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life lore is apart of this is Italy or
more specifically the Italian peninsula
like all civilizations in the real game
of sieve IRL Italy has been defined by
her geographic reality and starting
place at first glance
Italy's positions seem strong and easy
to defend she is surrounded by water on
three sides in the west south and east
which leaves only the north to defend
against land attacks from luckily
however the north is also easily
protected and defensible by the Alps
which are a bunch of really really big
mountains
Italy's geographic armor is amongst the
strongest of any country in the world
because she has full complete 360-degree
coverage but there is a downside to what
looks like nothing but upsides Italy's
geography stats have relatively recently
been nerfed compared to how good they
used to be in Italy today in the late
game just isn't as powerful as it used
to be back in the early game and here's
how the world's first civilizations that
spawned into the world map began around
here around 6000 years ago in
Mesopotamia followed up quickly by
several more across the Mediterranean
like Egypt the Greek states Carthage and
eventually a tiny little town called
Rome now the civilizations that started
around the Mediterranean were still in
the early game of world discovery so
most of the world's geography was still
shrouded and unknown to any of them
Travel and mapping off lands was
difficult but it was least difficult to
cross the Mediterranean Sea because map
makers could just sail around it and
across it and draw out what it looked
like on most maps of the known world at
the time therefore the Mediterranean was
often at the center or at least the most
prominent feature take a look at this
early world map created by the Greeks in
the 6th century BC or this map created
by the Greeks in the 5th century BC and
this map created by the Greeks after the
conquests of Alexander the Great
each iteration shows a slight evolution
in the understanding of the region's
geography but each one is highly
concentrated around the Mediterranean
Sea because that's what civilisations
here at the time we're familiar with so
if you wanted to dominate the
Mediterranean region and the rest of the
early civilizations and there
nations that surrounded it what
geographic feature do you think would be
the most important for you to control it
would be the Italian peninsula in the
center of it all with long coastlines
that can provide your civilizations
ships equally easy access to both the
western and eastern halves events if
fully controlled under a single power
Italy can be used as a springboard to
dominate and rule the entire
Mediterranean Sea from which at the time
was basically the entire known world to
the civilizations that existed there and
the first civilization that accomplished
that was Rome who carved out an enormous
empire across the region from the
nucleus in Italy Rome's power wealth and
success brought about an explosion in
the population of Italy to the point
where Italy alone was home to 6.5
percent of the entire human species
while the Empire and large was home to a
whopping 30% of humanity for the people
who lived in the ancient civilizations
around the Mediterranean Sea Italy was
basically at the center of the known
world and in terms of population Italy
literally was at the administrative
center for almost one out of every three
living humans but Italy's enormous
wealth and strategic location has
encouraged ambitious external invaders
for thousands of years Carthaginians
Germanic tribes Huns more Germanic
tribes that caused the Empire to
collapse Byzantines Arabs and eventually
the Spanish Austrian and French empires
after the collapse of the Roman Empire
Italy splintered into dozens of
independent city-states that largely
followed clear geographic lines across
the peninsula
Italy's interior is extremely
mountainous with the Apennines
stretching down the length of the spine
and this provided enough separation
between regions for strong regional
identities in the peninsula to crop up
over time after the collapse of the
empire and any strong centralized
authority that went with it
so after Byzantine Italy collapsed the
peninsula would remain divided between
the city-states and external empires for
over a thousand years before the pieces
started coming back together again in
the 19th century but by then
Italy's geographic situation and reality
had severely deteriorated
first of all population Italy's
population today
in twenty twenty is sixty point five
million which is almost the same as the
population of the entire Roman Empire in
the second century today though that
amount of people is only enough to make
up 0.8 percent of the entire human
population a significantly lower
percentage than in the second century
secondly the knowledge of the world map
has been dramatically expanded by this
point in the late game and everybody
knows that the Mediterranean isn't at
the center of everything nearly all of
the modern world's great powers after
all aren't even located within the
region like the UK Germany Russia India
China Japan and the United States the
Italian peninsula is still a strong
geographic position to dominate the
Mediterranean from but that only goes so
far as to establish regional domination
today rather than the world domination
of the past because far fewer people
live in the area proportionally than
they did in ancient times civilizations
have expanded across the globe trade has
moved on to new seas and continents and
the Mediterranean while still
significant is not as universally
