Romanian Eagle

Before the Battle of Dardanelles was over, Bulgaria thought it had seen the situation.

To give Bulgaria such confidence, in addition to the Allied forces that have been unstoppable in Dardanelles, there is also the performance of Italy's participation in the war.

In April 1915, because Britain and France promised to share Fiume and Dalmatia after the war, Italy and the Allies signed the "London Treaty" and prepared to declare war on Austria-Hungary. Interestingly, out of fear of Germany, Italy declared war only against Austria-Hungary, and did not dare to declare war on Germany until August 28, 1916.

For Italy, Britain and France mainly need its relatively strong navy. At this time, Italy has 3 dreadnoughts (one Dante class, two Count of Cavour class), if add the 3 joint force class of Austria-Hungary, the Allies will have 6 dreadnoughts in the Mediterranean.

The French fleet, which is responsible for defending the Mediterranean, has only two dreadnoughts and two outfitting. In order to ensure its advantage over the German High Seas Fleet, the United Kingdom did not dare to easily dispatch dreadnoughts to reinforce the Mediterranean Sea. However, because of territorial conflicts between Italy and Austria-Hungary, Italy chose to wait and see at the beginning of the war. Britain and France stepped up to win over Italy after seeing the rift in the Allies.

Thus, Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary on May 23, 1915. At sea, Italy mainly blocked the Austro-Hungarian navy together with France. On land, Italy was preparing to attack Austria-Hungary.

So the Italian army launched an attack on Austria-Hungary in the Izonzo area, but due to the complex terrain of this area and the fact that Austria-Hungary built a strong position here. The Italian army, commanded by General Cadorna, also committed a long time for artillery preparation (mountain terrain Italy prepared for a week of artillery bombardment, which consumed one sixth of the Italian ammunition reserve that was not much), and the front lines were scattered. .

And both Italian and Austrian commanders had a simple but distinct strategy for the battle. Italian commander Luigi Cadorna's strategy was to attack, and he believed that only by attacking could a decisive victory be achieved. Therefore, the Italian army launched four large-scale attacks on the Austrian army within six months. Faced with these attacks, the Austrian commander, General Borroch, adopted a very simple strategy. His strategy is to defend. So he issued only one order: "All troops should build fortifications and set up obstacles in front of them, and stick to the spot."

In this way he was able to force the Italian army to fight in the unfavorable terrain of rivers and mountains, with a complete fortification. This strategy made him famous among the troops and did not cause him much trouble in the early stages of the campaign. However, due to the low military quality of the Italian soldiers and the incompetent command of the officers. Let Italy bring the weakest major warring countries in World War I, but now Italy is still working hard to attack the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but the results are touching.

General Cadorna still insisted on the offensive strategy, but he still ignored two other important and complementary strategic factors. Concentrate your forces and devote maximum forces to decisive locations. Allocate reasonably, retaining the minimum necessary military means in indeterminate locations.

In 1915, Italian decision-makers decided to launch a full-scale attack on Izonzo's sixty-mile-wide front, which prevented them from concentrating their forces anywhere and weakened the troops both materially and spiritually. Their attacks, which always seemed to be uncoordinated, and inappropriate shelling, often fell behind the infantry. In addition, since the Austrians occupied many high ground, the attack was not unexpected, because the Austrians could watch all the Italian attack preparations from the high ground. As a result, 250,000 Italians were killed or taken prisoner in about six months. The four main attacks were at different locations,

But all of them suffered heavy casualties and made little progress.

Italy's biggest achievement was the capture of the small town of Podgora, the gateway to Gorizia, but it took too much time for Italy. After the battle of Golicce, Austria-Hungary began to dispatch troops to defend the border with Italy one after another. Now, after retaking Austrian Poland and battering the Russian army, the Austro-Hungarian Empire turned its attention to the south, and Serbia, the culprit of this European war, is still alive and kicking.

Austria-Hungary has invaded Serbia three times since the outbreak of the war, all of which have been repelled by Serbia. This small country with a population of 4.3 million is desperate to resist the invasion of Austria-Hungary. When the war started, Serbia mobilized 400,000 troops. However, after three battles against Austria-Hungary, Serbia has expanded its mobilization to women, and many Serbian troops have separate female units.

Even so, Serbia now has only more than 200,000 troops. 16% of the country's population has been mobilized into the army, and almost all young and middle-aged people have been incorporated into the army. Even so desperately, Serbia does not have much military strength. However, because Austria-Hungary was repelled by Serbia three times, Bulgaria behind it became extremely important. At this time, an extremely important news came that the weather in Serbia was abnormal. Due to the epidemic of typhoid fever, about 150,000 Serbian soldiers fell ill and lost their combat effectiveness. .

The Austro-Hungarian Empire stepped up its efforts to win over Bulgaria, and finally gave Bulgaria a guarantee to expand the Serbian territory it had captured to the central Kruševac area. In the face of such temptation, coupled with the influence of Russia's loss of the important town of Warsaw, Bulgaria finally decided to join the Allies to fight.

Preliminary political and military negotiations for Gallia's entry into the war were concluded on September 6, 1915. Three documents, two political and one military, were signed in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, and Germany, the German headquarters of the Eastern Front, Pres, and the German and Austrian armies. On the same day, Ottoman Turkey and Bulgaria signed a treaty to adjust the two borders.

Military is mainly the final settlement of Serbia's plan. In accordance with the agreement, Bulgaria issued a general mobilization order on September 22. By the day of the war, a total of 616,680 people had been mobilized. At that time, the total population of Bulgaria was 4.93 million, of which 2,484,122 were male. For example, about 3 out of 8 adult males joined the army.

Now Serbia is completely unaware of the malicious intentions from Bulgaria behind them. They are still focusing on the German and Austrian troops on the front. In this attack on Serbia, Austria-Hungary finally pulled the German army over, and the German 11th Army (7 German divisions) joined the invasion of Serbia. action. So Serbia has no energy to care about Bulgaria behind it, and now they are all defending the German-Austrian coalition.