The Treaty of London Is Signed: May 17, 1913
- Catholic Textbook Project
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This text comes from our book, Light to the Nations, Part II.
Italia irredenta—“unredeemed Italy”—was the name Italian nationalists gave to those lands where Italians lived but that as yet were not part of Italy. The most important of these territories were Trentino in the Alps, the Italian Tyrol, and Trieste, a port city northeast of Italy—all of which, in the early 1900s, were under Austrian rule. That Austria still held these territories was a source of great annoyance to Italian nationalists.
Yet, unredeemed Italy was not the only reason that Italian nationalists were annoyed with Austria. The Italian government wanted to control the Adriatic Sea, which meant that it had to extend its power over the eastern coast of the Adriatic. But a large part of that coast had long been under the rule of Austria or of the Ottoman Empire. The Italian government was not happy, then, when Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, for this brought even more of the eastern Adriatic coast under Austrian control. The annexation caused Italy to form a closer friendship with Russia, which objected to Austria’s taking of Slavic lands.
The annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina made Italian nationalists more eager to seek colonies elsewhere. A war with Austria to take unredeemed Italy or Bosnia was, of course, out of the question. Italy had two colonies in eastern Africa (Eritrea and Italian Somali Land), but now she wanted more. Italian nationalists began calling for the conquest of the Ottoman provinces of Tripoli and Cyrenaica on the North African coast, just west of Egypt. Controlling these provinces, said the nationalists, would give room for Italian businesses to expand and provide areas of settlement for Italian citizens.
Since 1900, when his father, Umberto I, had been assassinated by an anarchist, Vittorio Emanuele III had reigned as king of Italy. But, though king, Vittorio Emanuele was not the real power in Italy; the Italian parliament was, and by 1911 it had come under the control of nationalists who dreamed of creating an Italian empire. Though the socialists in the parliament argued that new colonies would be of no benefit to Italy, the nationalists in the end won out. In September 1911, the Italian prime minister, Giovanni Giolitti, sent an ultimatum to the Ottoman sultan, demanding that he allow Italy to occupy Tripoli and Cyrenaica. When the sultan refused, Italy declared war on the Ottoman Empire.
The Italo-Turkish War, which began in late September 1911, ended on October 18, 1912, when Italy and the Ottoman Empire signed the Treaty of Lausanne. The treaty gave Italy control of Tripoli and Cyrenaica (which together became the Italian colony of Libya), as well as the Dodecanese Islands in the Aegean Sea.
But while Italy was now the recognized ruler of Libya, it would be many years before she could control the rebellious Arabs who lived there. Much blood would be shed and much money spent before Italy could truly call herself the mistress of that mostly hot, dry, and desert land.
War in the Balkans
Italy’s easy victory over the Ottoman power in Libya inspired other nations to try their luck with the ancient Turkish Muslim empire. In 1911, the Ottoman Empire still held much of what was called European Turkey, a region of the Balkan Peninsula that included the Ottoman capital, Istanbul (Constantinople), Thrace, Macedonia, and Albania. These lands of European Turkey were coveted by the small Balkan states that had won their independence in the 19th and early 20th centuries—the kingdoms of Bulgaria, Serbia, and Greece. The Italian victories in Africa showed Bulgarians, Serbs, and Greeks that the Ottomans were not as powerful as they seemed. Perhaps, after so many centuries of their harsh, repressive rule, the Turks could at last be driven from Europe.
Nationalists in Greece had long wanted to form a “Greater Greece” that would include the historical Greek regions of Epirus, Thrace, parts of Macedonia, and the city of Constantinople as well as areas along the coast of Asia Minor, the Aegean Islands, and Crete. Bulgarians, for their part, wanted what they thought were the historical Bulgarian regions of Macedonia, including the coastal city of Saloniki, while Serbia claimed parts of Macedonia that she said belonged to historical Serbia. That each of the three kingdoms wanted some part of Macedonia was a problem that could lead to disputes between them; but as long as they had a common enemy—Ottoman Empire—the kingdoms could forget their differences and unite in a common cause.
While the Ottoman Empire was still locked in the war with Italy, the three kingdoms, along with the small kingdom of Montenegro, formed the Balkan League to drive the Turks from Europe. It was tiny Montenegro that first declared war on the Ottomans on October 8, 1912, but the others soon followed.
Each of the Balkan powers basically waged its own, separate war against the empire. Montenegro invaded Albania, and Serbia moved into Macedonia, as did Greece. In November, the Greek and Serbian armies met and moved westward. For their part, the Bulgarians marched into Eastern Thrace and pushed as far east as the outskirts of Constantinople itself. In the Aegean Sea, the Greek navy twice defeated the Turkish fleet, and in January 1913, Bulgarian and Serbian forces captured the important city of Adrianople. The war ended on May 17, 1913, with the signing of the Treaty of London. By the treaty, the Ottoman Empire surrendered all of European Turkey, except for Constantinople and the lands immediately surrounding it, to the four kingdoms.
The Treaty of London gave none of the four Balkan kingdoms everything it wanted. Austria-Hungary insisted that Serbia should not get Albania, and Italy (who wanted the Albanian coastland) agreed. Though Russia and France originally backed Serbia, Austria and Italy had their way, and Albania was declared an independent kingdom. Each of the other Balkan kingdoms received some part of European Turkey; but they could come to no agreement over how to divide Macedonia, while Greece and Bulgaria disagreed over how to divide Thrace between themselves.