Page 38 - The Secret War in the Italian front in WWI (1915-1918)

THE SECRET WAR ON THE ITALIAN FRONT IN WWI (1915 – 1918)

the Intelligence Service, perhaps because of the fatal misconception that Austrians were going to
fight an exclusively defensive war” .
10
An informer of the Prefect of Brescia transmitted to the Italian 5 Division the warning that
th
Austrian forces had passed the Adige River. However, the Commander of the Division General
Sirtori, was absent and the news was not conveyed to the Army Headquarters . This lack of
11
information contributed to bring about the Custoza defeat.
The experience of the Third Italian War of Independence led to a wide reorganisation of the structure
of the high command. In 1867, the Superior Office was replaced by the General Headquarters
of the General Staff Corps, having under its authority the Military Office, which included four
sections: military statistics and Intelligence; archives, library, and military-historical section;
military-topographic section; military publications . For the first time, the term ‘Intelligence’
12
was used to better define, also during peacetime, the body of the General Staff Corps engaged in
this kind of activities.
In addition, command of the Military Office was given not more to a colonel but to a general, under
the direct authority of the Commander of the General Staff Corps. Colonel Avet, who had replaced
Driquet as head of the office, was in turn replaced, in November 1867, by General Pompeo Bricola
who remained in office until December 1873.
Not by chance, in 1867, military publications emphasised the necessity of a central specialised
intelligence organisation since peacetime, asserting that:

We cannot implement a good, practical intelligence system on the eve of a campaign, or when
the war has already begun. At that point, the implementation of each measure turns out to be
belated and we are forced to use improvised means with poorly thought-out concepts. A good
practical information system must always be in place and ready to intensify investigations and
research when a war against one or another country is imminent, that is all .
13

In 1870, the Military Office was reorganised once more, renaming its sections as follows: Section
I (Military Topography); Section II (Statistics of Foreign Armies); Section III (Historical affairs);
Section IV (Regulations). The new name of the Statistics Section did not refer to ‘Intelligence’
anymore, even if this activity was still performed mainly by this Section .
14

10 Alberto Pollio, Custoza (1866), Ministry of War - Historical Office, Rome, 1923, p. 332-333.
11 “Outside of the Army, and even before the Army entered the campaign, the prefect of Brescia arranged an intelligence
service on his own initiative and almost completely at his own expense […]. The news coming from Verona and collected
by this service about the Austrian advance beyond the River Adige reached the Command of the 5 Division, although the
th
information was kept top secret by any means […]. But the information was not transmitted to the Italian General Headquarter
because General Sirtori, Head of the Division was absent. He then was forced into retirement” (Ottavio Zoppi, Una leggenda
sulle informazioni militari nel 1866 (A legend about military intelligence in 1866), “Rivista Militare Italiana”, 1906, p. 2155
- 2165).
12 Regio decreto per il riordinamento del Corpo di Stato Maggiore dell’11 maggio 1867 (Royal decree for the reorganization
of General Staff Corps, 11 March 1867), “Giornale Militare”, 1867, pp. 270-280. The General Command of the General Staff
included three offices: the Military Office, the Technical Office, and the Accounting Office. It also included the High War
School and a detached section of the General Staff Office in Naples.
13 Ambrogio Viviani, op. cit., Vol. 1, p. 109. According to the same author, an Office for Secret and Confidential Affairs was
also established within the Ministry of War in 1867.
14 Agenda of the Chief of the General Staff no.1 of 8 January 1870, AUSSME, Series L-3, env. 298. The figure of the military
attaché to diplomatic missions abroad appeared in 1870, too.

36