What if Italy joined the Central Powers in World War I?

A break from actual news

On the eve of World War I, Europe was divided into two major blocs.

One was the Triple Entente linking France, Russia, and the United Kingdom — three major powers who’d settled their colonial disputes and were determined to contain the rising power of Germany. The other was the Triple Alliance of Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy. War broke out, famously, because Austria went to war with the small nation of Serbia, which was allied with Russia, and that set the dominoes tumbling.

Except for Italy, which initially opted out of the war, only to join later on the Allied side.

Once they entered, Italy’s wartime performance has generally been viewed as dismal. Half a million Italian soldiers died and, even more so than on the Western Front, the battle lines of the Italian Front barely moved at all until the Central Powers’ sudden collapse at the end of the war.

Notably, Italy ended up requiring the assistance of a number of British, French, American, and even Czechoslovak divisions, though they only had to fight on a narrow front against an Austro-Hungarian Empire that was also battling Serbia and Russia.

The more important Allies were so unimpressed with Italian military performance that in the postwar treaty making, they erred on the side of being nice to the then-new country of Yugoslavia, and Italy wound up gaining less territory than they’d hoped from joining the Allied war effort. Disappointment with the fruits of war became part of the grist for Benito Mussolini’s mill and contributed to the rise of Fascism. But of course, Italy’s military performance in World War II as an Axis power was also incredibly weak and disappointing, requiring multiple bailouts from Germany and arguably leaving Hitler worse off than he’d have been without their “help.”

The overall poor reputation of the Italian military performance means they tend to be neglected in accounts of the war. But I think there’s a good case to be made that had Italy stuck with the Triple Alliance and fought as one of the Central Powers in World War I, they would have won the war. Italy was not a particularly effective fighting force against Austria and there’s no reason to believe they would have been a particularly effective fighting force against France. But even a modest amount of additional pressure on France would have been a big deal. Austria would have had more troops free to fight Serbia and Russia. The naval balance of power in the Mediterranean would have shifted, with the Allied blockade dramatically less effective.

So why didn’t Italy join the Central Powers?

Well, they wanted a higher price for their support than Austria-Hungary was willing to pay. But the Habsburgs were both the proximate instigator of the war and had their empire completely erased from the map as a result of losing it. So I think it’s not just an interesting historical counterfactual, but a case in point of the importance of setting priorities and thinking clearly and pragmatically about what you’re doing.