Italia irredenta - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Italian irredentism was an Italian

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

Irredentist

Irredentism

Irredentism is any position advocating annexation of territories administered by another state on the grounds of common ethnicity or prior historical possession, actual or alleged. Some of these movements are also called pan-nationalist movements. It is a feature of identity politics and cultural...

movement that (in the late 19th century and early 20th century) aimed at the unification

Italian unification

Italian unification was the political and social movement that agglomerated different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of Italy in the 19th century...

of all ethnically Italian people

Italian people

The Italian people are an ethnic group that share a common Italian culture, ancestry and speak the Italian language as a mother tongue. Within Italy, Italians are defined by citizenship, regardless of ancestry or country of residence , and are distinguished from people...

s.

Originally, the movement promoted the annexation to Italy of territories inhabited by an Italian indigenous population but retained by the Austrian Empire

Austrian Empire

The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...

after Third Italian War of Independence

Third Italian War of Independence

The Third Italian War of Independence was a conflict which paralleled the Austro-Prussian War, and was fought between the Kingdom of Italy and the Austrian Empire.-Background:...

in 1866 (hence 'unredeemed' Italy). These included Trentino and Trieste

Trieste

Trieste is a city and seaport in northeastern Italy. It is situated towards the end of a narrow strip of land lying between the Adriatic Sea and Italy's border with Slovenia, which lies almost immediately south and east of the city...

, but also multilingual areas with German

Germans

The Germans are a Germanic ethnic group native to Central Europe. The English term Germans has referred to the German-speaking population of the Holy Roman Empire since the Late Middle Ages....

, Slovene, Croat, Ladin and Istro-Romanian

Istro-Romanian

Istro-Romanian may refer to:*Istro-Romanians*Istro-Romanian language*Istro-Romanian grammar...

population such as South Tyrol

South Tyrol

South Tyrol , also known by its Italian name Alto Adige, is an autonomous province in northern Italy. It is one of the two autonomous provinces that make up the autonomous region of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol. The province has an area of and a total population of more than 500,000 inhabitants...

, a part of Istria

Istria

Istria , formerly Histria , is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner...

, Gorizia

Gorizia

Gorizia is a town and comune in northeastern Italy, in the autonomous region of Friuli Venezia Giulia. It is located at the foot of the Julian Alps, bordering Slovenia. It is the capital of the Province of Gorizia, and it is a local center of tourism, industry, and commerce. Since 1947, a twin...

, and part of Dalmatia

Dalmatia

Dalmatia is a historical region on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea. It stretches from the island of Rab in the northwest to the Bay of Kotor in the southeast. The hinterland, the Dalmatian Zagora, ranges from fifty kilometers in width in the north to just a few kilometers in the south....

. The claims were extended later to the city of Fiume

Rijeka

Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third largest city in Croatia . It is located on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and has a population of 128,735 inhabitants...

(Rijeka), Corsica

Corsica

Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....

, the island of Malta

Malta

Malta , officially known as the Republic of Malta , is a Southern European country consisting of an archipelago situated in the centre of the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, east of Tunisia and north of Libya, with Gibraltar to the west and Alexandria to the east.Malta covers just over in...

, the County of Nice

County of Nice

The County of Nice or Niçard Country is a historical region of France, located in the south-eastern part, around the city of Nice.-History:Its territory lies between the Mediterranean Sea , Var River and the southernmost crest of the...

, and Italian Switzerland.

Characteristics

Italian Irredentism was not a formal organization, it was rather an opinion movement, advocated by several different groups, that claimed that Italy had to reach its "natural borders" or unify territories inhabited by Italians. Similar nationalistic ideas were common in Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

in the late 19th century. The term 'irredentism' was successfully coined from the Italian word in many countries in the world (List of irredentist claims or disputes). This idea of Italia irredenta is not to be confused with the Risorgimento, the historical events that led to irredentism, nor with nationalism

Nationalism

Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...

or Greater Italy

Greater Italy

Greater Italy , or Imperial Italy , was an ambitious project envisioned by fascist Italy in which the objective was to create an Italian empire which would expand, in addition to the irredentist claimed territories , to additional Mediterranean basin territories...

, the political philosophy that took the idea further under fascism

Italian Fascism

Italian Fascism also known as Fascism with a capital "F" refers to the original fascist ideology in Italy. This ideology is associated with the National Fascist Party which under Benito Mussolini ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, the Republican Fascist Party which ruled the Italian...

.

The beginning of Irredentism in Italy was originated as a consequence of the French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

expansion in Italy that started with the annexation of Corsica

Corsica

Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....

in 1768 and was followed by Napoleon's inclusion - inside the territories of France's First French Empire

First French Empire

The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...

- of the regions of Piedmont

Piedmont

Piedmont is one of the 20 regions of Italy. It has an area of 25,402 square kilometres and a population of about 4.4 million. The capital of Piedmont is Turin. The main local language is Piedmontese. Occitan is also spoken by a minority in the Occitan Valleys situated in the Provinces of...

, Liguria

Liguria

Liguria is a coastal region of north-western Italy, the third smallest of the Italian regions. Its capital is Genoa. It is a popular region with tourists for its beautiful beaches, picturesque little towns, and good food.-Geography:...

and Tuscany

Tuscany

Tuscany is a region in Italy. It has an area of about 23,000 square kilometres and a population of about 3.75 million inhabitants. The regional capital is Florence ....

. Indeed, Pasquale Paoli

Pasquale Paoli

Filippo Antonio Pasquale di Paoli , was a Corsican patriot and leader, the president of the Executive Council of the General Diet of the People of Corsica...

