Curated category
Wars involving the United Kingdom
- War of the Third CoalitionThe War of the Third Coalition was a conflict that remade Europe in the space of a few months in 1805 and into 1806. At its heart was a single breathtaking…
- Crimean WarThe Crimean War began in October 1853 when Russian troops crossed the River Prut into Ottoman-controlled Moldavia and Wallachia, and it would not end until…
- Iraq WarAt 5:34 in the morning on the 20th of March 2003, Baghdad time, the United States began bombing Iraq. There was no declaration of war.
- War of the Fourth CoalitionThe War of the Fourth Coalition ended on the 7th of July 1807 at the edge of a raft anchored in the middle of the Niemen River, where Napoleon Bonaparte and…
- French Revolutionary WarsThe French Revolutionary Wars began in the spring of 1792 with a declaration of war against Austria and Prussia, and they did not end until 1802.
- French invasion of Egypt and SyriaNapoleon Bonaparte departed from Toulon in May 1798 with a fleet of around 36,000 troops. His goal was to undermine British trade routes and expand French…
- Second Boer WarThe Second Boer War began on the 11th of October 1899, when Boer forces crossed into British-held Natal and the Cape Colony.
- Gulf WarThe Gulf War pitted Iraq against a coalition of 42 countries led by the United States. On the 2nd of August 1990, Iraq invaded its small neighbor Kuwait and…
- War of 1812The War of 1812 began on the 18th of June 1812, when President James Madison signed a declaration of war against Britain into law, setting off a conflict…
- Anglo-Iraqi WarThe Anglo-Iraqi War began in earnest at 05:00 on the 2nd of May 1941, when 33 aircraft lifted off from RAF Habbaniya into the pre-dawn dark.
- The TroublesThe Troubles , Na Trioblóidí in Irish , scarred Northern Ireland for roughly thirty years, from the late 1960s to 1998. More than 3,500 people died.
- Korean WarAt 4:40 in the morning on the 25th of June 1950, the Korean People's Army crossed the 38th parallel behind a wall of artillery fire.
- Second French intervention in MexicoOn the 19th of June 1867, Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian of Austria stood on the Cerro de las Campanas outside Querétaro and faced a firing squad alongside…
- Greek Civil WarThe Greek Civil War began not with a declaration or a battle line, but with a demonstration. On the 3rd of December 1944, at least 200,000 people marched…
- Peninsular WarThe Peninsular War was, by Napoleon Bonaparte's own admission, a wound that would not close. He called it the "Spanish ulcer." Between 1808 and 1814, France…
- Taiping RebellionThe Taiping Rebellion may be the deadliest civil war in all of human history. Estimates place the death toll between 20 and 30 million people, roughly 5 to…
- Indian Rebellion of 1857The Indian Rebellion of 1857 began not with a grand proclamation but with a parade-ground refusal. On the 10th of May 1857, sepoys of the British East India…
- Syrian civil warThe Syrian civil war began in March 2011, when crowds gathered across Syria to demand democratic change from a government that had ruled by fear for decades.
- World War IIWorld War II killed between 60 and 75 million people, making it the deadliest conflict in history. Tanks and aircraft reshaped the battlefield, and aircraft…
- World War IWorld War I began with two pistol shots fired in a Sarajevo street on the 28th of June 1914. Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian Serb, had taken his position after…
- War on terrorOn the morning of the 11th of September 2001, nineteen men hijacked four jet airliners, all of them bound for California.
- Phoney WarThe Phoney War lasted eight months, from September 1939 to May 1940, and it may be one of the strangest intervals in the history of modern warfare.
- Finnish WarThe Finnish War began on the 21st of February 1808, when 24,000 Russian troops crossed the Swedish-Russian border at Ahvenkoski.