Austrian Guards

This is a very impressive looking unit, and has been since its imperial days.

Ah but can they match the Lifeguard of Halberdiers, the Gentlemen at Arms, the Royal Hungarian Nobles' Lifeguards, the Lifeguard Mounted Squadron, the Lifeguard Infantry Company and the Hungarian Crown Guard of pre-1918 Vienna? Militarily useless but visually magnificent. As one Austro-Hungarian of the old school said: "we had the prettiest army in Europe - and we had to go and ruin it in a war".

Isn't that the case with any army.
They look so good, why do we have to go and get them dirty?

hi
Just a link for modern Austrian rank insignia from Sean’s excellent link for German and French 19th cent uniforms.
I placed it here to go with the pictures of the Guard showing the collar badges.
The link is from the Austrian Armed Forces page’s English version.

http://www.bmlv.gv.at/english/forces/ranks.shtml