Page - 407 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The War of Attrition 407 and restrictions on the independence of the Commander of the 5th Army. Boroević must not continue to feel insulted, and must be aware at all times of the fact that orders given by a superior command must be obeyed without exception.’968 Archduke Eugen included this rebuke, which in any case was mildly formulated, in a letter to the Com- mander of the 5th Army, which concluded : ‘I therefore demand of Your Excellency that in future, you suppress the inadmissible sensitivity, which is only detrimental to our great purpose, for which we all wish to do our utmost, together with the irritability that springs from it, in order to implement my plans with all your excellent strength and, in so doing, to adapt yourself to this absolutely necessary hierarchical relationship’.969 Boroević understood. The Second Battle of the Isonzo ended on 3 August. On that day, Cadorna gave the order to halt the offensive. In the interim, the battle had become a material one. The Italian armies had received the weapons from the western powers that they had lacked at the beginning, and were also in a position to boost their own armaments industry. In this battle, the Italians had been far superior to the Imperial and Royal troops with regard to high-angle weapons and infantry guns in particular. However, the successes of the Italians were again extremely limited. Even so, the losses were enormously high on both sides. In just four weeks, the Imperial and Royal 5th Army had suffered total losses of 46,600 men. The Italians, however, lost 41,800, thus fewer than the defenders. Relative to the formations deployed, losses among the Imperial and Royal troops were even double those of the Italians. Despite the high losses to his armies during the first battles, the Chief of the Italian General Staff felt that he had chosen the right approach. He also explained to the Brit- ish liaison officer at the Comando Supremo, General Delme-Radcliff, that he would continue to storm the Austro-Hungarian fronts for as long as was possible without incurring any significant risk. However, after the Second Battle of the Isonzo, Cadorna was also forced to take consequences by relieving commanders en masse, which was a similar reaction to that of the Austro-Hungarian leadership in 1914. 27 generals alone were dismissed within just a few weeks.970 These measures were also designed to convey to the Entente that Italy would make every effort to wage war more effectively. However, the pleas for additional support with weapons, coal and money, which had already been voiced with urgency, created certain parallels between Italy’s relationship to the western powers on the one side and Austria-Hungary’s to the German Empire on the other. Gradually, the front on the Karst Plateau took on the same appearance as had al- ready become familiar from the positional warfare in the west, as well as from some sections of the Eastern Front. On the Isonzo, there was a severe shortage of water, and there were still far too few water conduits specifically built for the purpose. Since the rainwater was contaminated from the bodies lying about, it had to be carried to the fortifications from a great distance. The dead poisoned the air. In some cases, when the