Page - 364 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

364 ‘The King of Italy has declared war on Me On 16 October 1914, San Giuliano died. He had steered a course of neutrality for Italy, and wanted in this way first and foremost to keep Italy out of the war. His successor saw things differently. At the beginning of November, Baron Sidney Sonnino took over the Foreign Ministry. His semi-English parentage was immediately commented on. In the interim, however, Prime Minister Salandra himself had led the Foreign Ministry for two weeks. And on 18 October 1914 he used two words that would become formative for Italy : ‘sacro egoismo’.848 Almost unnoticeably, the emphases had changed. ‘Sacro egoismo’ During negotiations with the Entente and with the Central Powers Italy, remained a very patient adversary and attentively followed the war-related events in the meantime. It also exploited the situation for a time to improve its own position. When raids by Epirotes took place against southern Albania from Greece, raids that Italy believed threatened its own interests in the region around Albania, an Italian detachment  – with a sweeping interpretation of the Treaty of London regarding Albania  – occupied the port of Vlorë and the offshore island, and in this way brought the Strait of Otranto under its control. The distance from Vlorë to Otranto is only approximately 60 kilo- metres, and whoever controls the road from Otranto occupies a strategically important position. Austria accepted the occupation of Vlorë ; the German Empire even expressly welcomed it. In the meantime, as we know, the position of the Central Powers had not necessarily developed to their benefit. The German advance had stalled in France, the western front had to be pulled back and positional warfare began. The first offensives against Serbia had failed and in the east parts of Galicia had fallen into Russian hands. The Russian advance appeared to be unstoppable. In this situation, Great Britain, France and Russia made it clear that they were not of a mind in the event of a victory to make territorial concessions to Italy at the expense of the victors, unless Italy was prepared to step forward and declare war on the Central Powers. For its part, Italy pointed out that it had already set its conditions for entering the war and that one of these demands was a naval operation against the Imperial and Royal Navy. Italy feared having to bear the burden of the war against Austria-Hungary entirely alone, and this seemed too much of a risk. Here Italy almost unexpectedly received an ally, namely Romania. The Romanian Prime Minister Ion Brătianu began talks with the Italian envoy in Bucharest and had the Romanian standpoint forwarded to Rome : both states, Italy and Romania, should jointly pursue an annihilation of Austria-Hungary.849 As early as 23 September 1914, Romania and Italy signed a treaty that obligated both states to consult each other reciprocally and not to abandon their neutrality without giving the other one