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Asortie (from the French word meaningexit, fromLatin rootsurgere meaning to "rise up") is a deployment or dispatch of one military unit, be it anaircraft,ship, or troops, from astrongpoint.[1] The term originated insiege warfare.
Insiege warfare, the wordsortie refers specifically to a sudden sending of troops against the enemy from a defensive position—that is, an attack launched against the besiegers by the defenders. If the sortie is through asally port, the verbto sally may be used interchangeably withto sortie.
Purposes of sorties include harassment of enemy troops, destruction of siege weaponry and engineering works,[2] joining the relief force, etc.
SirJohn Thomas Jones, analyzing a number of sieges carried out during thePeninsular War (1807–1814), wrote:[3]
The events of these sieges show that a bold and vigorous sortie in force might carry destruction through every part of a besieger's approaches, where the guard is injudiciously disposed and ill commanded; but that if due precautions have been observed in forming the approaches and posting the defenders, any sortie from a besieged place must be checked with loss in their advance, when the approaches are still distant; or when the approaches are near, should a sortie succeed in pushing into them by a sudden rush, the assailants must inevitably be driven out again in a moment, with terrible slaughter.
Inmilitary aviation, a sortie is an aircraft flight or mission (training or combat),[4] starting when the aircraft takes off. For example, one mission involving six aircraft would tally six sorties. Thesortie rate of a unit is the number of sorties that it can support in a given time.
