The Austro-Prussian War: Austria's War with Prussia and Italy in 1866

This is a new history of the Austro-Prussian-Italian War of 1866, which paved the way for German and Italian unification. Geoffrey Wawro describes Prussia's successful invasion of Habsburg Bohemia, and the wretched collapse of the Austrian army in July 1866. Blending military and social history, he describes the panic that overtook Austria's regiments in each clash with the Prussians. He reveals the blundering of the Austrian commandant who fumbled away key strategic advantages and ultimately lost a war--crucial to the fortunes of the Habsburg Monarchy--that most European pundits had predicted they would win.The Austro-Prussian War, by history professor Dr. Geoffrey Wawro, is a well-written and interesting revisionist account of that oft-neglected conflict in 1866. Dr. Wawro has assembled an impressive amount of existing and new source material that sheds an entirely new light on the brief war of 1866 that brought Prussia to the brink of German unification and presaged a new era of professionalization in war. Wawro's account is particularly strong in its use of Austrian and Italian sources; the Italian role in the war is usually reduced to a few paragraphs but in these pages it is covered in great detail. However, readers should be aware that Dr. Wawro's account is revisionist in intent and tone, which the author does not always make clear. Dr. Wawro's central hypothesis is that both Austria and Prussia were fairly evenly matched opponents but that, "Austria did lose in 1866 for many reasons, but chiefly because...Ludwig Benedek, Austria's supreme commander on the Prussian front, revealed himself to be a supremely incompetent general." While the author also cites the technical superiority of the Prussian needle gun and the poor combat performance of many ethnic minority units in the Austrian army, the main cause the author ascribes for Austrian defeat is the poor generalship of Benedek. The "inferior generalship" hypothesis is a difficult one to prove, particularly given notable lapses in Prussian generalship, but by and large the author succeeds. Overall, the Austro-Prussian War belongs on any bookshelf of anyone seriously interested in the evolution of 19th Century warfare. Title: The Austro-Prussian War: Austria's War with Prussia and Italy in 1866 Author Name: Wawro, Geoffrey Location Published: Cambridge University Press: 1997 Binding: softcover Book Condition: Excellent Pages: 313 Categories: Austro Prussian War 1866, European Wars 1820-1870 Seller ID: 1759