The Spanish Armada is the term conventionally applied
to a massive fleet dispatched against England by
Spain's Catholic King Philip II in 1588, leading to an
early and important confrontation in the nearly
20-year Anglo-Spanish War of 1585-1604 (the "Twenty
Years' War"). The Armada had been sent following a
rift in Anglo-Spanish relations resulting from
commercial competition, religious differences, and
disputes over English aid to Protestant Dutch rebels,
though its proximate cause was the English execution
of the Catholic Mary Queen of Scots in 1587. The
flotilla's mission was to serve as an escort for an
invading professional army led by Alessandro Farnese,
the Duke of Parma, one of the king's generals who had
been combating a Protestant uprising in the
Spanish-ruled Netherlands. The Spanish fleet was
repulsed by English defensive ships, however, and
suffered major losses in a September Atlantic storm
while rounding the coast of Scotland en route to
Spain. The......
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