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Land battles and operations of World War II involving the United Kingdom

  • Operation CrusaderOperation Crusader began on the 18th of November 1941, and its target did not even know it was happening. Generalleutnant Erwin Rommel, commanding the Axis…
  • Operation CompassOperation Compass began on the night of the 9th of December 1940 with a force of about 31,000 soldiers, 120 guns, 275 tanks, and sixty armoured cars…
  • Operation SonnenblumeOperation Sonnenblume, which translates to Operation Sunflower, began in February 1941 with a question no British commander had seriously asked: what if the…
  • Siegfried Line campaignThe Siegfried Line campaign, a phase of the Western European war, began in the shadow of one of history's most dramatic reversals.
  • Fall of SingaporeOn the afternoon of the 15th of February 1942, British Lieutenant-General Arthur Percival walked toward the Ford Motor Factory in Singapore bearing a white…
  • Anglo-Soviet invasion of IranThe Anglo-Soviet invasion of Iran began before dawn on the 25th of August, 1941, when Royal Air Force aircraft crossed into Iranian airspace and dropped…
  • Operation TorchOperation Torch began at dawn on the 8th of November 1942, when Allied forces waded ashore on three separate coastlines across French North Africa at the…
  • Battle of ImphalThe Battle of Imphal began in March 1944 with a Japanese army crossing the Chindwin River, convinced it could destroy the Allied forces in northeast India…
  • Battle of KohimaThe Battle of Kohima came down, at one point, to a tennis court. In April 1944, British and Japanese soldiers occupied trenches on opposite sides of a small…
  • Operation U-GoOperation U-Go began on the 6th of March, 1944, when Japanese forces crossed into northeast India on one of the most audacious bets of the Second World War.
  • Battle of MadagascarThe Battle of Madagascar began on the 5th of May 1942, when British forces landed on a remote island in the Indian Ocean that most people had never given a…
  • Japanese invasion of BurmaThe Japanese invasion of Burma began on the 22nd of December 1941, when the 55th Division crossed the Burma frontier. What followed was one of the most…
  • Battle of CreteThe Battle of Crete began at 08:00 on the 20th of May 1941, when dozens of Junkers Ju 52 aircraft disgorged German paratroopers into the skies above Maleme…