First and foremost, let us all remember that today is not National Grilling Day. Today is a day to remember those armed service members who have given their lives in order to insure our freedom here in the United States. We have something here in the US which scores of other countries have not been able to experience, and let us not take any of it for granted.
In honor of Memorial Day, I would like to write a special post to commemorate the importance and significance of weather in many of the world's battles and wars.
Around the World
1281: Kublai Khan, grandson of Genghis Khan, took his Mongols, who had already conquered most of Asia moved to attack and conquer Japan when a typhoon arose and destroyed most of the 140,000 troops and 4,000 ships. Japan was saved by a western pacific hurricane.
1360: King Edward III of England almost renewed hostilities with France when a hailstorm raked the English countryside. Taking it as a bad omen, instead King Edward signed a peace treaty, the Treaty of Bretigny, with France.
1588: King Philip I of Spain organized the now-famous Spanish Armada to overthrow the reign of Queen Elizabeth I in England. However, between Sir Francis Drake and the North Sea Storms, Spain experienced their greatest naval disaster losing most of their 150 ships armed with 26,000 troops.
1788: It is thought that the French Revolution began sooner than planned due to food shortages caused by a series of crop-ruining hailstorms, similar to those in 1360.
1812: Napoleon's advance into Russia is halted due to the unusually harsh winter.
1815: As a result of heavy rain storms prior to the invasion, Napoleon's troops were outmaneuvered at the Battle of Waterloo as his horses got stuck in the mud in the low ground and were preyed upon by the Allied forces higher up.
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American Battles and Wars
1814: During the continuing War of 1812, the British set our nation's capitol on fire. The fires were put out the next day by a series of severe thunderstorms and possibly tornadoes and being awestruck and surprised by the intensity of these storms, it is believed that the British soldiers may have actually left their positions prematurely.
1940: "Miracle of Deliverance" - The weather allowed for the evacuation of more than 300,000 allied troops from the French Coast at Dunkirk. How?
1. The English Channel was unusually calm allowing for more than 700 "little ships" and many larger ships to cross.
2. Clouds and rain hindered the German Luftwaffe from performing bombing raids on the fair-weather coast.
3. The muddy terrain from the rain prevented tanks from rolling to the coast.
1941: The Japanese dive bombers had the perfect meteorological scenario for their surprise attack on Sunday, December 7. A 5,000 foot cloud deck permitted the main Japanese strike force to fly unseen to the attack zone over Pearl Harbor where the clouds broke and gave the pilots perfect visibility for their attacks on our unsuspecting Pacific naval fleet. Had the cloud base been higher, or not broken over Pearl Harbor, the Japanese pilots would not have been able to cripple the Pacific fleet nearly as effectively because they may have totally missed the Island of Oahu.
1944: The British Meteorological Office two-day weather forecast for the English Channel on June 4th, 1944 was for stormy conditions on June 5th, and calmer conditions on June 6th. The Allied forces attacked in the less favorable weather and took the Germans, who expected a fair-weather attack, completely by surprise on the beach at Normandy. Operation Overlord, also known as D-Day, was far more successful than planned.
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These are just a few examples throughout the last 800 years showing how much of an impact weather can have on the success (or lack thereof) of militaristic campaigns. Below are links with information concerning weather's impact in the military.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitalweathergang/2010/08/weather_and_war_throughout_his.html
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/space/aberdeen/history.htm
http://www.wunderground.com/news/war-and-weather-photos-20120527
http://www.livescience.com/11339-weather-changed-history.html
http://www.datasync.com/~bouchard/rich/brand2.html
This is fascinating, Michael. Thank you for helping me to remember what today is all about. I think I'm going to go get that American flag hung on my mailbox. Meant to do it this morning and forgot - Won't forget now.
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