, the hero of Corsica, was called "the precursor of Italian irredentism" by Niccolo Tommaseo

Niccolò Tommaseo

Niccolò Tommaseo was an Italian Dalmatian linguist, journalist and essayist, the editor of a Dizionario della Lingua Italiana in eight volumes , of a dictionary of synonyms and other works...

because he was the first to promote Italian language and socio-culture (the main characteristics of Italian irredentism) in his island. Corsica is one of the biggest islands in the Italian geography, and Pasquale Paoli wanted the Italian language

Italian language

Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...

to be the official language of his Corsican Republic; even his Corsican Constitution

Corsican Constitution

The first Corsican Constitution was drawn up in 1755 for the short-lived Corsican Republic and remained in force until the annexation of Corsica by France in 1769...

of 1755 was in Italian and the short-lived university he founded in the city of Corte

Corte

Corte is a commune in the Haute-Corse department of France on the island of Corsica. It is the fourth-largest commune in Corsica .-Administration:Corte is a subprefecture of the Haute-Corse department.-History:...

in 1765 used Italian.

During the 19th century the Italian irredentism fully developed the characteristic of defending the Italian language from other people's languages (like, for example, the German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

in Switzerland and in the Austro-Hungarian Empire or the French in Nice

Nice

Nice is the fifth most populous city in France, after Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Toulouse, with a population of 348,721 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Nice extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of more than 955,000 on an area of...

).

The liberation of Italia irredenta was perhaps the strongest motive for Italy's entry into World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

, and the Treaty of Versailles

Treaty of Versailles

The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...

in 1919 satisfied many irredentist claims.

Indeed Italian irredentism has even the characteristic of being originally moderate, requesting only the return to Italy of the areas with Italian majority of population, but after World War I

World War I

it became aggressive - under fascist influence - and claimed to the Kingdom of Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

even areas where Italians were minority or had been present only in the past. In the first case there were the Risorgimento claims on Trento

Trento

Trento is an Italian city located in the Adige River valley in Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol. It is the capital of Trentino...

, for example, while in the second there were the fascist claims on the Ionian Islands

Ionian Islands

The Ionian Islands are a group of islands in Greece. They are traditionally called the Heptanese, i.e...

, Savoy

Savoy

Savoy is a region of France. It comprises roughly the territory of the Western Alps situated between Lake Geneva in the north and Monaco and the Mediterranean coast in the south....

and Malta

Malta

Place names

To avoid confusion and in line with convention, this article uses modern English place names throughout. However, most places have alternative names in Italian

Italian language

. See List of Italian place names in Dalmatia.

Origins

After the Italian unification

Italian unification

Italian unification was the political and social movement that agglomerated different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of Italy in the 19th century...

and Third Italian War of Independence

Third Italian War of Independence

The Third Italian War of Independence was a conflict which paralleled the Austro-Prussian War, and was fought between the Kingdom of Italy and the Austrian Empire.-Background:...

in 1866, there were areas with Italian-speaking communities within the borders of several countries around the newly created Kingdom of Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

. The Irredentists sought to annex all those areas to the newly unified Italy, including some areas with a non-Italian majority. The areas targeted were Corsica

Corsica

Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....

, Dalmatia

Dalmatia

, Gorizia

Gorizia

, the Ionian islands

Ionian Islands

The Ionian Islands are a group of islands in Greece. They are traditionally called the Heptanese, i.e...

, Istria

Istria

Istria , formerly Histria , is the largest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea. The peninsula is located at the head of the Adriatic between the Gulf of Trieste and the Bay of Kvarner...

, Malta

Malta

, County of Nice

County of Nice

, Ticino

Ticino

Canton Ticino or Ticino is the southernmost canton of Switzerland. Named after the Ticino river, it is the only canton in which Italian is the sole official language...

, Trentino, Trieste

Trieste

and Fiume.

Different movements or groups born in this period: in 1877 the Italian politician Matteo Renato Imbriani invented the new term "terre irredente" ("unredeemed lands"); in the same year the movement Associazione in pro dell'Italia Irredenta ("Association for the Unredeemed Italy") was founded; in the 1885 was founded the Pro Patria movement ("For Fatherland") and in 1891 the "Lega Nazionale Italiana" ("Italian National League") was founded in Trento and Trieste (in the Austrian Empire).

Initially, the movement can be described as part of the more general nation-building

Nation-building

For nation-building in the sense of enhancing the capacity of state institutions, building state-society relations, and also external interventions see State-building....

process in Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries when the multi-national Austro-Hungarian

Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary , more formally known as the Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Holy Hungarian Crown of Saint Stephen, was a constitutional monarchic union between the crowns of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary in...

, Russian

Russian Empire

The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...

, and Ottoman

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

Empires were being replaced by Nation States. The Italian nation-building process can be compared to similar movements in Germany (Großdeutschland

Großdeutschland

Großdeutschland is German for "Greater Germany" or "Big Germany." It can refer to:* Kleindeutschland and Großdeutschland, two competing ideas for unifying German-speaking lands in the 19th century; advocates of Großdeutschland wished for a single German state that included Austria as the answer to...

), Hungary

Hungary

Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...

, Serbia

Serbia

Serbia , officially the Republic of Serbia , is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeast Europe, covering the southern part of the Carpathian basin and the central part of the Balkans...

, and in pre-1914 Poland

Poland

Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...

. Simultaneously, however, in many parts of 19th century Europe, liberalism

Liberalism

Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...

and nationalism

Nationalism

were ideologies which were coming to the forefront of political culture. In Eastern Europe, where the Habsburg Empire had long asserted control over a variety of ethnic and cultural groups, nationalism appeared in a standard format. The beginning of the 19th century "was the period when the smaller, mostly indigenous nationalities of the empire - Czechs, Slovaks

Slovaks

The Slovaks, Slovak people, or Slovakians are a West Slavic people that primarily inhabit Slovakia and speak the Slovak language, which is closely related to the Czech language.Most Slovaks today live within the borders of the independent Slovakia...

