"The War in Italy and Hungary

["Neue Rheinische Zeitung" No. 257, March 28, 1849]

*
Cologne, March 27. The war in Italy has begun. With it, the Habsburg monarchy has taken upon itself a burden under which it will probably succumb.

As long as Hungary was not engaged in open war with the entire monarchy, but merely in a fluctuating state of war against the South Slavs, it was no great feat for Austria to deal with the Italians, who were only half-revolutionised, split up, and paralysed by a threefold princely betrayal. And yet what trouble it cost! First the Pope <Pius IX>, the Grand Duke of Tuscany <Leopold II> had to withdraw their troops—directly or indirectly—from Venetian territory; first Charles Albert and his partly incompetent, partly sold-out generals had to commit direct treason against the cause of Italy; first, above all, now the Magyars, now the South Slavs had to be induced, by shoulder-shrugging policy and apparent concessions, to furnish troops for Italy, before Radetzky could gain his victories on the Mincio. It is well known that it was only the mass transfer of South Slav border regiments to Italy that made the disorganised Austrian army capable of fighting again.

Furthermore, as long as the armistice with Piedmont lasted, as long as Austria was merely obliged to maintain her Italian army at its existing strength without having to reinforce it extraordinarily, she could direct the bulk of her 600,000 soldiers against Hungary, could press the Magyars back from one position to another, and finally, by means of reinforcements arriving daily, even succeed in crushing Magyar power. In the long run, Kossuth, like Napoleon, would have had to succumb to superior force.

But the war in Italy changes the situation considerably. From the moment the termination of the armistice became certain, Austria had to double her troop dispatches to Italy, had to divide her newly raised recruits between Windischgrätz and Radetzky. In this way, neither is likely to receive enough.

Thus, while for the Magyars and Italians the sole issue is to gain time—time to procure and manufacture arms, time to train the Landsturm and National Guards into soldiers fit for field service, time to carry through the revolutionising of the country—Austria, in relation to her opponents, is losing power with every day that passes.

While Rome, Tuscany, and even Piedmont are being hurled ever deeper into the revolution by the war itself, forced daily to greater revolutionary energy, and while they can await the crisis in France, which is approaching with rapid strides, the third disorganising element in Austria, the
*Slav opposition*
, is daily gaining more ground and organising itself better every day. The imposed constitution, which, as thanks for having saved Austria, hurls the Slavs back behind March; the many insults inflicted upon the Slavs by bureaucratic and military encroachments—these are accomplished facts about which nothing can be altered.

Under these circumstances, it is understandable that the *Kölnische Zeitung* is in the greatest possible haste to have the Imperial forces done with the unpleasant Hungarian war. Yesterday, accordingly, it had them crossing the Theiss in three columns—a piece of news that is the more credible the less it has so far been confirmed by any bulletin. From other quarters, on the contrary, it is reported that the Magyar army is, quite the reverse, advancing on Pest by forced marches and obviously intends to relieve Komorn. Komorn, though heavily bombarded, is holding out bravely. During the bombardment they did not fire a single shot; but when the Austrians attempted a storm, they were repulsed with heavy loss by murderous canister fire. The Polish Uhlan regiment of Duke Coburg is said to have gone over to the Magyars when Dembinski calmly awaited his attack and had the tune “Poland Is Not Yet Lost” played.

This is all the news from the Hungarian theatre of war that we are able to give today. The Vienna post of the 23rd has not arrived.

Let us now turn to the Italian theatre of war. Here the Piedmontese army is deployed in a long arc along the Ticino and the Po. Its first line extends from Arona by way of Novara, Vigevano, Voghera, to Castel San Giovanni in front of Piacenza. Its reserve stands a few miles further back on the Sesia and Bormida, near Vercelli, Trino, and Alessandria. On the extreme right wing, at Sarzana on the Tuscan-Modenese frontier, there is a detached corps under La Marmora, ready to invade Parma and Modena through the passes of the Lunigiana, to link up on its left with the right wing of the main army, on its right with the Tuscan and Roman army, to cross the Po and the Adige as circumstances dictate, and to operate in Venetian territory.

Opposing them, on the left bank of the Ticino and the Po, stands Radetzky. His army is, as is well known, divided into two corps, one of which occupies Lombardy, the other Venetia. While no troop displacements whatever are reported from the latter province, we hear from all sides that Radetzky has concentrated his entire army in Lombardy on the Ticino. He has withdrawn all his troops from Parma and left only a few hundred men in the citadel of Modena. Varese, Como, the Val d’Intelvi and the Valtellina are completely denuded of troops, and even the customs frontier guards have disappeared.

Radetzky’s whole available force, 50,000 strong, is deployed along the Ticino from Magenta to Pavia, and along the Po from Pavia to Piacenza.

Radetzky himself is said to have conceived the foolhardy plan of crossing the Ticino immediately with this army and marching directly on Turin under cover of the inevitable consternation of the Italians. It will be recalled from last year how Radetzky more than once harboured such Napoleonic cravings and what came of them for him at that time. This time, however, the whole council of war opposed it, and it was resolved, without a decisive battle, to fall back behind the Adda, the Oglio, and, in case of necessity, even the Chiese, in order to draw reinforcements from Venetia and Illyria there.

It will depend on the manoeuvres of the Piedmontese and on the warlike ardour of the Lombards whether this retreat can be carried out without loss and whether the Austrians will succeed in holding up the Piedmontese for long. The southern slope of the Alps—the Comasca, the Brianza, the Bergamasque, the Valtellina (Val Tellina), and the Brescian—which are now largely abandoned by the Austrians, are eminently suited to a national guerrilla war of partisans. The Austrians, concentrated on the plain, are forced to leave the mountains free. Here, by a rapid advance with light troops on the right flank of the Austrians, the Piedmontese can quickly organise guerrillas who will threaten the flank and, in the event of the defeat of a single corps, the retreat of the Imperial forces, cut off their supplies, and carry the insurrection as far as the Tridentine Alps. Garibaldi would be in his element here. But it will not occur to him to serve once more under the traitor Charles Albert.

The Tuscan-Roman army, supported by La Marmora, will have the task of occupying the Po line from Piacenza to Ferrara, of crossing the Po as soon as possible and, as a second line, the Adige, of cutting Radetzky off from the Austro-Venetian corps and operating on his left wing, or in his rear. It will, however, hardly arrive quickly enough to exert any influence on the first operations of the war.

But more than all this, the attitude of the Piedmontese is decisive. The army is good and eager for war; but if it is betrayed again, as it was last year, it must be beaten. The Lombards are calling for arms to fight against these oppressors; but if, as last year, a vacillating bourgeois government again paralyses the uprising en masse, then Radetzky can once more make his entry into Milan.

Against the treason and cowardice of the government there is only one means: the revolution. And perhaps a new breach of word on the part of Charles Albert, a fresh faithlessness on the part of the Lombard nobility and bourgeoisie, is precisely what is needed to carry through the Italian revolution and, along with it, the Italian war of independence. But then woe to the traitors!