Misplaced Pages

#504495

89-952: Batalha (Portuguese for battle ) may refer to: Portugal Batalha, Portugal , a municipality Batalha Monastery (officially Mosteiro Santa Maria da Vitória), monastery in Batalha, Portugal Batalha Square , a historical public square in the city of Porto Brazil Batalha, Alagoas , municipality in Alagoas, Brazil (15,000 inhabitants) Batalha, Piauí , municipality in Piauí, Brazil Batalha River , river in São Paulo People José Lodi Batalha , Brazilian footballer Martha Batalha , Brazilian journalist Rui Batalha , Portuguese footballer Natalie Batalha , US astronomer Topics referred to by

178-420: A military secret . Scholars still do not know the exact nature of Greek fire , for instance. Researching Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom, for example, have presented unique challenges to historians due to records that were destroyed to protect classified military information, among other reasons. Historians use their knowledge of government regulation and military organization, and employing

267-479: A battle, so as to capitalize on the lessons learned from the past. When certifying military history instructors the Combat Studies Institute deemphasizes rote detail memorization and focuses on themes and context in relation to current and future conflict, using the motto "Past is Prologue." The discipline of military history is dynamic, changing with development as much of the subject area as

356-483: A broad view of warfare's role in the nation's history. They typically include displays of weapons and other military equipment, uniforms , wartime propaganda , and exhibits on civilian life during wartime, and decorations , among others. A military museum may be dedicated to a particular or area, such as the Imperial War Museum Duxford for military aircraft, Deutsches Panzermuseum for tanks,

445-545: A combination of sulfur, saltpeter ( potassium nitrate ), aconitine , oil, resin, ground charcoal and wax." Joseph Needham argued the Chinese were able to destroy buildings and walls using such devices. Such experimentation was not present in Western Europe, where the combination of saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal were used exclusively for explosives and as a propellant in firearms. What the Chinese often referred to as

534-624: A decisive battle can cause the losing side to surrender, while a Pyrrhic victory such as the Battle of Asculum can cause the winning side to reconsider its goals. Battles in civil wars have often decided the fate of monarchs or political factions. Famous examples include the Wars of the Roses , as well as the Jacobite risings . Battles affect the commitment of one side or the other to the continuance of

623-506: A historian's political position on current events on interpretive disagreement regarding the causes of 20th century wars. He surveyed the ideological preferences of 109 active diplomatic historians in the United States as well as 54 active military historians. He finds that their current political views are moderately correlated with their historiographical interpretations. A clear position on the left-right continuum regarding capitalism

712-458: A major impact on the societies involved as well as the aftermath of conflicts, while amateur historians and hobbyists often take a larger interest in the details of battles, equipment, and uniforms in use. The essential subjects of military history study are the causes of war, the social and cultural foundations, military doctrine on each side , the logistics, leadership, technology, strategy , and tactics used, and how these changed over time. On

801-619: A minor raid or a big offensive, nor is it likely that he anticipates the future course of the battle; few of the British infantry who went over the top on the first day on the Somme , 1 July 1916, would have anticipated that the battle would last five months. Some of the Allied infantry who had just dealt a crushing defeat to the French at the Battle of Waterloo fully expected to have to fight again

890-495: A new kind of spear, the iklwa . Forces with inferior weapons have still emerged victorious at times, for example in the Wars of Scottish Independence . Disciplined troops are often of greater importance; at the Battle of Alesia , the Romans were greatly outnumbered but won because of superior training. Battles can also be determined by terrain. Capturing high ground has been the main tactic in innumerable battles. An army that holds

979-493: A new type of naval warfare. The ironclad , first used in the American Civil War , resistant to cannons, soon made the wooden ship obsolete. The invention of military submarines , during World War I , brought naval warfare to both above and below the surface. With the development of military aircraft during World War II , battles were fought in the sky as well as below the ocean. Aircraft carriers have since become

