The name SVAN was also used occasionally, since the craft were built by the SVAN company.

THE BLACK PRINCE AND THE SEA DEVILS The Story of Prince Valerio Borghese and the Elite Commandos of the Decima MAS JACK GREENE ALESSANDRO MASSIGNANI

In 1917, an additional 100 MAS were ordered, and these were also used for attacks against Austro-Hungarian bases. Of the 244 MAS employed during the war by the Italians, 38 were equipped with electrical engines that allowed them to be more silent and stealthy.

Only 12 were fitted to launch two torpedoes. The armament of the boats varied and would be changed from time to time from torpedo to antisubmarine use. It included machine guns, 47 mm, 57 mm, and 76 mm guns, one or two towed torpedoes, and ship-mounted torpedoes.5

Please report what is being done to emulate the exploits of the Italians in Alexandria Harbour. . . . Is there any reason why we should be incapable of the same kind of scientific aggressive action that the Italians have shown? One would have thought we should have been in the lead. Winston Churchill to General Lionel Hastings Ismay for the Chiefs

The Italians developed—as later happened in other navies, including the British, German, and Japanese—what had been one of the main war devices in the Russo-Turkish war: the very small and fast boat armed with torpedoes, better known by Americans after World War II as the PT boat.

They were later built during World War I by an American company, Elco, as submarine chasers for Italy and Great Britain. For the Italian Navy, their main duty was to operate in the northern Adriatic Sea, where the waters were shallow, and the Adriatic coast of Austria required small vessels to operate because it was rocky and had many islands.

The development of special assault units occurred in World War I when the stalemate of the war at sea in the Adriatic led the Italians to attempt to besiege enemy bases by other means.

Yet, although the Italian Navy struggled to create new capital ships, it also possessed young officers such as Junio Valerio Borghese, who were less impressed by tonnage and firepower than by the concepts of innovation, small-unit actions, and bravery.