Vatican States in World War I

**The Vatican States were originally members of the Triple Alliance, the Vatican states never joined the central powers because the pact signed between Germany and Austria-Hungary was a non-offensive defensive pact so the Vatican states never joined, in the face of the refusal From the kingdom to enter the First World War as part of the triple alliance, Germany together with Austria-Hungary decided to invade the cities of Bolzano and Udine simultaneously on March 16, 1915 to weaken the Vatican defenses in what today would be known as the Battle of Bolzano and Udine from which our kingdom came out the loser, due to the low number of troops in those cities, the prime minister quickly decided to mediate diplomatically with Austria-Hungary and Germany, going against the congress and the king who wanted to counterattack before It was too late, the negotiations lasted 2 days without any change due to the disobedience of the prime minister before the king, Prime Minister C allimaco Schiavone was dismissed on March 19, 1915 without honors and with the title "regnum in ignominiam" (Disgrace for the kingdom) for disobeying a direct order, after the removal of the prime minister, the congress gave the king full power to be able to fight the war, since King Javier I was a great strategist, the king took full power of the Kingdom.**

# ***Declaration of War on Austria-Hungary and Germany***

**On the morning of March 29, the king gave a speech in St. Peter's Square before all the Vatican's who were there, there were approximately 15,370 people, among which were journalists from the main newspapers, the speech of declaration of war was the following: "Vatican People in the early morning of March 16 of this year the German and Austro-Hungarian threat invaded our national territory conquering the cities of Bolzano and Udine, killing our soldiers while they slept and taking our citizens prisoners, the day Today, I Javier I of the Vatican States and the Vatican Congress have decided to declare war on these foolish ambitious Imperialists wanting to bring our people to their knees, today I have become a king of war and that is why I ask for support from my people to help us, so I have decreed a State of Emergency and any man between 18 and 40 years old will be recruited into the Army, Force Air, Cavalry, Marines and Navy to serve their country, men over 40 years old to 65 years old will be recruited for farms, factories and any industry we need and women between 18 and 65 years old will be recruited for factories , hospitals and field hospitals and any woman who wishes to help her country can do so as a volunteer in the army, the Vatican people, we are at war "the next day 15,000 women voluntarily enrolled in the armed forces.**

# ***First Offensive***

**On April 3, the offensive plans were ready to counterattack the Austro-Hugarian and German army, in the city of Trento two brigades were waiting with approximately 9,346 Soldiers, there were also 4,500 horses for the cavalry and 342 Fighters at the Aviano Aerodrome, The General in command of the Operation was General Geraldino Mancini and the king would be aware of the operation, at 10 in the morning Operation Morte ai tedeschi (Death to Germans) began, which consisted of driving back the Germans and Austro- Hungarians to the city of Villach in Austria, at 10 a.m. General Mancini mobilized his troops on two fronts, one for Bolzano and the other for Udine, concentrated the cavalry in Bolzano and the air support in Udine, at 3 in the Later the first troops arrived in Bolzano and began to surround the city to bag it and attack from all sides, the maneuver was successful and at 3:45 the general gave the order for the cavalry to enter through the entrance. The main battle and distraction while the infantry locked up the Austro-Hungarians who did not put up much resistance, finally after 2 hours of fighting at 6 in the afternoon the battle ended with 47 Vatican casualties and 130 wounded, while the Austro-Hungarians lost 569 soldiers, 340 wounded and 2,405 prisoners, meanwhile in Udine, the soldiers arrived at 5 in the afternoon and it was decided that the air force would enter first and then the army, effectively the 335 fighters took off towards Udine and for approximately 30 minutes the The planes concentrated the fire in the known locations where there were soldiers, the planes went to recharge fuel and bullets, while some 54 soldiers entered the city to reconnoitre, reached the main square and did not oppose resistance, so they all advanced and They arrived at the town square to organize themselves and begin to enter house by house, the brigade was divided into 5 regiments, the first 2 would search the houses , while the other 3 would be on guard in the city, the city was empty of soldiers, according to the citizens, the Germans would have fled when the fighters opened fire, it was decided that they would rest that day and the next they would reach Villach, it was the first Vatican triumph in the war.**

# ***Entry into the Austro-Hungarian Empire***

**The next day after they rested, the attack plans were studied again and it was decided to change the city of Villach to advance to Salzburg and leave Austria-Hungary in two, but it was decided that for these plans they would save 2 months to build more planes and train more troops, after 2 months on June 4, the Vatican army had a force of 1,500,459 highly trained troops and 5,700 fighters, they went back to studying the plans but now they would not only go to Salzburg, but 100,000 soldiers would go to Innsbruck to conquer the Western part of Austria-Hungary, that was decided that in 2 days 560,000 soldiers would leave for Austria-Hungary and the others would stay to defend the kingdom, on June 6 the cavalry, the air force and the infantry were prepared At 5 in the morning, Captain Averardo Zito gave the order for the troops to advance to their objectives, it was known as the June offensive to this operation, the soldiers fought for 2 weeks In order to reach their objectives, at the end of the offensive we ended up with 15,000 dead, 23,000 wounded and 543 prisoners, while the enemies ended up with 52,000 dead, 17,000 wounded and 60,234 prisoners and we had achieved our objective, dividing the Austro-Hungarian Empire, The victory was celebrated throughout the kingdom, it was decided to stop the offensive there and let the troops rest, after that there were a few battles in which we lost and gained territory, for approximately 1 year we were left without deciding to advance and wait for the others countries that decided to move forward.**