SECTION 10

#1732775422505

1068-548: A sanitised version of warfare." The actual bomber that dropped the atomic bomb on Japan became the focus of an angry national controversy with veterans attacking curators and historians when the Smithsonian Institution planned to put its fuselage on public display in 1995. The uproar led to cancellation of the exhibit. The documentation of military history begins with the confrontation between Sumer (current Iraq ) and Elam (current Iran ) c. 2700 BC near

1157-409: A targeted and systematic research strategy to piece together war histories. Despite these limits, wars are some of the most studied and detailed periods of human history. Military historians have often compared organization, tactical and strategic ideas, leadership, and national support of the militaries of different nations. In the early 1980s, historian Jeffrey Kimball studied the influence of

1246-434: A technological bias, a focus on leading military powers and dominant military systems, the separation of land from sea and recently air conflicts, the focus on state-to-state conflict, a lack of focus on political "tasking" in how forces are used. If these challenges were not sufficient for military historians, the limits of method are complicated by the lack of records, either destroyed or never recorded due to their value as

1335-514: A time ( Battle of Leipzig ) or operations ( Battle of Wuhan ). The space a battle occupies depends on the range of the weapons of the combatants. A "battle" in this broader sense may be of long duration and take place over a large area, as in the case of the Battle of Britain or the Battle of the Atlantic . Until the advent of artillery and aircraft , battles were fought with the two sides within sight, if not reach, of each other. The depth of

1424-448: A traditional manner were destroyed by an Anglo-Egyptian force equipped with Maxim machine guns and artillery. On some occasions, simple weapons employed in an unorthodox fashion have proven advantageous; Swiss pikemen gained many victories through their ability to transform a traditionally defensive weapon into an offensive one. Zulus in the early 19th century were victorious in battles against their rivals in part because they adopted

1513-416: A very wide coverage of military history, with over 180,000 articles . Its editors sponsor Misplaced Pages:WikiProject Military history and encourage readers to join. Military museums specialize in military histories; they are often organized from a national point of view, where a museum in a particular country will have displays organized around conflicts in which that country has taken part. They typically take

1602-489: A war, for example the Battle of Inchon and the Battle of Huế during the Tet Offensive . Military historian Military history is the study of armed conflict in the history of humanity , and its impact on the societies, cultures and economies thereof, as well as the resulting changes to local and international relationships . Professional historians normally focus on military affairs that had

1691-495: A year include scholarly articles reviews of new books, and a bibliography of new publications and dissertations. The Society has 2300 members, holds an annual convention, and gives out prizes for the best scholarship. Historiography is the study of the history and method of the discipline of history or the study of a specialised topic. In this case, military history with an eye to gaining an accurate assessment of conflicts using all available sources. For this reason military history

1780-423: Is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Battle The word "battle" can also be used infrequently to refer to an entire operational campaign, although this usage greatly diverges from its conventional or customary meaning. Generally, the word "battle" is used for such campaigns if referring to a protracted combat encounter in which either one or both of

1869-474: Is named after Bayonne , France where it was first manufactured in the 16th century. It is used often in infantry charges to fight in hand-to-hand combat. General Jean Martinet introduced the bayonet to the French army. They were used heavily in the American Civil War , and continued to be used in modern wars like the Invasion of Iraq . Balloons were first used in warfare at the end of the 18th century. It

SECTION 20

#1732775422505

1958-407: Is no longer tied to the navy. A good example of an ancient naval battle is the Battle of Salamis . Most ancient naval battles were fought by fast ships using the battering ram to sink opposing fleets or steer close enough for boarding in hand-to-hand combat. Troops were often used to storm enemy ships as used by Romans and pirates . This tactic was usually used by civilizations that could not beat

2047-477: Is periodised, creating overlaying boundaries of study and analysis in which descriptions of battles by leaders may be unreliable due to the inclination to minimize mention of failure and exaggerate success. Military historians use Historiographical analysis in an effort to allow an unbiased, contemporary view of records. One military historian, Jeremy Black, outlined problems 21st-century military historians face as an inheritance of their predecessors: Eurocentricity,

2136-476: Is that if your enemy has a potentially war winning weapon, you have to either match it or neutralize it. Chariots originated around 2000 BC. The chariot was an effective, fast weapon; while one man controlled the maneuvering of the chariot, a second bowman could shoot arrows at enemy soldiers. These became crucial to the maintenance of several governments, including the New Egyptian Kingdom and

