Definition
Coastal warfare involved military operations in the broadly defined littoral zone, including ground operations that involve proximity to water, naval operations that involve proximity to land, and air operations support both ground and naval operations.
Introduction
Most people live near the coast, and that concentration has prevailed far back into prehistory. As a result, military history includes many chapters on coastal warfare. Invading armies attack from the sea, and defenders build fortifications to keep them back. This recorded history starts with Homer’s story of the Trojan War, and most recently includes the British recapture of the Falkland Islands, and in a new twist, the US Marines night landing in Somalia under the glare of television cameras.
Coastal warfare involves all the elements of warfare: knowledge and use of the environment (terrain, weather, and tides), fortifications and obstacles, deception and surprise, concentration of force at the decisive point,...
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Bibliography
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Guth, P.L. (2018). Coastal Warfare. In: Finkl, C., Makowski, C. (eds) Encyclopedia of Coastal Science . Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences Series. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48657-4_89-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-48657-4_89-2
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