If a government's plan to deal with the crisis was to lock things down for a year with no expectation of serious social unrest then the fault for that plan's inevitable failure would be theirs, for not basing their plans on reaslistic human behaviour. The reality is that people simply won't compliantly stay at home for a year, even if we wish they would, even if it's in their own best interests and even if it saves lives. Because they're people, with all the flaws and limitations that implies.
Going into lockdown at some point will be the right move for most countries. If anyone expects that lockdown to be anything other than unsustainable though then they are deluded. Which is why so many countries repeatedly stressed the dangers of implementing these measures too early, they already know they won't last beyond a certain point.
The best you can hope for from an Italian style lockdown is that you implement it at the right time, you make the most of it while it's there, you manage your population to keep them compliant for as long as possible and you exit the lockdown in a measured & managed process. Exit you must though and in a much shorter time frame than a year.