May 13 in Military History

Congress declared war on Mexico after President Polk asserted that Mexico had "shed American blood upon American soil", a claim hotly disputed by Abraham Lincoln and other Whig opponents. The war would add California, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming to the United States.

Robert Smalls, an enslaved harbor pilot, commandeered the Confederate transport CSS Planter in Charleston Harbor and sailed it to the Union fleet, one of the most daring escapes of the Civil War. His act helped persuade Lincoln to allow Black men to serve in the Union military.

The British Royal Flying Corps was established by royal warrant, creating the military aviation organization that would play a crucial role in World War I. The RFC would merge with the Royal Naval Air Service in 1918 to form the Royal Air Force, the world's first independent air force.

Churchill delivered his first speech as PM, offering "blood, toil, tears and sweat." The same day, German forces crossed the Meuse at Sedan.

Guderian's XIX Panzer Corps crossed the Meuse River at Sedan in a virtuoso combined-arms assault, achieving the decisive breakthrough of the Battle of France. French defenders broke under a storm of Stuka dive-bomber attacks. Within a week, German tanks reached the English Channel.

German Fallschirmjager of Sturmabteilung Koch, who had landed gliders on the roof of Belgium's Fort Eben-Emael three days earlier, secured the fortress complex as the garrison surrendered, clearing the way across the Albert Canal.

The U.S. aircraft carrier USS Wasp completed her second ferry mission to the besieged island of Malta, delivering 47 Royal Air Force Spitfires whose arrival broke Axis air superiority over the island within weeks.

The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) formally activated as a binational United States and Canadian command, integrating air defense radars, interceptor squadrons, and command centers into a single operational structure.

U.S. Air Force F-4 Phantoms of the 8th Tactical Fighter Wing dropped the Thanh Hoa Bridge in North Vietnam using laser-guided bombs, destroying in one mission a structure that had survived 871 sorties during Operation Rolling Thunder.

Pope John Paul II was shot and severely wounded by Turkish nationalist Mehmet Ali Agca in St. Peter's Square. The assassination attempt, later linked to Bulgarian intelligence and possibly the Soviet KGB, highlighted Cold War tensions between the Catholic Church's anti-communist stance and Eastern Bloc governments.