Editing Blockade runner (section)

== In history ==

=== Ancient Greece, Peloponnesian War ===

There were numerous blockades and attempts at blockade running during the [[Peloponnesian War]]. With his fleet blockaded, [[Leon of Salamis]] dispatched blockade runners to seek reinforcements from Athens.

=== Ancient Rome, Punic Wars ===
During the [[Punic Wars]], the [[Carthaginian Empire]] attempted to evade [[Roman navy]] blockades of its ports and strongholds. At one point, blockade runners brought in the only food reaching the city of [[Carthage]].<ref>Kern, Paul Bentley: ''Ancient siege warfare (p. 294)</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.livius.org/ha-hd/hamilcar/hamilcar2.html|title=Hamilcar Barca - Livius|website=www.livius.org|access-date=2020-03-26|archive-date=2013-01-22|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130122084732/http://www.livius.org/ha-hd/hamilcar/hamilcar2.html|url-status=dead}}</ref>

=== Middle age ===

During the 14th century, while Queen [[Margaret I of Denmark]]'s forces were besieging [[Stockholm]], the blockade runners who came to be known as the [[Victual Brothers|Victual Brotherhood]] engaged in war at sea and shipped provisions to keep the city supplied.

=== American Revolutionary War ===
Blockade runners in the American Revolution eluded the British naval blockades in order to supply resources to the army. [[France in the American Revolutionary War|French naval aid]] was vital.

=== American Civil War ===
{{Main article|Blockade runners of the American Civil War}}
[[File:St. George's Harbour circa 1864.jpg|thumb|right|A Confederate blockade runner at anchor at [[St. George's, Bermuda|St. George's]], [[Bermuda]]]]

During the [[American Civil War]], blockade running became a major enterprise for the [[Confederate States of America|Confederacy]] due to the [[Union blockade]] as part of the [[Anaconda Plan]] to cut off the Confederacy's overseas trade.  Twelve major ports and approximately 3,500 miles of coastline along the Confederacy were patrolled by roughly 500 [[Union Navy]] ships.{{fact|date=December 2023}}

The [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|United Kingdom]] played a major role in Confederate blockade running. British merchants had conducted significant amounts of trade with the South prior to the war, and were suffering from the [[Lancashire Cotton Famine]]. The [[British Empire]] also controlled many of the neutral ports in the Caribbean, most notably [[the Bahamas]] and [[Bermuda]]. In concert with Confederate interests, British investors ordered the construction of steamships that were longer, narrower and considerably faster than most of the conventional steamers guarding the American coastline, thus enabling them to outmaneuver and outrun blockaders. Among the more notable was the [[USS Advance (1862)|CSS Advance]] that completed more than 20 successful runs through the Union blockade before being captured.<ref>[[#Wyllie3|Wyllie, 2007]] p.22</ref> 

These vessels brought badly needed supplies, especially firearms, and [[Postage stamps and postal history of the Confederate States#Blockade runners|Confederate mail]]. The blockade played a major role in the Union's victory over the Confederate states, though historians have estimated the supplies brought by blockade runners to the Confederacy lengthened the duration of the war by up to two years.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/archaeology/historians-reveal-secrets-of-uk-gunrunning-which-lengthened-the-american-civil-war-by-two-years-9557937.html|title=Historians reveal secrets of UK gun-running which lengthened the American civil war by two years|author=David Keys|date=24 June 2014|work=[[The Independent]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=The Confederate Blockade Runners|url=https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/1933/april/confederate-blockade-runners|author=Paul Hendren|date=April 1933|publisher=[[United States Naval Institute]]}}</ref> By the end of the American Civil War, Union warships had captured more than 1,100 blockade runners and had destroyed or run aground another 355.<ref>[[#Scharf|Scharf, 1894]] pp.479-480</ref><ref name="Confederate blockade mail">{{cite web |url=http://www.rfrajola.com/blockade/blockade.htm |title=Confederate blockade mail |publisher=Richard Frajola, philatelist and historian |access-date=17 November 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110715182220/http://www.rfrajola.com/blockade/blockade.htm |archive-date=15 July 2011}}</ref>

=== Cretan Revolt (1866–1869) ===

Greek blockade runners supplied the Christians during the [[Cretan revolt (1866–1869)]].  Names of the ships include: ''Arkadion'' (named after the [[Arkadi Monastery]], sunk by the Ottoman sloop-of-war ''Izzedin'' in August 1867);<ref>''Morning Post'', London. 5 September 1867 citing Official Ottoman report of the incident.</ref> ''Hydra''; ''Panhellenion''; and ''Enosis'' (Unification), which was detained in Syros by [[Hobart Pasha]] in December 1868, just about the time the rebellion collapsed.

=== Prohibition era ===
{{See also|Prohibition in the United States|Rum-running}}

=== World War I ===
{{see also|Blockade of Germany (1914–1919)}}
During World War I the [[Central Powers]], most notably Germany, were blockaded by the [[Entente Powers]]. In particular the North Sea blockade made it nearly impossible for surface ships to leave Germany for the then neutral United States and other locations.

