Discover new selections
$2.99 with 93 percent savings
Print List Price: $39.95

Promotions apply when you purchase

These promotions will be applied to this item:

Some promotions may be combined; others are not eligible to be combined with other offers. For details, please see the Terms & Conditions associated with these promotions.

Sold by Amazon.com Services LLC.
Read with our free app
You've subscribed to ! We will preorder your items within 24 hours of when they become available. When new books are released, we'll charge your default payment method for the lowest price available during the pre-order period.
Update your device or payment method, cancel individual pre-orders or your subscription at
Your Memberships & Subscriptions
Kindle app logo image

Download the free Kindle app and start reading Kindle books instantly on your smartphone, tablet, or computer - no Kindle device required.

Read instantly on your browser with Kindle for Web.

Using your mobile phone camera - scan the code below and download the Kindle app.

QR code to download the Kindle App

Follow the author

Paolo Morisi
Follow
Something went wrong. Please try your request again later.

Hell in the Trenches: Austro-Hungarian Stormtroopers and Italian Arditi in the Great War Kindle Edition

by Paolo Morisi (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.2 out of 5 stars 24 ratings
The Austro-Hungarian Stormtroopers and the Italian Arditi of World War I were elite special forces charged with carrying out bold raids and daring attacks. These units were comprised of hand-picked soldiers that possessed above-average courage, physical prowess as well as specific combat skills. Many military historians have argued that the First World War was mainly a static conflict of positional attrition, but these shock troops were responsible for developing breakthrough tactics of both fire and movement that marked a significant change to the status quo. Both armies used special assault detachments to capture prisoners, conduct raids behind enemy lines and attack in depth in order to prepare the way for a broad infantry breakthrough. This account traces the development of Austrian and Italian assault troop tactics in the context of trench warfare waged in the mountainous front of the Alps and the rocky hills of the Carso plateau. It not only examines their innovative tactics but also their adoption of vastly improved new weapons such as light machine-guns, super-heavy artillery, flamethrowers, hand grenades, daggers, steel clubs and poison gas. This book offers a narrative of the organizational development of the shock and assault troops, of their military operations and their combat methods. The bulk of the chapters are devoted to a historical reconstruction of the assault detachments' combat missions between 1917-18 by utilizing previously unreleased archival sources such as Italian and Austrian war diaries, official manuals, divisional and High Command reports and the soldiers' own recollections of the war. Finally, it offers a comprehensive description of their uniforms, equipment, and weapons, along with a large number of illustrations, maps and period photographs rarely seen. This epic trial of military strength of these special stormtroops cannot be properly understood without visiting, and walking, the battlefields. The appendix thus offers the reader a series of walks to visits key high mountain fortifications in the Italian Dolomites, many of which have attained almost legendary status.
Previous slide of product details
  1. Print length
    336 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Helion & Company
  4. Publication date
    November 2, 2018
  5. File size
    18.2 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
  7. Word Wise
    Enabled
  8. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
Next slide of product details
Due to its large file size, this book may take longer to download

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...overall Hell in the Trenches is a very good treatment of the development of special assault forces in the war."
The NYMAS Review

The author should be heartily congratulated on a book that is not only extremely well written, but is also about a very little known part of the Great War. The bravery and audacity of the Italian and Austria-Hungarian troops shows in every picture and almost every page. Mankind's ability to overcome nature is shown in the book to be absolutely astounding. The fact that both sides had to, at most times, use explosives and sheer manpower to cut their trenches into the very rock of these heights is mind boggling.
Robert Peterson, A Wargamers Needful Things

About the Author

Paolo Morisi is a military historian who has written extensively on the Italian Army during World War One and Two. He has published several books and articles on such topics as the Folgore Parachute Division, the Alpini and Austro-Hungarian stormtroopers of the First World War, the Savoia Marchetti S.79 torpedo bomber and the Axis air forces of the Second World War.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B07RFRCX1W
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Helion & Company (November 2, 2018)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ November 2, 2018
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 18.2 MB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.2 out of 5 stars 24 ratings

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.
Paolo Morisi

Paolo Morisi

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.
Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Discover more of the author’s books, see similar authors, read book recommendations and more.

