On this day in military history - 14 November

[Woodmonkey]

1812 - As Napoleon Bonaparte's army retreats form Moscow, temperatures drop to 20 degrees below zero.



1862 - Lincoln approves Burnside's plan:* President Lincoln approves of General Ambrose Burnside's plan to capture the Confederate capital at Richmond, Virginia. This was an ill-fated move, as it led to the disastrous Battle of Fredericksburg on December 13, in which the Army of the Potomac was dealt one of its worst defeats at the hands of General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.* Lincoln approved Burnside's plan just five days after Burnside assumed command of the army. The general had replaced George McClellan, who led the force for more than a year. McClellan's tenure was marked by sharp disagreements with the administration and sluggishness in the field. Although McClellan was successful against Lee at the Battle of Antietam on September 17, 1862, Lincoln removed him from command because of McClellan's reluctance to attack the Confederate army in Virginia.* After McClellan was removed, Burnside stepped up to take his shot at Lee. His plan called for the Army of the Potomac to move 40 miles to Fredericksburg on the Rappahannock River. From there, his troops would advance south to the Confederate capital of Richmond. Lincoln appreciated the fact that Burnside's plan protected Washington, D.C. In spring 1862, McClellan had sailed the army down the Chesapeake Bay and landed it on the James Peninsula for an attempt on Richmond, a move that left the Union capital dangerously exposed. However, Lincoln and general in chief Henry Halleck were concerned that Burnside was focused solely on capturing Richmond; they believed that the goal should be to destroy Lee's army. However, Burnside's plan was an improvement over McClellan's operations.* Lincoln approved the plan but warned Burnside that action needed to be taken quickly. By early December, Burnside had the army in motion. When the Yankees reached Fredericksburg, however, they experienced delays in crossing the Rappahannock, which allowed Lee to move his forces into place above the city. On December 13, Burnside made a series of doomed attacks and the Army of the Potomac suffered one of the most costly and demoralizing defeats of the war.




1910 - Lieutenant Eugene Ely, U.S. Navy, becomes the first man to take off in an airplane from the deck of a ship. He flew from the ship Birmingham at Hampton Roads to Norfolk.



1940 - Germans bomb Coventry:* On this day in 1940, German bombers devastate the English city of Coventry, demolishing tens of thousands of buildings and killing hundreds of men, women, and children. The verb "Koventrieren" (to Coventrate) passed into the German language, meaning "to annihilate or reduce to rubble."* On November 8, Adolf Hitler had to move up his scheduled speech in Munich on the anniversary of his 1923 attempted coup in Bavaria because British bombers were on their way to take out a railway yard. Hitler was determined to avenge this audacious offensive. The Fuhrer let his bomber pilots know that he was not "willing to let an attack on the capital of the Nazi movement go unpunished."* And so, on this day, almost 500 German bombers unleashed some 150,000 incendiary bombs and more than 500 tons of high explosives on the British industrial city, taking out 27 war factories. Of the 568 people killed, more than 400 were burned so badly they could not be identified. Among the more than 60,000 buildings destroyed or severely damaged was St. Michael's Cathedral.




1951 - French paratroopers capture Hoa Binh, Vietnam.



1960 - President Dwight Eisenhower orders U.S. naval units into the Caribbean after Guatemala and Nicaragua charge Castro with starting uprisings.



1961 - President Kennedy increases the number of American advisors in Vietnam from 1,000 to 16,000.



1965 - Major battle erupts in the Ia Drang Valley:* In the first major engagement of the war between regular U.S. and North Vietnamese forces, elements of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) fight a pitched battle with Communist main-force units in the Ia Drang Valley of the Central Highlands.* On this morning, Lt. Col. Harold G. Moore's 1st Battalion, 7th Cavalry conducted a heliborne assault into Landing Zone X-Ray near the Chu Pong hills. Around noon, the North Vietnamese 33rd Regiment attacked the U.S. troopers. The fight continued all day and into the night. American soldiers received support from nearby artillery units and tactical air strikes. The next morning, the North Vietnamese 66th Regiment joined the attack against the U.S. unit. The fighting was bitter, but the tactical air strikes and artillery support took their toll on the enemy and enabled the 1st Cavalry troopers to hold on against repeated assaults.* At around noon, two reinforcing companies arrived and Colonel Moore put them to good use to assist his beleaguered soldiers. By the third day of the battle, the Americans had gained the upper hand. The three-day battle resulted in 834 North Vietnamese soldiers confirmed killed, and another 1,000 communist casualties were assumed.* In a related action during the same battle, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cavalry, was ambushed by North Vietnamese forces as it moved overland to Landing Zone Albany. Of the 500 men in the original column, 150 were killed and only 84 were able to return to immediate duty; Company C suffered 93 percent casualties, half of them deaths.* Despite these numbers, senior American officials in Saigon declared the Battle of the Ia Drang Valley a great victory. The battle was extremely important because it was the first significant contact between U.S. troops and North Vietnamese forces. The action demonstrated that the North Vietnamese were prepared to stand and fight major battles even though they might take serious casualties. Senior American military leaders concluded that U.S. forces could wreak significant damage on the communists in such battles--this tactic lead to a war of attrition as the U.S. forces tried to wear the communists down. The North Vietnamese also learned a valuable lesson during the battle: by keeping their combat troops physically close to U.S. positions, U.S. troops could not use artillery or air strikes without risking injury to American troops. This style of fighting became the North Vietnamese practice for the rest of the war.