August marked the 79th anniversary of the first special-operations raid directly supported by submarines.
Decades later, submarine special-operations have become a staple of the Navy SEAL Teams and one of the US military’s most valuable capabilities.
US Marine Corps
In August 1942, US Marine Raiders conducted the first amphibious attack ever launched from submarines.
During the raid on Makin Island, the USS Nautilus and USS Argonaut landed 200 Marine commandos on the small Japanese-held island with the goal of destroying enemy installations, capturing prisoners, and gathering intelligence.
Although the raid was neither a success nor a failure — the Marine Raiders achieved some objectives but failed on others — it paved the way for future special operations from submarines.
Since World War II, advances in submarine and combat diving technology have allowed for far more complex submarine operations involving commandos.
Nowadays, submarines don’t have to surface to land special operators, as they did during the Makin Island raid, and can instead deploy commandos while submerged.
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