# ***Final offensive and entry into Vienna***

**On September 1, it was decided to agree with the United Kingdom that if we reached Vienna and weakened the Austro-Hungarians, at the end of the war in the negotiations they would give us part of the Austro-Hungarian territory, so it was decided to make a plan to occupy the part Western Austria-Hungary and then arrive in Vienna and comply with the proposal of the United Kingdom, it was decided that the agreed date would be September 15 and enlist the troops and battle plans, the plans were ready, 850,000 soldiers would be needed and 15,347 planes and for this offensive the cavalry would not be used if not horse-towed artillery, it was decided that of the 850,000 soldiers, 250,000 would go west to conquer what was left of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, it was decided that these 250,000 soldiers would reach up to the border of Liechtenstein and France and the other 600,000 would reach Vienna, it was expected that the western front would not give much strength since they had been 1 year without many supplies Istros and for the front of Vienna if there would be a lot of resistance because it was very important, so the planes and artillery would be concentrated there, on September 15 the troops were ready to leave, at 4 in the morning the troops left for their objectives, the western front as expected did not put up much resistance and only in 3 weeks they conquered the western part of the empire, with 3,000 casualties and 15,000 wounded, while the few enemy troops that remained were almost completely annihilated, only 10,000 remained Prisoners of war, meanwhile on the Vienna front put up too much resistance, but after 3 months we arrived in Vienna in what is known today as the December miracle, on this front there were almost 90,000 casualties, 200,000 Wounded and 5,000 Prisoners of War While the enemies had 200,000 casualties, 30,000 wounded and almost 400,000 prisoners of war, the Austro-Hungarian emperor managed to escape to Budapest and took refuge. Ass, as a victory it was decided that the king would go to Vienna and walk the streets as a victory parade, but it was canceled after an attack on a hotel where the Vatican troops were, it was decided that to influence fear in the Austro-Hungarians 670 bombers and 3,000 fighters would take off to budapest to bombard it and make the Austro-Hungarians capitulate, it was decided that on January 1, when the people celebrated the New Year, the city of Budapest would be bombed and indeed that happened, on January 1 the bombers took off and fighters from Vienna and bombing the city of Budapest for 5 hours in a row, due to the proximity between Vienna and Budapest it was very easy, the skies of Budapest were covered with Vatican planes and for 5 hours bombs rained on Budapest, the planes landed again in Vienna and a Message was sent to the Austro-Hungarians with an ultimatum.**

# ***Capitulation of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and End of the War for the kingdom***

**After the Ultimatum in Budapest, the Austro-Hungarians totally refused so a plan was started to bomb Budapest for a week, it was agreed that on January 16 the intense bombardment would begin 24 hours a day, 50 fighters would leave every hour escorting 20 bombers, January 16 arrived and 50 fighters and 20 bombers per hour began to leave Vienna, thus the bombings of Budapest occurred for a week and an ultimatum was sent again, Budapest was in ruin and Germany and the Ottoman Empire They were also falling, so finally on the morning of January 26 the Austro-Hungarian Empire capitulated and ended the War for the Kingdom of the Vatican States.**

# ***Victory Parade and Speech***

**On February 1 the king was going to give his victory speech and the victory parade was going to be held, it was decided that approximately 100,000 soldiers were going to participate in the parade with the king, the parade began at 10 in the morning and ended At 3 o'clock in the afternoon at the triumphal arch, in the arch the king gave his speech: "Vatican People, we have won the Austro-Hungarian Imperialists, we have won this war for which we have suffered 110,000 losses of our brave soldiers , this was not a triumph for our people if not for humanity, we will never allow a nation to attack our strong kingdom, I want to thank all of you and our brave soldiers, because without you we would not have gained anything, our nation did not lose those lives in vain, because we won and now prosperity will come for our kingdom "the festivities in Rome were gigantic, for two days people did not work and celebrated, the king promised that he would pay for his his personal heritage and he did so.**

# ***Consequences of war***

**We suffered approximately 110,000 military casualties and 20,000 civilians, the Treaty of Versailles granted us the cities of Villach and Klagenfurt and a debt on the part of Austria of about 1,700,000,000 Dollars, after the First World War, the economic growth was brutal and the military power grew too much.**