The Italian Army (Esercito Italiano) is the ground defence force of the Italian Armed Forces. It is an all-volunteer force of active-duty personnel, numbering 108,355 in 2010. Its best-known combat vehicles are the Dardo infantry fighting vehicle, the Centauro tank destroyer and the Ariete tank, and among its aircraft the Mangusta attack helicopter, recently deployed in UN missions. The headquarters of the Army General Staff are located in Rome, opposite the Presidential Palace.
The army's history dates back to the unification of Italy in the 1850s and 1860s. The army fought in colonial engagements in China, Libya (1911-1912), northern Italy against the Austro-Hungarian Empire during World War I, Abyssinia before World War II, and in World War II in Albania, Greece, north Africa, Russia and Italy itself. During the Cold War the army prepared itself to defend against a Warsaw Pact invasion from the east. Since the end of the Cold War the army has seen extensive peacekeeping service and combat in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Read more about Italian Army: History, Operations, Command Structure, Operational Forces, Effective Operational Capability
Famous quotes containing the words italian and/or army:
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)
“I declare Billy. I like you so much personally I wish I could vote for you. But bein’ a member of the Grand Army of the Republic, I just as leave cut my throat as to vote for a Democrat.”
—Laurence Stallings (1894–1968)