The below image shows a great selection of Soldiers of various units of the polyglot Austro-Hungarian army in 1914 (click to big up).
From left to right:
Austrian Landwehr ulan cavalrymen,
Austrian Landwehr (infantryman),
Bosnian Jäger,
Austrian Jäger,
Austrian infantryman,
Hungarian infantryman,
Tyrolean and Imperial Jäger,
Bosnian infantryman,
Hungarian honvéd infantryman,
Common, or joint (közös) Hussar in a new camp uniform,
Common, or joint (közös) hussar,
Common, or joint (közös) Jäger,
Common, or joint (közös) dragoon.
Note the Austro-Hungarian bluejacket at the far right, dressed for shore duty.
And it doesn’t even include such exotic units as the Albanians:
or ski troops…
Or crazy weapon systems like the water-cooled Standschütze Hellriegel Submachine Gun
While they looked good in photos and on paper, the Austrian forces were so poorly led, confusingly staffed and shallow in depth that German warlord Gen. Erich von Ludendorff said that to fight alongside old Franz Josef’s army was like being “shackled to a corpse.”
Of course, the uniforms would become much more practical as the Great War’s modern combat left the quaint 19th Century stylings behind in the mud of trench warfare– especially on the horrors of the Italian front, where the Austrians gave a better account of themselves than against the Serbs and Russians in the opening stages of the conflict.
Austro-Hungarian assault troops k.u.k. Sturmbatallione. They’ re-equipped with Austrian zeitzunderhandgranates, wire cutters and a variety of small arms.