From there, Masséna struck north to capture two towns in the upper Tanaro valley before turning west to outflank the positions around Saorge.

The engagement is significant in military history because a newly appointed artillery general by the name of Napoleon Bonaparte drew up the plans for the offensive.

Aware of his awkward situation, King Victor Amadeus III of Sardinia attempted to secure an alliance with Habsburg Austria at the same time as he held diplomatic talks with the French.

The French government ordered General Anne-Pierre, marquis de Montesquiou-Fézensac to invade Savoy on 15 May, but that officer decided that he needed more time to prepare.

On 22 September, Austria finally agreed to provide an Auxiliary Corps of 8,000 troops under Feldmarschall-Leutnant Leopoldo Lorenzo, Count of Strassoldo.

[4] On 23 September, a French naval squadron under Rear Admiral Laurent Jean François Truguet sailed to the Piedmontese port of Oneglia where an 800-man battalion disembarked.

[9] The Sardinian army held a powerful defensive position at Saorge (Saorgio), blocking access to the strategically important Col de Tende (Tenda Pass).

[8] On 8 June 1793, the Army of Italy under General of Division Gaspard Jean-Baptiste Brunet won a minor victory over the Sardinians in the area of L'Aution Peak west of Saorge.

Also engaged were two companies of French Royalist volunteers, the Cacciatori de Canale, Light Infantry, 1st, 3rd, and 5th Grenadier Battalions, and the Vercelli, Casale, and Acqui Provincial Regiments.

Prince Maurizio, Duke of Montferrat, who led the counter-invasion of Savoy, was to follow strict daily orders from De Vins.

Meanwhile, De Vins' chief of staff, Generalmajor Eugène-Guillaume Argenteau managed to get himself on bad terms with most of the Piedmontese officer corps.

Large French republican forces had to be sent to suppress the revolt at the Siege of Toulon, giving Piedmont a chance to recover its lost territory.

King Victor Amadeus and De Vins left the capital in August to oversee the southern front where they planned to start operations on 7 September.

[16] The offensive ended when heavy snow fell in the mountains, forcing the king to give up the campaign and return to his capital in November.

[17] At the start of 1794, the Piedmontese occupied a formidable defensive position that ran from Roquebillière on the west through the Col de Raus, L'Aution Peak, and Colle Basse to Saorge.

At this time, the representatives were Augustin Robespierre and Antoine Christophe Saliceti and both were influenced by freshly-promoted General of Brigade Napoleon Bonaparte, the army's new artillery chief.

Bonaparte, basing his strategy on the work of Pierre-Joseph Bourcet,[21] planned to launch a drive northeast along the coast to capture Oneglia, a nest of Sardinian privateers that preyed on the Genoa-to-Nice grain trade.

Argenteau, who commanded the local Piedmontese division, occupied Ormea and strung out his 10 battalions in an attempt to link the Saorge defenses in the west with Dego in the east.

The French advance, led by General of Division André Masséna, brushed aside Argenteau's men and captured Ormea around 17 April and Garessio on the 19th.

On the same day, Masséna successfully attacked the Col Ardente with General of Brigade Amédée Emmanuel François Laharpe's division.

[21] General of Division François Macquard occupied the Col de Tende, while farther east Masséna deployed his troops to hold the ridges between Ormea and Loano.

[29] In the fighting near Saorge, historian Digby Smith stated French losses as 1,500 killed and wounded, while the allied casualties numbered 2,800.