Around the time of the first World War, all the countries along the Mediterranean coast of Northern Africa were controlled by France or Great Britain, except for Libya, which was controlled by which other European nation?

By the early 20th century, the so-called "Scramble for Africa" had left the northern coast of the continent almost entirely under the control of Europe's two largest colonial powers. France held sway from Morocco to Tunisia, while Great Britain controlled Egypt. The exception was the territory lying between them, which belonged to a latecomer to the colonial game. Having unified as a nation only in 1871, Italy was eager to build its own empire and claim a "place in the sun," looking to Africa as the primary stage for its ambitions.

This opportunity came at the expense of the weakening Ottoman Empire, which had controlled the provinces of Tripolitania and Cyrenaica for centuries. In 1911, Italy launched an invasion, sparking the Italo-Turkish War. This conflict is historically significant as the first war to feature aerial reconnaissance and bombing. After a year of fighting, the Ottomans ceded the territory.

Italy consolidated the provinces and revived the ancient classical name for the region: Libya. It was promoted to the Italian public as the nation's "Fourth Shore," a renewal of the old Roman dominion over the Mediterranean. However, Italian control was tenuous for decades, especially during World War I, when it was largely confined to coastal cities while powerful local resistance movements dominated the interior.