The White War
The White War

Author: Mark Thompson

Publisher: Basic Books

Published: 2009-03-17

Total Pages: 466

ISBN-13: 0786744383

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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.

The White War
The White War

Author: Mark Thompson

Publisher: Faber & Faber

Published: 2009-08-06

Total Pages: 475

ISBN-13: 0571250084

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In May 1915, Italy declared war on the Habsburg Empire, hoping to seize its 'lost' territories of Trieste and Tyrol. The result was one of the most hopeless and senseless modern wars - and one that inspired great cruelty and destruction. Nearly three-quarters of a million Italians - and half as many Austro-Hungarian troops - were killed. Most of the deaths occurred on the bare grey hills north of Trieste, and in the snows of the Dolomite Alps. Outsiders who witnessed these battles were awestruck by the difficulty of attacking on such terrain. General Luigi Cadorna, most ruthless of all the Great War commanders, restored the Roman practice of 'decimation', executing random members of units that retreated or rebelled. Italy sank into chaos and, eventually, fascism. Its liberal traditions did not recover for a quarter of a century - some would say they have never recovered. Mark Thompson relates this nearly incredible saga with great skill and pathos. Much more than a history of terrible violence, the book tells the whole story of the war: the nationalist frenzy that led up to it, the decisions that shaped it, the poetry it inspired, its haunting landscapes and political intrigues; the personalities of its statesmen and generals; and also the experience of ordinary soldiers - among them some of modern Italy's greatest writers. A work of epic scale, The White War does full justice to one of the most remarkable untold stories of the First World War.

Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign
Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign

Author: John Macdonald

Publisher: Pen and Sword

Published: 2011-12-13

Total Pages: 328

ISBN-13: 1781599300

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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.

Battles in the Alps
Battles in the Alps

Author: G. Irving Root

Publisher: Publishamerica Incorporated

Published: 2008

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 9781607030379

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Far removed from the bloody battles of attrition in the rain and mud of northern France, there raged another desperate struggle between two of Europeas strongest yet most underrated powers, the Kingdom of Italy and the Empire of Austria-Hungary. Here, along a twisting, curving 475-mile-long battle line, fierce fighting was conducted among the lofty peaks and rugged countryside of the continentas most notorious mountain range, replete with all the difficulties of weather and the awesome challenges of movement and supply. Contingents of troops from all of the major warring powers eventually became involved in this war of extremes. Before it was over, two and one-half million casualties had been suffered and the map of Europe had been changed forever. Battles in the Alps chronicles this important theatre of the Great War, and explains in text and in maps the consequences of Italyas entry into hostilities and the changes resultant from its aftermath. Related incidents in the skies over the Front and on the waves of the adjacent Adriatic Sea are also narrated.

A Soldier on the Southern Front
A Soldier on the Southern Front

Author: Emilio Lussu

Publisher: Rizzoli Publications

Published: 2014-02-25

Total Pages: 277

ISBN-13: 0847842797

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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 Italian War on the Eastern Front, 1941–1943
The Italian War on the Eastern Front, 1941–1943

Author: Bastian Matteo Scianna

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2019-09-09

Total Pages: 365

ISBN-13: 3030265242

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The Italian Army’s participation in Hitler’s war against the Soviet Union has remained unrecognized and understudied. Bastian Matteo Scianna offers a wide-ranging, in-depth corrective. Mining Italian, German and Russian sources, he examines the history of the Italian campaign in the East between 1941 and 1943, as well as how the campaign was remembered and memorialized in the domestic and international arena during the Cold War. Linking operational military history with memory studies, this book revises our understanding of the Italian Army in the Second World War.

The Italian Front
The Italian Front

Author: Michael E. Haskew

Publisher: Campaigns of World War II

Published: 2018-03

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9781782746171

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The Italian Front is a superbly illustrated history of the original 'second front' in Europe, including artworks of key materiel and uniforms, and campaign maps showing the movement of troops in the theater.

The Hero of Italy
The Hero of Italy

Author: Gregory Hanlon

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2014-03

Total Pages: 257

ISBN-13: 0199687242

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Relates the misadventure of a minor Italian state whose prince led it into a major war against the principal European power of the time

Caporetto and Isonzo Campaign: The Italian Front 1915-1918 (Large Print 16pt)
Caporetto and Isonzo Campaign: The Italian Front 1915-1918 (Large Print 16pt)

Author: Zeljko Cimpric

Publisher: ReadHowYouWant

Published: 2014-10-13

Total Pages: 265

ISBN-13: 9781459688025

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From May 1915 to October 1917 the armies of Italy and the Austro - Hungarian empire were locked into a series of twelve battlesalong the River Isonzo, a sixty - mile front from the Alps to the Adriatic. The campaign was fought in the most appalling terrain forcombat, with horrendous casualties on both sides, often exceeding those of the more famous battles of the Great War. The twelfth and final battle, Caporetto, resulted in a devastating defeat for Italy and led to one of the greatest breakthroughs achieved during the entire conflict. Yet this massive struggle is too often neglected in histories of the war which focus on the fighting on the Western and Eastern Fronts. John Macdonald, in this accessible and highly illustrated account, aims to set the record straight. His description of theIsonzo battles, of the battlefields and of the atrocious conditions in which the soldiers lived and fought is supported by a graphicselection of original photographs that record the terrible reality of the conflict.The impact of the intervention of British, French and German troops is covered, as are the parts played by famous individuals - among them Rommel, Mussolini, Badoglio and Cadorna, the notorious Italian commander in chief. But it is the front - line experience of the common soldiers on both sides that is most powerfully portrayed.Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign gives a fascinating insight into a conflict that was a pivotal moment in the history of Italy, Austria and the Balkans.

The Day of Battle
The Day of Battle

Author: Rick Atkinson

Publisher: Macmillan

Published: 2008-09-16

Total Pages: 852

ISBN-13: 9780805088618

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In the second volume of his epic trilogy about the liberation of Europe in World War II, Pulitzer Prize-winning author Atkinson tells the harrowing story of the campaigns in Sicily and Italy.