nt to investigate the whole question, for the three chief
Generals concerned were not only removed from their commands, but given
no further employment and placed upon half-pay.

The original break was due to many causes. The great mass of German
Divisions and Artillery was concentrated in the Caporetto sector. This
fact should have been known to the High Command, and if the Italian
troops holding the line at this point were, for various reasons, of poor
quality, this also should have been known to the High Command, whose
duty it is to know the comparative fighting power of different units.
The High Command, when the battle started, claimed that they had known
beforehand when and where the blow was coming, that all preparations had
been made and that they were fully confident of the result. Such boasts
have been made by other High Commands on other Fronts, on the eve of
other disasters, and even after them. They greatly deepen the
responsibility of those who make them.

The German Batteries on the Italian Front had a much larger supply of
ammunition than the Austrians, including a large quantity of "special
gas" shell. Many Italian troops, both Infantry and Artillery, subjected
to prolonged gas bombardment, found the gas masks provided by the High
Command quite inadequate. It was left for General Diaz some months later
to order the equipment of the whole Italian Army with the British box
respirator.

The number of guns lost by the Second Army was very great. I am told
that one reason for this was the fact that the High Command had for some
weeks been preparing a further big offensive against the Plateau of
Ternova, had concentrated an abnormal number of Batteries on the Second
Army Front, and had pushed the majority of the guns much further up than
would have been justified, if an enemy offensive had been expected.
Then, having made these preparations, the High Command hesitated and
began to change its mind. But the disposition of the forward Batteries,
thoroughly unsound for defensive purposes, was not appreciably altered,
and a quite small enemy advance sufficed to make enormous captures of
guns.

When the attack developed, some of the troops in the Caporetto sector
unquestionably turned and ran, as troops of every great Army in this war
have at times turned and run, under conditions of greater or less
provocation. Then the High Command apparently lost its head, and
attempted to issue to the world a communique of