Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 125 i History of War

The Third Battle of Ypres in 1917 was a long and gruelling offensive, characterised by almost impossibly muddy conditions that slowed the allies’ progress. The objective was to seize the heights surrounding the city of Ypres, while also taking logistical rail hubs. Among the formations thrown into the fray during over 100 days of combat were several Australian divisions – including many men and officers who had already experienced radically different but no less gruelling conditions during the Gallipoli campaign. Inside this issue, Craig Tibbitts, senior researcher at Australian War Memorial, recounts how the men of these divisions, far from home, made the ultimate sacrifice at Passchendaele. FOLLOW THE HISTORY OF WAR TEAM / HISTORY OF WAR MAG @HISTORY OF WAR MAG SCAN TO GET OUR WEEKLY NEWSLETTER…

A turret belonging to a destroyed Yugoslav People’s Army tank lies on farmland after a battle. As evidenced most recently in the war in Ukraine, Soviet era tanks have incredibly vulnerable ammunition storage, resulting in catastrophic detonation in the event of a direct hit – in many cases blowing the turret clean off the hull. In 1991, both Croatia and Slovenia fought separate wars for independence during the break-up of Yugoslavia. The Yugoslav People’s Army, federal armed forces, attempted unsuccessfully to suppress these breakaway states, resulting in a long and violent period in the region’s history.…

Italy was to provide a complex subplot to campaigning in other regions. Though hostilities stretched out over the entire course of the war, it was a strangely subdued theatre. Many of the Italian states had no interest whatsoever in the argument over who should take over the Habsburg throne, and most (including Venice and Tuscany) remained neutral. The pope made it clear he wasn’t taking sides either. Fighting in Italy was therefore rather detached from (and undertaken for different purposes than) the fighting in Germany and the Low Countries. One of the principal goals, in fact, was the securing of an Italian principality for the younger child of the Spanish queen, Elizabeth Farnese. Don Philip, it was thought, would look good on the throne of Parma. The two Italian states…

CHATTANOOGA,  TENNESSEE • 18-20 SEPTEMBER 1863 By August 1863, the Confederacy seemed in dire straits. President Jefferson Davis and his key advisers and military commanders debated long and hard about what their next step should be. Robert E Lee’s second attempt to take the war to the north and inflict a decisive defeat that would bring the Union to the negotiating table had failed. Lee’s Army of Northern Virginia, fresh from its spectacular triumph that spring at Chancellorsville, had been heavily repulsed a few months later at Gettysburg in Pennsylvania, suffering irreplaceable losses of men and commanders. At the same time as this news arrived at Davis’ government in Richmond, so General Ulysses S Grant’s capture of the vital Confederate port of Vicksburg quickly followed. Now the Union navy dominated the…

01 CORVETTE One of the smallest types, the corvette is a lightly armed and manoeuvrable vessel used for coastal operations. Stealth corvettes are now becoming popular too. 02 FRIGATE Lightly armed, medium-sized ships generally used to protect other military or civilian vessels. Recently, frigates have been re-focused to take out submarines. 03 DESTROYER Large and heavily armed, destroyers are typically outfitted for anti-submarine, anti-aircraft and anti-surface warfare and can remain at sea for months on end. 04 CRUISER The cruiser is an armed-to-the-teeth multi-role vessel akin to a modern destroyer. While cruisers are still in use, they have largely been superseded now. 05 CARRIER These vast ships act as an air base at sea. Advances in hull design, composite materials and integrated systems this century will serve to increase their importance. “THE…

Red Army soldiers armed with PPSh-41 submachine guns defend their position in the outskirts of Stalingrad during the battle for the city. The submachine guns were fitted with drum magazines, increasing the weapon’s ammunition but also its weight. These guns were among the most common in the Red Army during the Second World War, with a high rate of fire (approximately 900 rounds per minute) that made them highly effective in urban environments. The PPSh-41’s simple design made it incredibly hard-wearing and practical; it was easy to disassemble and clean, while broken parts could be easily removed and replaced.…

RADAR SYSTEM A mast-mounted radome houses a Phazatron FH-01 Millimeter Wave Radar system. Its distinctively widened nose accommodates the system, and two antennae provide aerial and ground target acquisition. TWIN-SEAT COCKPIT The twin-seat cockpit is equipped with heads-up display, image intensifiers, GPS receiver and four SMD 66 multifunction displays. An added safety feature is the K-37-800M ejection seat for both pilots. ARMAMENT DIVERSITY Along with the 2A42 automatic gun, six hard points are fitted with a combination of the 9M120 Ataka and VIKHR anti-tank guided missiles and B8V20 rocket launchers for unguided S-8 or S-13 rockets. The IGLA-V guided missile provides anti-aircraft defence. ROTOR SYSTEM The Kamov contra-rotating system of rotors improves handling and manoeuvrability, and eliminates the requirement for a tail rotor system. Well over a decade after the…

