Big Blue Blanket
The big blue blanket was an air defense system devised by John Thach during World War II for protecting American warships from attack by Japanese kamikazes. History and tactics As the American island hopping campaign got closer to Japan, the Japanese military began to employ suicide operations more extensively. As Allied losses mounted, a system for countering incoming suicide aircraft was developed. Thach, serving on Admiral Halsey's and Admiral McCain's staff as air operations officer, developed a plan that called for the constant presence of the blue-painted Hellcats and Corsairs over the fleet at all hours. He recommended larger combat air patrols (CAP) stationed farther away from the carriers, a line of picket destroyers and destroyer escorts placed 50 or more miles from the main body of the fleet to provide earlier radar Radar is a system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), direction ( azimuth and elevation angles), and ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Destroyer
In naval terminology, a destroyer is a fast, maneuverable, long-endurance warship intended to escort larger vessels in a fleet, convoy, or carrier battle group and defend them against a wide range of general threats. They were conceived in 1885 by Fernando Villaamil for the Spanish NavySmith, Charles Edgar: ''A short history of naval and marine engineering.'' Babcock & Wilcox, ltd. at the University Press, 1937, page 263 as a defense against torpedo boats, and by the time of the Russo-Japanese War in 1904, these "torpedo boat destroyers" (TBDs) were "large, swift, and powerfully armed torpedo boats designed to destroy other torpedo boats". Although the term "destroyer" had been used interchangeably with "TBD" and "torpedo boat destroyer" by navies since 1892, the term "torpedo boat destroyer" had been generally shortened to simply "destroyer" by nearly all navies by the First World War. Before World War II, destroyers were light vessels with little endurance for unatte ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Battle Of Anzio
The Battle of Anzio was a battle of the Italian Campaign (World War II), Italian Campaign of World War II that commenced January 22, 1944. The battle began with the Allies of World War II, Allied amphibious landing known as Operation Shingle, and ended on June 4, 1944, with the liberation of Rome. The operation was opposed by German and by Italian Italian Social Republic, ''Repubblica Sociale Italiana'' (RSI) forces in the area of Anzio and Nettuno. Allied landings on the Italian mainland began in September 1943, and after slow gains against German resistance, the progress was stopped in December 1943 at the German defensive Gustav Line, south of Rome. The operation was initially commanded by Major General John P. Lucas, of the U.S. Army, commanding VI Corps (United States), U.S. VI Corps with the intent to outflank German forces at the Winter Line and enable an attack on Rome. The success of an amphibious landing at that location, in a basin consisting substantially of reclaim ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Battle Of Mindoro
The Battle of Mindoro (Filipino language, Filipino: ''Labanan sa Mindoro'') took place during World War II between the forces of the United States and Empire of Japan, Japan, in Mindoro Island in the central Philippines, from 13–16 December 1944, during the Philippines Campaign (1944–45), Philippines Campaign. Troops of the United States Army, supported by the United States Navy and United States Army Air Forces, U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF), made an amphibious warfare, amphibious landing on Mindoro and defeated Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) forces there. There was no significant opposition from the Imperial Japanese Navy, nor from the Japanese Army and Navy Air Forces, except for ''kamikaze'' (suicide) attacks on American ships. The Japanese force in Mindoro was not large, and was eliminated in three days. The Army was assisted in the campaign by guerrillas from the local Filipino population. The U.S. captured Mindoro to establish airfields there, which would be in fighte ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Philippines Campaign (1944–45)
Philippines campaign may refer to various military campaigns that have been fought in the Philippine Islands, including: Spanish colonial period (1565–1898) *Numerous revolts against Spain during the Spanish colonial period; see Philippine revolts against Spain and Military history of the Philippines#Spanish colonial period (1565–1898) *Various actions fought in the Philippines during the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Netherlands; see "Eighty Years War (1568–1648)" at Military history of the Philippines#Spanish colonial period (1565–1898) *The Limahong Campaign (1573–1575), an attempt by the Chinese pirate Limahong to seize northern Luzon from Spanish authorities *Various actions fought in the Philippines during the Seven Years War (1756–1763) between European powers; see Military history of the Philippines#Spanish colonial period (1565–1898) and Seven Years' War#Other Continents *The Philippine Revolution (1896–1898), called the "Tagalog Revolt" by ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Troopship
A troopship (also troop ship or troop transport or trooper) is a ship used to carry soldiers, either in peacetime or wartime. Troopships were often drafted from commercial shipping fleets, and were unable to land troops directly on shore, typically loading and unloading at a seaport or onto smaller vessels, either Ship's tender, tenders or barges. Attack transports, a variant of ocean-going troopship adapted to transporting invasion forces ashore, carry their own fleet of landing craft. Landing ships beach themselves and bring their troops directly ashore. History Ships to transport troops were used in antiquity. Ancient Rome used the navis lusoria, a small vessel powered by rowers and sail, to move soldiers on the Rhine and Danube. The modern troopship has as long a history as passenger ships do, as most maritime nations enlisted their support in military operations (either by leasing the vessels or by impressing them into service) when their normal naval forces were deemed ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Aircraft Carrier