, Slovenes, Croats

Croats

Croats are a South Slavic ethnic group mostly living in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and nearby countries. There are around 4 million Croats living inside Croatia and up to 4.5 million throughout the rest of the world. Responding to political, social and economic pressure, many Croats have...

, Serbs

Serbs

The Serbs are a South Slavic ethnic group of the Balkans and southern Central Europe. Serbs are located mainly in Serbia, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and form a sizable minority in Croatia, the Republic of Macedonia and Slovenia. Likewise, Serbs are an officially recognized minority in...

, Ukrainians

Ukrainians

Ukrainians are an East Slavic ethnic group native to Ukraine, which is the sixth-largest nation in Europe. The Constitution of Ukraine applies the term 'Ukrainians' to all its citizens...

, Romanians

Romanians

The Romanians are an ethnic group native to Romania, who speak Romanian; they are the majority inhabitants of Romania....

- remembered their historical traditions, revived their native tongues as literary languages, reappropriated their traditions and folklore, in short reasserted their existence as nations." The notion of a single united Italy was related to the aspirations of the "majority populations".

19th century

A precursor of the 'Irredentists' was perhaps the unification leader Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi

Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...

who, in 1859 as deputy for his native Nice

County of Nice

in the Piedmontese parliament at Turin

Turin

Turin is a city and major business and cultural centre in northern Italy, capital of the Piedmont region, located mainly on the left bank of the Po River and surrounded by the Alpine arch. The population of the city proper is 909,193 while the population of the urban area is estimated by Eurostat...

, attacked Cavour for ceding Nice to Napoleon III in order to get French help and approval for Italian Unification. Irredentism grew in importance in Italy in the next years.

On July 21, 1878, a noisy public meeting was held at Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

with Menotti Garibaldi, the son of Giuseppe Garibaldi, as chairman of the forum, and a clamour was raised for the formation of volunteer battalions to conquer the Trentino. Benedetto Cairoli

Benedetto Cairoli

Benedetto Cairoli was an Italian statesman.-Biography:Cairoli was born at Pavia, Lombardy.From 1848 until the completion of Italian unity in 1870, his whole activity was devoted to the Risorgimento, as Garibaldian officer, political refugee, anti-Austrian conspirator and deputy to parliament...

, then Prime Minister of Italy

Prime minister of Italy

The Prime Minister of Italy is the head of government of the Italian Republic...

, treated the agitation with tolerance.

It was, however, mainly superficial, as most Italians did not wish a dangerous policy against Austria, and even less against France

France

for the sake of Nice and Corsica, or against Britain

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

for Malta.

One consequence of Irredentist ideas outside of Italy was an assassination plot organized against the Emperor

Emperor of Austria

The Emperor of Austria was a hereditary imperial title and position proclaimed in 1804 by the Holy Roman Emperor Francis II, a member of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, and continually held by him and his heirs until the last emperor relinquished power in 1918. The emperors retained the title of...

Francis Joseph in Trieste in 1882, which was detected and foiled. Guglielmo Oberdan

Guglielmo Oberdan

Guglielmo Oberdan, was an Italian irredentist. He was executed after a failed attempt to assassinate Austrian Emperor Francis Joseph, thus becoming a martyr of the Italian unification movement.- Biography :He was born in the city of Trieste, then part of the Austrian Empire...

, a Triestine and thus Austrian citizen, was executed. When the Irredentist movement became troublesome to Italy through the activity of Republicans and Socialists, it was subject to effective police control by Agostino Depretis

Agostino Depretis

Agostino Depretis was an Italian statesman.-Biography:Depretis was born at Mezzana Corte, near Stradella, in the province of Pavia ....

.

Irredentism faced a setback when the French occupation of Tunisia

Treaty of Bardo

The Treaty of Bardo was signed on May 12, 1881 between representatives of the French Republic and Tunisian bey Muhammed as-Sadiq. A raid of Algeria by the Tunisian Kroumer tribe served as a pretext for French armed forces to invade Tunisia...

in 1881 started a crisis in French–Italian relations. The government entered into relations with Austria and Germany

German Empire

The German Empire refers to Germany during the "Second Reich" period from the unification of Germany and proclamation of Wilhelm I as German Emperor on 18 January 1871, to 1918, when it became a federal republic after defeat in World War I and the abdication of the Emperor, Wilhelm II.The German...

, which took shape with the formation of the Triple Alliance

Triple Alliance (1882)

The Triple Alliance was the military alliance between Germany, Austria–Hungary, and Italy, , that lasted from 1882 until the start of World War I in 1914...

in 1882.

The Irredentists' dream of absorbing the targeted areas into Italy made no further progress in the 19th century, as the borders of the Kingdom of Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

remained unchanged and the Rome government began to set up colonies in Eritrea

Eritrea

Eritrea , officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa. Eritrea derives it's name from the Greek word Erethria, meaning 'red land'. The capital is Asmara. It is bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south, and Djibouti in the southeast...

and Somalia

Somalia

Somalia , officially the Somali Republic and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic under Socialist rule, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. Since the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991 there has been no central government control over most of the country's territory...

in Africa.

World War I

See also: The Kingdom of Italy's entry into World War I and Italy in World War I - from neutrality to intervention

Italy signed the London Pact

London Pact

London Pact , or more correctly, the Treaty of London, 1915, was a secret pact between Italy and Triple Entente, signed in London on 26 April 1915 by the Kingdom of Italy, Great Britain, France and Russia....

and entered World War I

World War I

with the intention of gaining those territories perceived by Irredentists as being Italian under foreign rule. According to the pact, Italy was to leave the Triple Alliance

Triple Alliance (1882)

The Triple Alliance was the military alliance between Germany, Austria–Hungary, and Italy, , that lasted from 1882 until the start of World War I in 1914...

and join the Entente Powers

Allies of World War I

The Entente Powers were the countries at war with the Central Powers during World War I. The members of the Triple Entente were the United Kingdom, France, and the Russian Empire; Italy entered the war on their side in 1915...

