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Wars & Conflicts

Declared and undeclared wars and the armed conflicts that defined American foreign policy, from the Revolution to the present.

American Civil War
The 1861–1865 war over slavery and union that remade the nation
Battle of Antietam
The bloodiest single day in American military history, September 17, 1862
Battle of Brandywine
The defeat that opened the road to Philadelphia, 1777
Battle of Bull Run
The First Great Battle of the Civil War, July 1861
Battle of Bunker Hill
The 1775 bloodbath that proved American militiamen could stand against British regulars
Battle of Chancellorsville
Lee's tactical masterpiece — and the shot that cost him his most dangerous general
Battle of Cowpens
Daniel Morgan's masterpiece, January 1781
Battle of Gettysburg
The bloodiest battle of the Civil War, July 1–3, 1863
Battle of Guilford Courthouse
The victory that cost Cornwallis his army, 1781
Battle of Kings Mountain
The backcountry victory that turned the Southern war, 1780
Battle of Lexington and Concord
The First Shots of the American Revolution, April 1775
Battle of Long Island
The largest battle of the Revolution — and a narrow escape, 1776
Battle of Midway
The naval battle that permanently shifted the balance of power in the Pacific, 1942
Battle of Monmouth
The army that came out of Valley Forge, 1778
Battle of New Orleans
Andrew Jackson's lopsided 1815 victory — fought two weeks after the war had already ended
Battle of Princeton
Washington's second strike in ten days, January 1777
Battle of Saratoga
The 1777 American victory that brought France into the Revolutionary War
Battle of the Alamo
The 13-day siege that became a Texan rallying cry
Battle of the Bulge
Hitler's Last Gamble in the West, December 1944 – January 1945
Battle of Trenton
Washington's Christmas Crossing and the Revolution's Turning Point
Battle of Vicksburg
The 47-Day Siege That Split the Confederacy in Two
Battle of Yorktown
The 1781 siege that ended the Revolutionary War and secured American independence
Bay of Pigs
The CIA's Failed Invasion of Cuba and Kennedy's Defining Early Crisis, April 1961
Bleeding Kansas
The violent territorial struggle that previewed the Civil War
Capture of Fort Ticonderoga
The Revolution's first offensive victory, May 1775
D-Day
The June 1944 Allied invasion that broke Nazi Germany's Atlantic Wall and sealed the war's outcome in the West
Death of Osama bin Laden
The 2011 raid that ended a decade-long manhunt
Fort Pillow Massacre
The Confederate Slaughter of Black Union Soldiers, April 12, 1864
French and Indian War
The North American theater of a world war that made the American Revolution inevitable, 1754–1763
Hiroshima and Nagasaki
The Atomic Bombings That Ended World War II, August 1945
Korean War
The "Forgotten War" that established the Cold War's logic of limited conflict, 1950–1953
March to the Sea
Sherman's 1864 campaign of deliberate destruction that broke the Confederacy's will to fight
Mexican-American War
The 1846–1848 war of conquest that gave the United States half a continent — and a crisis
Pearl Harbor
The Japanese attack of December 7, 1941, that brought America into World War II
Sand Creek Massacre
The Slaughter of a Cheyenne and Arapaho Village Under a Flag of Truce, November 1864
Spanish-American War
The 1898 war that made America an empire in four months
The Alamo
The 1836 siege that became the defining myth of Texas independence
The American Revolution
The colonial war of independence that created the United States, 1775–1783
The Burning of Washington
The only time since the Revolution a foreign power has occupied and burned the U.S. capital
The Quasi-War
The undeclared naval war that nearly broke the Franco-American alliance
The Texas Revolution
How American settlers broke Texas away from Mexico
Trail of Tears
The forced relocation of Native nations from the American Southeast, 1830–1850
U.S.–Iran Military Strikes
From the killing of Soleimani in 2020 to direct strikes on Iran's nuclear sites in 2025–2026
Vietnam War
America's longest 20th-century conflict and the war that broke the postwar consensus, 1955–1975
War of 1812
The strange second war with Britain that nobody won — and that made America a nation
World War I
The European catastrophe that pulled America in, remade the world order, and produced the next war
World War II
America's 1941–1945 war that defeated the Axis and made it a superpower
Wounded Knee 1973
The 71-Day AIM Occupation That Revived Native American Resistance
Wounded Knee Massacre
The 1890 killing of at least 250 Lakota men, women, and children that ended the Indian Wars