Giulio Douhet
Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy Mitchell, and Hugh Trenchard. In his influential 1921 work ''The Command of the Air'', Douhet argued that strategic bombing—particularly targeting civilian populations and infrastructure—could break a nation's will to fight. He believed that by inflicting enough terror and destruction from the air, the morale of the civilian population would collapse, forcing the enemy government to capitulate. Douhet's theories proved influential, although the effectiveness of his strategies remains debated. Biography Born in Caserta, Campania, Italy, from a family of Savoyard exiles who had migrated there after the cession of Savoy to FranceDouhet, Giulio ''The Command of the Air'' (Editors' Introduction), Coward McCann (1942), Office of Air Force Histo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Caserta
Caserta ( ; ) is the capital of the province of Caserta in the Campania region of Italy. An important agricultural, commercial, and industrial ''comune'' and city, Caserta is located 36 kilometres north of Naples on the edge of the Campanian plain at the foot of the Campanian Subapennine mountain range. The city is best known for the 18th-century Bourbon Royal Palace of Caserta. History Anciently inhabited by Osco- Samnite tribes, modern Caserta was established around the defensive tower built in Lombard times by Pando, Prince of Capua. Pando destroyed the original city around 863. The tower is now part of the Palazzo della Prefettura that was once the seat of the counts of Caserta, as well as a royal residence. The original population moved from Casertavecchia (former bishopric seat) to the current site in the sixteenth century. Casertavecchia was built on the Roman town of ''Casa Irta'', meaning "home village located above" and later contracted as "Caserta". The ci ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Gianni Caproni
Giovanni Battista "Gianni" Caproni, 1st Count of Taliedo (July 3, 1886 – October 27, 1957) was an Italian aeronautical engineer, civil engineer, electrical engineer, and aircraft designer who founded the Caproni aircraft-manufacturing company. Early life and education Caproni was born on July 3, 1886, in Massone, which at the time was in Austria-Hungary but became a part of Italy in 1919. In 1907 he received a degree in civil engineering from the Technical University Munich. A year later he received a doctoral degree in electrical engineering from the University of Liège. Career In 1907 and 1908, Caproni gained experience in the construction of aircraft engines; he also collaborated with the Romanian aircraft designer Henri Coandă, whom he had met at ''lIstituto Montefiori di Liegi'', in the building of sailplanes. In 1908, he founded the Caproni factory in the Taliedo district of Milan, Italy, to manufacture biplanes. In 1909 he opened an industrial airport near t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Aerial Warfare
Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare. Aerial warfare includes bombers attacking tactical bombing, enemy installations or a concentration of enemy troops or Strategic bombing, strategic targets; fighter aircraft battling for air superiority, control of airspace; attack aircraft engaging in close air support against ground targets; naval aviation flying against sea and nearby land targets; Military glider, gliders, Military helicopter, helicopters and other aircraft to carry airborne forces such as paratroopers; aerial refueling tankers to extend operation time or range; and military transport aircraft to move cargo and personnel. Historically, military aircraft have included lighter-than-air balloons carrying artillery observers; lighter-than-air airships for bombing cities; various sorts of Reconnaissance aircraft, reconnaissance, Surveillance aircraft, surveillance, and Airborne early warning and control, early warning aircraft ca ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Total War
Total war is a type of warfare that includes any and all (including civilian-associated) resources and infrastructure as legitimate military targets, mobilises all of the resources of society to fight the war, and gives priority to warfare over non-combatant needs. The term has been defined as "A war that is unrestricted in terms of the weapons used, the Territory (country subdivision), territory or combatants involved, or the objectives pursued, especially one in which the law of war, laws of war are disregarded." In the mid-19th century, scholars identified what later became known as total war as a separate class of warfare. In a total war, the differentiation between combatants and non-combatants diminishes due to the capacity of opposing sides to consider nearly every human, including non-combatants, as resources that are used in the war effort. Characteristics Total war is a concept that has been extensively studied by scholars of conflict and war. One of the most not ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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The Bomber Will Always Get Through
"The bomber will always get through" was a phrase used by Stanley Baldwin in a 1932 speech "A Fear for the Future" given to the British Parliament. His speech stated that contemporary bomber aircraft had the performance necessary to conduct a strategic bombing campaign that would destroy a country's cities and there was little that could be done in response. It concluded that the conduct of future wars would require one to "kill more women and children more quickly than the enemy if you want to save yourselves." At the time of the speech aircraft performance was rapidly improving and new techniques and construction methods were producing ever-larger aircraft. For a time, this resulted in a performance gap where multi-engine aircraft outperformed the single-engine fighter aircraft that would have to intercept them. This gap could be further widened through the use of night bombing, which made interception practically impossible. This state of affairs was relatively short-lived ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Morale
Morale ( , ) is the capacity of a group's members to maintain belief in an institution or goal, particularly in the face of opposition or hardship. Morale is often referenced by authority figures as a generic value judgment of the willpower, obedience, and self-discipline of a group tasked with performing duties assigned by a superior. According to Alexander H. Leighton, "morale is the capacity of a group of people to pull together persistently and consistently in pursuit of a common purpose". With good morale, a force will be less likely to give up or surrender. Morale is usually assessed at a collective, rather than an individual level. In wartime, civilian morale is also important. Definition Military history experts have not agreed on a precise definition of "morale". Clausewitz's comments on the subject have been described as "deliberately vague" by modern scholars. George Francis Robert Henderson, a widely read military author of the pre-World War I era, viewed mo ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Douhet
