the form of a hundred thousand men landed on the N. coast of
Thrace and a naval attack on the Bosporus, came to nothing.
Great Britain and France were not merely to assent to Russia's
schemes but to give them effect; and they were not such as would
enlist support in the Balkans. Venizelos was apparently pre-
pared to land two Greek divisions, but they would almost
certainly have been inadequate, and it was more than Hohen-
zollern interests that prevented the embarkation. Bulgaria
would have bowed to the accomplished fact, but no sane politi-
cian could have expected her to help Russia into Constantinople.
The western Allies themselves were deeply committed to an
offensive with their maximum force on the western front, and
reluctantly doled out belated troops for the Dardanelles. So the
ill-starred enterprise dragged on to its inevitable end. Success
may sometimes redeem the worst of policies and plans, but the
failure of the Dardanelles expedition precipitated the evils it
had sought to prevent, drove Bulgaria into the enemies' camp,
and handed the Balkans over to the Teutonic alliance.
Italy's Entry. The next diplomatic move was more successful. The better mind of Italy had been shown by her refusal to acquiesce in an Austrian attack on Serbia in 1913 and to back up her Allies in Aug. 1914; and the tradition of Garibaldi and Mazzini had already inspired Italians to enlist under Ricci Garibaldi for service in France. The gibe of the French diplo- matist that Italy would rush to the rescue of the conqueror was disproved by her quiescence when the Germans were at the gates of Paris; and popular Italian sympathies were undoubtedly stirred by the wrongs of Belgium and of Serbia. But in Italy, as in other countries, there was at first a hiatus between the soul of the people and the diplomacy of her government. It was Baron Sidney Sonnino who was mainly instrumental in negotiat- ing the secret Treaty of London on April 26 1915. He had been convinced that Italy's interests required her intervention on the side of the Entente. He believed in a balance of power which Italy might turn to her own advantage. The seizure of Tunis by France in 1881, and fear lest the Mediterranean might become a French lake, had driven Italy into the Triple Alliance and the bosom of her hereditary Austrian enemy; and fear lest the Adriatic should fall under Teutonic domination if the Entente were defeated, and under Yugoslav influence if it won, drove Sonnino in 1915 out of the refuge of neutrality. In either event it was only by Italian belligerency that the situation could be redressed in Italy's favour; and Sonnino's calculations were that, if the war did not end in a decisive victory, Italy would probably get more out of a semi-victorious Entente than out of a semi-victorious Germany. Germany might, indeed, throw the Habsburg dominions into the melting pot as part of a general liquidation, and recognize Yugoslav independence; but she would keep Trieste for herself and Fiume for Hungary, which would be worse for Italy than the status quo.
Better terms could be obtained from the Entente, and Sonnino sought a fulcrum for his bargain in the concessions he demanded from Austria. Both Austria and Italy were pledged to the principle of reciprocal compensation in case either was forced to disturb the status quo in the Balkans. Austria argued that the invasion of Serbia involved no permanent territorial change; but Sonnino retorted that during the Turkish-Italian War Austria had declared that an Italian bombardment of the Dar- danelles or even the use of searchlights against the Turkish coasts would constitute a claim for Austrian compensation. In March 1915 Burian admitted the principle of the Italian claim, and under pressure from Germany conceded the Trentino to avoid a breach. But there was no guarantee that the conces- sion would be regarded as binding in the hour of victory, nor would Burian budge an inch with regard to Gorizia, Trieste, the Dalmatian islands, or Valona. Sonnino had naturally less compunction in demanding from the Entente Powers their recognition of acquisitions to be made at the expense of their enemy than he had in requiring the surrender of territory from his ally; and in the Treaty of London, signed on April 26 1915, he made full use of this opportunity. To the Entente it seemed that victory was all that mattered, and victory appeared to be
doubtful without Italian assistance. It was useless to talk about placing the rights of the smaller nationalities upon an unas- sailable foundation if insistence upon all those rights prevented any foundation at all. Nor apparently did any of the Entente governments appreciate at that time the view which the smaller nationalities involved in the bargain took of their rights.
The complete dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy was not then, declared Salandra four years later, considered as a possible war-aim; and it was under the impression that peace would still leave the Habsburg Empire a formidable foe to Italy that the Entente agreed to the terms which ultimately threatened to break up the Peace Conference in 1919 and provoke a fresh war between Italians and Yugoslavs. Thus Italy was to receive! the Trentino up to the Brenner Pass; this would give her all the advantages of a strategic offensive against Austria which Italy complained that Austria had possessed against her, and would subject to Italian rule a quarter of a million Germans. She was to acquire Istria, including Gorizia, Trieste, and Pola, but not Fiume, and western Dalmatia including the harbours of Zara and Sebenico, a protectorate over central Albania and the sover- eignty of Valona. The Adriatic would thus become an Italian lake. In the E. Mediterranean she was to have entire sov- ereignty over the Dodecanese which she had occupied since the Turco-Italian War, and in the event of a complete or partial partition of Turkey was to receive the province of Adalia and its adjacent littoral. She was to be compensated for any British and French colonial expansion in Africa by similar extension of territory in Eritrea, Somaliland, and Libya, and to be paid a share in the war indemnity corresponding to her sacrifices.- The signatories were pledged to secrecy and to support Italy in opposing papal participation in the negotiations and settle- ment of peace. Italy in return undertook to wage war with all her resources against all the enemies of the Entente, to com- mence hostilities within a month, and to sign the declaration of Sept. 5 1914 by which the Allies engaged to make no separate peace. But while she denounced the Triple Alliance on May j 1915 and declared war on Austria on the 23rd, she did not an- nounce her adhesion to the pact of Sept. until Nov. 30 and : remained at peace with Germany until Aug. 27 1916. Salandra subsequently claimed this delay as an important service rendered to his country, and Tittoni justified it on the ground that no date had been specified in the treaty, although her Allies in giving their consent to it noted her declaration that she would " actively- intervene at the earliest possible date, and at any rate not later than one month after their signature."
The secrecy of the treaty exonerates the Italian people from the charge of being actuated by its materialistic motives when- they enthusiastically supported intervention in May 1915 and defeated Giolotti's attempt to drive Salandra from power. 1 But the treaty was soon revealed to the Yugoslavs with results which materially helped the Austrian cause. Great indignation- was expressed during the Peace Conference of 1919 at the' admission of Yugoslavs to plead their cause, and the Italian' premier Orlando exclaimed that it would be as proper to call in the Germans, since Slovenes and Croats had fought through- out the war on Austria's side. But some at least of their per- sistence was due to the Treaty of London, which proposed to transfer hundreds of thousands of them merely from a familiar to an unfamiliar alien domination. The upshot was largely to reinforce the small pro-Austrian party among the Yugoslavs, and to place obstacles in the way of Italy's march to Trieste. Similarly deterrent was the effect of the Italian claim to the purely Greek Dodecanese and her Albanian pretensions upon the popular mind in Greece. Italy was not, however, alone to blame. On the eve of her decision a Pan-Slav society in Petro-i grad adopted and published abroad a resolution to the effect that in view of Russia's victorious progress across the Carpa- thians the projected Italian intervention was belated and undesir- able; and the first use which Serbia made of the promised accession of strength was, as soon as Italy was at war, to dash across to the Albanian coast where Serb and Italian ambitions conflicted. It was not the imperialism of Italy which delayed
