why was the spanish armada defeated?

Answer 1

The Spanish Armada was defeated because it's ships were too big and bulky to maeuver quickly. The English ships had the advantage of speed and "home court advantage" -- the English Channel. The Armada was also defeated because following an initial defeat they chose to flee north and had to round England and come back by for a second disastrous encounter

Answer 2

Some of the Big reasons the Armada failed to do anything but parade up the English Channel was support, time, supply and weather.
Support. The Army in the Netherlands was waiting for news of the Armada's arrival, which never got to the Commader in time to complete preperations, the army was already engaged heavily with the Netherlands Rebels.
Time, This again worked in favour of the English, the Calais Roads are extremely dangerous to work in (even these days) and with the heavy Galleons, rowing galleons and caravels of the Spanish fleet they either pulled to much draft or did not have the power to attack the currents to move back down the channel and could only follow the tide into the North Sea.
Supply, due to the repeated attacks against the fleet, although the English ships where doing little damage with the wepons of the day against the Heavy ships, they where expending a vast amount of shot and gunpowder, where the English could re supply, the Armada could not.
The Weather played right into the English Hands, the smaller ships could tack against the North Easterly gale that was brewing over the days and could make head way to get back to harbour, the Amada due to its size and types of ship could only follow the wind, which was actually assisting the tides in forcing the ships up channel into the Goodwin Race and into the area known as Dogger. The Armada then either had the trouble of trying to wait and force passage back down channel or folowing the wind up and around the Isles and into the North Atlantic (which it done) which brought it straight into the full force of the Hurricane force winds that destroyed so many ships.
The English Squadrons of Ships only harrassed the Armada, they did not actually sink one ship! And as for the fireships of Calais Road, if the Armada had been commanded by an able Admiral instead of a General, the situation would have not caused so much panic as Picket ships would have been able to stop them.
Hope this helps.

Answer 3

Because of an English commander called Francis Drake.

First off, England saw the armada coming; so Francis Drake went and sunk several galleons before they had even left the dock.

The English ships didn't carry many marines, so that meant if the Spanish got close enough they could easily take the British warships; so they stayed their distance, and the Spanish, who had "replaced" their experienced sailors to make room for more soldiers, had no chance against the Royal Navy.

Oh, and a storm came and sunk about a third of the armada. Thats why a medal was issued to all who fought against the Spanish, saying "God breathed upon them and they were scattered", or something like that...

Answer 4

There were three main reasons. The Spaniards had a problem in that their ships were large and not very manoeuverable whereas the English ships were small and extremely manoeuverable.

Secondly, the Armada was not commanded by a sailor, but by the Duke of Medina Sidonia who was a great soldier but knew nothing about naval warfare tactics nor even about the basics of sailing. England had Sir Francis Drake who was probably one of the greatest seafarers of all time in addition to having had to fight his way out of many a confrontation with the Spaniards. In addition to setting fire ships in among the Spanish fleet, he also blockaded the English channel so that the Armada could not retreat to friendly territory to regroup.

Third, a horrendous gale blew up which added to the Armada's problems. They sailed north and went around the British Isles because that was the only way out of their predicament.

Answer 5

Poor communications between Medina Sidonia and the Duke of Parma.
Outdated tactics.
Better English gunnery and guns.
More manouverable English ships.
Poor leadership and decision making by Medina Sidonia.
Failure to appreciate that the English had virtually run out of ammunition on two separate occasions.
Lack of available friendly harbours.
Failure to secure the English Channel for the crossing of the Spanish army in barges.
However all these points only resulted in a stalemate - the real damage was done by storms off the Scottish and Irish coasts on the long voyage home.

Answer 6

Because they were carrying an invading army their ships were large and not easy to manage in the rough waters of the narrow seas around the British Isles. This gave the smaller more mobile ships of the British navy an advantage but what really finished off the Spanish Armada was the bad weather they encountered which forced them to sail around the north of Scotland and Ireland where they were smashed on the rocky coast.

Answer 7

Their fleet was too small. When William of Orange conquered Britain in the "Glorious Revolution", he brought over a fleet several times the size. Amphibious invasions are extremely difficult to pull off, the Allies in WW2 spent years amassing an invasion force for the D-Day landings and even with their overwhelming advantage, they we're still paranoid about getting beaten back. The Holy Roman Emperor in Spain pushed for an inadequate fleet to attempt an invasion with far too little preparation. They were harassed by longer range english cannons, their formation broken by fireships and then what was left of their fleet hunted down and wrecked by storms in the north of scotland.

Answer 8

The Barnsley Manager

Answer 9

They were defeated becaused "They posed a danger to our shipping". The latins might have done well to remember this lesson from history.

Answer 10

because the English used better battle tatics