This essay will be discussing the reasons why the Armada failed, such as Spanish poor planning, English skills and tactics and Spanish weaknesses. In this essay I will be explaining things about both the English and Spanish Armada and why the Spanish lost to the English. Spanish poor planning and tactics was the main reason why the Armada failed to conquer England. My reasons for this are, that when the Armada was in Plymouth, Philip told them not to attack unless necessary. If they had attacked then maybe they could have accomplished their goal of conquering England because the English had the wind against them, so they wouldn't be able to fight back. Another reason was that they needed a week to prepare because the troops were not ready and the communication over sea was very unreliable. For example when the Spanish troops went to pick up the other soldiers in the Flanders they were not ready. This shows that they were very unprepared and it would have been very risky. .
Another major reason why the Armada failed because of Spanish poor planning is that there ships were unable for sea battle. The cannons were unusable and they had the wrong size of shot for their cannonballs. Instead the Spanish used a technique that was also very risky, they climbed onto the English ships and did one-on-one battles. This was not a very clever idea because if they came towards the English, the English could easily break their ships because of the weak, poor ships and planning. One more reason is that when the Armada had to go past Scotland and Ireland they started running out of food and supplies. This is partly why only a third of the men returned safely to Spain. All of this was important and led to the failure because the Spanish were not ready and had nothing planned out this makes it easier for the English to attack whenever they wanted.
However, there were also other reasons why the Armada failed such as English skills and tactics.
