The destiny of Italian prisoners in Austro-Hungarian POW camps during the First World War: remembering the defeat of Caporetto 100 years on

The living conditions of Italian prisoners during the First World War were extremely difficult. At the end of the conflict, the treatment of Italian soldiers in Austro-Hungarian POW camps and in those of the German territories was recognized as particularly harsh in comparison with that of other prisoners. The reasons may be ascribed to three main factors. The Italian prisoners paid the price of being considered traitors, since Italy was allied with the Austro-Hungarian Empire and with Germany until 1914, subsequently switching to the side of France, the United Kingdom and Russia. The Italian government and the Italian High Command considered their soldiers poorly inclined to engage in a war which became over time increasingly costly in terms of human sacrifice. The strategy pursued by the General-in-Chief Luigi Cadorna was very aggressive and showed little care for the life conditions of his troops, who were frequently thrown into the fray and exposed to potential slaughter. Due to this negative judgement on their troops' willingness to fight, the government did not help, and even hindered, the despatch of packages of food and clothes to prisoners in the Austro-Hungarian and German camps via the Red Cross. The idea of a better life in the trenches compared with that expected in the camps as prisoners was widespread. Thirdly, the maritime blockade of the Adriatic Sea over time reduced to starvation the populations of Austria, Hungary and Germany, which obviously had grave repercussions on prisoners. It was estimated that around 100,000 Italians lost their lives in POW camps; after the defeat at Caporetto, when over 250,000 prisoners were captured, the number of deaths rose. The main causes of death were: tuberculosis, pneumonia, malnutrition and typhoid fever. At the end of the war, when coming back to Italy, former POWs were interned for months in camps (located predominantly in the Emilia region) and had to face interrogation and trials to demonstrate they were not deserters and were free to go back home. In the meantime, many lost their lives due to "Spanish" flu, pneumonia and other infectious diseases. Only the mobilization both of families and public opinion forced the Italian government to close the camps at the end of the year 1919.

Military Importance of Natural Toxins and Their Analogs

Toxin weapon research, development, production and the ban on its uses is an integral part of international law, with particular attention paid to the protection against these weapons. In spite of this, hazards associated with toxins cannot be completely excluded. Some of these hazards are also pointed out in the present review. The article deals with the characteristics and properties of natural toxins and synthetic analogs potentially constituting the basis of toxin weapons. It briefly describes the history of military research and the use of toxins from distant history up to the present age. With respect to effective disarmament conventions, it mentions certain contemporary concepts of possible toxin applications for military purposes and the protection of public order (suppression of riots); it also briefly refers to the question of terrorism. In addition, it deals with certain traditional as well as modern technologies of the research, synthesis, and use of toxins, which can affect the continuing development of toxin weapons. These are, for example, cases of new toxins from natural sources, their chemical synthesis, production of synthetic analogs, the possibility of using methods of genetic engineering and modern biotechnologies or the possible applications of nanotechnology and certain pharmaceutical methods for the effective transfer of toxins into the organism. The authors evaluate the military importance of toxins based on their comparison with traditional chemical warfare agents. They appeal to the ethics of the scientific work as a principal condition for the prevention of toxin abuse in wars, military conflicts, as well as in non-military attacks.

[Scientific and research experimentation center of aviation and space medicine and human engineeing celebrates 80th anniversary]

The article is devoted to the history of the Research Test Center Aviation and Space Medicine and military ergonomics, now included in the Central Research Institute of the Air Force Defense Ministry. The center throughout 80 years history is a leding research organization in the country for the integrated study of the human factor in aviation and problems connected with it. The world-famous scientific schools in aviation physiology, hygiene and radiolorgy, emergency medicine, aviation psychology and ergonomics have been grounded on the basis of this center. With a high qualified scientific staff and laboratory-and-bench-scale base including unique seminatural airplanes and helicopters complexes, posters and installation simulating the impact of flight factors (centrifuge, hyperbaric chambers, shakenr vestibulyar-WIDE stands, etc.) the center has. successfully slved tasks concerning an improvement of flight crews protection from occupational hazards, ergonomic demands to capabilities of aircraft, professional and psycho-physiological training. Automatic systems of medical decision-making on assessment of the health status in the medical-flight expertise and dynamic medical supervision, planning, treatment and preventive and remedial actions aircrew training are currently 'being developed