2225-654: Is the Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) which attempts to explain how warfare has been shaped by emerging technologies, such as gunpowder. It highlights the short outbursts of rapid change followed by periods of relative stability. In terms of the history profession in major countries, military history is an orphan, despite its enormous popularity with the general public. William H. McNeill points out: In recent decades University level courses in military history remain popular; often they use films to humanize

2314-530: The Nautilus . The Howitzer , a type of field artillery , was developed in the 17th century to fire high trajectory explosive shells at targets that could not be reached by flat trajectory projectiles. Organizational changes resulting in better training and intercommunication, made the concept combined arms possible, allowing the use of infantry, cavalry, and artillery in a coordinated way. Bayonets also became of wide usage to infantry soldiers. Bayonet

2403-722: The Battle of Britain and the Battle of Midway . Another important use of aircraft came with the development of the helicopter , which first became heavily used during the Vietnam War, and still continues to be widely used today to transport and augment ground forces. Today, direct engagements between aircraft are rare – the most modern fighter-interceptors carry much more extensive bombing payloads, and are used to bomb precision land targets, rather than to fight other aircraft. Anti-aircraft batteries are used much more extensively to defend against incoming aircraft than interceptors. Despite this, aircraft today are much more extensively used as

2492-475: The Battle of Gettysburg (1863) were exceptional in lasting three days.) This was mainly due to the difficulty of supplying armies in the field or conducting night operations . The means of prolonging a battle was typically with siege warfare . Improvements in transport and the sudden evolving of trench warfare , with its siege-like nature during the First World War in the 20th century, lengthened

2581-825: The Lange Max Museum for the Western Front (World War I) , the International Spy Museum for espionage, The National World War I Museum for World War I , the "D-Day Paratroopers Historical Center" (Normandy) for WWII airborne, or more generalist, such as the Canadian War Museum or the Musée de l'Armée . For the Italian alpine wall one can find the most popular museum of bunkers in the small museum n8bunker at Olang / Kronplatz in

2670-541: The Passchendaele , Pearl Harbor , the Alamo , Thermopylae and Waterloo . Military operations , many of which result in battle, are given codenames , which are not necessarily meaningful or indicative of the type or the location of the battle. Operation Market Garden and Operation Rolling Thunder are examples of battles known by their military codenames. When a battleground is the site of more than one battle in

2759-680: The Shang dynasty and the nation states of the early to middle Zhou dynasty . Some of the military unit types and technologies which were developed in the ancient world are: For settled agrarian civilizations, the infantry became the core of military action. The infantry started as opposing armed groups of soldiers underneath commanders. The Greeks and early Romans used rigid, heavily armed phalanxes . The Macedonians and Hellenistic states would adopt phalanx formations with sarissa pikemen. The Romans would later adopt more flexible maniples from their neighbors which made them extremely successful in

Batalha - Misplaced Pages Continue

2848-497: The Spanish Civil War and especially World War II. Aircraft design began specializing, primarily into two types: bombers, which carried explosive payloads to bomb land targets or ships; and fighter-interceptors, which were used to either intercept incoming aircraft or to escort and protect bombers (engagements between fighter aircraft were known as dog fights ). Some of the more notable aerial battles in this period include

2937-587: The Tanker War , as part of the Iran–Iraq War . The first navigable submarine was built in 1624 by Cornelius Drebbel , it could cruise at a depth of 15 feet (5 m). However, the first military submarine was constructed in 1885 by Isaac Peral . The Turtle was developed by David Bushnell during the American Revolution . Robert Fulton then improved the submarine design by creating

3026-458: The battlefield has also increased in modern warfare with inclusion of the supporting units in the rear areas; supply, artillery, medical personnel etc. often outnumber the front-line combat troops. Battles are made up of a multitude of individual combats, skirmishes and small engagements and the combatants will usually only experience a small part of the battle. To the infantryman , there may be little to distinguish between combat as part of

