Morale and the Italian Army during the First World War

Morale and the Italian Army during the First World War PDF Author: Vanda Wilcox
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316692469
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 239

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Book Description
Italian performance in the First World War has been generally disparaged or ignored compared to that of the armies on the Western Front, and troop morale in particular has been seen as a major weakness of the Italian army. In this first book-length study of Italian morale in any language, Vanda Wilcox reassesses Italian policy and performance from the perspective both of the army as an institution and of the ordinary soldiers who found themselves fighting a brutally hard war. Wilcox analyses and contextualises Italy's notoriously hard military discipline along with leadership, training methods and logistics before considering the reactions of the troops and tracing the interactions between institutions and individuals. Restoring historical agency to soldiers often considered passive and indifferent, Wilcox illustrates how and why Italians complied, endured or resisted the army's demands through balancing their civilian and military identities.

The Italian Army and the First World War

The Italian Army and the First World War PDF Author: John Gooch
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 0521193079
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 401

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Book Description
A major new account of the role and performance of the Italian army in the First World War. Setting military events in a broad context, Gooch explores pre-war Italian military culture, and reveals how an army with a reputation for failure fought a challenging war in appalling conditions - and won.

Morale and the Italian Army during the First World War

Morale and the Italian Army during the First World War PDF Author: Vanda Wilcox
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316692469
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 239

Get Book Here

Book Description
Italian performance in the First World War has been generally disparaged or ignored compared to that of the armies on the Western Front, and troop morale in particular has been seen as a major weakness of the Italian army. In this first book-length study of Italian morale in any language, Vanda Wilcox reassesses Italian policy and performance from the perspective both of the army as an institution and of the ordinary soldiers who found themselves fighting a brutally hard war. Wilcox analyses and contextualises Italy's notoriously hard military discipline along with leadership, training methods and logistics before considering the reactions of the troops and tracing the interactions between institutions and individuals. Restoring historical agency to soldiers often considered passive and indifferent, Wilcox illustrates how and why Italians complied, endured or resisted the army's demands through balancing their civilian and military identities.

The White War

The White War PDF Author: Mark Thompson
Publisher: Basic Books
ISBN: 0786744383
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 466

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Book Description
In May 1915, Italy declared war on the Habsburg Empire. Nearly 750,000 Italian troops were killed in savage, hopeless fighting on the stony hills north of Trieste and in the snows of the Dolomites. To maintain discipline, General Luigi Cadorna restored the Roman practice of decimation, executing random members of units that retreated or rebelled. With elegance and pathos, historian Mark Thompson relates the saga of the Italian front, the nationalist frenzy and political intrigues that preceded the conflict, and the towering personalities of the statesmen, generals, and writers drawn into the heart of the chaos. A work of epic scale, The White War does full justice to the brutal and heart-wrenching war that inspired Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.

Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign

Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign PDF Author: John Macdonald
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1781599300
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
This illustrated WWI history sheds light on a major campaign fought along the significant yet often neglected Italian Front. From 1915 to 1917 the armies of Italy and the Austro-Hungarian Empire were locked in a series of battles along the River Isonzo, a sixty-mile front from the Alps to the Adriatic Sea. The campaigns were fought in unforgiving terrain, with casualty counts that exceeded those of the Great War’s more famous battles. The twelfth and final battle, Caporetto, was a major victory for the Central Powers as they broke through the Italian Front. Historian John Macdonald chronicles the Isonzo battles with vivid descriptions of the battlefields and of the atrocious conditions in which the soldiers fought. The text is supported by a selection of original photographs that record the terrible reality of the conflict. The intervention of British, French and German troops is covered, as are the parts played by famous individuals, including Erwin Rommel, Benito Mussolini, Pietro Badoglio and Luigi Cadorna, the notorious Italian commander in chief. Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign examines an aspect of the First World War that was pivotal in the history of Italy, Austria and the Balkans.

The Italian Army of World War I

The Italian Army of World War I PDF Author: David Nicolle
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1782006931
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 127

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Book Description
The dilemma of the young Italian kingdom and the experience of her army in the Great War were unique among the combatant nations. Late to enter the war against the Central Powers, she faced a massively defended Austro-Hungarian front in the north, including strong mountain features, as well as distractions in the Balkans and a simultaneous rebellion in her Libyan colony. Costly and repeated battles on the Isonzo front culminated in the disaster of Caporetto in October 1917, followed by a remarkable revival and eventual victory in 1918. This concise study describes and illustrates the Italian Army's campaigns, organisation, uniforms, weapons and equipment – including the famous 'death companies' and Arditi assault troops.