Giulio Douhet (30 May 1869 – 15 February 1930) was an Italian general and air power theorist. He was a key proponent of strategic bombing in aerial warfare. He was a contemporary of the air warfare advocates Walther Wever, Billy Mitchell, and Hugh Trenchard. In his influential 1921 work ''The Command of the Air'', Douhet argued that strategic bombing—particularly targeting civilian populations and infrastructure—could break a nation's will to fight. He believed that by inflicting enough terror and destruction from the air, the morale of the civilian population would collapse, forcing the enemy government to capitulate. Douhet's theories proved influential, although the effectiveness of his strategies remains debated. Biography Born in Caserta, Campania, Italy, from a family of Savoyard exiles who had migrated there after the cession of Savoy to FranceDouhet, Giulio ''The Command of the Air'' (Editors' Introduction), Coward McCann (1942), Office of Air Force History 19 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Encyclopedia Britannica
An encyclopedia is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge, either general or special, in a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into article (publishing), articles or entries that are arranged Alphabetical order, alphabetically by article name or by thematic categories, or else are hyperlinked and searchable. Encyclopedia entries are longer and more detailed than those in most dictionary, dictionaries. Generally speaking, encyclopedia articles focus on ''factual information'' concerning the subject named in the article's title; this is unlike dictionary entries, which focus on Linguistics, linguistic information about words, such as their etymology, meaning, pronunciation, use, and grammar, grammatical forms.Béjoint, Henri (2000)''Modern Lexicography'', pp. 30–31. Oxford University Press. Encyclopedias have existed for around 2,000 years and have evolved considerably during that time as regards language (written in a major inte ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Rome
Rome (Italian language, Italian and , ) is the capital city and most populated (municipality) of Italy. It is also the administrative centre of the Lazio Regions of Italy, region and of the Metropolitan City of Rome. A special named with 2,746,984 residents in , Rome is the list of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, third most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits. The Metropolitan City of Rome Capital, with a population of 4,223,885 residents, is the most populous metropolitan cities of Italy, metropolitan city in Italy. Rome metropolitan area, Its metropolitan area is the third-most populous within Italy. Rome is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, within Lazio (Latium), along the shores of the Tiber Valley. Vatican City (the smallest country in the world and headquarters of the worldwide Catholic Church under the governance of the Holy See) is an independent country inside the city boun ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who, upon assuming office as Prime Minister of Italy, Prime Minister, became the dictator of Fascist Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until Fall of the Fascist regime in Italy, his overthrow in 1943. He was also of Italian fascism from the establishment of the Italian Fasces of Combat in 1919, until Death of Benito Mussolini, his summary execution in 1945. He founded and led the National Fascist Party (PNF). As a dictator and founder of fascism, Mussolini inspired the List of fascist movements, international spread of fascism during the interwar period. Mussolini was originally a socialist politician and journalist at the Avanti! (newspaper), ''Avanti!'' newspaper. In 1912, he became a member of the National Directorate of the Italian Socialist Party (PSI), but was expelled for advocating military intervention in World War I. In 1914, Mussolini founded a newspaper, ''Il P ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Battle Of Caporetto
The Battle of Kobarid (also known as the Twelfth Battle of the Isonzo, the Battle of Caporetto or the Battle of Karfreit) took place on the Italian front of World War I. The battle was fought between the Kingdom of Italy and the Central Powers and took place from 24 October to 19 November 1917, near the town of Kobarid (now in north-western Slovenia, then part of the Austrian Littoral), and near the river Isonzo. The battle was named after the Italian name of the town (also known as ''Karfreit'' in German). Austro-Hungarian forces, reinforced by German units, were able to break into the Italian front line and rout the Italian forces opposing them. The battle was a demonstration of the effectiveness of the use of stormtroopers and the infiltration tactics developed in part by Oskar von Hutier. The use of poison gas by the Germans also played a key role in the collapse of the Italian Second Army. The rest of the Italian Army retreated to the Piave River; its effec ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Military History Of Italy During World War I
Although a member of the Triple Alliance, Italy did not join the Central Powers – Germany and Austria-Hungary – when the war started with Austria-Hungary's declaration of war on Serbia on 28 July 1914. In fact, the two Central Powers had taken the offensive while the Triple Alliance was supposed to be a defensive alliance. Moreover the Triple Alliance recognized that both Italy and Austria-Hungary were interested in the Balkans and required both to consult each other before changing the status quo and to provide compensation for whatever advantage in that area: Austria-Hungary did consult Germany but not Italy before issuing the ultimatum to Serbia, and refused any compensation before the end of the war. Almost a year after the war's commencement, after secret parallel negotiations with both sides (with the Allies in which Italy negotiated for territory if victorious, and with the Central Powers to gain territory if neutral) Italy entered the war on the side of the Allied Po ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |