Part 2-28 European Wars
RamscoopRaider
Donor
…The Dual Monarchy was put in a precarious position by the unexpected nature of the Italian March Offensive. The spring floods were protecting their western flank and giving them time to strip the rest of the country for reserves to hold off the Italians just a bit longer. However the quality of those troops, and especially their morale was lacking. A good push by the Italians would still break them, and everyone knew it. With the Entente not responding to peace overtures they were making; something would have to be done to rebuild the shattered morale of the frontline soldiers. If the Dual Monarchy could hold on a bit longer, their peace overtures might bear fruit and they might yet receive terms that were less than Carthaginian. Doing that would require their forces on the Italian front to stand and fight, and that would mean boosting their morale.
The best way to do that was a victory, but there were no easy opponents left, apart from occupation troops in Serbia and the Ukraine their only deployments were on the Western and Italian fronts, with the Bulgarians having taken over the Albanian front. The Army simply had no opportunity to launch an attack with a chance of success. Thus it fell to the Navy to do that.
The Austro-Hungarian Navy was always the red headed stepchild of the country, given that it faced potential land based threats from almost every direction and had little sea access. By the start of the war it was smaller than the Italian navy alone, much less the French and British reinforcements that backstopped it. Yet it had done well so far in the war, apart from the success of their U-Boats the battleships had in 1915 sailed right up to the Italian coast and shelled the city of Ancona without being stopped. Repeated raids had been launched on the Entente blockade of the strait of Otranto, resulting in it being unable to meaningfully hamper the U-Boat arm. In short the outnumbered, outgunned and outmoded Austrian fleet had punched well above its weight.
Admiral Miklos Horthy was the most successful of the Austrian naval commanders and he was given the task of providing a victory to restore national morale and the credibility of the Austrian Armed Forces. Horthy planned on attacking, not the Otranto Barrage as in previous attacks, but the port of Valona. Valona was the key to Italian logistics in Albania, with a spy providing Italian convoy timetables Horthy would be able to hit the port just as the ships started to unload, being able to sink the ships at their moorings while still loaded, denying the Italians use of the port and the supplies.
Horthy scheduled the raid for April 14th, however on the 10th when final preparations were supposed to begin in earnest things came undone. The crews of the ships at Pola refused to work, having learned of the planned attack and viewing it as a suicide mission. It was not just the army that had been suffering from poor morale, and the navy had been strongly infiltrated by communists and ethnic nationalists. Attempts to get things moving again turned violent and the Austrian fleet became at outright mutiny. The mutiny was quelled by April 15th, but only by promises that the fleet would not sail unless the Italians attacked Pola…
…The mutiny at Pola was noted with alarm by the high command of the Kriegsmarine, who worried that the same thing could happen to them. Measures were immediately taken to deal with potential ringleaders and malcontents by transferring them to shore postings and obsolete vessels…
…The liberation of Rheims on the 14th was the signal that the Bulgarians, Romanians and Greeks had been waiting for. It was now more than clear that the Germans could not afford a major diversion of troops and that it was time for their plans to be executed.
On April 16th Bulgarian forces began pulling back to their prewar borders. The Romanians in turn began pulling back from the easternmost portions of occupied Ukraine, while the Greeks began a quiet mobilization. On April 18th the Bulgarians and Romanians jointly announced a unilateral ceasefire with the Entente pending a formal peace agreement, while the Greeks declared war on the Ottoman Empire.
The Greek navy was able to escort an invasion convoy into Ionia on the 20th of April. The Ottomans, with major commitments in three other locations had no troops available to stop the Greeks, who captured Smyrna on the 25th. By the start of May the Greeks had penetrated 40 miles inland and there was no evident way of stopping them before they broke out onto the Anatolian plateau. Cut off from their remaining allies by the withdrawal of Bulgaria and with their heartland under threat the Ottomans were almost ready to throw in the towel.