Customer reviews

4.2 out of 5 stars
24 global ratings

Review this product

Share your thoughts with other customers
Write a customer review

Top reviews from the United States

  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars solid research
    Reviewed in the United States on August 18, 2023
    Excellent work
    One person found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • Frederick N. Bosworth
    4.0 out of 5 stars Happy I bought it despite significant problems
    Reviewed in the United States on May 20, 2020
    Verified Purchase
    I am quite happy I bought this book and enjoyed reading it, despite its problems. I have over about 20 books on the WW I Alpine Front, many of which are in German or Italian, but Morisi's work has more detail about Sturmtruppen actions and the specific tactics used per se than any other book I have seen.

    The book does have too many translation stumbles (e.g., "hand grenade stick" for "stick grenade") but I did not find that these kept me from understanding what was meant. There sometimes tended to be a lack of clarity about military unit designations (teams, squads, sections, platoons, companies), as if the translator had a limited military background, but again, the most important information came through, especially when quoting archive sources and officer memoirs.

    What most surprised me were some stunning errors about the Austrian order of battle. Worst occurances:

    - After stating on page 29 that each infantry regiment had specialist mountain warfare units, the author adds that "...the Austro-Hunagrian army had four regiments of alpine units, the Kaiserjägers, 30 battalions of sharpshooters (Feldjäger) and four Bosnian regiments."
    -- Nope. There were 5 Austrian regiments of mountain troops (Gebirgstruppen) in 1914: the three regiments of Tiroler Landesschützen (given the honorific "Kaiserschützen" in 1917), and two regular k.u.k. regiments later named Gebirgrjäger regiments 1 and 2), trained and equipped as such before WWI started. One battalion of almost every regiment was trained and equipped as mountain troops before the war, but these did not remain with their regiments as the author implies, they were grouped together in mountain brigades (not unlike historical grenadier battalions), usually forming mountain divisions. Austria-Hungary had a huge force of mountain troops, but they were not the units the author lists. The four Tyrolean Kaiserjäger (TKJ) regiments were not true mountains troops until equipped and operating as such on the Alpine Front in 1915. The TKJ, Feldjäger (similar to the TKJ but from other regions), and regiments from Bosnia-Hercegovina were good in rough terrain but were not "mountain" (Gebirgstruppen) in 1914, just like the regiments from Upper Austria (7th, 14th, 59th) that eventually became mountain troops in effect only by 1916-1917 on the Alpine Front.

    - On page 139 the author gives the following for the composition of three Austrian mountain divisions that played key roles in the 1917 offensive (12th Isonzo/Caporetto):
    -- Edekweiss Division: "four regiments and two brigades" including the 3rd and 4th Kaiserjäger regiments. [No, the 3rd "Edelweiss" Division, as normal, included two brigades (not 4 regts plus 2 bdes): 216th Brigade with k.u.k. 59th Regiment (Salzburg) and one battalion (from 4th TKJ); and 217th Brigade with 3rd TKJ Regt and the rest of 4th TKJ.]
    -- 22nd Schützen Division of "four regiments and two brigades ...with 1st, 3rd, and 26th Kaiserschützen regiments." [No, the division's two brigades included 43rd Schützen Brigade (3rd and 26th Schützen, not "Kaiserschützen"), and 98th Schützen Brigade (with I and II Kaiserschützen Regiments; no "26th Kaiserschützen regiment" existed).]
    -- 55th Division "with three regiments and two brigades ...the 4th and 7th Infantry Regiments (Bosnia-Hercegovina)" [No, 55th Mountain Division had the normal two brigades: 26th Mountain Brigade (Gebirgsbrigade) with most of k.u.k. Inf. Regt. No. 7 (Upper Austria, in effect a mountain regiment by 1917) and 4th Bosnian-Hercegovinian (BH) Inf. Regt.; and 38th Brigade with 2nd BH Inf Regt and the rest of 7th Inf. Regt and 4th BH Inf. Regt.]
    Omitting the 2nd BH Inf. Regt. is particularly painful since it received more decorations for valor in WWI than any other regiment in the empire.

