Military history of Italy during World War I

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Although a member of the Triple Alliance, Italy did not join the Central Powers – Germany and Austria-Hungary – when the war started with Austria-Hungary's declaration of war on Serbia on 28 July 1914. In fact, the two Central Powers had taken the offensive while the Triple Alliance was supposed to be a defensive alliance. Moreover the Triple Alliance recognized that both Italy and Austria-Hungary were interested in the Balkans and required both to consult each other before changing the status quo and to provide compensation for whatever advantage in that area: Austria-Hungary did consult Germany but not Italy before issuing the ultimatum to Serbia, and refused any compensation before the end of the war.

Almost a year after the war's commencement, after secret parallel negotiations with both sides (with the Allies in which Italy negotiated for territory if victorious, and with the Central Powers to gain territory if neutral) Italy entered the war on the side of the

The government's hope was that the war would be the culmination of Italy's struggle for national independence. Her new allies promised her the "natural frontiers" which she had so long sought-the Trentino and Trieste-and something more. At the end of hostilities she did indeed extend her territory, but she came away from the peace conference dissatisfied with her reward for three and a half years' bitter warfare, having lost half a million of her noblest youth, with her economy impoverished and internal divisions more bitter than ever. That strife could not be resolved within the framework of the old parliamentary regime. The war that was to have been the climax of the Risorgimento produced the Fascist dictatorship. Something, somewhere, had gone wrong.^[1]

From neutrality to intervention

Italy was a member of the

A few days after the outbreak of the war, on 3 August 1914, the government, led by the conservative Antonio Salandra, declared that Italy would not commit its troops, maintaining that the Triple Alliance had only a defensive stance and Austria-Hungary had been the aggressor. Thereafter Salandra and the minister of Foreign Affairs, Sidney Sonnino, began to probe which side would grant the best reward for Italy's entrance in the war or its neutrality. Although the majority of the cabinet (including former Prime Minister Giovanni Giolitti) was firmly against intervention, numerous intellectuals, including Socialists such as Ivanoe Bonomi, Leonida Bissolati, and, after 18 October 1914, Benito Mussolini, declared in favour of intervention, which was then mostly supported by the Nationalist and the Liberal parties. Pro-interventionist socialists believed that, once that weapons had been distributed to the people, they could have transformed the war into a revolution.

The negotiation with

On 3 May 1915 Italy officially revoked the Triple Alliance. In the following days Giolitti and the neutralist majority of the Parliament opposed declaring war, while nationalist crowds demonstrated in public areas for it. (The nationalist poet Gabriele D'Annunzio called this period le radiose giornate di Maggio—"the sunny days of May"). Giolitti had the support of the majority of Italian parliament so on 13 May Salandra offered his resignation to King Victor Emmanuel III, but then Giolitti learned that the London Pact was already signed: fearful of a conflict between the Crown and the Parliament and the consequences on both internal stability and foreign relationships, Giolitti accepted the fait accompli, declined to succeed as prime minister and Salandra's resignation was not accepted. On 23 May, Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary. This was followed by declarations of war on the Ottoman Empire (21 August 1915,^[2] following an ultimatum of 3 August), Bulgaria (19 October 1915) and the German Empire (28 August 1916).^[3]

Italian Front

The front on the Austro-Hungarian border was 650 km (400 mi) long, stretching from the Stelvio Pass to the Adriatic Sea. Italian forces were numerically superior but this advantage was negated by the difficult terrain. Further, the Italians lacked strategic and tactical leadership. The Italian commander-in-chief was Luigi Cadorna, a staunch proponent of the frontal assault whose tactics cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of Italian soldiers. His plan was to attack on the Isonzo front, with the dream of breaking over the Karst Plateau into the Carniolan Basin, taking Ljubljana and threatening the Austro-Hungarian Empire's capital Vienna. It was a Napoleonic plan, which had no realistic chance of success in an age of barbed wire, machine guns, and indirect artillery fire, combined with hilly and mountainous terrain.^[4]

The first shells were fired in the dawn of 24 May 1915 against the enemy positions of Cervignano del Friuli, which was captured a few hours later. On the same day the Austro-Hungarian fleet bombarded the railway stations of Manfredonia and Ancona. The first Italian casualty was Riccardo Di Giusto.

