy might have switched sides after a German victory against France. But, this should not be included in this game. If Paris is captured things are already looking bleak for the allies. If Italy joins the Central Powers immediately after, there is no chance for an allied victory. It might be historical but no one would want to play the game.

It’s laughable because it just wasn’t going to happen.  This is NOT just another example of seeing the historical outcome as the only possible outcome.  There were a lot of points in history where things could have played out either way.  Italy joining the Central Powers just wasn’t one of them.  You guys can protest the facts all you want, but the overwhelming verdict of scholars on the war who have studied the issue much more carefully than gamers at a fansite is that Italy would either have stayed out of the war or (as it did) joined on the side that was fighting Austria.

Also, while I’m not here to defend Italy or its fighting skills (von Blomberg reported, after watching Italian war games and asked what he thought, “The side that wins the next war will be whatever side doesn’t have Italy for an ally”), it should be noted that Italy kept fighting even after the disaster at Caporetto and went on to win a victory at Vittorio Veneto.  Italy didn’t “change sides” in the war - from 1902 it was allied with France and it stayed on the Allied side despite calamitous setbacks.

Who cares.
It could be a fun house rule, if the thought makes you irritated then obviously its not suited for you.

@Suvorov:

It’s laughable because it just wasn’t going to happen.  This is NOT just another example of seeing the historical outcome as the only possible outcome.  There were a lot of points in history where things could have played out either way.  Italy joining the Central Powers just wasn’t one of them.  You guys can protest the facts all you want, but the overwhelming verdict of scholars on the war who have studied the issue much more carefully than gamers at a fansite is that Italy would either have stayed out of the war or (as it did) joined on the side that was fighting Austria.

Which scholars?

Italy would still have joined the Allies if they saw them losing badly? Italy wouldn’t have joined the CP if they saw the CP winning handily and Italy was offered North Africa to help finish the job?

Italy may have been fickle, but it’s leaders weren’t stupid.

Montanelli is very clear about it.  Italy needed time before it could join the war:

Ma sopratutto bisognava rimediare alle gravi lacune della nostra preparazione militare.  Del milione e trecentomila uomini che lo Stato Maggiore riteneva indispensabile per la difesa delle nostre frontiere, non ne avevamo sotto le arme che quattrocentomila.  E Salandra, dopo aver dichiarato alla Camera ch’eravamo in grado di equipaggiarne tre volti tanti, scopr� che i magazzini, svuotati dalla guerra di Libia, non erano stati riforniti.  Se l’Austria - scrisse pi� tardi Cadorna - ci avesse attaccato, ci saremmo trovati alla sua merc�.

San Giuliano tranquillizz� il Generale scrivendogli alla fine di agosto che l’Italia non sarebbe entrata nel conflitto senza un novantanove per cento di probabilit� di vittoria perch� una campagna come quella del 1866 avrebbe significato la fine della monarchia, e ribad� ufficialmente la neutralit�.  - p. 146, L’Italia di Giolitti, 1974, Rizzoli Editore, Milano, reprinted 2010 RCS Libri S.p.A., Milano.

_But above all it was necessary to remedy the serious gaps in our military preparedness. Of the one million and three hundred thousand men that the General Staff considered indispensable for the defense of our borders, we did not have more than four hundred thousand under arms. And Salandra, having declared in the House that we were able to equip as many as three times that much, discovered that the warehouses, emptied by the war in Libya, had not been replenished. If Austria - later wrote Cadorna - had attacked us, we would be at its mercy.

San Giuliano reassured the General writing to him at the end of August that Italy would not have entered into the conflict without a ninety-nine percent chance of winning because a campaign like the one in 1866 would have meant the end of the monarchy, and officially reaffirmed the policy of neutrality._

As to which side to join, Montanelli two sentences later explains that the first overtures were made to the British.  However, the government of Salandra was weak.  Popular forces, particularly the irredentists, were making waves.  Montanelli notes that the group “Secolo” had formed, that Peppino Garibaldi had already formed a volunteer legion, and others like Marinetti coined mottos such as “marciare, non marcire” (to march, not to rot), advocating an active role to support France.  Giuriati also advocated fiercely for a pro-French, anti-Austrian point.  The socialists, under Filippo Corridoni, supported by Michele Bianchi, Edmondo Rossoni, Alceste De Ambris and Giuseppe Giulietti, had all gone to the banner of irredentism and advocated attacking Austria.  Of course, it was when the editors of “Avanti” didn’t like the anti-Austrian writings of Benito Mussolini that he founded a new paper, “Il Popolo d’Italia”, to advocate for intervention.  His exact phrase was “O guerra, o rivoluzione”.  Of the major newspapers, “Giornale d’Italia”, “La Tribuna”, “L’Idea Nazionale”, “Il Secolo” and “Corriere della Sera” all advocated intervention against Austria, with only “La Stampa” from Turin advocating neutrality.

No one advocated for intervention on the side of the Central Powers outside the government, and hardly anyone inside had.  One of the only Italians in government in favor of the Central Powers was Sonnino, who replaced San Giuliano as Foreign Minister in October 1914 (San Giuliano died).  However, Sonnino had taken that position only when the Germans were advancing quickly, and he rebuffed the Austrian offers, just as Giolitti rebuffed von B�low when the two met face to face.

In short, in 376 pages there is ample evidence to refute any allegation that Italy was seriously considering joining the Central Powers.  Italy had to play for time, however, because it was not ready in 1914 to declare war, and so of course the various ministers and ambassadors met to discuss theoretical alliances.

@ch0senfktard:

Who cares.
It could be a fun house rule, if the thought makes you irritated then obviously its not suited for you.

How would you balance that out?  The Allies would be crushed if the Italians joined the CPs without any other adjustments.

Why this is such a laughable concept, I honestly don’t get.

let me help you…

The decision to join the fray on the side of the Allies was based largely on the assurances Italy received in the Treaty of London, signed in April 1915. By its terms, Italy would receive the fulfillment of its national dream: control over territory on its border with Austria-Hungary stretching from Trentino through the South Tyrol to Trieste. In addition, the Allies promised the Italians parts of Dalmatia and numerous islands along Austria-Hungary’s Adriatic coast; the Albanian port city of Vlore (Italian: Valona) and a central protectorate in Albania; and territory from the Ottoman Empire.

and this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wars_of_Italian_Independence

Interesting, so it was a treaty signed well after the Germans failed to defeat France.

Clearly, if France had gone differently, so would have Italy’s role.