Gaetano Salvemini - La politica estera italiana dal 1871 al 1915

Parte quarta dream to you and me just a short while ago - that the Italian and Austrian battalions should fight side by side as dose allies - might easily come about now." Tittoni, the Italian ambassador to Paris, told the German ambassador: "This affair is having the right consequences. We now know where we stand with the French. We now know where are to be found the irascible and selfish friends, and where the calm, altruistic friends." These proofs that the Italian Government was not avers from "reaping still further advantages from the Triple Alliance" produced the desired effect first among. the Germans. On February 23rd, Jagow, the German ambassador, speaking "not as ambassador but as a friend" to a high officiai of the Italian Foreign Office, hinted that an action against the Dardanelles would probably arouse no recriminations on the part of Berch– told, the new minister of Foreign Affairs who had just succeeded Aehrenthal. Jagow was .m,istaken. The next day, February 24th, the Italian sank two Turkish destroyers in the port of Beirut and on the coasts of Syria. The Austrian ambassador to Rome immediately "called the attention of the Italian Government to the responsabilities which Italy would incur by an– other bombardment of Beirut where there was a large Austrian colony." The opinion voiced by Jagow the day before had been the outcome of wishful thinking. The policy of vetoes inaugurateci by Aehrenthal had been inherited by his successor. At this point, San Giuliano had an idea. By virtue of article VII of the Triple Alliance, Berchtold could prohibit operations of the Italian fleet against the Ottoman coasts and the islands in the Aegean Sea but not against the Ottoman fleet. The Italian fleet could consequently enter the Dardanelles, penetrate into the Sea of Marmora, and destroy the Turkish fleet there. On March 14th, the chiefs of the Italian fleet were given orders to devise some pian of operation with this objective. . Ten days later, on March 24th, the German Emperor and the King of Italy met at Venice. The king displayed irritation against the French, made the most ampie declarations of loyalty to the alliance and obtained that the Berlin Cabinet should make Berchtold understand that he would act in the interest of the Alliance by not opposing a decisive "blow" _on the part of the Italian fleet against the Dardanelles. Berchtold, whom the German Government sounded without explaining specifically what this "blow" would consist in, refused all concessions. But he did not refuse to be conciliatory toward another proposal. In the . south-western corner of Asia Minor there was a group of islands, the so– called Dodecanese, which, from the administrative standpoint, was linked to Asiatic Turkey, and which could, by closing one eye, be considered as foreign to the Aegean Sea and therefore not taboo according to article VII of the treaty of Alliance. These islands were far from the Balkan penisula and it was consequently to be hoped that an Italian occupation would provoke no rebound in the Balkan territories about which Berchtold was so parti- 446 BibliotecaGino Bianco