Overall view of chemical and biochemical weapons

This article describes a brief history of chemical warfare, which culminated in the signing of the Chemical Weapons Convention. It describes the current level of chemical weapons and the risk of using them. Furthermore, some traditional technology for the development of chemical weapons, such as increasing toxicity, methods of overcoming chemical protection, research on natural toxins or the introduction of binary technology, has been described. In accordance with many parameters, chemical weapons based on traditional technologies have achieved the limit of their development. There is, however, a big potential of their further development based on the most recent knowledge of modern scientific and technical disciplines, particularly at the boundary of chemistry and biology. The risk is even higher due to the fact that already, today, there is a general acceptance of the development of non-lethal chemical weapons at a technologically higher level. In the future, the chemical arsenal will be based on the accumulation of important information from the fields of chemical, biological and toxin weapons. Data banks obtained in this way will be hardly accessible and the risk of their materialization will persist.

World War I: an air war of consequence

On December 17, 1903, the brothers Wilbur and Orville Wright flew the world's first successful airplane, following this with the first military airplane in 1908. (The 1908 Flyer was built by the brothers in response to a 1907 requirements specification for a 2-place aircraft capable of flying at 40 mph and able to be broken down and transported in a horse-drawn wagon. Technically, since it crashed during its demonstration program and was not formally delivered to the Army, it never became Army property. But the trials had been so impressive that the Army ordered a second, delivered in 1909.) Just six years later, Europe erupted in a general war. Often portrayed as a sideshow to the war on land and sea, the air war heralded the advent of mechanized warfare, the airplane being one of four great technological advances--the submarine, the tank, and radio communication--that, together, revolutionized military affairs. Aircraft reconnaissance influenced the conduct of military operations from the war's earliest days, and airborne observers routinely governed the fall of artillery barrages, crucially important in an artillery-dominant war.

Medical science and the military: the Allies' use of amphetamine during World War II

Although amphetamine was thoroughly tested by leading scientists for its effects in boosting or maintaining physical and mental performance in fatigued subjects, the results never provided solid grounds for approving the drug's use, and, in any case, came too late to be decisive. The grounds on which amphetamine was actually adopted by both British and American militaries had less to do with the science of fatigue than with the drug's mood-altering effects, as judged by military men. It increased confidence and aggression, and elevated "morale."

A historically significant shield for in vivo measurements

Due to the ubiquitous nature of ionizing radiation, in vivo measurement systems designed to measure low levels of radionuclides in people are usually enclosed within a high-density shield. Lead, steel, earth, and water are just some of the materials that have been and are being used to shield the detectors from radiations of cosmic, atmospheric, man-made, and terrestrial origin. At many Department of Energy sites, the counting room shields are constructed of pre-World War II steel to reduce the background levels in order to perform measurements that have low minimum detectable activities. The pre-World War II steel is commonly called low background steel in the in vivo industry vernacular. The low background descriptor comes from the fact the steel was manufactured prior to the beginning of atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons in the 1940's. Consequently, the steel is not likely to be contaminated with fission or activation products from fallout. For high energy photons (600 keV < E < 1500 keV), 30 cm of steel shielding significantly reduces the measured background radiation levels. This is the story of the unique steel that began as the hull of the U.S.S. Indiana and now forms a shielded room at the In Vivo Radiobioassay and Research Facility in Richland, Washington.

