The US Government sent over 6,000 American troops to invade Grenada on 25 October 1983 after leaders of a local ”Revolutionary Military Council” (RMC) ousted and killed Prime Minister Maurice Bishop and his cabinet ministers from the moderate New Jewel Movement.
The Americans regarded the coup as a threat to their own security, and the invasion, code-named ”Operation Urgent Fury,” was designed to remove the RMC and install a pan-Caribbean council to govern the tiny island until democratic elections could be held.
US Army Rangers parachuted from an altitude of less than 500 feet (150 meters) to avoid fire from Cuban antiaircraft guns at the Point Salines airstrip (now Maurice Bishop International Airport).
The airport was seized, and 500 more Rangers were flown in, followed by an additional 5,000 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division who were airlifted directly from US bases.
Meanwhile, a Navy SEAL contingent freed Grenada’s governor-general Paul Scoon from house arrest while other SEALs prepared beaches and landing sites for 2,000 Marines. The combined forces quickly moved to occupy the island’s airfields, power station, and broadcast facilities.
US troops also secured the St. George’s University School of Medicine, where more than 600 American students were enrolled.
Although the local Grenadian troops put up a fight, the United States succeeded in its mission, which the United Nations Security Council criticised as a violation of international law.
Casualties in the American invasion of Grenada were relatively few. 19 US combatants were killed, and 116 were wounded. Cuban forces suffered perhaps 24 killed and 59 wounded.
21 members of the Grenadian army were killed in action, while Grenadian civilian casualties numbered 24 dead and 337 wounded.
There was much criticism of the American invasion of a British Commonwealth nation, with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher admonishing President Reagan, saying “NATO does not pursue her ends by force; she pursues them by persuasion”.