3115-443: The electromagnetic spectrum . Battles are decided by various factors, the number and quality of combatants and equipment, the skill of commanders and terrain are among the most prominent. Weapons and armour can be decisive; on many occasions armies have achieved victory through more advanced weapons than those of their opponents. An extreme example was in the Battle of Omdurman , in which a large army of Sudanese Mahdists armed in

3204-441: The explosive charge was ignited by a lit match or hot coal held in the other hand. In the mid-15th century came the matchlock , allowing the gun to be aimed and fired while held steady with both hands, as used in the arquebus . Starting about 1500, clever but complicated firing mechanisms were invented to generate sparks to ignite the powder instead of a lit match, starting with the wheel lock , snaplock , snaphance , and finally

3293-545: The flintlock mechanism , which was simple and reliable, becoming standard with the musket by the early 17th century. At the beginning of the 16th century, the first European fire ships were used. Ships were filled with flammable materials, set on fire, and sent to enemy lines. This tactic was successfully used by Francis Drake to scatter the Spanish Armada at the Battle of Gravelines , and would later be used by

3382-636: The "fire drug" arrived in Europe, fully fleshed out, as gunpowder. Cannons were first used in Europe in the early 14th century, and played a vital role in the Hundred Years' War . The first cannons were simply welded metal bars in the form of a cylinder, and the first cannonballs were made of stone. By 1346, at the Battle of Crécy, the cannon had been used; at the Battle of Agincourt they would be used again. The first infantry firearms, from fire lances to hand cannons , were held in one hand, while

3471-577: The 12th century also became important in the Middle Ages. It helped to give the English a large early advantage in the Hundred Years' War , even though the English were eventually defeated. The Battle of Crécy and the Battle of Agincourt are excellent examples of how to destroy an enemy using a longbow. It dominated battlefields for over a century. There is evidence for gunpowder evolving slowly from formulations by Chinese alchemists as early as

3560-421: The 20th and 21st centuries is defined as the combat between large components of the forces in a military campaign , used to achieve military objectives . Where the duration of the battle is longer than a week, it is often for reasons of planning called an operation. Battles can be planned, encountered or forced by one side when the other is unable to withdraw from combat. A battle always has as its purpose

3649-574: The 2nd century BC Han dynasty invented rudders and sculled oars for their warships. Fortifications are important in warfare. Early hill-forts were used to protect inhabitants in the Iron Age . They were primitive forts surrounded by ditches filled with water. Forts were then built out of mud bricks, stones, wood, and other available materials. Romans used rectangular fortresses built out of wood and stone. As long as there have been fortifications, there have been contraptions to break in, dating back to

Batalha - Misplaced Pages Continue

3738-614: The 3rd–4th century AD, heavily armored cavalry became widely adopted by the Parthians, Sasanians , Byzantines , Eastern Han dynasty and Three Kingdoms , etc. The early Indo-Iranians developed the use of chariots in warfare. The scythed chariot was later invented in India and soon adopted by the Persians . War elephants were sometimes deployed for fighting in ancient warfare. They were first used in India and later adopted by

3827-475: The 4th century, at first as experiments for life force and metal transmutation, and later experiments as pyrotechnics and incendiaries. By the 10th century, the developments in gunpowder led to many new weapons that were improved over time. The Chinese used incendiary devices based on this in siege warfare against the Mongols starting in the mid 13th century. "Pots with wicks of flax or cotton were used, containing

3916-521: The British by Tipu Sultan of the Kingdom of Mysore during the Anglo-Mysore Wars . Rockets were generally inaccurate at that time, though William Hale , in 1844, was able to develop a better rocket. The new rocket no longer needed the rocket stick , and had a higher accuracy. In the 1860s there were a series of advancements in rifles . The first repeating rifle was designed in 1860 by

4005-623: The Chinese, Russians, Greeks, and several other countries in naval battles. Naval mines were invented in the 17th century, though they were not used in great numbers until the American Civil War . They were used heavily in the First and Second World Wars. Air-deployed naval mines were used to mine the North Vietnamese port of Haiphong during the Vietnam War . The Iraqi Navy of Saddam Hussein used naval mines extensively during