However their leadership was not quite ready to give up just yet. Enver Pasha promised that his Army of Islam was on the verge of breaking the Armenians. If that occurred their position at the peace table would be far better…
…The withdrawal of the Bulgarian army allowed the Italians in Albania to make rapid gains, and they reached the prewar Bulgarian border shortly after the Bulgarians did. They then began wheeling northwards to attack into the soft underbelly of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In their way were only occupation troops and a few scattered detachments of Landwehr and training units…
…The fall of Rheims, and the subsequent ceasefire from Romania and Bulgaria was a signal that the time to revolt against the Hapsburgs was here. Elements of the local governments in Czechia, Slovakia, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia began declaring independence. A Czechoslovak state was declared on the 28th of April, and one of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes on the 30th. Local Austrian forces were overwhelmed by the uprisings and were unable to do more than maintain order in the largest cities. The Hapsburg Empire had entered its terminal decline…
-Excerpt from European Wars for Americans, Harper & Brothers, New York, 2004
The best way to do that was a victory, but there were no easy opponents left, apart from occupation troops in Serbia and the Ukraine their only deployments were on the Western and Italian fronts, with the Bulgarians having taken over the Albanian front. The Army simply had no opportunity to launch an attack with a chance of success. Thus it fell to the Navy to do that.
The Austro-Hungarian Navy was always the red headed stepchild of the country, given that it faced potential land based threats from almost every direction and had little sea access. By the start of the war it was smaller than the Italian navy alone, much less the French and British reinforcements that backstopped it. Yet it had done well so far in the war, apart from the success of their U-Boats the battleships had in 1915 sailed right up to the Italian coast and shelled the city of Ancona without being stopped. Repeated raids had been launched on the Entente blockade of the strait of Otranto, resulting in it being unable to meaningfully hamper the U-Boat arm. In short the outnumbered, outgunned and outmoded Austrian fleet had punched well above its weight.
Admiral Miklos Horthy was the most successful of the Austrian naval commanders and he was given the task of providing a victory to restore national morale and the credibility of the Austrian Armed Forces. Horthy planned on attacking, not the Otranto Barrage as in previous attacks, but the port of Valona. Valona was the key to Italian logistics in Albania, with a spy providing Italian convoy timetables Horthy would be able to hit the port just as the ships started to unload, being able to sink the ships at their moorings while still loaded, denying the Italians use of the port and the supplies.
Horthy scheduled the raid for April 14th, however on the 10th when final preparations were supposed to begin in earnest things came undone. The crews of the ships at Pola refused to work, having learned of the planned attack and viewing it as a suicide mission. It was not just the army that had been suffering from poor morale, and the navy had been strongly infiltrated by communists and ethnic nationalists. Attempts to get things moving again turned violent and the Austrian fleet became at outright mutiny. The mutiny was quelled by April 15th, but only by promises that the fleet would not sail unless the Italians attacked Pola…
…The mutiny at Pola was noted with alarm by the high command of the Kriegsmarine, who worried that the same thing could happen to them. Measures were immediately taken to deal with potential ringleaders and malcontents by transferring them to shore postings and obsolete vessels…
…The liberation of Rheims on the 14th was the signal that the Bulgarians, Romanians and Greeks had been waiting for. It was now more than clear that the Germans could not afford a major diversion of troops and that it was time for their plans to be executed.
On April 16th Bulgarian forces began pulling back to their prewar borders. The Romanians in turn began pulling back from the easternmost portions of occupied Ukraine, while the Greeks began a quiet mobilization. On April 18th the Bulgarians and Romanians jointly announced a unilateral ceasefire with the Entente pending a formal peace agreement, while the Greeks declared war on the Ottoman Empire.
The Greek navy was able to escort an invasion convoy into Ionia on the 20th of April. The Ottomans, with major commitments in three other locations had no troops available to stop the Greeks, who captured Smyrna on the 25th. By the start of May the Greeks had penetrated 40 miles inland and there was no evident way of stopping them before they broke out onto the Anatolian plateau. Cut off from their remaining allies by the withdrawal of Bulgaria and with their heartland under threat the Ottomans were almost ready to throw in the towel.
However their leadership was not quite ready to give up just yet. Enver Pasha promised that his Army of Islam was on the verge of breaking the Armenians. If that occurred their position at the peace table would be far better…
…The withdrawal of the Bulgarian army allowed the Italians in Albania to make rapid gains, and they reached the prewar Bulgarian border shortly after the Bulgarians did. They then began wheeling northwards to attack into the soft underbelly of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In their way were only occupation troops and a few scattered detachments of Landwehr and training units…
…The fall of Rheims, and the subsequent ceasefire from Romania and Bulgaria was a signal that the time to revolt against the Hapsburgs was here. Elements of the local governments in Czechia, Slovakia, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia began declaring independence. A Czechoslovak state was declared on the 28th of April, and one of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes on the 30th. Local Austrian forces were overwhelmed by the uprisings and were unable to do more than maintain order in the largest cities. The Hapsburg Empire had entered its terminal decline…
-Excerpt from European Wars for Americans, Harper & Brothers, New York, 2004