A. J. P. Taylor, in one of his throwaway lines, has noted: ‘there were few real secrets in the diplomatic world [before 1914], and all diplomatists were honest, according to their moral code’. He then adds a cautionary footnote: ‘It becomes wearisome to add “except the Italians” to every generalisation. Henceforth it may be assumed.’

On the surface this comment is absurd, a typical example of Taylor's rhetorical excess. Yet, as so often, Taylor's absurdity contains a grain of truth. Italian diplomatists were, naturally, as personally honest as any of their counterparts. Yet the basis of Italian diplomacy, the simple ambition to act as a Great Power, was so far from the reality of Italian strength as to be, in the last analysis, dishonest, and often produced policy which was ambivalent, tortuous and again, crudely dishonest.

There have been many efforts to search for the key to Italy's newly enthusiastic expansionism between 1912 and 1914. The domestic machinations of Giolitti, the personal frustrations and ambition of San Giuliano, the new philosophy of the Nationalist Association, the Drang nach Osten of new Italian capitalism, all have had their advocates, and all indeed had a role to play, an influence on policy. Yet, above all, Italian policy was decided, in the sense of being set in context, by the assumption of the majority of her ruling class after the Risorgimento that Italy was a Great Power and needed to act, distinct from lesser states, as a Great Power.