The Biggest Amphibious Operations of the World Wars

Summary

A swift, sudden attack from the ocean, putting soldiers ashore on a hostile coast at some point weakly defended by the enemy, has been a powerful tactical and strategic tool since the late Bronze Age. Utilized by the Sea Peoples against New Kingdom Egypt and the Greek city-states in their internecine wars, amphibious warfare combined high mobility with a strong chance of complete surprise.

The technique continued in use through such periods as the early Medieval era, when Viking armies numbering up to 10,000 men struck suddenly and devastatingly from the sea using their highly seaworthy longships or “dragonships” (drekkar). At around the same time, the Normans carried out amphibious landings of invasion forces, including mounted men, in Muslim-occupied Sicily (1061) and Saxon England (1066).

As navies grew larger and the Spanish clashed with the Ottomans in the Mediterranean during the Renaissance, some military forces introduced specialized marines for the first time. These men, trained specially for landings carried out using ships’ boats, formed a part of many European navies from the 16th century onward. 

World War I was the first truly industrial war, and it created a paradigm which reached its zenith with World War II and towards which virtually all equipment, innovation and training were dedicated throughout the Cold War and the remainder of the 20th century. To this day, modern warfare remains synonymous with tanks and mass infantry battles, although a confrontation of this nature has not occurred (except briefly during Operation Desert Storm) since World War II.  World War II witnessed a sudden explosion in the scope and metamorphosis in the methods of amphibious warfare. With battlefields covering significant portions of the planetary surface, combined with the availability of the modern era’s powerful technology and vehicles, the mighty conflict witnessed unprecedented tactical and strategic amphibious operations.