May of this year was not a good month for Austria-Hungary, its strength was already very poor, and it basically had to rely on the Germans to break through to hold the Ukrainian front.

The war against Greece did not go well, even if Bulgaria's strength could crush Greece, but it could not hinder the strength of other allies, and kept transporting troops to the Balkans.

The internal ethnic divisions also make the aging empire collapse at any time, and the successors will be shattered; The problems posed by a pluralistic society are enormous.

It can be said that Austria-Hungary has been holding on, both externally and internally, approaching the limit of the collapse of this ancient empire.

Now that Italy is in the war, it has brought even greater pressure to Austria-Hungary, and what is even more fatal is that they have no regular army there, all local garrisons, and their combat effectiveness is extremely worrisome.

It should be noted that the local troops are ethnically unified, and they are natives and bred in the region, and their will to fight is extremely strong, which is to some extent much stronger than the Austro-Hungarian regular army.

But they only have a few tens of thousands, and Italy on the other side has hundreds of thousands!

Those elite Italian mountain infantry, after a long period of training, had surpassed their combat capabilities, not to mention the help of the French.

From any point of view, it was almost impossible for the Tyroleans to stop this army, and they were able to delay for hours!

If the Tyrolean defenses collapsed and the Entente pushed out of the Alps, hundreds of thousands of troops would be deployed in an instant, and the Balkans of the Central Powers and even the Austro-Hungarian capital Vienna would face the threat of being outflanked on a large scale.

When the Austro-Hungarian top brass learned that Italy had entered the war, they were very frightened, stopped all offensives, and withdrew 30% of their troops from the Eastern Front back to defense, with Borojevich as commander.

As for the expeditionary force in the Caucasus, it was not withdrawn, because the top brass thought that the distance was too far, and the daylily was cold when it came back. However, they asked Kuster to launch an offensive to ease the pressure on the Ukrainian front.

Austria-Hungary reacted quickly, and Italy entered the war at noon on May 2, and emergency deployment began at two o'clock in the afternoon.

But how fast can it go? It will take at least 1,000 kilometers from Ukraine to the Alpine front, and it will take four or five days to transport it, to say the least.

If the Tyroleans had lasted so long, they would have been rewarded for their return after the war.

Italy, however, would not allow it, as it was the last European power to enter the war, and was extremely well prepared for war. The reserves of ammunition for rifles and cannons were much larger than those in Russia, and the weapons and equipment produced in the United States were enough to arm several divisions.

If they could, they could have covered the sky with shells, or even through the mountains. Elite infantry will follow, rushing up the hill to seize the Alps.

It's just a fantasy, but it will soon become a reality. Tyrol can't hold it, everyone thinks so.

As if to confirm the suspicions, the battle went well at first, and the Austro-Hungarian troops in the plains did not last long before withdrawing, and soon approached the Battle of the Isonzo River.

Thousands of cannons rang out in unison, and the tremendous force was able to make the earth shake violently.

The Austro-Hungarian position was riddled with craters, a bloody fog remained in the skies, and everything went well.

It wasn't until the war turned into a mountainous area that Italy became increasingly impassable.

The terrain of the Alps is extremely complex, and heavy weapons are almost impossible to use here, and the cannons must be dragged up the mountain with ropes to be effective.

The icy climate is also a kind of training for soldiers, and the snow-capped mountains can collapse at any moment.

The training courses of the Italian soldiers did not expose the soldiers to the cold, and they were still too tender compared to the native Tyroleans.

However, the large superiority of troops can completely cover up this shortcoming, and the soldiers are extremely professional, they know the methods of mountain warfare, and scatter and harass the enemy.

The offensive against Tyrol was huge, and Italian reservists were constantly coming to the Apennines to join the campaign with friendly forces.

The battle lasted almost a day and a night, the Austro-Hungarian defenses in the mountains were almost smoothed, and the resting places in the caves were blown up.

This terrible thing would continue, and the Tyroleans had no artillery to counter enemy fire, and the smoke alone could drown them out on the battlefield.

With the arrival of the Italian infantry, an even more ferocious offensive began, with hundreds of thousands of men almost levelling everything in the Alps.

However, the result was a big surprise, even though the Italian attack was fierce, it was still unable to break through Austria-Hungary in the slightest.

This anxiety lasted until four days later, when the first reinforcements finally arrived, and the new Boroyevich quickly regrouped all his troops into battle and successfully held off the attack.

The war progressed to this point, and the Austro-Hungarian defense line in the Alps gradually improved, and the Italians could no longer enter it, and then they could only fall into a never-ending war of attrition like the Western Front.

The Chief of the Austro-Hungarian General Staff, Conrad, lavished praise on the heroic and combative garrison, awarding medals to all of them.

It was not only the Italian soldier who was thwarted, but also the so-called national spirit, and his endless ambitions.

This defeat was a great blow to the face of the Italian government, and the social contradictions intensified again, but it was not as large as before, just a group of literati tearing each other apart.

More people are indifferent to this and concentrate on their work; Like Kuster, who was far away in the Caucasus, he was discussing how to deal with the Russian defenses.

After 6 days of preparation, the remnants of the Russian army in the Caucasus have been thoroughly digested and can organize a new offensive.

The Russian army has also been reinforced, but it is already the end of the crossbow, only less than 500,000 people can join the battle, of which only 200,000 are equipped with rifles, and the rest are all cold weapons.

On the other hand, the larger and more equipment Kuster had, he had collected all the way, and his army had reached 450,000 men, and it was easy to break through in the plains, so he was thinking not about how to win, but how to use it.

The first priority should now be to expand the front, mainly because of Russia's shortage of troops, but also to share the pressure on the allies.

Kuster believed that the front should be pushed to the northern shore of the Sea of Azov - the junction of the Volga and the Caspian Sea.

This was undoubtedly very bold, especially since Italy suddenly entered the war and Austria-Hungary was held back, and no friendly army would be able to meet him.

But Kuster didn't care, he finally crossed the Caucasus Mountains, and he was sorry for the painstaking months of not racing in such a good area as the steppe.

A total of 400 km from the Caucasus to the northern shore of the Sea of Azov, and 350 km to the Volga, this was not a difficult task for his army, and it was possible to take full control in a few days.

He wandered in front of the map of the new headquarters, pointing his hand at the map, and finally with a wave of his hand, the whole of Eastern Europe was once again in flames.