The Battle of the Otranto Straits: Controlling the Gateway to the Adriatic in World War I [Hardcover]

In most histories of the naval conflicts of the First World War, the emphasis is primarily - if not exclusively - on the maneuverings and battles in the North Sea and the Atlantic. While this area was indeed the site of many of the important maritime struggles of the war, such a focus overlooks the many other areas in which the war at sea was fought. One of those areas was the Adriatic, where the Austro-Hungarian navy battled the combined naval forces of the British, the French, and the Italians. In this book, Paul Halpern, the preeminent naval historian of the war, illuminates this often-overlooked front by focusing on the key battle waged there, the battle of the Otranto Straits.

Halpern begins his book by providing the background to the battle. He notes that many people often overlook the proud naval history of the Austrians, who triumphed in the battle of Lissa in 1866. While primarily a costal and regional force, the Austro-Hungarian fleet was involved in the naval armaments races at the beginning of the 20th century, and had a number of battleships at the start of the war. Their use was restricted by the geography of the region however, which favored conflict by smaller craft. As a result, the most effective and oft-utilized weapon was the submarine, and the ports of the Austro-Hungarian empire played a key role in basing German and Austrian submarines that attacked Allied supply lines in the Mediterranean.

Though the British and the French easily outmatched the Austro-Hungarian fleet on paper, the demands of the conflict meant that their superior forces were usually deployed elsewhere in the war. While the Italians added to this superiority upon joining the conflict, their reluctance to risk their capital warships - a risk illustrated by the sinking of two armored cruisers early in the war - meant that a rough stalemate existed in the Adriatic. Halpern is especially good at describing the challenges faced by the multinational Allied force, with political tensions often defining plans and operations inhibited by the difficulties in communicating across three languages.

Nowhere was this better illustrated than with the barrage the Allies tried to establish across the Otranto Straits, an effort that was often hindered by disputes over contributions from the various sides. Halpern is dismissive of the efficacy of the barrage in stopping submarine transits through the straits, yet it provided a useful target for the Austro-Hungarian navy to attack. On May 15, 1917, three cruisers attacked the drifters manning the barrage, sinking fourteen of them before heading back to base. The Allies attempted to intercept the cruisers, prompting a midday engagement from which the Austrians escaped with some damage. Though Halpern credits the Austro-Hungarian force with the greater success in the battle, the success proved difficult to replicate, and in the end could not prevent the empire from going down to defeat the following year.

Halpern does an excellent job of reconstructing this engagement, an effort complicated by the conflicting accounts of the battle. Yet the greatest strength of the book is his use of the clash as a window into this often-overlooked theater of the war, demonstrating how it embodied many of the elements the various sides faced while fighting in the Adriatic. Though marred slightly by occasional repetition within the text, this is a great account of an often neglected battleground of the First World War and a must-read for anyone interested in the war at sea.

I have enjoyed Paul Halpern's works over the years and this is an added must. In it he gives a very detailed and tactical account of how the battle in 1917 unfolded and by this he shows how many of the tactical convoy and naval battles would be like in World War II.

So unless you read Italian or German, this is the best account in English and is well put together with maps and wonderful and well produced photographs.

It's an otstanding account of one of the most unknown naval battles of the first world war. A confused action, without Jutland' big guns became alive in the great description of the author

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