    Disappointing, but still, I am glad for the many detailed archive/memoir reports on specific actions that appear to be accurately quoted.
    [My primary source here is an Austrian military history book (in German) published in Vienna in 1996.]
    7 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • Dominic E Etzold
    2.0 out of 5 stars Very disappointing
    Reviewed in the United States on October 29, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    I was really looking forward to reading this book since it covers not only the two lesser covered belligerents in WWI, but their unique storm trooper units (Sturmtruppen and Arditi). The Southern Front was quite different from the Western and Eastern Fronts in that it was mountainous and assault tactics often involved scaling cliff surfaces, skiing, or digging tunnels. One would expect that this would be exciting to read about, but instead I found it to be a chore and would typically have read three books in the time span it took me to finish this one.

    First off, it is full of mistakes, from simple details like constantly referring to German grenades as M24s (which is what they used in WWII), saying Carzano instead of Carcano and Mannlichen instead of Mannlicher, to more glaring errors such as specifically naming an Ardito that waved a flag on a mountaintop on one page and then on the very next page naming the same person as an Italian historian. Which is it? I was able to catch many mistakes, but they were on topics I already knew quite about, I bought this to learn more and am reliant on a historian to provide those facts.

    Second, the author gets bogged down in minutiae that has nothing to do with the assault units the book is supposed to be about. He goes on and on about Austrian and Italian weapon production figures, how many artillery guns they had and how many mms they were. He goes into great detail about artillery pieces (like a Skoda 305mm gun) but then when he talks about what weapons the assault troops used, he'd often say "automatic machine gun" or light machine gun. Well, firstly I'd expect a machine gun to be "automatic," second what type was it, an MG08/15 a Beretta, if you're going to talk minutiae about units that have nothing to do with the book, keep consistent and give me the specifics I actually want to learn about? He relies heavily on Austrian and Italian official histories as sources, which is fine, but his heavy emphasis on them makes him merely recount events taking place in a dry and summarized manner that is lacking any emotion, bigger picture, or relevant details other than the time things took place and how many guns/prisoners were captured. Since the author's primary language is Italian (and this shows by his repeated use of words that he translated from Italian that are more obscure to natural English speakers), I would expect that he would have provided more Italian primary sources and personal accounts. Another annoyance is that he often quotes the work of other historians, which again is alright, but he doesn't add any additional details to it, so again the facts are delivered dryly and in a summarized fashion. This subject of this book is in and of itself fascinating and exciting but the author manages to bore you to death.

    Lastly, it is written in a style that should work in theory, but in practice fails miserably. He separates the book into a section on Austro-Hungarian Sturmtruppen, tactics, and battles, and then has another section on the Italian Arditi in the same format. Oftentimes you read about the same battles 3 or 4 times at various parts of the book because both sides fought each other and the battles are recounted separately. He also write in a school book report type of format where chapters follow the theme of summary, evidence, and conclusion, but because he writes so generally, the gist of the event is described enough in the summary portion and the evidence provided is so general that it seems redundant.

    The final chapter of the book was actually pretty interesting, as he tells you how to visit the sites of important battles and what you'd find there. If I were traveling to Northern Italy, I'd want to bring this book along, just for help in finding places to go. That being said, that's not good if that's the more interesting part of an entire book on assault troops.

    Buy this book if you want dates, times, and quick summations of events within a battle. If you are looking for a true history to allow you to better understand the war these units fought, this isn't it.
    8 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report
  • Eric J. Hartsfield
    4.0 out of 5 stars Good summary of tactical development in Italy during WW 1
    Reviewed in the United States on November 11, 2019
    Verified Purchase
    While it does not look at the war from an operational perspective it provides a good analysis of how the tactics evolved during the war. Wish it had more maps/diagrams of the action described.
    2 people found this helpful
    Helpful
     Report

Top reviews from other countries

  • Amazon Customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars Honest account of First war combat
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 22, 2018
    Verified Purchase
    Really good account of the development of modern infantry tactics during WW1,concentrating on the Austro Hungarian and Italian army's. Lots of first hand accounts and new material. Not the best translation but doesn't detract.
    Report

Report an issue


Does this item contain inappropriate content?
Report
Do you believe that this item violates a copyright?
Report
Does this item contain quality or formatting issues?
Report