A Soldier on the Southern Front

A Soldier on the Southern Front PDF Author: Emilio Lussu
Publisher: Rizzoli Publications
ISBN: 0847842797
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 277

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Book Description
A rediscovered World War I masterpiece—one of the few memoirs about the Italian front—for fans of military history and All Quiet on the Western Front An infantryman’s “harrowing, moving, [and] occasionally comic” account of trench warfare on the alpine front seen in A Farewell to Arms (Times Literary Supplement). Taking its place alongside works by Ernst JŸnger, Robert Graves, and Erich Maria Remarque, Emilio Lussu’s memoir as an infantryman is one of the most affecting accounts to come out of the First World War. A classic in Italy but virtually unknown in the English-speaking world, it reveals in spare and detached prose the almost farcical side of the war as seen by a Sardinian officer fighting the Austrian army on the Asiago plateau in northeastern Italy—the alpine front so poignantly evoked by Ernest Hemingway in A Farewell to Arms. For Lussu, June 1916 to July 1917 was a year of continuous assaults on impregnable trenches, absurd missions concocted by commanders full of patriotic rhetoric and vanity but lacking in tactical skill, and episodes often tragic and sometimes grotesque, where the incompetence of his own side was as dangerous as the attacks waged by the enemy. A rare firsthand account of the Italian front, Lussu’s memoir succeeds in staging a fierce indictment of the futility of war in a dry, often ironic style that sets his tale wholly apart from the Western Front of Remarque and adds an astonishingly modern voice to the literature of the Great War.

The Forgotten Front

The Forgotten Front PDF Author: George H. Cassar
Publisher: Bloomsbury Continuum
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
With The Forgotten Front, George H. Cassar intends to demonstrate Italy's vital contribution to the Allied effort in the First World War. His account of the war in Italy covers the strategic considerations as well as the actual fighting.

Italy in the Era of the Great War

Italy in the Era of the Great War PDF Author:
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004363726
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 419

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Book Description
In Italy in the Era of the Great War, Vanda Wilcox brings together nineteen Italian and international scholars to analyse the political, military, social and cultural history of Italy in the country’s decade of conflict from 1911 to 1922. Starting with the invasion of Libya in 1911 and concluding with the rise of post-war social and political unrest, the volume traces domestic and foreign policy, the economics of the war effort, the history of military innovation, and social changes including the war’s impact on religion and women, along with major cultural and artistic developments of the period. Each chapter provides a concise and effective overview of the field as it currently stands as well as introducing readers to the latest research. Contributors are Giulia Albanese, Claudia Baldoli, Allison Scardino Belzer, Francesco Caccamo, Filippo Cappellano, Selena Daly, Fabio Degli Esposti, Spencer Di Scala, Douglas J. Forsyth, Irene Guerrini, Oliver Janz, Irene Lottini, Stefano Marcuzzi, Valerie McGuire, Marco Pluviano, Paul O’Brien, Carlo Stiaccini, Andrea Ungari, and Bruce Vandervort. See inside the book.

The Italian Army In North Africa

The Italian Army In North Africa PDF Author: Walter S. Zapotoczny Jr.
Publisher: Fonthill Media
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 362

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Book Description
Previously unpublished analysis of why and how the Italians foughtA look at the role the Italian Army played in North Africa as part of the Deutsches Afrika Korps (German Afrika Korps)In spite of poor leadership, the Italian soldier performed well against all odds in North AfricaProfusely illustrated with many rare and unpublished images ‘The German soldier has impressed the world, however, the Italian Bersagliere soldier has impressed the German soldier.’ Erin Rommel aka ‘The Desert Fox’ When most people think of the Italian Army in North Africa during the Second World War, they tend to believe that the average Italian soldier offered little resistance to the Allies before surrendering. Many suggest that the Italian Army performed in a cowardly manner during the war: the reality is not so simple. The question remains as to whether the Italians were cowards or victims of circumstance. While the Italian soldier’s commitment to the war was not as great as that of his German counterpart, many Italians fought bravely. The Italian Littorio and Ariete Divisions earned Allied admiration at Tobruk, Gazala and EI Alamein. The Italian Army played a significant role as part of the German Afrika Korps and made up a large portion of the Axis combat power in North Africa during 1941 and 1942. In the interest of determining how the Italian Army earned the reputation that it did, it is necessary to analyse why and how the Italians fought.

The Beginning of Futility

The Beginning of Futility PDF Author: Gaetano V. Cavallaro
Publisher: Xlibris Corporation
ISBN: 1462827438
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 735

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Book Description
Since Picketts failed charge at Gettysburg, the frontal infantry assault had been known as obsolete. Nevertheless fifty years later, Allied military leaders in the Great War persisted in using it as a military tactic. Italian military leaders were no exception not even accepting the deadly effect of machine guns or quick-firing artillery. The Battles of the Isonzo on the Austro-Italian Front have now been classified with Verdun as to intensity and casualty lists. Mountain warfare on the Isonzo River Valley resulted in almost two million casualties from avalanches, frostbite, malaria, cholera, as well as prisoner-of-war starvation. Using the attacco frontale the blood of the illiterate fanti was used as coin to purchase terrain pushing the enemy back leading to Vienna's request to Berlin for help, leading to Caporetto.