Caporetto's drama
The Second Army dissolved (desertions, surrenders, mutinies) so much so that the Austro-Germans in the first two or three days made about 300,000 prisoners, not to mention the dead, the wounded and the missing.
They also captured thousands of tons of food, thousands of cannons and marched quickly to reach the Po Valley, with the intent to bring Italy out of the war, making it surrender.
Even today it is not clear, despite the historians' commitment, why such a powerful army dissolved in two or three days.
However, one thing now seems established: that the morale of the troops - of all the troops of all armies - was worrying, because the conditions of life of the soldier, in the First World War, were so anti-human as to escape any imagination.
We know that French wards mutinied, that Russian wards surrendered en masse and that other wards, always Russian, fraternized with their enemies.
There are also episodes of fraternization between Italians and Austrians (it seems that during the night food was exchanged between the trenches, a few meters away); we know that every assault meant for the soldier a 50% chance of being at least wounded.
The wall of the machine gun and barbed wire made any attack impossible.
We also know that the generals of the Austro-Italian front believed that the war would take place by occupying mountain tops, or "quotas".
Caporetto was the egg of Columbus because a German lieutenant, Rommel, who commanded a battalion of soldiers, discovered that it was possible to advance safely in the mountains, without taking care of the peaks and, therefore, by way of valleys, arrived in Caporetto.
Caporetto, in general, now corresponds to the concept of defeat, but also means the obtuseness of certain strategic schemes which were, in fact, overturned by the genius of a few officers, unfortunately of an adverse and especially German side.
Now, we need to clarify the responsibilities of the gen.
Cadorna: he organized the retreat well, fortifying the Piave and the Grappa massif in the meantime.
This was made necessary by the situation of the moment because, due to the breakthrough of the Austro-Germans, the front had been very reduced and concentrated, precisely, on the Piave and Grappa.
The handover from Cadorna to Diaz saw a change in the situation.
The troops, in fact, who were no longer forced to the grueling and absurd sorties (which meant certain death) that had characterized the eleven battles on the Isonzo, felt the moral rise; thanks to a more careful interest of the Command, the families of the fighters had help and comfort, at least for the very fact of not feeling completely abandoned, while the husbands, the brothers, the fathers who were at the front felt they were fighting for something.
The Carabinieri were essential in this with their information and assistance work.
The attacks on the Karst ended, terrible in winter because of the frost and in summer because of the lack of water; Finally, the conditions of the soldiers also improved in the trenches of Monte Grappa, very well organized and more livable than the trenches that the fighters had known previously.
Once on the Piave, the Italian army did not move anymore.
It was helped by some English, French divisions and an American regiment.
After the enormous defeat of Caporetto, it was a matter of reconstituting the army, the armament, the baggage, until June 1918 (Battle of the summer solstice) when the Austrians attacked for the last time trying to break through, but to no avail.
Exactly one year after Caporetto, on 24 October 1918, the Italian army triggered a medium-sized attack: a department of this offensive arrived in Vittorio Veneto which was the caporetto of the Austrians who, by now, were at the minimum terms.
Just in memory of this, in the Victory Bulletin, issued by the Command and signed Diaz (even if it was written by Ugo Ojetti), we read, at the end: “The remains of what was one of the most powerful armies in the world date back, in disorder and hopeless, the valleys that had descended with proud security "