4094-804: The First World War, the British Battles Nomenclature Committee was formed to decide on standard names for all battles and subsidiary actions. To the soldiers who did the fighting, the distinction was usually academic; a soldier fighting at Beaumont Hamel on November 13, 1916, was probably unaware he was taking part in what the committee named the Battle of the Ancre . Many combats are too small to be battles; terms such as "action", "affair", "skirmish", "firefight", "raid", or "offensive patrol" are used to describe small military encounters. These combats often take place within

4183-784: The Internet for many more resources than are typically available in nearby libraries. Since 1993, one of the most popular sites, with over 4000 members (subscriptions are free) has been H-WAR, sponsored by the H-Net network based at Michigan State University. H-War has six coeditors, and an academic advisory board that sets policy. It sponsors daily moderated discussions of current topics, announcements of new publications and conferences, and reports on developments at conferences. The H-Net family of lists has sponsored and published over 46,000 scholarly book reviews, thousands of which deal with books in military history broadly conceived. Misplaced Pages itself has

4272-589: The Persians. War elephants were also used in the Battle of the Hydaspes River , and by Hannibal in the Second Punic War against the Romans. One of the most important military transactions of the ancient world was Chandragupta Maurya 's gift of 500 elephants to Seleucus I Nicator . Naval warfare was often crucial to military success. Early navies used sailing ships without cannons; often

4361-535: The Second World War, along with indirect combat through the use of aircraft and missiles which has come to constitute a large portion of wars in place of battles, where battles are now mostly reserved for capturing cities. One significant difference of modern naval battles, as opposed to earlier forms of combat is the use of marines , which introduced amphibious warfare. Today, a marine is actually an infantry regiment that sometimes fights solely on land and

4450-510: The Western World ) and B.H. Liddell Hart ( Decisive Wars of History ), among many others, have written books in the style of Creasy's work. There is an obvious difference in the way battles have been fought. Early battles were probably fought between rival hunting bands as unorganized crowds. During the Battle of Megiddo , the first reliably documented battle in the fifteenth century BC, both armies were organised and disciplined; during

4539-640: The analysis of a leader was taken by Xenophon (430–355 BC) in Anabasis , recording the expedition of Cyrus the Younger into Anatolia . The memoirs of the Roman Julius Caesar (100–44 BC) enable a comparative approach for campaigns such as Commentarii de Bello Gallico and Commentarii de Bello Civili . The nature of warfare never changes, only its superficial manifestations. Joshua and David , Hector and Achilles would recognize

SECTION 50

#1732775422505

4628-501: The central unit in naval warfare, acting as a mobile base for lethal aircraft. Although the use of aircraft has for the most part always been used as a supplement to land or naval engagements, since their first major military use in World War I aircraft have increasingly taken on larger roles in warfare. During World War I, the primary use was for reconnaissance, and small-scale bombardment. Aircraft began becoming much more prominent in

4717-656: The combat experience. For example, Eugene P. A. Scleh, history professor at the University of Maine, has explored the advantages and problems of teaching a course of "Modern War and Its Images" entirely through films. Students said they found the documentaries more valuable than the dramas. However, military historians are frustrated by their marginal status in major history departments. Academic historians concerned with military topics have their own scholarly organization, Society for Military History . Since 1937 it has published The Journal of Military History . Its four issues

4806-451: The combat that our soldiers and Marines have waged in the alleys of Somalia and Iraq. The uniforms evolve, bronze gives way to titanium, arrows may be replaced by laser-guided bombs, but the heart of the matter is still killing your enemies until any survivors surrender and do your will. New weapons development can dramatically alter the face of war, the cost of warfare, the preparations, and the training of soldiers and leaders. A rule of thumb

4895-562: The combatants had the same methods, resources, and strategic objectives throughout the encounter. Some prominent examples of this would be the Battle of the Atlantic , Battle of Britain , and the Battle of France , all in World War II. Wars and military campaigns are guided by military strategy , whereas battles take place on a level of planning and execution known as operational mobility . German strategist Carl von Clausewitz stated that "the employment of battles ... to achieve

