Page - 795 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

Operation ‘Loyalty to Arms’ 795 men of conscription age were loafing about in civilian clothing with nothing to do in Lombardy and Veneto, did nothing to lessen the fury that the British felt towards the Italians. In the view of the British delegation, the layabouts should simply be rounded up and 150,000 Italians sent as military workers to France.1857 However, this was nat- urally no solution to the current problems. The western Allies would quite simply have to relocate troops to the south and if revolution were to break out in Italy, would have to consider further displacements of their forces. The condition that the French and British set for the deployment of their troops was formulated very clearly, however : Cadorna had to go. The new Italian Prime Minister, Vittorio Emanuele Orlando, who had been in office since 29 October, made no hesitation in agreeing. On 8 November, Cadorna was replaced by General Armando Diaz. However, more important for the Italians than the Allied support troops, who were gradually arriving, was the fact that the troops of the Central Powers were also unable to move further forward, although attempts were still being made at the start of De- cember to cross the Piave River. The Austrians and Germans had no more guns at the front and, above all, no ammunition. The supply convoy had not caught up with them. The railway lines had been destroyed. There was no supply bridge. As had been the case in the east, the rain turned the roads to mud, and the carts became stuck. It was calcu- lated that the process of hauling up the guns and supplying additional ammunition in order to be able to resume activity would take days, if not weeks. As a result, there was almost no prospect of continuing the advance. On 3 December, the offensive was officially brought to a halt, and the order given to move to suitable positions. The troops were also at the end of their strength. ‘Hag- gard Austrian soldiers in torn, filthy uniforms, without underclothes underneath, the vacant gaze ahead from reddened eyes  – in this way, they panted and hastened forwards, without rest, without sleep, without food  – for days on end  – only forwards, forwards’. This was how the painter and drawer Ludwig Hesshaimer described the sight that had already greeted him in the Codroipo-Latisana area. ‘What was once a crowd of fresh-faced youths had now become aged, emaciated men from our Alps, heavily laden and bent, a piece of tent cloth pulled over their heads as miserable protection against the storms and rain, grotesque figures […]. The embittered Austrians, maddened by over-exertion, could no longer be held back by their officers […]. On the evening of this terrible day, the fighters lay below and between the dead, half-dead themselves, groaned and lay in cramped positions in their sleep before the next day dawned.’1858 However, the balance was impressive. Around 10,000 Italians had fallen, 30,000 had been wounded, 294,000 men were taken prisoner and, at least temporarily, hundreds of thousands (a figure of 400,000 soldiers was given) had run away, either going home or simply disappearing, in order to avoid having to continue fighting.1859 The Germans in particular claimed the credit for the success. Boroević had only been able to make