. Furthermore, Italy was to declare war

Declaration of war

A declaration of war is a formal act by which one nation goes to war against another. The declaration is a performative speech act by an authorized party of a national government in order to create a state of war between two or more states.The legality of who is competent to declare war varies...

on Germany and Austria-Hungary

Austria-Hungary

within a month. The declaration of war was duly published on 23 May 1915. In exchange, Italy was to obtain various territorial gains at the end of the war. In April 1918, in what he described as an open letter "to the American Nation" Paolo Thaon di Revel

Paolo Thaon di Revel

Paolo Emilio Thaon di Revel, 1st Duca del Mare was an Italian admiral of the Royal Italian Navy during World War I and later a politician....

, Commander in Chief of the Italian navy

Regia Marina

The Regia Marina dates from the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy in 1861 after Italian unification...

, appealed to the people of the United States to support Italian territorial claims over Trento, Trieste, Istria, Dalmatia and the Adriatic, writing that "we are fighting to expel an intruder from our home."

The outcome of the First World War and the consequent settlement of the Treaty of Saint-Germain

Treaty of Saint-Germain

The Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, was signed on 10 September 1919 by the victorious Allies of World War I on the one hand and by the new Republic of Austria on the other...

met some Italian claims, including many (but not all) of the aims of the Italia irredenta party. Italy gained Trieste, Gorizia

Gorizia

, Istria and the city of Zadar

Zadar

Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...

(Zara). In Dalmatia, despite the Treaty of London, only territories with Italian majority as Zadar

Zadar

Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...

with some Dalmatian islands, such as Cres

Cres

Cres is an Adriatic island in Croatia. It is one of the northern island in the Kvarner Gulf and can be reached via ferry from the island Krk or from the Istrian peninsula ....

(Cherso), Lošinj

Lošinj

Lošinj is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, in the Kvarner Gulf. It is almost due south of the city of Rijeka and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....

(Lussino) and Lastovo

Lastovo

Lastovo is an island municipality in the Dubrovnik-Neretva County in Croatia. The municipality consists of 46 islands with a total population of 792 people, of which 93% are ethnic Croats, and a land area of approximately . The biggest island in the municipality is also named Lastovo, as is the...

(Lagosta) were annexed by Italy, because Woodrow Wilson

Woodrow Wilson

Thomas Woodrow Wilson was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913...

, supporting Yugoslav claims and not recognizing the treaty, rejected Italian requests on other Dalmatian territories.

The city of Rijeka (Fiume) in the Kvarner

Kvarner Gulf

The Kvarner Gulf ); sometimes also Kvarner Bay, in Italian Quarnaro or Carnaro) is a bay in the northern Adriatic Sea, located between the Istrian peninsula and the northern Croatian seacoast....

was the subject of claim and counter-claim (see Italian Regency of Carnaro

Italian Regency of Carnaro

The Italian Regency of Carnaro was a self-proclaimed state in the city of Fiume led by Gabriele d'Annunzio between 1919 and 1920.-Impresa di Fiume:...

, Treaty of Rapallo, 1920

Treaty of Rapallo, 1920

The Treaty of Rapallo was a treaty between the Kingdom of Italy and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes , signed to solve the dispute over some territories in the upper Adriatic, in Dalmatia and in the region which became known as the Julian March.The treaty was signed on 12 November 1920 in...

and Treaty of Rome, 1924

Treaty of Rome, 1924

The Treaty of Rome of January 27, 1924 was an agreement by which Italy and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes revoked the parts of the Treaty of Rapallo from 1920, which had created the independent Free State of Fiume...

) and become Italian in 1924..

The stand taken by the irredentist Gabriele D'Annunzio

Gabriele D'Annunzio

Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...

, which briefly led him to become an enemy of the Italian state, was meant to provoke a nationalist

Nationalism

revival through Corporatism

Corporatism

Corporatism, also known as corporativism, is a system of economic, political, or social organization that involves association of the people of society into corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labor, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common...

(first instituted during his rule over Fiume), in front of what was widely perceived as state corruption

Political corruption

Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...

engineered by governments such as Giovanni Giolitti

Giovanni Giolitti

Giovanni Giolitti was an Italian statesman. He was the 19th, 25th, 29th, 32nd and 37th Prime Minister of Italy between 1892 and 1921. A left-wing liberal, Giolitti's periods in office were notable for the passage of a wide range of progressive social reforms which improved the living standards of...

's.

D'Annunzio briefly annexed to this "Regency of Carnaro" even the Dalmatian islands of Krk

Krk

Krk is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, located near Rijeka in the Bay of Kvarner and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....

(Veglia) and Rab

Rab

Rab is an island in Croatia and a town of the same name located just off the northern Croatian coast in the Adriatic Sea.The island is long, has an area of and 9,480 inhabitants . The highest peak is Kamenjak at 408 meters...

(Arbe), where there was a numerous Italian community.

Fascism and World War II

Fascist Italy strove to be seen as the natural result of war heroism, against a "betrayed Italy" that had not been awarded all it "deserved", as well as appropriating the image of Arditi

Arditi

Arditi was the name adopted by Italian Army elite storm troops of World War I. The name derives from the Italian verb Ardire and translates as "The Daring Ones"....

soldiers. In this vein, irredentist claims were expanded and often used in Fascist Italy's desire to control the Mediterranean basin.

