This form of little sea powerand its rules for naval strategyis widely read, but ultimately peripheral to Mahans core purpose. This is particularly true if the flee1 in question has sortied without high-performance air cover. However, in the combined 840 pages of The Influence of Sea Power Upon History:16601783 and The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future, Mahan does not investigate the role of a nations coast guard. People. In this sense, Corbett is less a repudiation of Mahan than a refinement of Mahanian logics. In the 1890s, Mahans ideas resonated with leading politicians, including Get briefed on the story of the week, and developing stories to watch across the Asia-Pacific. Suzanne Geissler, God and Sea Power: The Influence of Religion on Alfred Thayer Mahan (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 2015). All of these factors, however, are mere functions of the controlling equation the character of the government. Power, Crossroads Borrowing a phrase from: Charles Maier, Among Empires: American Ascendancy and Its Predecessors (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2006). The term itself entered the English language in the 1840s via the British classicist George Grotes History of Greece, which described the Minoans as a seapower or, alternately, thalassocracy.[15] Mahan split that word into its component parts for effect (maritime power was apparently too smooth for his liking) and then spread the concept with nearly religious zeal. Nov 23, 2022; 6 min; ALL. The consent submitted will only be used for data processing originating from this website. Without commerce, territorial infrastructure, and political will, naval preponderance is unsustainable. Mahan, as a historian, (and roughly three-quarters of Influences actual text) is concerned chiefly with applying these basic principles and definitions to the 18th century and the rise of Great Britain to a position of what the historian Paul Kennedy called naval mastery.[38] Conversely, but of equal importance, Mahan is interested in why France failed to build enough Sea Power to upset Britains position in the North Atlantic. Its geographic position and physical conformation can be, at least in part, altered by canals> dredging, icebreakers, and alliances. It describes his life and his "America," which was socially and politically at war with itself. When combined with the average Russians disdain for sustained effort, his love of wielding arbitrary power, and the continually smashed dreams of consumer satisfaction, the ambitious five-year plans of the government (which dictate economic quotas and growth) lead to corruption, shoddy production, and unavailability of parts and service. [85] Admiral Mahan, New York Times, December 2, 1914. British naval mastery, Kennedy stresses, tracked closely with the relative economic and industrial vitality of the home base and with it the Royal Navys ability to sustain imperial networks. cOMPRAR. The number of people in a country obviously influences the garrisoning of a given space. Tactics were conditioned by changing types of naval armaments. Writing during the interwar period and World War II, he argued that the real contest for power in the 20th century would take place in the rimland around Eurasia (what Mackinder called the Inner Crescent) where Sea Power and Land Power meet in a sort of geopolitical estuary. In doing so it encourages readers to consider the text through three lenses: polemic, naval strategy, and grand strategy. Alfred Thayer Mahan stands out as one of the foremost thinkers on naval warfare and maritime strategy. The publication of Mahans books preceded much of the disorder associated with the 1890s, but his work resonated with many leading intellectuals and politicians concerned by the political and economic challenges of the period and the declining lack of economic opportunity on the American continent. Work on the long-planned Muse-Kyaukphyu line is once again inching forward, but construction is likely many years off. providing fuel and supplies for the enlarged navy, and maintaining open lines of abroad. the 1890s, but his work resonated with many leading intellectuals and Methodologically, his interest in applied history has imitators across the academy. In 1890, Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, a lecturer in naval history and the president of the United States Naval War College, published The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 16601783, a revolutionary analysis of the importance of naval power as a factor in the rise of the British Empire. economic power. He wrote his treatise in 1911 specifically toward that end, balancing (like Clausewitz) the ways, means, and ends of naval war. [44] American independence, as it turned out, was a function of the one instance in which continental France effectively deployed sea power (if not Sea Power) against the British Empire, winning a determinative victory at the Battle of the Chesapeake (1781). [7] In doing so these navalists spurred on what one historian has called the American Naval Revolution: the radical re-making of the U.S. Navy and with it the entry of the United States into the ranks of the North Atlantic maritime powers as an empire among empires, in 1898.