In September 1788, during the Austro-Turkish War, an army of roughly 100,000 Austrian soldiers marched toward the town of Karánsebes in present-day Romania to engage the Ottoman Empire. What was supposed to be a routine military encampment rapidly escalated into one of history's most absurd self-inflicted military disasters. It began when a vanguard of hussars crossed the Timiș River to scout for Ottoman forces.
Finding no enemy, they encountered a group of Romani traders who offered to sell them barrels of schnapps. As the cavalrymen began drinking, a detachment of Austrian infantry crossed the river and demanded a share of the alcohol. The hussars refused, building makeshift fortifications around the kegs, which led to a heated altercation and a stray gunshot.
Chaos erupted instantly. Soldiers began firing on one another in the dark, and in the confusion, some infantrymen yelled out warnings that the Turks were attacking. Because the multi-ethnic Habsburg army was composed of soldiers speaking German, Hungarian, Romanian, Italian, and Slavic languages, commands were wildly misunderstood.
When officers shouted 'Halt!' in German, non-German speaking troops misheard it as 'Allah!' , prompting a full-blown panic.
Realizing the commotion, an artillery commander mistook the fleeing troops for an Ottoman cavalry charge and ordered cannon fire directly into his own forces. The panic spread like wildfire through the main camp, causing thousands of soldiers to flee in total disarray. When the Ottoman army arrived two days later, they found the battlefield littered with thousands of wounded and dead Austrian soldiers.