Word: taranto
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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London newspapers did not exaggerate much when they called the Taranto victory the most significant action...
...Andrew's main fleet took a stand off Taranto's double harbor (see map). To prick the Italians into an action, he stabbed into the harbors with Fleet Air Arm planes from his carriers Illustrious and Eagle. First through the darkness went some light bombers, to drop flares and incendiaries and light up the scene for the real workmen. These were pilots of Fairey Swordfish torpedo-carrying planes, ancient-looking single-engine contraptions with enough wire between their wings to rig a hen yard. But the Swordfish, like the U. S. Navy's Douglas TBD-1, pack...
With dawn, the British withdrew from Taranto. Their cruisers patrolled the wide waters until afternoon, then joined the big battlewagons in a return to Alexandria. Not even one Italian airplane came out to challenge their presence. British reconnaissance planes flew in and reported...
...bombers from Greek bases soon followed up the Fleet Air Arm's work with an attack upon the naval dry-docks of Taranto. For it was not in Sir Andrew's mind to let the Italians repair their ships, in dock or by caisson work, as the Russians did after the Japanese opened the war on them with torpedoes in a snowstorm in 1904. The R. A. F. blasted the repair dock, and might be counted on, from its new bases in Crete, to complicate any and all salvage...
Significance. Britain already outnumbered the Axis in battleships, 19-to-12, allowing for the commissioning of five King George Vs and two German ships and both the Italian battleships abuilding. The stab at Taranto reduced the ratio locally from 6-to-4 in favor of Italy to 4-to-3 in favor of the British. But the action at Taranto meant a great deal more than the British gaining battle-force supremacy in the Mediterranean...