List of largest parachute assaults
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This is a list of the largest parachute assaults in history. The overwhelming majority of these occurred during World War II.
- Invasion of Normandy: 13,100 American paratroopers and 8,500 British and Canadian paratroopers
- Operation Varsity: March 24, 1945. 16,000 paratroopers.[Note 1]
- Operation Market Garden: September 17–25, 1944. 34,600 paratroopers.[5]
- Battle of Crete: May 20 – June 1, 1941. 15,000 paratroopers.
- Tangail Airdrop: Over 5000 Indian Army paratroopers paradropped to capture Poongli Bridge in East Pakistan (present-day Bangladesh) during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, also known as the Bangladesh Liberation War.[6]
See also
Notes
- The airborne component of Operation Market Garden was a larger operation, but the drop zones were split over three distinct areas and spread over several days. Operation Varsity was conducted on a single day in one location, and was the largest such single airborne operation in history.[1][2][3][4]