important as it was in the past to
illustrate this point even more
let's analyze Italy's geographic
problems she encountered during the
world wars in 1915 the recently unified
Italy joined the aunt aunt in declared
war against Germany and austria-hungary
the Italian front line stretched across
here from Switzerland to the Adriatic
Sea and therefore was the only possible
path for the Italian army to attack
through overt lands Switzerland was
neutral and could not be passed and
naval assaults across the Adriatic Sea
were complicated so unfortunately for
the Italians the whole front ran through
the gigantic mountains here and along
the isanzo river over here meaning that
whenever they attacked they had to
either fight over mountains or across a
river the austro-hungarians just had to
sit in their forts on the mountains or
behind the river and let geography kill
and slow the advancing italians and that
is exactly what they did
eleven times in eleven separate battles
the Italians attacked across the isanzo
river and eleven times they made
effectively no progress and lost
hundreds of
thousands of men in the process on the
twelfth battle it was the
austro-hungarians supported by the
Chairman's who are the ones attacking
and they pushed the exhausted and
demoralized Italians back over 100
kilometers near to Venice before they
were finally stopped out of all of
Italy's casualties in the war
half of them were spent just trying to
break out of her geographic prison
across the isanzo but Italy's geographic
weaknesses extend well beyond this place
and war part of the reason why Italian
states never became world colonizers in
the first place is also due to sheer
geographic placement it's no wonder that
the European states who became the most
successful colonizers we're all located
on the westernmost side of the continent
because they had the easiest access to
launch ships out into the global ocean
system while Italy is well-positioned to
launch ships to dominate the
Mediterranean her access to the world
ocean is more limited because the only
way out historically was through the
Strait of Gibraltar which is only 11
kilometers wide at its narrowest point
and when an enemy is in control of the
Strait and chokes it off if Holly navies
can't leave and they get trapped and
this is what happened during the Second
World War at this point the British
Empire controlled not only Gibraltar but
also the Suez Canal which were the only
two entrances and exits possible into
the Mediterranean and so they could be
used to contain the entire Tahlia Navy
inside like a big bathtub
Italy's Navy couldn't break out to
threaten the Allies elsewhere unless
they could take over one or the other
but they were never capable of it even
further Britain also controlled the
island of Malta
that's roughly at the halfway point
between Sicily and North Africa Malta
was used as an outpost to harass Italy's
shipping logistics and supplies that she
was sending out to her overseas troops
fighting in North Africa and Italy was
just never capable of dealing with it
like a constant thorn in her side and
once America got involved the Allies
could just funnel in ships through
either entrance and overwhelm Italy
smaller Navy and smaller industrial base
that couldn't replenished losses as
easily and by 1943 Italy was already
defeated the Allies had vast empires and
reefs or
to call upon from across the world that
they could concentrate into the
Mediterranean while Italy's colonial
empire was much closer to home just
across the Mediterranean in Libya and
through the Suez in Somalia and Ethiopia
which were all very easy for the Allies
to cut off and separate from the Italian
mainland modern Italy is also largely
defined by her Geographic realities
Italy is very mountainous after all
which makes development in those parts
of the country pretty expensive Plains
and flat land are cheaper to build
cities in and develop and this is the
largest plane that Italy has and it's
called the Po River Valley so it should
come as no surprise that this plane is
home to some of Italy's most powerful
cities like Venice Milan and Turin the
Po Valley and nearby surrounding areas
accounts for 46% of Italy's population
and 55% of Italy's entire economy there
is a huge economic divide between
Italy's north and Italy's south which
has caused tension and separatist
movements to become popular numerous
polls have been taken in the province of
Veneto that show over 50% support in the
province for an independent state of
Venice and there already exists two
fully independent states that are
separate from Italy in the Italian
peninsula they never got San Marino and
Vatican City which was given
independence in 1929 the mountains
across Italy have kept people separated
and led to the development of strong
regional identities and autonomy and
keeping the whole peninsula together and
United has been a strong challenge for
the Italian States ever since it was
founded and it continues to be a problem
even today while a developed country and
a modern great power
Italy's geographic position is still
good for regional domination in the
Mediterranean but it's no longer the
ideal starting place for world
domination like it was in the ancient
past and so that is how Italy's
geography got nerfed in the late game of
sieve IRL geography however is just one
of many aspects about our planet that
influences one civilization success and
another one's hardships I could tell you
all about how geology physics biology
psychology and even chemistry
also all have major critical roles in a
civilizations success or you could just
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