In 1922 Mussolini temporarily occupied Corfu, using irredentist claims based on minorities of Italians in the Ionian islands of Greece. Similar tactics may have been used towards the islands around the Kingdom of Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

- through the Pro-Italian Maltese, Corfiot Italians

Corfiot Italians

Corfiot Italians are a population from the Greek island of Corfu with ethnic and linguistic ties to the Republic of Venice. Their name was specifically established by Niccolò Tommaseo during the Italian Risorgimento...

and Corsican Italians - in order to control the Mediterranean sea (that he called in Latin Mare Nostrum

Italy's Mare Nostrum

Italy's Mare Nostrum was the name given, during World War II, by Benito Mussolini and his fascist propaganda to the Mediterranean Sea under the domination of the Kingdom of Italy, mainly in 1942.-The Mare Nostrum of Mussolini:...

).

Around 1939, the main territories sought by fascist irredentism included the rest of Dalmatia

Dalmatia

, the Ionian Islands

Ionian Islands

The Ionian Islands are a group of islands in Greece. They are traditionally called the Heptanese, i.e...

(in Greece

Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

), Malta

Malta

, Corsica

Corsica

Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....

, Nice

County of Nice

, Savoy

Savoy

Savoy is a region of France. It comprises roughly the territory of the Western Alps situated between Lake Geneva in the north and Monaco and the Mediterranean coast in the south....

and Ticino

Ticino

Canton Ticino or Ticino is the southernmost canton of Switzerland. Named after the Ticino river, it is the only canton in which Italian is the sole official language...

. Other claims were also made for the Fourth Shore, which meant coastal Libya

Libya

Libya is an African country in the Maghreb region of North Africa bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....

and Tunisia

Tunisia

Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...

, and the Dodecanese

Dodecanese

The Dodecanese are a group of 12 larger plus 150 smaller Greek islands in the Aegean Sea, of which 26 are inhabited. Τhis island group generally defines the eastern limit of the Sea of Crete. They belong to the Southern Sporades island group...

islands of the Aegean Sea

Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea[p] is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkan and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey. In the north, it is connected to the Marmara Sea and Black Sea by the Dardanelles and Bosporus...

.

After the occupation of Albania

Albania

Albania , officially known as the Republic of Albania , is a country in Southeastern Europe, in the Balkans region. It is bordered by Montenegro to the northwest, Kosovo to the northeast, the Republic of Macedonia to the east and Greece to the south and southeast. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea...

in April 1939, Mussolini sent nearly 11,000 Italian colonists to Albania

Italian colonists in Albania

The Italian colonists in Albania were Italians who, between the two world wars, moved to Albania to colonize the Balkan country for the Kingdom of Italy.-History:...

(and started to create irredentism ideals related to Albania). Most of them were from the Venice

Venice

Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...

area and Sicily

Sicily

Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...

. They settled primarily in the areas of Durrës

Durrës

Durrës is the second largest city of Albania located on the central Albanian coast, about west of the capital Tirana. It is one of the most ancient and economically important cities of Albania. Durres is situated at one of the narrower points of the Adriatic Sea, opposite the Italian ports of Bari...

, Vlorë

Vlorë

Vlorë is one of the biggest towns and the second largest port city of Albania, after Durrës, with a population of about 94,000 . It is the city where the Albanian Declaration of Independence was proclaimed on November 28, 1912...

, Skadar, Porto Palermos, Elbasan

Elbasan

Elbasan is a city in central Albania. It is located on the Shkumbin River in the District of Elbasan and the County of Elbasan, at...

and Saranda. They were the first settlers of a huge group of Italians to be moved to Albania to create the Greater Italy

Greater Italy

of the Mussolini "dreams".

During World War II, large parts of Dalmatia were annexed by Italy into the Governorship of Dalmatia

Governorship of Dalmatia

The Governorate of Dalmatia was a province of Italy, created in April 1941 from occupied Yugoslav territory annexed after the German blitzkrieg Invasion of Yugoslavia.-Characteristics:...

from 1941 to 1943. Corsica and Nice were also administratively annexed by the Kingdom of Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

in November 1942. Malta was heavily bombed but was not occupied, due to Allied naval control of the Mediterranean and the success of Operation Pedestal

Operation Pedestal

Operation Pedestal was a British operation to get desperately needed supplies to the island of Malta in August 1942, during the Second World War. Malta was the base from which surface ships, submarines and aircraft attacked Axis convoys carrying essential supplies to the Italian and German armies...

, one of the most important British strategic victories of the Second World War.

After Italian capitulation in 1943, areas formerly under Italian control in Istria and the Julian March

Julian March

The Julian March is a former political region of southeastern Europe on what are now the borders between Croatia, Slovenia, and Italy...

(Italian: Venezia Giulia) were temporarily controlled by Yugoslav Partisans. Shortly afterward these areas were occupied by the German Wehrmacht

Wehrmacht

The Wehrmacht – from , to defend and , the might/power) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer , the Kriegsmarine and the Luftwaffe .-Origin and use of the term:...

and SS forces, which drove away Josip Broz Tito

Josip Broz Tito

Marshal Josip Broz Tito – 4 May 1980) was a Yugoslav revolutionary and statesman. While his presidency has been criticized as authoritarian, Tito was a popular public figure both in Yugoslavia and abroad, viewed as a unifying symbol for the nations of the Yugoslav federation...

's Partisans and found the remains of several hundred killed Italians

Foibe killings

The Foibe killings or Foibe massacres refers to the killings that took place mainly in Istria during and shortly after World War II from 1943 to 1949, perpetrated mainly by Yugoslav Partisans. The name derives from a local geological feature, a type of deep karst sinkhole called a foiba...

, executed by Yugoslav partisan troops.

After 1945, many Italians were murdered in the Foibe killings

Foibe killings

and up to 270,000 (according to other sources up to 350.000) of them left these territories

Istrian exodus

The expression Istrian exodus or Istrian-Dalmatian exodus is used to indicate the departure of ethnic Italians from Istria, Rijeka, and Dalmatia , after World War II. At the time of the exodus, these territories were part of the SR Croatia and SR Slovenia , today they are parts of the Republics of...

and moved mainly to Italy.

