After the Battle of Dogali,[2] fought on January 26, 1887,[3] the new head of government Francesco Crispi[4] decided to continue the hostilities by sending an expeditionary force of 20,000 men, of which he became assigned to the command of the special corps, as Chief of Staff of the African troops.

In May 1890 he returned to Eritrea as a lieutenant colonel of staff, under the orders of General Alessandro Asinari di San Marzano, participating in the 1890–91 campaign as an officer assigned to the governor.

[6] He reached the theater of operations on January 12, 1896, in time to take part in the Battle of Adwa, where he tried in vain to block[7] the road to the enemy advance[8] with a company of Alpini troops and the 16th Battalion of the 5th Infantry Regiment.

With the Italian entry into World War I, on May 24, 1915, he assumed command of the 4th Army,[10] with its headquarters in Vittorio Veneto, which deployed its forces from Passo Cereda to Monte Peralba on a front of about 75 km.

General Luigi Cadorna, supreme commander of the Royal Italian Army, began an offensive against Austria-Hungary [11] starting with the conquest of the forts of Sexten, Landro and Valparola.

[1] The official motivation was that: "In the first fifteen days of operations he did not act with promptness and energy, exploiting his superiority of forces, and he exercised the command with insufficient decision.

However, this proved to be almost impossible given the assignment previously carried out, and the lack of army commands available in the face of the abundance of other officers that wanted to lead them.

To the accusations, he replied by arguing the delay and the numerical insufficiency of the siege artillery park that had been made available to him, without which it was criminally unrealistic to face the permanent works and field defenses prepared by the Austrians in Cadore and in the Ampezzano area.

On June 2, 1921, he was definitively retired due to his service length and enrolled in the roles of the reserve, where in November 1924 he was nominated as army general, with seniority from February 1 of the previous year.