amphibious warfare summary

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Learn about the use of amphibious warfare in military operations, also its advantages and disadvantages

Below is the article summary. For the full article, see amphibious warfare.

amphibious warfare, Military operations directed against hostile shores and characterized by attacks launched from the sea by naval and landing forces. It has been conducted since ancient times. The Greeks attacking Troy (1200 bc) had to make a shore landing, as did the Persian invaders of Greece prior to the Battle of Marathon (490 bc). The British-led landings at Gallipoli (1915) were the main amphibious assault in World War I. The Allies of World War II found amphibious tactics essential in the island-hopping Pacific campaign and in the famous D-Day of the Normandy campaign, which still ranks as the greatest amphibious assault in history. Amphibious warfare’s greatest advantage is its mobility and flexibility; its greatest limitation is that the attacker must start from nothing to build up strength ashore. Modern amphibious forces attempt to overcome this by fielding larger and more efficient landing vessels and also by using helicopters and short-takeoff and -landing airplanes to deploy troops beyond the hostile shore.

Normandy Campaign summary

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Know about the Allied invasion of Europe in the Normandy Campaign, which concluded with the liberation of Paris, 1944

Below is the article summary. For the full article, see Normandy Invasion.

Normandy Campaign, Allied invasion of northern Europe in World War II that began on June 6, 1944, with the largest amphibious landing in history in Normandy, France. Also called Operation Overlord, the landing transported 156,000 U.S., British, and Canadian troops across the English Channel in over 5,000 ships and 10,000 planes. Commanded by Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the Allied forces landed at five beaches on the Normandy coast and soon established lodgement areas, despite stiff German resistance and heavy losses at the code-named Omaha Beach and Juno Beach. Allied air supremacy prevented rapid German reinforcements, and discord between Adolf Hitler and his generals stalled crucial counterattacks. Though delayed by heavy fighting near Cherbourg and around Caen, the Allied ground troops broke out of the beachheads in mid-July and began a rapid advance across northern France. The Normandy Campaign is traditionally considered to have concluded with the liberation of Paris on Aug. 25, 1944.