The blockade was run with cargo submarines, also called [[merchant submarine]]s, ''[[German submarine Deutschland|Deutschland]]'' and ''[[German submarine Bremen|Bremen]]'', which reached the then neutral United States.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://warandgame.wordpress.com/2008/02/21/german-u-boat-wwi-blockade-runners/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080303050452/http://warandgame.wordpress.com/2008/02/21/german-u-boat-wwi-blockade-runners/|url-status=dead|archive-date=3 March 2008|title=German U-boat WWI Blockade Runners « War and Game|date=3 March 2008}}</ref>

The ''Marie'' successfully ran the British North Sea blockade and docked, heavily damaged, in Batavia, Dutch East Indies (now called [[Jakarta]]) on May 13, 1916.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1916/11/05/archives/survived-british-shells-german-blockade-runner-almost-a-sieve.html|title=SURVIVED BRITISH SHELLS.; German Blockade Runner, Almost a Sieve, Sailed from Africa to Java.|work=The New York Times |date=5 November 1916|via=NYTimes.com}}</ref>

In 1917 Germany tried unsuccessfully to supply their forces in Africa by sending [[Zeppelin LZ104]].

=== World War II ===

==== Axis blockade runners ====

[[File:Abzeichen für Blockadebrecher.jpg|thumb|German [[Blockade Runner Badge]]]]
On the outbreak of war, the Royal Navy imposed a [[Blockade of Germany (1939–1945)|naval blockade of Germany]]. The fall of France provided the German occupying forces with access to the French Atlantic coast and between 1940 and 1942, many blockade running trips succeeded in delivering cargoes of critical war supplies - especially crude rubber - through the port of Bordeaux; a trade that increased with the entry of Japan into the war in December 1941.  Allied attempts to disrupt these operations initially had only a limited effect; as in [[Operation Frankton]].  From 1943 improved Allied air superiority over the Bay of Biscay rendered blockade running by surface ships effectively impossible.  By some counts, during the war Germans sent 32 (surface) blockade runners to Japan, only 16 of them reaching their destination. Later in the war, most of the trade between Germany and Japan was by cargo submarine.<ref name=harvey581>{{citation
|first=A. D. |last=Harvey
|publisher=Continuum |year=1992
|isbn=1852850787
|title=Collision of Empires: Britain in Three World Wars, 1793–1945
|url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Ah4cfjAHMm0C&pg=PA581
|pages=581–582}}</ref>

Italian ships, interned in Spain after Italy entered the war in June 1940, crossed the [[Bay of Biscay]] to [[Bordeaux]] and some of them, such as ''[[SS Fidelitas|Fidelitas]]'' and ''Eugenio C'', dashed through the [[English Channel]] bound for Germany and Norway.<ref>{{Cite book|url=http://catalogo.casd.difesa.it/Document.htm&numrec=031964357914610|title=Navi mercantili perdute|last=Notarangelo|first=Rolando|publisher=Ufficio Storico della Marina Militare|year=1977|location=Roma|pages=185|language=it}}</ref><ref>Notarangelo (1977), p. 176</ref>

To transfer technology to Imperial Japan, on 25 March 1945 Nazi Germany dispatched a submarine, {{GS|U-234||2}}, to sail to Japan. Germany surrendered before it arrived. The Japanese submarine ''[[Japanese submarine I-8|I-8]]'' completed a similar mission.

The German ship ''Ramses'' was in China when the war started. On Nov. 23, 1942, she attempted to sail from Batavia (now [[Jakarta]]), to Bordeaux with a cargo of rubber. The hope was that maintaining a sharp 24-hour lookout they could evade the Allied blockade.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://ahoy.tk-jk.net/macslog/BlockadeRunner.html|title=Ahoy - Mac's Web Log - Blockade Runner Ramses|website=ahoy.tk-jk.net}}</ref> [[HMAS Adelaide (1918)|HMAS ''Adelaide'' (1918)]] caught and sank her.

A small number of planes succeeded in flying between the Axis-controlled Europe and the Japanese-controlled parts of Asia. The first known flight was by an Italian [[Savoia-Marchetti SM.75]] ''Marsupiale'', which [[Savoia-Marchetti SM.75#Rome-to-Tokyo flight|flew in July 1942]], according to various sources, either from [[Zaporozhye]] to [[Baotou]] or from [[Rhodes]] Island to [[Rangoon]].<ref name=harvey581/> Later, German [[Junkers Ju 290]]-A aircraft prepared for (or, according to some sources, completed) [[Junkers Ju 290#Flights to Japan|similar flights]].<ref name=harvey581/>

==== Allied blockade runners ====

During World War II, trade between Sweden (which remained neutral throughout the war) and Britain was severely curtailed by the German blockade of the [[Skagerrak]] straits between Norway and the northern tip of Denmark. In order to import vital ''materiel'' from Sweden, such as [[ball bearings]] for the British aircraft industry, five [[Motor Gun Boat]]s, such as the [[HMS Gay Viking|''Gay Viking'']], were converted into blockade runners, using winter darkness and high speed to penetrate the German maritime blockade. Larger Norwegian ships succeeded in escaping through the blockade to Britain in [[Operation Rubble]] but later attempts failed.

=== Modern era ===

In modern times, tracking equipment such as radar, sonar, and reconnaissance satellites make evading a total blockade by a world power nearly impossible.{{citation needed|date=December 2023}} Drug smugglers and groups like the [[Tamil Tigers]] are able to run blockades due to the partial nature of the blockade, or because the navy imposing the blockade is weak and under-equipped.  Reminiscent of earlier German attempts, drug smugglers have used [[Semi-submersible naval vessel|semi-submersible]]s ([[narco-submarine]]s) in their smuggling operations.