As a consequence, there was a very significant decline in Italian speaking populations in Istria and Dalmatia.

Dalmatia

The Italian linguist Matteo Bartoli

Matteo Bartoli

Matteo Giulio Bartoli was an Italian linguist from Istria ....

calculated that Italian

Italian language

was the primary spoken language by almost 30% of the Dalmatian population at the beginning of the Napoleonic wars. Bartoli's evaluation was followed by other claims: Auguste de Marmont, the French Governor General of the Napoleonic Illyrian Provinces

Illyrian provinces

The Illyrian Provinces was an autonomous province of the Napoleonic French Empire on the north and east coasts of the Adriatic Sea between 1809 and 1816. Its capital was established at Laybach...

commissioned a census in 1814–1815 which found that Dalmatian Italians

Dalmatian Italians

Dalmatian Italians are a mostly historical Italian national minority in the region of Dalmatia, part of the Republics of Croatia and Montenegro.-Characteristics:...

comprised 25% of the total population of Dalmatia. Accordingly, three years later, an Austrian census found around 70,000 Italians in a total of 301,000 people living in Austrian Dalmatia.

With the development of Slav nationalism, critics such as Croatian historian Duško Večerina, asserted that these evaluations were not conducted by modern scientific standards and that they took spoken language as the criterion, rather than ethnicity. They pointed out that, according to a report by Imperial court councillor Joseph Fölch in 1827, the Italian language

Italian language

was spoken by noblemen and some citizens of middle and lower classes exclusively in the coastal cities of Zara

Zadar

Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...

, Sebenico

Šibenik

Šibenik is a historic town in Croatia, with population of 51,553 . It is located in central Dalmatia where the river Krka flows into the Adriatic Sea...

, and Spalato

Split (city)

Split is a Mediterranean city on the eastern shores of the Adriatic Sea, centered around the ancient Roman Palace of the Emperor Diocletian and its wide port bay. With a population of 178,192 citizens, and a metropolitan area numbering up to 467,899, Split is by far the largest Dalmatian city and...

. Since only around 20,000 people populated these towns and not all were Italian speakers, their real number was rather smaller, probably around 7% of the total population, as is asserted by the Department of Historical Studies of the Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts

Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts

The Croatian Academy of Sciences and Arts is the national academy of Croatia. It was founded in 1866 as the Yugoslav Academy of Sciences and Arts , and was known by that name for most of its existence.- History :...

(HAZU).

Not only Italian irredentists (like Gabriele D'Annunzio

Gabriele D'Annunzio

Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...

) but also Italian prominent scholars (like Angelo Vivante) alleged that Joseph Fölch did not include the Dalmatian islands of Cres

Cres

Cres is an Adriatic island in Croatia. It is one of the northern island in the Kvarner Gulf and can be reached via ferry from the island Krk or from the Istrian peninsula ....

, Lošinj

Lošinj

Lošinj is a Croatian island in the northern Adriatic Sea, in the Kvarner Gulf. It is almost due south of the city of Rijeka and part of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar county....

, Vis

Vis (island)

Vis is the most outerly lying larger Croatian island in the Adriatic Sea, and is part of the Central Dalmatian group of islands, with an area of 90.26 km² and a population of 3,617 . Of all the inhabited Croatian islands, it is the farthest from the coast...

, Hvar, Korcula and many others islands with significant Italian communities. And so -in their opinion- Folch did only a partial and mistaken estimate of the real number of the Dalmatian Italians. They reasserted that the only official evidence about the Dalmatian population comes from the 1857 Austro-Hungarian census, which showed that in this year there were 369,310 Slavs and 45,000 Italians in Dalmatia, making Dalmatian Italians

Dalmatian Italians

Dalmatian Italians are a mostly historical Italian national minority in the region of Dalmatia, part of the Republics of Croatia and Montenegro.-Characteristics:...

17% of the total population of Dalmatia in the mid-19th century.

The last city with a significant Italian presence in Dalmatia was the city of Zadar (Zara). In the Habsburg empire census of 1910 the city of Zara had an Italian population of 9,318 (or 69.3% out of the total of 13,438 inhabitants). Zara population grew to 24,100 inhabitants, of which 20,300 Italians, when was in 1942 the capital of the Governatorate of Dalmatia (the "Governatorate" fulfilled the aspirations of the Italian irredentism in the Adriatic).

In 1943, Josip Broz Tito

Josip Broz Tito

informed the Allies

Allies of World War II

The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...

that Zara was a very important logistic centre for German forces in Yugoslavia. By overstating its importance, he persuaded them of its military significance. Italy surrendered in September 1943 and over the following year, specifically between 2 November 1943 and 31 October 1944, Allied Forces bombarded the town fifty-four times.

Nearly 2,000 people were buried beneath rubble; 10–12,000 people escaped and took refuge in Trieste and slightly over 1,000 reached Apulia.

Tito's partisans entered in Zara on 31 October 1944, and 138 people were killed.
With the Peace Treaty of 1947, Italians still living in Zara followed the Italian exodus from Dalmatia

Istrian exodus

and only about 100 Dalmatian Italians now remain in the city.

Supposed Italian irredentism today

After World War II, Italian Irredentism disappeared along with the defeated Fascists and the Monarchy of the House of Savoy

House of Savoy

The House of Savoy was formed in the early 11th century in the historical Savoy region. Through gradual expansion, it grew from ruling a small county in that region to eventually rule the Kingdom of Italy from 1861 until the end of World War II, king of Croatia and King of Armenia...

. After Treaty of Paris

Paris Peace Treaties, 1947

The Paris Peace Conference resulted in the Paris Peace Treaties signed on February 10, 1947. The victorious wartime Allied powers negotiated the details of treaties with Italy, Romania, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Finland .The...