The main effort was to be concentrated in the

• First Battle of the Isonzo (23 June – 7 July)
• Second Battle of the Isonzo (18 July – 4 August)
• Third Battle of the Isonzo (18 October – 4 November)
• Fourth Battle of the Isonzo (10 November)

In these first four battles, the Italian Army registered 60,000 fatalities and more than 150,000 wounded, equivalent to around one fourth of the mobilized forces. The offensive in the upper Cadore, near the Col di Lana, though secondary, blocked large Austro-Hungarian contingents, since it menaced their main logistic lines in Tyrol.

Italian offensives of 1916–1917

This stalemate dragged on for the whole of 1916. While the Austro-Hungarians amassed large forces in Trentino, the Italian command launched the Fifth Battle of the Isonzo, lasting for eight days from 11 March 1916. This attempt was also fruitless.

In June the Austro-Hungarian counter-offensive (dubbed "

, at the cost of 20,000 dead and 50,000 wounded. The year ended with three new offensives:

• Seventh Battle of the Isonzo (14–16 September)
• Eighth Battle of the Isonzo (1 November)
• Ninth Battle of the Isonzo (4 November)

The price was a further 37,000 dead and 88,000 wounded for the Italians, again for no remarkable conquest. In late 1916, the Italian army advanced for some kilometers in Trentino, while, for the whole winter of 1916–1917, the situation in the Isonzo front remained stationary. In May and June was the Tenth Battle of the Isonzo. The Battle of Mount Ortigara (10–25 June) was Cadorna's attempt to conquer back some territories in Trentino which had remained under Austro-Hungarian control. On 18 August 1917 began the most important Italian offensive, the Eleventh Battle of the Isonzo. This time the Italian advance was initially successful as the Bainsizza Plateau southeast of Tolmino was captured, but the Italian army outran its artillery and supply lines, thus preventing the further advance that could have finally succeeded in breaking the Austro-Hungarian army. The Austro-Hungarian line ultimately held and the attack was abandoned on 12 September 1917.

Austro-Hungarian offensives of 1917–1918

Main articles:

Battle of the Piave River

Though the last Italian offensive had proven inconclusive, the Austro-Hungarians were in strong need of reinforcements. These became available when Russia crumbled and troops from the Eastern front, the Trentino front and Flanders were secretly concentrated on the Isonzo front.

On 24 October 1917, the Central Powers troops broke through the Italian lines in the upper Isonzo at

Caporetto (the modern Kobarid

) and routed the 2nd Italian Army. The Italian army commanders had been informed of a probable enemy attack, but had underestimated it and did not realize the danger posed by the infiltration tactics developed by Germans.

From Caporetto the Austro-Hungarians advanced for 150 km (93 mi) south-west, reaching Udine after only four days. The defeat of Caporetto caused the disintegration of the whole Italian front of the Isonzo. The situation was re-established by forming a stop line on the Tagliamento and then on the Piave rivers, but at the price of 10,000 dead, 30,000 wounded, 265,000 prisoners, 300,000 stragglers, 50,000 deserters, over 3,000 artillery pieces, 3,000 machine guns and 1,700 mortars. The Austro-Hungarian and German losses totaled 70,000. Cadorna, who had tried to attribute the causes of the disasters to low morale and cowardice among the troops, was relieved of duty. On 8 November 1917 he was replaced by Armando Diaz.

The Central Powers ended the year 1917 with a general offensive on the Piave, the Altopiano di Asiago, and the Monte Grappa, which failed and the Italian front reverted to attritional trench warfare. The Italian army was forced to call the 1899 levy, while that of 1900 was left for a hypothetical final effort for the year of 1919.