4984-429: The commands of their leaders with conviction in its success invariably has a higher morale than an army that doubts its every move. The British in the naval Battle of Trafalgar owed its success to the reputation of Admiral Lord Nelson . Battles can be fought on land, at sea, and in the air. Naval battles have occurred since before the 5th century BC. Air battles have been far less common, due to their late conception,

5073-499: The date on which they took place, such as The Glorious First of June . In the Middle Ages it was considered important to settle on a suitable name for a battle which could be used by the chroniclers . After Henry V of England defeated a French army on October 25, 1415, he met with the senior French herald and they agreed to name the battle after the nearby castle and so it was called the Battle of Agincourt . In other cases,

5162-404: The defeated party. If no resolution is reached in a battle, it can result in a stalemate . A conflict in which one side is unwilling to reach a decision by a direct battle using conventional warfare often becomes an insurgency . Until the 19th century the majority of battles were of short duration, many lasting a part of a day. (The Battle of Preston (1648) , the Battle of Nations (1813) and

5251-445: The duration of battles to days and weeks. This created the requirement for unit rotation to prevent combat fatigue , with troops preferably not remaining in a combat area of operations for more than a month. The use of the term "battle" in military history has led to its misuse when referring to almost any scale of combat, notably by strategic forces involving hundreds of thousands of troops that may be engaged in either one battle at

5340-485: The enemy with ranged weaponry. Another invention in the late Middle Ages was the use of Greek fire by the Byzantines, which was used to set enemy fleets on fire. Empty demolition ships utilized the tactic to crash into opposing ships and set it afire with an explosion. After the invention of cannons, naval warfare became useful as support units for land warfare. During the 19th century, the development of mines led to

5429-628: The field of battle. The kingdoms of the Warring States in East Asia also adopted infantry combat, a transition from chariot warfare from centuries earlier. Archers were a major component of many ancient armies, notably those of the Persians, Scythians, Egyptians, Nubians, Indians, Chinese, Koreans and Japanese. Cavalry became an important tool. In the Sicilian Expedition , led by Athens in an attempt to subdue Syracuse ,

SECTION 60

#1732775422505

5518-445: The fight as a concept in military science has changed with the variations in the organisation, employment and technology of military forces. The English military historian John Keegan suggested an ideal definition of battle as "something which happens between two armies leading to the moral then physical disintegration of one or the other of them" but the origins and outcomes of battles can rarely be summarized so neatly. Battle in

5607-587: The goal was to ram the enemy ships and cause them to sink. There was human oar power, often using slaves, built up to ramming speed. Galleys were used in the 3rd millennium BC by the Cretans . The Greeks later advanced these ships. In 1210 BC, the first recorded naval battle was fought between Suppiluliuma II , king of the Hittites , and Cyprus , which was defeated. In the Greco-Persian Wars ,

5696-544: The heard of the dolomites of South Tyrol . The U.S. Army and the state National Guards operate 98 military history museums across the United States and three abroad. Curators debate how or whether the goal of providing diverse representations of war, in terms of positive and negative aspects of warfare. War is seldom presented as a good thing, but soldiers are heavily praised. David Lowenthal has observed that in today's museums, "nothing seems too horrendous to commemorate". Yet as Andrew Whitmarsh notes, "museums frequently portray

5785-589: The high ground forces the enemy to climb and thus wear themselves down. Areas of jungle and forest, with dense vegetation act as force-multipliers, of benefit to inferior armies. Terrain may have lost importance in modern warfare, due to the advent of aircraft, though the terrain is still vital for camouflage, especially for guerrilla warfare . Generals and commanders also play an important role, Hannibal , Julius Caesar , Khalid ibn Walid , Subutai and Napoleon Bonaparte were all skilled generals and their armies were extremely successful at times. An army that can trust

5874-535: The many wars of the Roman Empire , barbarians continued to use mob tactics . As the Age of Enlightenment dawned, armies began to fight in highly disciplined lines. Each would follow the orders from their officers and fight as a unit instead of individuals. Armies were divided into regiments , battalions , companies and platoons . These armies would march, line up and fire in divisions. Native Americans , on