(1947) and, after Treaty of Osimo

Treaty of Osimo

The Treaty of Osimo was signed on 10 November 1975 by the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the Italian Republic in Osimo, Italy, to definitely divide the Free Territory of Trieste between the two states...

(1975), all territorial claims were abandoned by the Italian State (see Foreign relations of Italy

Foreign relations of Italy

Since its unification in 1861, Italy has been one of the most important and influential European countries. Its major allies are the United States, the other NATO countries , and the European Union...

). Today, Italy, France, Malta, Greece and Slovenia are all members of the European Union

European Union

The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...

, while Croatia

Croatia

Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...

, Montenegro

Montenegro

Montenegro Montenegrin: Crna Gora Црна Гора , meaning "Black Mountain") is a country located in Southeastern Europe. It has a coast on the Adriatic Sea to the south-west and is bordered by Croatia to the west, Bosnia and Herzegovina to the northwest, Serbia to the northeast and Albania to the...

and Albania

Albania

are candidates for accession.

However, some Croatian and Slovenian politicians and organizations assert that some Italian politicians still propagate some irredentist ideas even in the 21st century, often causing sharp reactions from Croatian or Slovenian officials.

They often cite the then-Italian Deputy Gianfranco Fini

Gianfranco Fini

Gianfranco Fini is an Italian politician, President of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, leader of the center-right Future and Freedom party, and the former leader of the conservative National Alliance and the post-fascist Italian Social Movement...

, who in Senigallia

Senigallia

Senigallia is a comune and port town on Italy's Adriatic coast, 25 km by rail north of Ancona, in the Marche region, province of Ancona....

in 2004 gave an interview to the Slobodna Dalmacija
Slobodna Dalmacija
Slobodna Dalmacija is a Croatian daily newspaper published in Split.The first issue of Slobodna Dalmacija was published on June 17, 1943 by Tito's Partisans in a cave on Mosor, a mountain near Split, which was occupied by the Italian army during that time. The paper was later published in various...

daily newspaper at the 51st gathering of the Italians who left Yugoslavia after World War II, in which he was reported to have said that "From the son of an Italian from Fiume I learned that those areas were and are Italian, but not because at any particular historical moment our army planted Italians there. This country was Venetian, and before that Roman". Rather than issuing an official rebuttal of those words, Carlo Giovanardi

Carlo Giovanardi

Carlo Amedeo Giovanardi is an Italian politician and member of the Parliament..-Political career:He graduated in jurisprudence, and did his military service in the Carabinieri...

, then Parliamentary Affairs Minister in Berlusconi's government, affirmed Fini's words, saying "...that he told the truth".

These sources point out that on the 52nd gathering of the same association, in 2005, Carlo Giovanardi was quoted by the Večernji list

Vecernji list

Večernji list is a Croatian daily newspaper published in Zagreb.The newspaper was started in the 1950s and it is today one of two largest daily newspapers in Croatia...

daily newspaper as saying that Italy would launch a cultural, economic and touristic invasion in order to restore "the Italianness of Dalmatia" while participating in a roundtable discussion on the topic "Italy and Dalmatia today and tomorrow". Giovanardi later declared that he had been misunderstood, and sent a letter to the Croatian Ministry of Foreign Affairs

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Integration (Croatia)

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and European Integration of the Republic of Croatia is the ministry in the Government of Croatia which is in charge of foreign relations and admission into the European Union.-Foreign affairs ministers:...

in which he condemned nationalism and ethnic strife.

They underline that Alleanza Nazionale (a former Italian conservative party, now merged in the People of Freedom party) derived directly from the Italian Social Movement

Italian Social Movement

The Italian Social Movement , and later the Italian Social Movement–National Right , was a neo-fascist and post-fascist political party in Italy. Formed in 1946 by supporters of former Italian dictator Benito Mussolini, the party became the fourth largest party in Italy by the early 1960s...

(MSI), a neo-fascist party, which often claimed that Italy paid too much for her defeat in World War II. For example, in 1994, Mirko Tremaglia, a member of the MSI and later of Alleanza Nazionale, described Rijeka, Istria and Dalmatia as "historically Italian" and referred to them as "occupied territories", saying that Italy should "tear up" the 1975 Treaty of Osimo

Treaty of Osimo

with the former Yugoslavia and block Slovenia and Croatia's accession to EU membership

Enlargement of the European Union

The Enlargement of the European Union is the process of expanding the European Union through the accession of new member states. This process began with the Inner Six, who founded the European Coal and Steel Community in 1952...

until the rights of their Italian minorities are respected.

In 2001, Italian president Carlo Azeglio Ciampi

Carlo Azeglio Ciampi

dr. Carlo Azeglio Ciampi is an Italian politician and banker. He was the 73rd Prime Minister of Italy from 1993 to 1994 and was the tenth President of the Italian Republic from 1999 to 2006...

gave the golden medal (for the aerial bombings endured during World War II) to the last Italian administration of Zara

Zadar

Zadar is a city in Croatia on the Adriatic Sea. It is the centre of Zadar county and the wider northern Dalmatian region. Population of the city is 75,082 citizens...

(today Zadar, Croatia), represented by its Gonfalone

Gonfalone

The gonfalon or gonfalone , is a type of heraldic flag or banner, often pointed, swallow-tailed, or with several streamers, and suspended from a crossbar...

, which is currently owned by the association "Free municipality of Zara in exile". Croatian authorities complained that he was awarding a fascist institution, although the motivations for the golden medal explicitly recalled the contribution of the city to the Resistance

Italian resistance movement

The Italian resistance is the umbrella term for the various partisan forces formed by pro-Allied Italians during World War II...

against Fascism. The motivations were contested by several Italian right wing associations, such as the same "Free municipality of Zara in exile" and the Lega Nazionale.

