 But Victor Emmanuel was unwilling to accept the Allied demand for unconditional surrender, and as a result, the secret armistice talks in Lisbon were dragged out over the summer of 1943.Besides for rejecting unconditional surrender as "truly monstrous", Victor Emmanuel wanted from the Allies a guarantee that he would keep his throne; a promise that Italian colonial empire in Libya and the Horn of Africa would be restored; that Italy would keep the part of Yugoslavia that had been annexed by Mussolini; and finally the Allies should promise not to invade the Italian mainland, and instead invade France and the Balkans.Mack Smith wrote that these demands were "unrealistic" and caused much time to be wasted in the Lisbon peace talks as the Allies were willing to concede that Victor Emmanuel could keep his throne and rejected all of his other demands.