Week 56

 

Last week I had promised to conclude in a thematically coherent way by following up on the debate on the League of Nations with a review of the traditional arguments of the Italian Dalmatian irredentism. During the week something else has come up though, that I believe relevant enough to warrant inclusion in this ongoing series.

If you haven't already, you may consider checking out /u/Elm11's panel on Armistice day. In the context of that panel, I had submitted an answer concerning the “myth of the mutilated victory” and in broad terms the Treaty of London and the Italian diplomatic efforts in the Peace Conference of Paris.

That answer had inspired a pertinent observation by /u/King_of_Men, which, albeit a bit outside of the focus of my post, warrants perhaps a longer elaboration than what I immediately submitted as a follow up. Which is the reason why you'll have to wait till next week to hopefully see the end of the last one. For reasons of space, I am not reproducing my original post here, but you can and perhaps should check it since I won't reiterate all the points made there, but I'll reference a few of them.

First I should probably admit that it would have been better avoid using a somewhat technical term, if I didn't intend for the argument to be taken as a technical one. All things considered, and after reviewing my original submission, it still seems a fair assessment to me that the eventual ratification of the Treaty of Saint Germain did not constitute a direct breach of the Treaty of London – but it is also true that the choice of nullifying it did not come as a result of a proper agreement of the four signatories. But rather of a (perhaps substantial) disagreement between France and Great Britain and Italy (this in itself is a point I'd like to cover in further detail later – for the time being, let's keep it so).

For the purpose of avoiding ambiguity in what follows, I'll disclose without prejudice that I do have an inclination to look at treaties more as descriptions of the international relations than as prescriptions. And at the elaboration surrounding treaties as the most “true” and immediate expression of international relations. And with the same frankness I'll admit that I don't think I am mistaken on the issue – especially in this particular context (for more than a few reasons I'll try to illustrate in the following). As for what the British and French thought exactly, that's harder to say – a point that I should have made more evident in my phrasing. I have a few more arguments that should illustrate somehow the Italian point of view. But it's better to begin by returning to the treaty itself.

The first hing I did was to start snooping around in search for contemporary or late contemporary sources on the Treaty – finding little in so far as arguments on its inherent merit and solidity, and more on its context and on the legitimacy of its formulation. I'll mention a few of the most relevant ones:

Albrecht-Carrie, R. The present significance of the Treaty of London of 1915 [1939]

Albrecht-Carrie, R. Italy and her allies, June, 1919 [1941]

Albrecht-Carrie, R. Italian colonial policy 1914-18 [1946]

Seton-Watson, R.W. The Italian intervention and the secret Treaty of London [1926]

Toscano, M. Il patto di Londra [1931]

Toscano, M. Gli accordi di San Giovanni di Moriana [1936]

Notably Seton-Watson (who was not a fan of Sonnino's diplomatic efforts, at all – and is a fairly partial source) chose a summary similar to my own (I had not read it before hand):

On April 26^th then, the secret Treaty of London was signed, by which Italy […] received the Entente's permission, in the event of victory, to annex the following territories: etc.

Regardless of Seton-Watson's point of view, the treaty did not prescribe any specific form of military action, nor commitment of any amount of military forces to provide Italy with their desired prize. Such deliberations would anyway have been delegated to the conventions on military matters, since those required some degree of involvement of the military staff which had not (for the Italians at least) been informed of the Treaty, nor of the details of the of the ongoing negotiations. In fact, if we are to believe the Italian High Command, those talks proceeded very much against the intentions of the Army and what they estimated as the strategic needs of Italy by pursuing the annexation of the Dalmatian coast.

While I have been so far unable to locate the full text of the first convention – or any of the subsequent revisions – those would anyways not have been intended as extensions of the Treaty unless otherwise agreed upon by the four subscribers; similarly for any matter of armistice and demarcation lines, which were subordinated to the evaluation of the respective High Commands. The immediate purpose of the convention though, as stated in the Treaty, was to secure the Italians from the risk of the Austrians taking advantage of their already complete mobilization to attempt to overrun the weaker Italian forces by applying (by means of the Russian Army) a convenient and appropriate pressure on the Galician front. As per art. 1:

This convention shall settle the minimum number of military forces to be employed by Russia against Austria-Hungary in order to prevent that Power from concentrating all its strength against Italy

This was a legacy of the original diplomatic action of the Marquis of San Giuliano who, already in August 1914 – a time when the extent and rapidity of the Russian deployment on the German and Austrian border was still unsure – had made explicit inquiries (for instance on August 17^th to the Italian Ambassador in Budapest, the Baron Fasciotti) as to how much of the Russian army was going to be employed against the Austrians; for the obvious concern that Austria, if left substantially unchallenged by the Russians, could overrun Italy in case of an untimely intervention (the whole, extremely competent action of San Giuliano was dedicated to create the conditions for a timely Italian intervention, since only a precise action could make it so that the intervention was actually advantageous for the Italians – in this sense, and we'll return to that later, Sonnino's gravest mistake was to consolidate those diplomatic lines that had been conceived, and by necessity, as fluid and evolving under the circumstances by his predecessor).

Art. 2 – while apparently the most obvious one – became rather controversial because of the prolonged delay of the Italian declaration of war to Germany.

On her part, Italy undertakes to use her entire resources for the purpose of waging war jointly with France, Great Britain and Russia against all their enemies.

The Italian delay though, while unpopular with the allies, was not only a consequence of the difficulties to disentangle properly from the Triple Alliance (Italy would argue that Austria-Hungary had actually caused a breach in the Triple Alliance with its refusal to provide upfront compensation for its intended expansion in the Balkans – as per art. 7 of the Triple – but took the step of a formal denunciation of the Treaty only on May 3^rd 1915) but also a coherent expression of the Italian point of view on the war.

The usual argument for the application of the Schlieffen plan is the foreseeable slow mobilization of the Russian Army. Regardless of the technical details on the application of the plan, the inability of the Germans to secure a swift victory over the French (something that certain elements among the Italian diplomacy had thought a realistic possibility – and that included Sonnino himself, who had at the time favored for this reason, one of the very few, an immediate intervention on the side of the Triple) had persuaded many that, with a Russian military effort only destined to increase with time, the Central Empires were destined to a more or less rapid defeat. The Austrians especially had looked far less formidable than expected and there were talks that they might end up forced out of the war before the end of 1915.