This research examines the ways in which the CUP (Young Turks) attempted to extend their influence in the hinterland of Libya i.e. Chad and Niger. The moves by the CUP in this hinterland region were a form of defensive imperialism, but they can also be viewed as a form of peripheral incorporation. This peripheral incorporation process was being pursued in other parts of the Ottoman Empire at the same time that it was being pursued in Libya. One route that the CUP pursued, which was also utilized under the Hamidian period, was utilizing international agreements and conferences to argue their claims over the Saharan hinterland of Libya. This fit well into the CUP’s view of itself as a modernist and reforming regime. But, the CUP also simultaneously pursued the Hamidian policy of promoting Ottoman Caliphal prestige and pursuing an Islamist agenda among the populations of the hinterland. This dichotomous policy deviated from the way in which the CUP pursued peripheral incorporation in other parts of the Ottoman Empire. Interestingly, the CUP’s alliance with the Sanusiyya, was something that was generally avoided elsewhere and, in fact, elsewhere in the Ottoman Empire in the same period the CUP worked against organizations like the Sanusiyya. Nonetheless, this partnership worked to expand Ottoman sovereignty in the Libya hinterland. This paper will highlight some of the details of the uneasy partnership between the CUP and Sanusiyya. Further, it will show that this bid by the CUP was part of an empire-wide project of peripheral incorporation that attempted to solidify the boundaries of the Ottoman Empire. This regularization of practice and assertion of sovereignty was one of the most important parts of the CUP’s reform program and had a special significance in Libya due to close proximity to the protectorates and colonies of the British and the French.