Combat science: the emergence of Operational Research in World War II

World War II became known as the "wizard war" because the cycles of developing countermeasures and counter-countermeasures to the weapons deployed by all sides drove rapid technological change. However, technological innovation was not the only contribution scientists made to the war effort. Through Operational Research (OR)--the scientific scrutiny of new weapons, their deployment and relative efficiency--scientists also influenced how warfare itself was conducted. This new scientific field emerged in the UK, where it helped to tighten the defense against the Luftwaffe. It quickly spread to other aspects of the military machine, improving both antisubmarine campaigns and bombing strategy. But although this analytical approach to warfare offered military commanders a factual basis on which to base difficult decisions and deal with tactical and strategic uncertainty, it was not without controversy. Indeed, several recommendations that came out of OR sparked disputes over the allocation of resources and strategic priorities.

Dr. Lytle Adams' incendiary "bat bomb" of World War II

On December 7, 1941, a 60-year old dentist from Irwin, Pennsylvania, Dr. Lytle S. Adams, was driving home from a vacation at Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico. Hours earlier, he had been gripped with amazement as he witnessed millions of bats exiting the caves of Carlsbad. Listening to his car radio on his return trip, he was shocked to hear that Japan had just attacked Pearl Harbor. Dr. Adams, outraged over this travesty, began to mentally construct a plan for U.S. retaliation. As his thoughts returned to the countless bats that had awed him, he formed a tentative plan: millions of these small, flying mammals could be connected to tiny, time-fused incendiary bombs, and then released to land on the flimsily constructed structures which dotted the cities of Japan. Within a few minutes, the bombs would explode and enflame the entire urban areas. He postulated that these immeasurable numbers of fires, spreading their devastation over such vast areas within Japanese cities would result in the enemy's speedy surrender. This article documents the futile efforts of Dr. Adams, his team and the U.S. government to develop and employ an effective, incendiary bat bomb. The recently developed atom bomb, a far more deadly weapon was used in its place.

Norbert Elias, maritime supremacy and the naval profession: on Elias' unpublished studies in the genesis of the naval profession

In 1950 Norbert Elias published the first of three studies on 'The Genesis of the Naval Profession' in the British Journal of Sociology. At the time Elias was not the established scholar that he was to become in later days. In the 1950s his work on the 'Naval Profession' was not well received by the audience, even though all the major themes of the 'civilizing process' were interwoven in the article. The other two studies were never published in English journals (only one was published in a Dutch journal but received no international attention). A perusal of the Norbert Elias Archive in Marbach am Neckar in Germany--shows that the 'Naval Profession' project is larger than the intended three part series of articles for the BJS. From an outline to the project found in the archive it can be concluded that Elias intended to write a book with six to seven chapters. The key to the studies is a sketchy theory of institutions, which states that conflict promotes institutional development. Through the conflict between two occupational groups, sailors and soldiers, the naval officer becomes institutionalized as a new profession. During the period this process takes place England acquires maritime supremacy, secures the passages to the colonies and becomes an empire.

The government of Israel and the health care of the Negev Bedouin under military government, 1948-1966

Bedouin Arabs in Israel are a Muslim society undergoing dramatic social change. The Bedouin have lived in the Negev desert since the sixth century, having migrated there from the Arabian Peninsula. In the course of the last five decades this traditionally nomadic/semi-nomadic population has undergone rapid modernization and urbanization, and today approximately 120,000 Bedouin Arabs live in the Negev. Traditionally herders and farmers, only about 5 per cent of the Negev Bedouin are still semi-nomadic tent dwellers. Most families are sedentary, living in sub-tribal groups in shacks and houses. The Negev Bedouin population has the lowest socio-economic rating of all localities and social groups in Israeli society.

Traditional virtues, feudal ties and Royal Guards: the culture of service in the eighteenth-century "Maison Militaire du Roi"

Recent discussions of French army reform before the Revolution have revived interest in the more general topic of military culture in the ancien régime. One account of this period speaks of an evolution in criteria for military merit, one in which professional efficiency came to overshadow traditional martial virtues, such as fidelity and courage. But a review of the evidence, both archival and published, from the Maison militaire du Roi reveals that here, at least, old virtues continued to be central until the end, serving as expressions of a relationship with the king in which royal grâces were their natural complement. Viewed historically, this conception of service continued a feudal tradition. The milieu of the Maison was distinctive in the encouragement it gave to such traditions, but the function of the institution as a pépinière of officers for the army gave it a potentially wide influence in balancing the tendencies towards professionalism.