An aircraft carrier is a warship that serves as a seagoing airbase, equipped with a full-length flight deck and hangar facilities for supporting, arming, deploying and recovering carrier-based aircraft, shipborne aircraft. Typically it is the capital ship of a naval fleet, fleet (known as a carrier battle group), as it allows a naval force to power projection, project seaborne naval aviation, air power far from homeland without depending on local airfields for staging area, staging aerial warfare, aircraft operations. Since their inception in the early 20th century, aircraft carriers have evolved from wooden vessels used to deploy individual tethered reconnaissance balloons, to nuclear marine propulsion, nuclear-powered supercarriers that carry dozens of fighter aircraft, fighters, strike aircraft, military helicopters, airborne early warning and control, AEW&Cs and other types of aircraft such as unmanned combat aerial vehicle, UCAVs. While heavier fixed-wing aircraft such as a ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Delayed Action Fuse
A delay-action bomb is an aerial bomb designed to explode some time after impact, with the bomb's fuzes set to delay the explosion for times ranging from very brief to several weeks. Short delays are used to allow the bomb to penetrate before exploding: "a delay action bomb striking the roof of a tall building will penetrate through several floors before bursting". Similarly, a bomb with a time-delay fuze could penetrate the superstructure, deck or armour of a warship and explode inside, causing greater damage compared to the same bomb exploding outside on contact. A short delay would also prevent a fighter-bomber or ground-attack aircraft getting caught in the blast of its own bomb after a low-altitude attack. Longer delays were intended to disrupt salvage and other activities, to spread terror in areas where there could still be live bombs and to attack bomb disposal workers. Such bombs were used widely by British and American and German forces during World War II. One use was t ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Radar
Radar is a system that uses radio waves to determine the distance ('' ranging''), direction ( azimuth and elevation angles), and radial velocity of objects relative to the site. It is a radiodetermination method used to detect and track aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, map weather formations, and terrain. The term ''RADAR'' was coined in 1940 by the United States Navy as an acronym for "radio detection and ranging". The term ''radar'' has since entered English and other languages as an anacronym, a common noun, losing all capitalization. A radar system consists of a transmitter producing electromagnetic waves in the radio or microwave domain, a transmitting antenna, a receiving antenna (often the same antenna is used for transmitting and receiving) and a receiver and processor to determine properties of the objects. Radio waves (pulsed or continuous) from the transmitter reflect off the objects and return to the receiver, giving ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Destroyer Escort
Destroyer escort (DE) was the United States Navy mid-20th-century classification for a warship designed with the endurance necessary to escort mid-ocean convoys of merchant marine ships. Development of the destroyer escort was promoted by the British need in World War II for anti-submarine ships that could operate in open oceans at speeds of up to 20 knots. These "British Destroyer Escort"s were designed by the US for mass-production under Lend Lease as a less expensive alternative to fleet destroyers. The Royal Navy and Commonwealth forces identified such warships as frigates, and that classification was widely accepted when the United States redesignated destroyer escorts as frigates (FF) in 1975. From circa 1954 until 1975 new-build US Navy ships designated as destroyer escorts (DE) were called ocean escorts. Similar types of warships in other navies of the time included the 46 diesel powered '' Kaibōkan'' of the Imperial Japanese Navy, 10 ''Kriegsmarine'' F-class escor ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Combat Air Patrol
Combat air patrol (CAP) is a type of flying mission for fighter aircraft. A combat air patrol is an aircraft patrol provided over an objective area, over the force protected, over the critical area of a combat zone, or over an air defense area, for the purpose of intercepting and destroying hostile aircraft before they reach their target. Combat air patrols apply to both overland and overwater operations, protecting other aircraft, fixed and mobile sites on land, or ships at sea. Known by the acronym CAP, it typically entails fighters flying a tactical pattern around or screening a defended target, while looking for incoming attackers. Effective CAP patterns may include aircraft positioned at both high and low altitudes, in order to shorten response times when an attack is detected. Modern CAPs are either Ground-controlled interception, GCI or Airborne Early Warning and Control, AWACS-controlled to provide maximum early warning for defensive reaction. The first CAPs were charac ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Air Defense
Anti-aircraft warfare (AAW) is the counter to aerial warfare and includes "all measures designed to nullify or reduce the effectiveness of hostile air action".AAP-6 It encompasses surface-based, subsurface (Submarine#Armament, submarine-launched), and air-based weapon systems, in addition to associated sensor systems, command and control arrangements, and passive measures (e.g. barrage balloons). It may be used to protect naval, army, ground, and air forces in any location. However, for most countries, the main effort has tended to be homeland defense. Missile defense, Missile defense is an extension of air defence, as are initiatives to adapt air defence to the task of intercepting any projectile in flight. Most modern anti-aircraft (AA) weapons systems are optimized for short-, medium-, or long-range air defence, although some systems may incorporate multiple weapons (such as both autocannons and surface-to-air missiles). 'Layered air defence' usually refers to multiple 't ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |