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The words of Ernest Hemingway

If the Isonzo Front is a backdrop for the novel Farewell to Arms, then the miraculous breakthrough in Kobarid is a script for the game of death, whose tragedy was simultaneously written by more than 3000 cannons on the Austro-Hungarian side. If Hemingway was fortunate amidst the tragedy, the same cannot be said for the several hundred thousand soldiers whose blood stained the Soča River red. 

The Isonzo Front represented only a portion of the 600 km long front that extended from the Austrian-Italian-Swiss tri-border to the Soča Valley and the Adriatic Sea. In 1915, this portion of the landscape was converted into a mass of steel and concrete. The fortified positions gave rise to long-term positional warfare. 

From June 1915 to September 1917, the Italians fought eleven battles, while the twelfth, called the Miracle in Kobarid, changed the course of the war in the region. 

The German-Austrian Army in the mountainous area between Bovec and Tolmin created an unusual plan of attack that was based on speed, surprise, harmonised operation and rapid penetration through the valley.  

24 October 1917 unleashed hell upon many. That includes those who came away from the shells filled with toxic gas. The breakthrough succeeded and the front moved to the Piave River, where at the end of October 1918, the arms said "Farewell". 

Tactically speaking, the Twelfth Battle of Isonzo is considered one of the most successful campaigns of the First World War. It was among the biggest mountain battles in the history of warfare, and among other things, it forged the future reputation of the "desert fox", Erwin Rommel, in the Second World War.  

If Farewell to Arms along with the other remains of the First World War that you find in this region can revive that memory and keep it alive, then perhaps this sort of thing may never happen again.

Impressions from the Museum

Some impressions from the book reviews, which can be found in the Kobarid Museum.