The experience of Spain's early modern soldiers: combat, welfare and violence

Between 1500 and 1700, hundreds of thousands of soldiers served in the armies of the Spanish monarchs. Our knowledge of the conditions of service of these men is scant and largely limited to those who served in the Army of Flanders. This article examines the experience of soldiers in the regular armies and the militias in the Iberian peninsula during this period. With a focus on combat, physical and spiritual welfare and the culture of violence, it provides a range of insights into the reality of warfare in mainland Spain. It examines a number of variables which influenced or arose from that experience. These include rates of attrition arising from desertion and casualities; the availability, use and effectiveness of weapons and munitions, along with evidence for ratios of the deployment of artillery; the nature of medical and spiritual assistance; food and drink; association with women; and engagement in and subjection to violence. The article provides incidental evidence for the use in the peninsula in the mid-seventeenth century of tactics associated with the Military Revolution, and for the violent interaction of soldiers with civilians.

Serious misapplications of military research: dysfunction between conception and implementation

Researchers and technologists involved in the development of weapon systems can take their work to such extremes as to cause unplanned injury or death to others and lasting damage to the environment, reviewed here. In some cases innocent human casualties and ecological harm may actually be programmed and achieved. An analysis is proffered, attributing blame, and indicating efforts to correct the situation. The ethics involved are "complexified",a moral boundaries are exceeded, and humanity is transgressed as it develops solutions to the problem.

Popular gymnastics and the military spirit in Germany, 1848-1871

Over the course of the nineteenth century, a popular nationalist movement developed in the German states that had gained considerable strength by 1871, the year of unification. The German gymnastics association movement was one of the main forms in which popular nationalism was organized. It was started by Friedrich Ludwig Jahn early in the nineteenth century as a means to train young Germans to fight the French occupation. Gradually, it developed into a movement that sought to unify Germany, a project that was not, at first, supported by the German states. The movement was also guided by liberal and, especially before the revolution of 1848, democratic principles, and in this sense, too, was at odds with the reigning political system in Central Europe.

The web of honour: soldiers, Christians, and gentlemen in the English Civil War

Contrary to stereotypes that represent it primarily as an expression of machismo or romantic chivalry, military honour in early modern England was professional, moral, utilitarian, and a force for social stability. It was pragmatic as well as idealistic. It shared attributes of civilian honour but also comprehended rules and obligations specific to soldiers. Professional honour required that the soldier should know and observe the codes and practices of his métier. To do so satisfied his internal sense of personal integrity and brought external reputation. Honour also had a broader social value. Mutuality and utility marked its operation in the English civil war. This mutuality safeguarded practices both sides found useful, such as prisoner exchanges, for the honour of each side was engaged in observance of the relevant rules. The survival of a bipartisan soldiers' honour ameliorated relations between enemies. It helped to prevent irrevocable social divisions, to sustain social order, and to enable previously warring Englishmen to live together with tolerable equanimity.

Stereotaxy, navigation and the temporal concatenation

Nautical and cerebral navigation share similar elements of functional need and similar developmental pathways. The need for orientation necessitates the development of appropriate concepts, and such concepts are dependent on technology for practical realization. Occasionally, a concept precedes technology in time and requires periods of delay for appropriate development. A temporal concatenation exists where time allows the additive as need, concept and technology ultimately provide an endpoint of elegant solution. Nautical navigation has proceeded through periods of dead reckoning and celestial navigation to satellite orientation with associated refinements of instrumentation and charts for guidance. Cerebral navigation has progressed from craniometric orientation and burr hole mounted guidance systems to simple rectolinear and arc-centered devices based on radiographs to guidance by complex anatomical and functional maps provided as an amalgam of modern imaging modes. These maps are now augmented by complex frame and frameless systems which allow not only precise orientation, but also point and volumetric action. These complex technical modalities required and developed in part from elements of maritime navigation that have been translated to cerebral navigation in a temporal concatenation.