I wrote often to my friends. Never did I let myself indulge in writing all my true feelings and opinions, because I was first of all a soldier, obeying. I found my recreation in the trenches studying the psychology of officers and troops. Later on that practice in observation became invaluable to me.
In my rough heart I held a persistent admiration for the soldiers from all corners of Italy. Many ordered to the eastern front were not convinced of the historical basis for the war; yet they knew how to obey their commanding officers with admirable discipline. Many of those officers were students of the colleges and universities. It was fine to see them striving to emulate the regulars and to prove that the old-time valor was still alive in the new Italian generation.
The fact was that war, with its heavy toll of man and materials, and with its terrific hardships, surprised us. It was far away from our Garibaldian conception of what war was. We were compelled, in breakneck haste, to modify our ideas, to change our systems of fighting and our methods of offense and defense. My heart was gladdened to see that the capacity for adaptability of our race brought marvellous and quick returns. The headquarters and all the auxiliary military organizations, particularly the medical, worked with a precision which I never have forgotten. But often, as I went over the political situation back of our armies, dark doubts were in my mind. The work and actions of the men in power and of the political organizations centred in Rome caused me deep fears. The parliamentary world seemed unable to free itself from its old faults.
The poisonous currents of non-intervention and neutrality were still spending their last strength upon us. They would not fairly face their defeat. I knew they were doing their utmost to minimize the energy and elasticity of our fighting efforts.
The foolish babblings and fears of the coffeehouse strategists, the slackers whose presence offended the families whose sons were in the war, contributed to depress the spirit of resistance. As a plain soldier, I could not understand how, for instance, Rumania could be dragged into the war with a few hundred machine guns. How could Greece be persuaded to march against the Turks, influenced by a classic dance that Isadora Duncan performed at the Piræus?
I was following, day by day, the movement of our army—the Battle of the Isonzo in 1916, the fights on the Alps. With less interest, I followed the fortunes of war in France, the unfortunate failure at the Dardanelles and the developments in the eastern section. As for Italy, never for a minute did I doubt that victory would finally come to us. Though war were to last longer than the longest estimate, though our economic power might totter under the effort and weight of the conflict, nevertheless I was sure of a final victory.
The Italian army in its various actions was led by a method of successive assaults, to shake the efficiency of the enemy. In spite of all the hardship, discipline remained intact throughout our lines. The invasion attempted on the plateaus of the Alps in 1916 was soon thrown back. The soldiers of the Carso, where I was, had all the appearance of seasoned veterans.
In such a gigantic drama, when thousands of our brothers fell, it is absurd to speak of oneself.
However, to prove once more what miseries were woven into the Italian life of politics, I was compelled from time to time to give out in the newspapers news concerning myself. This was in order to smash the suspicions of those persons who thought me hidden in some office, distributing mail and entertaining in my mind doubts of the possibility of our winning the war. I was compelled to offset this slander and to state over and over what I had done and what I was doing. I was then major corporal of the Bersaglieri and had been in the front line trenches from the beginning of the war up to February, 1917, always under arms, always facing the enemy without my faith being shaken or my convictions wavering an inch. From time to time I sent articles to the Popolo d’Italia exhorting to endless resistance. I pleaded for unshaken faith in final victory. For reasons of military discipline I used a nom de plume. Thus I found myself fighting in two ways—against the enemy without and in front of me and against the enemy of weak spirit within and behind me.
On the morning of February 22, 1917, during a bombardment of the enemy trenches in Sector 144—the sector of the hard-pressed Carso under the heaviest shellfire—there happened one of those incidents which was a daily occurrence in trench life. One of our own grenades burst in our trench among about twenty of us soldiers. We were covered with dirt and smoke, and torn by metal. Four died. Various others were fatally wounded.