The attitudes of the Neutralists and Interventionists to Italys Essay Example

weak Liberal government. He too wanted to make Italy great again. He joined Nationalist protests and demonstrations. As a result, he and many of his supporters were expelled from the party.

As for the Liberals, the main Interventionist liberal was Salandra. He hoped that war would help unite the nation, and that the liberals could claim the credit for restoring Italy. He also believed that the war would be short and would strengthen the Liberal government as they would be credited for winning the war. As a result he at first negotiated with the Austrians to see if participation on the Alliance side would bring about territorial gains however when that failed he turned to GB and FR who agreed to give Italy her territorial demands, the Irredentist lands, once the war was won.

So the Treaty of London was signed in April 1915 agreeing to this. On the other hand, many disagreed with the war. They were known as Neutralists. These included the socialists and some liberals. The socialists were concerned with the welfare of the Italian people: they feared that war would have a bad effect on the working classes and that it would destroy the already weak Italian economy. The socialists condemned the war as a capitalist scheme. Liberals such as Giolitti shared these sentiments, as well as being concerned about the state of the Italian army.

Many Liberals opposed the idea of entering the war. About 100, led by Giolitti, believed that Italy wasn’t ready for war and that war would be bad for Italian society and economy. The Catholic Church were unhappy about the idea of the war and fighting other Catholic countries

like Austria. They kept diplomatically quiet. The Italian public were also apathetic about the idea of war but supported the belief that participation might lead to territorial gains from the Austrian Empire.