The Central Powers stopped their attacks in 1917 because German troops were needed on the Western Front while the Austro-Hungarian troops were exhausted and at the end of much longer logistical lines. The offensive was renewed on 15 June 1918 with Austro-Hungarian troops only in the Battle of Piave. The Italians resisted the assault. The failure of the offensive marked the swan song of Austria-Hungary on the Italian front. The Central Powers proved finally unable to sustain further the war effort, while the multi-ethnic entities of the Austro-Hungarian Empire were on the verge of rebellion. The Italians rescheduled earlier their planned 1919 counter-offensive to October 1918, in order to take advantage of the Austro-Hungarian crisis.

Italian victory

The Italian attack of 52 Italian divisions, aided by 3 British 2 French and 1 American division, 65,000 total and Czechoslovaks (see

Parenzo, the Dalmatian island of Lissa, and the Dalmatian cities of Zara and Fiume were occupied: the latter were not included in the territories originally promised secretly by the Allies to Italy in case of victory, but the Italians decided to intervene in reply to a local National Council, formed after the flight of the Hungarians, and which had announced the union to the Kingdom of Italy. The Regia Marina occupied Pola and Sebenico, which became the capital of the Military Government of Dalmatia. It occupied also all Tyrol by the III Corps of the First Army with 20–22,000 soldiers.^[5]

Other theaters

Balkans

Italian troops played a major role in the defence of

Salonika front as part of the Allied Army of the Orient. The Italian XVI Corps (a separate entity independent from the Army of the Orient) took part in actions against Austro-Hungarian forces in Albania; in 1917 they established an Italian protectorate over Albania

.

Western Front

Some Italian divisions were also sent to support the Entente on the Western Front. In 1918 Italian troops saw intense combat during the German spring offensive. Their most prominent engagement on this front was their role in the Second Battle of the Marne.

Middle East

Main article:

Senussi Campaign

Italy played a token role in the

Sinai and Palestine Campaign

, sending a detachment of five hundred soldiers to assist the British there in 1917.

As Italy entered the war on 23 May 1915, the situation of her forces in the African colonies was critical.

Gasr Bu Hadi (or al-Qurdabiya near Sirte) respectively. By August 1915, the situation in Tripolitania was similar to that of Cyrenaica. The conquest of all of Libya

was not resumed until January 1922.

Consequences

First World War without ever being defeated on the battlefield.^[6]

Italy's representative at the

Biennio Rosso and later the rise of fascism and its leader Benito Mussolini

.

See also

• Propaganda and censorship in Italy during the First World War
• Italian prisoners of war in the First World War

References

1. JSTOR 3021078
   .
2. ^ "Declarations of War from Around the World: Italy". Law Library of Congress. August 21, 1915. Retrieved May 9, 2017.
3. ^ United States Department of State, Declarations of War and Severances of Relations (1914–1918) (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1919).
4. ISBN 9783110435993
   .
5. ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2017-08-22. Retrieved 2017-08-22.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
6. ^ "SAVOIA AOSTA, Emanuele Filiberto di, duca d'Aosta" (in Italian). Retrieved 23 November 2021.

Further reading

• Ferrari, Paolo. "The Memory And Historiography Of The First World War In Italy" Comillas Journal of International Relations (2015) #2 pp 117–126 [ISSN 2386-5776] DOI: cir.i02.y2015.009 online
• Gooch, G. P. Recent Revelations Of European Diplomacy (1940), pp 245–62 summarizes memoirs of major participants
• Gooch, John (2014). The Italian Army and the First World War. Armies of the Great War. Cambridge University Press.
  ISBN 978-0521149372
  .
• OCLC 414372
  .
• Pergher, Roberta. "An Italian War? War and Nation in the Italian Historiography of the First World War" Journal of Modern History (Dec 2018) 90#4
• Pryce, Roy. "Italy and the Outbreak of the First World War." Cambridge Historical Journal 11#2 (1954): 219-27 online.

External links

• Italy World War
• Cappellano, Filippo: Warfare 1914–1918 (Italy) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War.