5963-607: The modern Basra . Other prominent records in military history are the Trojan War in Homer 's Iliad (though its historicity has been challenged), The Histories by Herodotus (484–425 BC) who is often called the "father of history". Next was Thucydides whose impartiality, despite being an Athenian , allowed him to take advantage of his exile to research the war from different perspectives by carefully examining documents and interviewing eyewitnesses. An approach centered on

6052-400: The most prominent being the Battle of Britain in 1940. Since the Second World War, land or sea battles have come to rely on air support. During the Battle of Midway , five aircraft carriers were sunk without either fleet coming into direct contact. Battles are usually hybrids of different types listed above. A decisive battle is one with political effects, determining the course of

6141-553: The navy became of increasing importance. Triremes were involved in more complicated sea-land operations. Themistocles helped to build up a stronger Greek navy, composed of 310 ships, and defeated the Persians at the Battle of Salamis , ending the Persian invasion of Greece. In the First Punic War , the war between Carthage and Rome started with an advantage to Carthage because of their naval experience. A Roman fleet

6230-450: The next day (at the Battle of Wavre ). Battlespace is a unified strategic concept to integrate and combine armed forces for the military theatre of operations , including air , information , land , sea and space . It includes the environment, factors and conditions that must be understood to apply combat power, protect the force or complete the mission, comprising enemy and friendly armed forces ; facilities; weather; terrain; and

6319-481: The object of war" was the essence of strategy . Battle is a loanword from the Old French bataille , first attested in 1297, from Late Latin battualia , meaning "exercise of soldiers and gladiators in fighting and fencing", from Late Latin (taken from Germanic) battuere "beat", from which the English word battery is also derived via Middle English batri . The defining characteristic of

6408-460: The other hand, just war theory explores the moral dimensions of warfare, and to better limit the destructive reality caused by war, seeks to establish a doctrine of military ethics. As an applied field, military history has been studied at academies and service schools because the military command seeks to not repeat past mistakes, and improve upon its current performance by instilling an ability in commanders to perceive historical parallels during

6497-487: The other hand, did not fight in lines, using guerrilla tactics. American colonists and European forces continued using disciplined lines into the American Civil War . A new style arose from the 1850s to the First World War, known as trench warfare , which also led to tactical radio . Chemical warfare also began in 1915. By the Second World War, the use of the smaller divisions, platoons and companies became much more important as precise operations became vital. Instead of

6586-435: The political actors. Personal effects of battle range from mild psychological issues to permanent and crippling injuries. Some battle-survivors have nightmares about the conditions they encountered or abnormal reactions to certain sights or sounds and some experience flashbacks . Physical effects of battle can include scars, amputations, lesions, loss of bodily functions, blindness, paralysis and death. Battles affect politics ;

6675-480: The primary tools for both army and navy, as evidenced by the prominent use of helicopters to transport and support troops, the use of aerial bombardment as the "first strike" in many engagements, and the replacement of the battleship with the aircraft carrier as the center of most modern navies. Battles are usually named after some feature of the battlefield geography , such as a town, forest or river, commonly prefixed "Battle of...". Occasionally battles are named after

6764-442: The reaching of a mission goal by use of military force. A victory in the battle is achieved when one of the opposing sides forces the other to abandon its mission and surrender its forces, routs the other (i.e., forces it to retreat or renders it militarily ineffective for further combat operations ) or annihilates the latter, resulting in their deaths or capture. A battle may end in a Pyrrhic victory , which ultimately favors

6853-646: The same battle entered the popular culture, such as the First Battle of Bull Run and the Second Battle of Bull Run , which are also referred to as the First and Second Battles of Manassas. Sometimes in desert warfare, there is no nearby town name to use; map coordinates gave the name to the Battle of 73 Easting in the First Gulf War . Some place names have become synonymous with battles, such as

