alternatehistory.com

…The Austro-Hungarians had rushed to prepare their assault for the same day as the German attack in Flanders. Unlike the meticulous planning for Caporetto with a well prepared assault by well practiced troops at a place of their choosing against an enemy weak point, the attack on the Mincio was a hurried affair. The Austrians had been able to comb their best troops into specialized stromtrooper battalions, in the German model, but otherwise were not particularly prepared for the attack. Rather than hitting a weak point they were attacking a strongly held river line manned by the best troops in the Italian Peninsula, at a number of points limited by their supply of bridging equipment.

What was worse for them was that the Entente learned of the coming offensive from various deserters from the Slavic regiments of the Austro-Hungarian Army. Not only did they know roughly where it was coming, but down to the hour it was going to occur. The British and French troops holding the Mincio were thus well prepared to deal with the Austrian attack.

On March 23rd at 3:00 in the Morning Entente guns opened up all along the Mincio front, targeting the forward trenches where the Austro-Hungarian Stormtroopers were forming up. Austrian guns responded, but they were on the back foot and forced to split between silencing enemy guns and performing the preparatory bombardment. Despite the heavy casualties they took the Austrian Stormtroopers launched their assault as scheduled at 3:30, following a curtain of gas and a short, sharp but diminished preparatory barrage.

They crossed the river in small boats into the teeth of alerted Franco-British Troops with massed machine guns. Despite this the well trained Assault troops were able to secure multiple lodgements over the river, using submachine guns, cut down machine guns, pistols, grenades and flamethrowers to clear enemy trenches. This cost them heavily. However following up with this would require bridges over the Mincio to move in additional forces.

The Franco-British air superiority allowed them an almost uncontested view of the battlefield. They were quickly able to locate the places where the Austrian Engineers were attempting to throw up temporary bridges and direct heavy guns onto them. Austrian artillery attempted to counter-battery the enemy guns, but lacking aerial reconnaissance and having taken losses from the Entente artillery they were unable to do so. After three days the majority of available Austrian bridging equipment had been destroyed. With the ability to sustain operations across the river gone Conrad called off the assault.

The Austrians had suffered 30,000 casualties in three days and saw their year long stream of victories broken. What was worse was these losses were concentrated in their best trained and best motivated troops, whose loss would be sorely missed in the coming months. Possibly worse than that was the assault effectively neutralized the Austro-Hungarian Army until summer.

In contrast the Entente had taken less than 10,000 casualties. The French and British divisions were able to be withdrawn to reinforce the Western Front in a timely manner, making the primary objective of the offensive a failure. Reconstituted Italian divisions replaced the transferred French and British. The pause in operations forced by the attack allowed the Italians to fortify the area and rebuild the shaky morale of their formations.

By insisting on an attack before the Austrians were ready Ludendorff had unwittingly handed the Entente a victory and quite possibly lost the war. Had Conrad been able to launch a late Spring offensive against the Italians after the Franco-British forces were withdrawn it could have conceivably gone very well for the Austrians. As it was the Italians would have several more months to prepare for the coming storm...


-Excerpt from European Wars for Americans, Harper & Brothers, New York, 2004



I wanted to do Michael today, but computer issues and having to work on my day off. On the bright side I may squeeze out a couple extra updates this week, thanks to some vacation time, may be an extra update for this on Wednesday depending on how nasty Tuesday is for me and how late I'm stuck at the polling place