In February 2007 (on "Foibe Memorial Day"), Italian President Giorgio Napolitano gave a statement in which he used phrases like "one of the barbarities of the century", "movement of hate and bloodthirsty rage", "Slavic annexationist project", when speaking about the Foibe massacres. The Croatian President Stjepan Mesić

Stjepan Mesić

Stjepan "Stipe" Mesić is a Croatian politician and former President of Croatia. Before his ten-year presidential term between 2000 and 2010 he held the posts of Speaker of the Croatian Parliament , Prime Minister of Croatia , the last President of the Presidency of Yugoslavia , Secretary General...

responded by stating that "it's impossible not to see in Napolitano's statements traces of open racism, historical revisionism and political revanchism". The European Commission asked for both sides to tone down and advised the Croatian President "not to use too sharp phrases".

On December 12, 2007, the Italian post office issued a stamp with a photo of the Croatian city of Rijeka

Rijeka

Rijeka is the principal seaport and the third largest city in Croatia . It is located on Kvarner Bay, an inlet of the Adriatic Sea and has a population of 128,735 inhabitants...

and with the text "Rijeka - eastern land once part of Italy" ("Fiume-terra orientale già italiana"). The same sources declared that the severity of this act could seen in use of prepositions and adjectives - affirming that "già italiana" could also mean "already Italian". According to Italian syntaxis the correct meaning in this case is only "previously Italian". 3.5 million copies of the stamp were printed http://www.r-1.hr/view.asp?idp=7396&c=5 http://www.totalportal.hr/firedesk/Hrvatska/Doga%F0aji/marka-rijeka.jpg, but it was not delivered by the Italian Post Office in order to forestall a possible diplomatic crisis with Croatian and Slovenian authorities http://www.totalportal.hr/firedesk/Hrvatska/Doga%F0aji/marka-rijeka.jpg. Nevertheless, intentionally or not, some of the stamps leaked out and came in official use.

Napolitano's statement in Feb 2008 (on "Foibe Memorial Day"), in which he reconfirmed his statements from 2007 and called Mesić's reactions from 2007 "unjustified", drew a sharp reaction from the Office of the Croatian President Stipe Mesić on 11 Feb 2008, saying that as a reaction to Napolitano's statement, there was no need to change any word from Mesić's reaction the previous year.

Some Italian exiles believe that all these complaints made by Croatian authorities (like President Mesic) are due to the fact that there it is a growing movement in Italy (and Europe) toward asking for the official recognition of "genocide" or even democide

Democide

Democide is a term revived and redefined by the political scientist R. J. Rummel as "the murder of any person or people by a government, including genocide, politicide, and mass murder." Rummel created the term as an extended concept to include forms of government murder that are not covered by the...

http://books.google.com/books?id=hhD0R8DBr_UC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=ethnic+cleansing+of+dalmatian+italians&source=web&ots=5WAZ_hWme1&sig=ZdO3tsGQPWkJ0Ln1CRM04sK5lOo&hl=en of the Italians in Istria and Dalmatia (like has been done with the Armenian massacre done by the Turks).

They argue that there it is a long history of ethnic cleansing in Croatia
and former Yugoslavia, as reported by many academics like R.J. Rummel

Political figures in Italian irredentism

Guglielmo Oberdan
Guglielmo Oberdan
Guglielmo Oberdan, was an Italian irredentist. He was executed after a failed attempt to assassinate Austrian Emperor Francis Joseph, thus becoming a martyr of the Italian unification movement.- Biography :He was born in the city of Trieste, then part of the Austrian Empire...
Cesare Battisti
Nazario Sauro
Nazario Sauro
Nazario Sauro was an Austrian-born Italian irredentist and sailor.-Life:Born in Capodistria, in what was then the Austrian Littoral , he took to sailing from a very young age, and became the captain of a cargo ship when he was only 20...
Damiano Chiesa
Fabio Filzi
Carmelo Borg Pisani
Carmelo Borg Pisani
Carmelo Borg Pisani was a Maltese-born Italian Fascist who was found guilty by a Maltese war tribunal established by the Government under British rule and executed for treason against His Majesty's Government....
Giuseppe Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi
Giuseppe Garibaldi was an Italian military and political figure. In his twenties, he joined the Carbonari Italian patriot revolutionaries, and fled Italy after a failed insurrection. Garibaldi took part in the War of the Farrapos and the Uruguayan Civil War leading the Italian Legion, and...
Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio
Gabriele D'Annunzio or d'Annunzio was an Italian poet, journalist, novelist, and dramatist...
Petru Simone Cristofini
Petru Giovacchini
Petru Giovacchini
Petru Giovacchini was a Corsican activist, born in Canale-di-Verde to an old noble Corsican family with deep-rooted pro-Italian feelings...
Maria Pasquinelli

External links

Unredeemed Italy (Google Book)
Articles on the History of Dalmatia
Articles on the Italians in Dalmatia
Articles on Zara (Zadar), when was a city of the Kingdom of Italy.
Slovene - Italian relations between 1880-1918
Irredentists Website of the Italian irredentism Hrvati AMAC Gdje su granice (EU-)talijanskog bezobrazluka? (Where are the limits of Italian arrogancy?; page contains the speech of Italian deputy)Slobodna Dalmacija Počasni građanin Zadra kočnica talijanskoj ratifikaciji SSP-aD'Annunzio and Fiume Politicamentecorretto.com Onorevole Guglielmo Picchi Forza ItaliaItalia chiama Italia Francobollo Fiume: bloccata l'emissioneTrieste.rvnet.eu Stoppato” il francobollo per Fiume, bufera: protestano Unione degli istriani, An e Forza Italia (contains the scan of the stamp)