6942-466: The same conflict, the instances are distinguished by ordinal number , such as the First and Second Battles of Bull Run. An extreme case are the twelve Battles of the Isonzo — First to Twelfth —between Italy and Austria-Hungary during the First World War. Some battles are named for the convenience of military historians so that periods of combat can be neatly distinguished from one another. Following

7031-536: The same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Batalha . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Batalha&oldid=1250977249 " Categories : Disambiguation pages Disambiguation pages with surname-holder lists Place name disambiguation pages Portuguese-language surnames Hidden categories: Short description

7120-736: The sides adopted different names for the same battle, such as the Battle of Gallipoli which is known in Turkey as the Battle of Çanakkale . During the American Civil War, the Union tended to name the battles after the nearest watercourse, such as the Battle of Wilsons Creek and the Battle of Stones River, whereas the Confederates favoured the nearby towns, as in the Battles of Chancellorsville and Murfreesboro. Occasionally both names for

7209-503: The societies and organisations that make use of it. The dynamic nature of the discipline of military history is largely due to the rapid change of military forces, and the art and science of managing them, as well as the frenetic pace of technological development that had taken place during the period known as the Industrial Revolution , and more recently in the nuclear and information ages . An important recent concept

7298-427: The time and space of a battle and while they may have an objective, they are not necessarily "decisive". Sometimes the soldiers are unable to immediately gauge the significance of the combat; in the aftermath of the Battle of Waterloo , some British officers were in doubt as to whether the day's events merited the title of "battle" or would be called an "action". Battles affect the individuals who take part, as well as

7387-467: The times of Romans and earlier. Siege warfare is often necessary to capture forts. Some of the military unit types and technologies which were used in the medieval period are: Bows and arrows were often used by combatants. Egyptians shot arrows from chariots effectively. The crossbow was developed around 500 BC in China, and was used heavily in the Middle Ages . The English/Welsh longbow from

7476-502: The trench stalemate of 1915–1917, in the Second World War, battles developed where small groups encountered other platoons. As a result, elite squads became much more recognized and distinguishable. Maneuver warfare also returned with an astonishing pace with the advent of the tank , replacing the cannon of the Enlightenment Age. Artillery has since gradually replaced the use of frontal troops. Modern battles resemble those of

7565-491: The war such as the Battle of Smolensk or bringing hostilities to an end, such as the Battle of Hastings or the Battle of Hattin . A decisive battle can change the balance of power or boundaries between countries. The concept of the decisive battle became popular with the publication in 1851 of Edward Creasy 's The Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World . British military historians J.F.C. Fuller ( The Decisive Battles of

7654-786: The well-trained Syracusan cavalry became crucial to the success of the Syracusans. Macedonian Alexander the Great effectively deployed his cavalry forces to secure victories. In battles such as the Battle of Cannae of the Second Punic War , and the Battle of Carrhae of the Roman-Persian Wars , the importance of the cavalry would be repeated. There were also horse archers , who had the ability to shoot on horseback—the Parthians , Scythians , Mongols , and other various steppe people were especially fearsome with this tactic. By

7743-543: Was apparent in most cases. All groups agreed with the proposition, "historically, Americans have tended to view questions of their national security in terms of such extremes as good vs. evil." Though the Socialists were split, the other groups agreed that "miscalculation and/or misunderstanding of the situation" had caused U.S. interventionism." Kimball reports that: People interested in military history from all periods of time, and all subtopics, are increasingly turning to

7832-478: Was built in 261 BC, with the addition of the corvus that allowed Roman soldiers to board enemy ships. The bridge would prove effective at the Battle of Mylae , resulting in a Roman victory. The Vikings , in the 8th century AD, invented a ship propelled by oars with a dragon decorating the prow, hence called the Drakkar . The 12th century AD Song dynasty invented ships with watertight bulkhead compartments while

7921-511: Was first introduced in Paris of 1783; the first balloon traveled over 5 miles (8 km). Previously military scouts could only see from high points on the ground, or from the mast of a ship. Now they could be high in the sky, signalling to troops on the ground. This made it much more difficult for troop movements to go unobserved. At the end of the 18th century, iron-cased artillery rockets were successfully used militarily in India against

#504495