ABSTRACT
Since 1943 there had been in some mountainous and inaccessible parts of Austria isolated groups of Green Cadres, as people used to call the partisan groups or maquis units in Austria. The first stronger partisan groups began to appear in the winter of 1942-1943 in southern Carinthia, the Styrian-Carinthian border area, and the Bacher Mountains in Styria. Beginning in the fall of 1943 there were armed Resistance groups in the Otz Valley that banded together in units of 60 to 80 men and controlled the lateral valleys of the Otztal as well as a major portion of the mountain massif. Several hundred partisans were able to hold out in southern Carinthia and make a number of attacks on the main railroad line between Klagenfurt or Villach and Yugoslavia and Italy. The most important and strongest partisan units were undoubtedly those operating near the border of Carinthia and Styria opposite Yugoslavia.
