page_title: Naval gunfire support
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: Naval gunfire support / History / World War II
caption_attribution_description: English: USS Idaho (BB-42), a New Mexico-class battleship shells Okinawa on 1 April 1945, easily distinguished by her tower foremast &amp; 5”-38 Mk 30 single turrets (visible between the barrels of the forward main turrets). Idaho was the only battleship with this configuration.
context_page_description: Naval gunfire support is the use of naval artillery to provide fire support for amphibious assault and other troops operating within their range. NGFS is one of a number of disciplines encompassed by the term naval fires. Modern naval gunfire support is one of the three main components of amphibious warfare assault operations support, along with aircraft and ship-launched land-attack missiles. Shipborne guns have been used against shore defences since medieval naval warfare.
context_section_description: The practice reached its zenith during World War II, when the availability of man-portable radio systems and sophisticated relay networks allowed forward observers to transmit targeting information and provide almost instant accuracy reports—once troops had landed. Battleships, cruisers and destroyers would pound shore installations, sometimes for days, in the hope of reducing fortifications and attriting defending forces. Obsolete battleships unfit for combat against other ships were often used as floating gun platforms expressly for this purpose. However, given the relatively primitive nature of the fire control computers and radar of the era combined with the high velocity of naval gunfire, accuracy depended upon designated observer aircraft until troops landed and were able to radio back reports to the ship. Observation seaplanes proved vulnerable to land-based fighter aircraft during the invasion of Sicily so gunfire observers flew Spitfires in support of the Normandy landings.
  The solution was to engage in longer bombardment periods—up to two weeks, in some cases—saturating target areas with fire until a lucky few shells had destroyed the intended targets. This alerted an enemy that he was about to be attacked. In the Pacific War this mattered less, where the isolated defenders of island strongholds expected to be invaded at some point and had already committed whatever combat resources were available. Japanese battleships bombarded United States Marines at Guadalcanal's Henderson airfield in October 1942. Bombardment periods were usually shorter in the European theatre, where surprise was more often valued, overland reinforcement far more likely, and ships' guns were responding to the movements of mobile defenders, not whittling away at static fortifications.
  Naval gunfire could reach as far as 20 miles (32 km) inland, and was often used to supplement land-based artillery. After the light cruiser USS Boise demonstrated the effectiveness of naval gunfire against tanks at Gela, the heavy-calibre guns of some eighteen battleships and cruisers were used to stop German Panzer counterattacks at Salerno. Naval gunfire was used extensively throughout Normandy, although initially the surprise nature of the landings themselves precluded a drawn-out bombardment which could have reduced the Atlantic Wall defences sufficiently, a process that fell to specialist armoured vehicles instead.
caption: The WWI-era (launched 30 June 1917) United States Navy battleship USS Idaho shells Japanese defenses on Okinawa on 1 April 1945.
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