The Probert Encyclopaedia of Warfare

BATTLE OF CAPORETTO

The Battle of Caporetto was a joint German-Austrian victory over the Italian Army in October 1917 during the Great War, at Caporetto, a village on the river Isonzo in north-west Slovenia. The German commander, General Karl von Bulow, broke through Italian lines on the Isonzo and forced an Italian retreat to fall back onto the Piave line.

At the close of September the Italian offensive against Austria in 1917 came to an end in the Isonzo area. The front extended from north of Plezzo to the Adriatic.

By the end of the third week of October it was known to Cadorna that Germans were reinforcing the Austrians. For two or three weeks before he had been aware that the enemy was preparing an offensive, but he had no idea that it would be on a large scale. But during the summer the German general staff had planned a great offensive, to be developed with those novel tactics that had just been successful against the Russians.

The belief in Italy was that the enemy's attack would be in and from the Trentino and the north front. Here the Italians had the fifth army, under General Morone, on the west side of the Trentino, the first army, under General Pecori-Giraldi, on the east side of it to the Brenta, and the fourth army, under General de Robilant, from the Brenta, across Cadore and Carnia, to the junction of its right with the left of the second army on the Isonzo. Over against these armies were the army commanded by von Hoetzendorff in the Trentino, and the army commanded by von Krobatin in Cadore and Carnia: both of them Austrian armies, stiffened with some German troops. Against the Italian second army was now arrayed a new army, consisting of six German divisions and several Austrian divisions, under von Below, who had been transferred from the French front. He took extraordinary precautions to keep his plans secret. To make sure that no soldier under his orders revealed them to the enemy, he withdrew all Austro-Hungarian troops between Tolmino and Plezzo, and sent his own shock troops into the battle-line.

Von Below, with Ludendorff in the background, was the driving force of the enemy offensive, which began on October the 23rd and 24th, with an intense bombardment from Plezzo to the sea. On October the 24th the weather was wet, with a thick mist, which exactly suited von Below, who under cover of it took the Italians by surprise. After a pause in the bombardment, a tremendous fire was again concentrated on the lines between Plezzo and the Bainsizza plateau, and large infantry forces were hurled against the positions of the second army from Monte Rombon to near San Gabriele. The Italians held on the flanks, but the centre broke. On the north Below was
Checked at Saga, and on the south he made little progress, but he pierced the Italian front between the height of Krasji, south of Polounik, and the Vodil height, north-west of Tolmino.

Lower down, from west of Tolmino to Auzza, Below also broke through. Advancing from the Tolmino bridgehead in the mist, the Germans captured the heights of Globocak, which, however, were retaken by the Italians. Higher up, however, the enemy was clean through the Italian lines west of the Isonzo, and was aiming straight for Caporetto, had isolated an Italian force in the Monte Nero region, and was progressing up the Isonzo from the Vodil height district also towards Caporetto, south-east of which at the village of Luico there was extraordinarily obstinate fighting, the place changing hands eight times.

Severe fighting went on all through October the 25th over the greater part of this section, but the gap was rapidly enlarged. In some places the Italians, whose reserves did not come up in time, offered little or no resistance, but on most of the front the struggle was bitter. The troops who had held their ground at Saga had to retreat in haste, and on the Bainsizza plateau also the Italians were compelled to withdraw, with their flank exposed to attack owing to the destruction or disappearance of the corps south of Tolmino. Caporetto was lost, and an effort made by. Cadorna, to stem the enemy's advance was unsuccessful; masses of men of the second army were in headlong retreat under the shock of disaster, and to bring up fresh troops through the midst of the fugitives was almost impossible. Below, however, failed to take full advantage of his amazing good fortune. Had he swept in force from Caporetto to Cividale and Udine, and thence southward upon the flank and rear of the Italians, he would have annihilated them.

On October the 26th the situation grew worse. At some points the Italians made a stand, and died rather than surrender. Thus the men on Monte Nero who had been cut off on October the 24th perished. At other points the Italians stood nearly too long. Those who had continued to hold on to Globocak were almost surrounded before they withdrew. But by the afternoon of October the 26th Below was pressing down the valleys of the Judrio and the Natisone, and was sending a considerable force west from Saga into Carnia. Though the Italians from Monte Santo to Gorizia, forming the right of the second army, still maintained their ground, and the third army had defeated all the Austrian attacks in the Carso, the situation was such that Cadorna ordered a general retreat on the evening of October the 26th. The enemy was threatening to cut the communications of the whole Isonzo line as well as those of the Italians in Carnia.

The Italian retreat was first to the Tagliamento, but that river did not offer a line strong enough to stand on, and the retreat had to be continued to the Piave. It was a difficult retreat, particularly in the narrow space west of the Carso, across which the third army had to pass, but that army kept its cohesion in a wonderful manner, retired in good order under rearguards, who fought off the Austrians, and brought away most of its guns, after destroying some of its heavy pieces, the distance traversed to the Piave being about 60 miles. Farther north the 11th corps, which had been on the north of the Carso, reached the Tagliamento,, but found that the bridge had been destroyed, and large numbers of men were captured.

By November the 1st the bulk of the Italian army from the Isonzo had crossed the Tagliamento, and the retreat slowed down. Meanwhile the Germans were some distance into the Friulian Plain; Gorizia was again Austrian; Cividale, a burning ruin, was in the hands of Below, and Udine, which had been Cadorna's headquarters, was occupied by Below on October the 29th. The losses of the Italians were very heavy; the Germans put them at 200,000 in prisoners alone, and about 2,000
guns. On November the 3rd Below forced the passage of the Tagliamento at Pinzano, and struck south-west to, the Livenza, Next day .the Italians repulsed him when attempting a crossing of the Tagliamento near St Vito, but on November the 7th they quit the line of that river and fell back to the line of the Monticano Livenza, which was abandoned next day for the line of the Piave. By November the 10th they were standing there, and the retreat was: at an end.
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