09. bitva na Soči (Isonzu) [1916]

After five days of artillery training, Italian troops broke through the Austro-Hungarian position in the three-kilometer section, and after two days of fighting, they advanced to Kostanjevica, 12 kilometers as the crow flies from the starting line of the first Sochi offensive. Here, the Austro-Hungarian counterattacks stopped them and forced them to partially retreat. Italians lost 16,000 men, Austrians 11,000 ...


Josef Fučík, Marek Pavlík: Sočská fronta 1915-1917 (Prague 2008)

... Going into captivity was not so easy, almost impossible, only during the offensives some divisions got there. They usually had a reasonable batch with them and stayed in the caverns. But even so, they had to proceed carefully, stick out a white rag, and even then it was uncertain whether the Italians would start throwing hand grenades at them. If, on the other hand, a platoon surrounded by a cavern set out with a shout 'hooray' and managed to kill or wound an Italian officer, the following development was unworthy of the Italian army. The whole anthill of Italians immediately dropped their rifles and shook their white handkerchiefs. And with what joy it ran into captivity! Those handkerchiefs talked a lot about heroism, and we always envied them for not being in their shoes. It was strangely wrong. We had no reason to fight, nor did we fight at all, just guarded and repaired the trenches, and at every opportunity we wanted to run - either forwards or backwards - full of dirt, lice, hunger and mud. And they, well fed, red and grazed, loafers full of food to fight - and yet in the end the battlefield was ours and they were in captivity ...


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