German Landsturm posted as station guards in Belgium, after the invasion at the outbreak of the First World War. Dating back over 100 years prior, the Landsturm was a reservist militia, mostly composed of men too old to serve in the main infantry. Called upon during wartime ostensibly to defend Germany, it fulfilled roles behind the lines such as guarding logistical hubs and infrastructure. The brief and bloody invasion of Belgium was followed by an occupation that lasted for the duration of the war – the plight of the tiny nation’s fate at the hands of its much larger neighbour became a powerful image in Allied recruitment and propaganda material.…

19 April 1713 THE PRAGMATIC SANCTION 01 The document that is the spark for a war: Charles VI, ruler of the Habsburg monarchy and Holy Roman Emperor, declares that any female offspring he produces will be eligible to succeed him, superseding the claims of his nieces, the daughters of the previous emperor, Joseph I. 13 May 1717 BIRTH OF MARIA THERESA 02 Until Charles has children, the Pragmatic Sanction is purely academic, but that changes with the birth of Archduke Leopold Johann. Tragically, Leopold dies before the age of one and it is Charles’ second child, Maria Theresa, who stands in line for the Habsburg throne. 10 April 1741 BATTLE OF MOLLWITZ Without bothering to declare war, Prussia invades Silesia, eager to add territory. The new Prussian monarch, Frederick II,…

Operations had already opened in the Low Countries when the Austrians and Prussians ended hostilities for the second time. The French had made inroads into the Austrian Netherlands in 1744, and the next year Marshal Maurice de Saxe persuaded his political masters that a renewed assault on the Low Countries would be the best way of straining British resources. Worries over a potential rebellion in Scotland meant that Britain had one eye on the situation at home and one on the continent, and Saxe took advantage, launching an offensive against the most important of the so-called Dutch ‘barrier forts’, Tournai. The move drew out the British and forced them to face Saxe with a Dutch-German-English army commanded by the Duke of Cumberland – the two armies met at the Battle…

A distinctive feature on the Passchendaele battlefield in 1917 was concrete pillboxes. Three main factors led to their use. First, the high water table and rainfall made trenches less practicable, so robust fortifications on the surface were needed. Second, increasing British artillery superiority meant these constructions could offer German defenders shelter during bombardments and a strong post to fight off infantry attacks. Third, pillboxes also suited revised German defensive tactics of defence in depth using mutually supporting strong points. Made of steel-reinforced concrete with walls and roofs several feet thick, they were able to withstand even direct hits from all but the heaviest-calibre shells. Low and squat, they were built in many different sizes, some designed to accommodate only six to eight men, ranging up to larger ones with up…

The Second World War was a conflict of mobility and machinery, of great innovation in the seemingly endless desire of humans to find more powerful ways to subjugate and kill other humans. Tanks and trucks; bombers and fighters; rockets and ultimately ballistic missiles; submarines and aircraft carriers; jet engines; and in the end, industrialised genocide and the atomic bomb. Yet for nearly 900 days of this complex war, which featured such a rapid development of technology, one of the great cities of Europe was almost entirely cut off from the rest of the continent, and starved – reminiscent of medieval siege tactics. Leningrad, formerly St Petersburg and Petrograd, was the second-largest city in the Soviet Union and home to much of its heavy industry. Built by Peter the Great in…

REAL TIMELINE 1813 Battle of Leipzig Napoleon is decisively beaten in battle for the first time, by a coalition including troops from Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden. He is forced to return to France but the coalition continues to pursue him. 16 October 1813 Napoleon abdicates After being defeated by the Allies of the Sixth Coalition, Napoleon is exiled to the island of Elba. The pre-revolutionary Bourbon monarchy is restored and Louis XVIII becomes King of France. 11 April 1814 Beginning of Napoleon’s Hundred Days Napoleon escapes Elba and after landing on the French mainland convinces the regiment sent to incept him to join him and march on Paris. As he moves north, more soldiers defect to join him. King Louis XVIII flees to the Netherlands. 26 February 1815 Congress…

On 3 July 1778, a combined force of Iroquois and Loyalists descended upon the Wyoming Valley in Pennsylvania. There, the British-backed raiders met an outnumbered contingent of American troops, decimating their numbers in a battle since dubbed – somewhat contentiously – the Wyoming Massacre. Among the fallen was Gershom Prince, a Black soldier fighting with the Patriots who had once called the valley his home. From his body, an elaborately decorated powder horn he had long carried was taken and preserved. “Very few powder horns of Black Revolutionary War soldiers survive,” says Dr Philip Mead, chief historian and director of curatorial affairs at the Museum of the American Revolution in Philadelphia, where the centuries-old artefact was recently on loan. “This one is probably the only surviving powder horn of a…