Editing Unification of Italy (section)

===Irredentism and the World Wars===
[[File:Promised Borders of the Tready of London.png|thumb|left|Territories promised to Italy by the [[Treaty of London (1915)]], i.e. [[Trentino-Alto Adige]], the [[Julian March]] and [[Dalmatia]] (tan), and the [[Snežnik (plateau)|Snežnik Plateau]] area (green). Dalmatia, after the WWI, however, was not assigned to Italy but to [[Kingdom of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]].]]
Italy [[Italian entry into World War I|entered into the First World War]] in 1915 with the aim of completing national unity: for this reason, the Italian intervention in the First World War is also considered the [[Fourth Italian War of Independence]],<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.piacenzaprimogenita150.it/index.php?it%2F176%2Fil-1861-e-le-quattro-guerre-per-lindipendenza-1848-1918|title=Il 1861 e le quattro Guerre per l'Indipendenza (1848–1918)|date=6 March 2015|language=it|access-date=12 March 2021|archive-date=19 March 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220319075828/http://www.piacenzaprimogenita150.it/index.php?it%2F176%2Fil-1861-e-le-quattro-guerre-per-lindipendenza-1848-1918|url-status=dead}}</ref> in a historiographical perspective that identifies in the latter the conclusion of the unification of Italy, whose military actions began during the [[revolutions of 1848]] with the [[First Italian War of Independence]].<ref name="ReferenceA">{{cite web|url=http://www.beniculturali.it/mibac/export/MiBAC/sito-MiBAC/Contenuti/MibacUnif/Eventi/visualizza_asset.html_1239896580.html|title=La Grande Guerra nei manifesti italiani dell'epoca|language=it|access-date=12 March 2021|archive-date=23 September 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923183754/http://www.beniculturali.it/mibac/export/MiBAC/sito-MiBAC/Contenuti/MibacUnif/Eventi/visualizza_asset.html_1239896580.html|url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_LntMIUOXngC&q=%22quarta+guerra+d%27indipendenza%22&pg=PA41|title=Il Manuale di Storia in Italia, di Piergiovanni Genovesi|isbn=978-8856818680|language=it|access-date=12 March 2021|last1=Genovesi|first1=Piergiovanni|date=11 June 2009|publisher=FrancoAngeli }}</ref>

During the post-unification era, some Italians were dissatisfied with the current state of the Italian Kingdom since they wanted the kingdom to include [[Triest]]e, [[Italian irredentism in Istria|Istria]], and other adjacent territories as well. This Italian irredentism succeeded in [[World War I]] with the annexation of Trieste and [[Trento]], with the respective territories of [[Julian March]] and [[Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol|Trentino-Alto Adige]].

The Kingdom of Italy had declared neutrality at the beginning of the war, officially because the [[Triple Alliance (1882)|Triple Alliance]] with Germany and Austria-Hungary was a defensive one, requiring its members to come under attack first. Many Italians were still hostile to Austria's continuing occupation of ethnically Italian areas, and Italy chose not to enter. [[Austria-Hungary]] requested Italian neutrality, while the [[Triple Entente]] (which included Great Britain, France and Russia) requested its intervention. With the [[Treaty of London (1915)|Treaty of London]], signed in April 1915, Italy agreed to declare war against the [[Central Powers]] in exchange for the ''irredent'' territories of Friuli, Trentino, and [[Italian irredentism in Dalmatia|Dalmatia]] (see ''[[Italia irredenta]]'').
[[File:GovernateOfDalmatia1941 43.png|thumb|right|400px|Map of the three Italian provinces of the [[Governorate of Dalmatia]] (1941–1943): [[province of Zara]], [[Spalato (Italian province)|province of Spalato]] and [[province of Cattaro]]]]

Italian irredentism obtained an important result after the First World War, when Italy gained [[Trieste]], [[Gorizia]], [[Istria]], and the cities of [[Zadar|Zara]] and [[Pula|Pola]] after the [[Treaty of Rapallo (1920)|Treaty of Rapallo]] in 1920. Some historians see the Risorgimento as continuing to that time, which is the view presented at the [[Central Museum of the Risorgimento]] at [[Altare della Patria]] in Rome.<ref name="Arnaldi"/><ref name="museo"/> But Italy did not receive other territories promised by the Treaty of London, such Dalmatia, so this outcome was denounced as a "[[mutilated victory]]". The rhetoric of "mutilated victory" was adopted by [[Benito Mussolini]] and led to the [[Fascist Italy (1922–1943)|rise of]] [[Italian Fascism]], becoming a key point in the [[propaganda of Fascist Italy]]. Historians regard "mutilated victory" as a "political myth", used by fascists to fuel [[Italian imperialism]] and obscure the successes of [[liberal Italy]] in the aftermath of World War I.<ref>G.Sabbatucci, ''La vittoria mutilata'', in AA.VV., ''Miti e storia dell'Italia unita'', Il Mulino, Bologna 1999, pp. 101–106</ref>

During the [[Second World War]], after the Axis attack on [[Kingdom of Yugoslavia|Yugoslavia]], Italy created the [[Governatorate of Dalmatia]] (from 1941 to September 1943), so the Kingdom of Italy annexed temporarily [[Split, Croatia|Split]] (Italian ''Spalato''), [[Kotor]] (''Cattaro''), and most of coastal Dalmatia. From 1942 to 1943, [[Italian irredentism in Corsica|Corsica]] and [[Italian irredentism in Nice|Nice]] (Italian ''Nizza'') were temporarily annexed to the Kingdom of Italy, nearly fulfilling in those years the ambitions of Italian irredentism.

For its avowed purpose, the movement had the "emancipation" of all Italian lands still subject to foreign rule after Italian unification. The Irredentists took language as the test of the alleged Italian nationality of the countries they proposed to emancipate, which were [[Trentino]], Trieste, Dalmatia, Istria, Gorizia, [[Ticino]], Nice (Nizza), Corsica, and [[Italian irredentism in Malta|Malta]]. Austria-Hungary promoted [[Croats|Croatian]] interests in Dalmatia and Istria to weaken Italian claims in the western [[Balkans]] before the First World War.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/irredentismo_(Enciclopedia-Italiana) |title=Irredentismo in "Enciclopedia Italiana" – Treccani |publisher=Treccani.it |access-date=31 May 2015}}</ref>