[8]. John Keegan, The Price of Admiralty: The Evolution of Naval Warfare (New York: Viking, 1988). Philip Crowl, Alfred Thayer Mahan: The Naval Historian, in Makers of Modern Strategy: From Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. [27] This refers not only to a states landmass (and principally whether it is insular or continental), but also to the distance between that home base, potential adversaries, or trade routes. First, Mahan looked for strategic points of convergence and concentration. Published in 1890 and 1892,. See also: 28, 510. [19] A.T. Mahan, The Life of Nelson: The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain (London: Sampson Low, Marston, 1897). sense, sea power and cyber power share a common objective. This is 'defined as the condition that exists when an adversary is denied the ability to use an area of sea for its own purposes He further understood that predominant Anglo-American sea power in its broadest sense was the key to ensuring the geopolitical pluralism of Eurasia. Mahans evidentiary base consists of several case studies, beginning with the Anglo-Dutch Wars in the 17thcentury. What are their objectives? As he generalizes, amid all the fluctuations of continental politics in a most unsettled period the eye of England was steadily fixed on the maintenance of her sea power: military command of the ocean as a result of economic productivity, commercial shipping, and foreign territorial infrastructure. In any case, as a history of naval war Influence makes for dull reading. Margaret Tuttle Sprout, Mahan: Evangelist of Sea Power, in Makers of Modern Strategy: Military Thought from Machiavelli to Hitler, ed. [5] Lee McGiffin, Yankee of the Yalu: Philo Norton McGiffin, American Captain in the Chinese Navy (1885-1895) (New York: E.P. require three things: a merchant navy, which could carry American products to the President, Visits by Foreign Heads What do we know about him? Some have argued that twentieth-century inventions like the submarine and the aircraft carrier make Mahan and his overwhelming emphasis on surface-capital ships irrelevant, but this is far too narrow a reading of the text. Naval forces, as the American naval strategist Wayne P. Hughes later agreed, are fundamentally in the links business, assuring: 1) our own goods and services are safe and 2) that an enemys are not.[9] Mahan believed (and used history to demonstrate) that navies are best able to provide this protection through a decisive, concentrated engagement with an adversary fleet. He has written articles and reviews on historical and foreign policy topics for Strategic Review, American Diplomacy, Joint Force Quarterly, the University Bookman, the Washington Times, the Claremont Review of Books, and other publications. Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840-1914) was a US Navy officer and author of influential marine history and strategy books. Following the successful conclusion of the Spanish-American War in 1898, the United States gained control of territories that could serve as the coaling stations and naval bases that Mahan had discussed, such as Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines. Ensign Pandoife is a 1980 graduate of the Naval A _r^*Tl_ Academy> where he majored in history. His understanding of the anarchical nature of international politics, the importance of geography to the global balance of power, the role of sea power in national security policy, and historys ability to shed light on contemporary world politics remains relevant to the 21st century world. [91] Immanuel C.Y. Following the Civil War, Secretary of State William Seward had attempted to expand the U.S. commercial presence in Asia by purchasing Alaska in 1867, and increasing American influence over Hawaii by concluding a reciprocity treaty that would bind the islands economy to that of the United States. 71: No. Mahan argued for a universal principle of concentration of powerful ships in home waters and minimized strength in distant seas, while Fisher reversed Mahan by utilizing technological change to propose submarines for defense of home waters and mobile battle cruisers for protection of distant imperial interests. Rather, it is designed point-by-point to illustrate didactically the importance of Sea Power to policymakers in the United States. Mahans prescience did not end there, however. NB: Influence was published in 1890, but I have cited throughout the 1898 version because it is the one most widely available on Google Books c. 2022. [33] Without the former, the latter rests on weak foundations. . of the Department, Mahans The Influence of Sea Power upon History: Securing International for a vigorous foreign policy were signs that Americans were increasingly From time to time, he wrote, the superstructure of tactics has to be altered or wholly torn down; but the old foundations of strategy so far remain, as though laid upon a rock.[78] The strategic principles of concentration, decisive engagement, control of communications, and offensive action all translated from the Age of Sail, while specific tactics required revision as a result of technical advances. Mahan is suspicious of democratic societies because they may struggle to maintain naval funding during peacetime (witness U.S. demobilization after the Civil War). As the custodian of U.S. ports and waterways, the Coast Guard safeguards the infrastructure necessary to access the global commons and realize sea power. 2.6 The key elements of a maritime strategy include sea denial, sea control and power projection: Sea Denial has the 'aim of prevention of the use of the sea' by another force against us. Report, Trans-Pacific 54. Amid great power competition, life in the China-Russia borderlands reveals the paradoxes underpinning the Beijing-Moscow friendship. 15-30 (16 pages) https://www.jstor.org/stable/45236517 About this issue By Lieutenant Commander Ryan Clark, U.S. Coast Guard, CNO Naval History - Midshipmen and Cadets, CNO Naval History - Professional Historian, www.history.uscg.mil/Complete-Time-Line/Time-Line-1700-1800/, www.imo.org/en/OurWork/IIIS/Pages/Port%20State%20Control.aspx, Lieutenant Commander Ryan Clark, U.S. Coast Guard. [38] Paul Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery (New York: Penguin, 2017), originally, (New York: Scribner, 1976). In a narrow sense, Influence is a specific argumenta polemicaimed at fin de sicle navalists about the necessity of expanding the United States Navy (USN). [52] Revista de Marina, No. of the British Empire. During, I his course of study, he spent a semester as an exchange student at West Point and participated in Queen Elizabeth s Silver Anniversary Naval Re- ^ , view in 1977 while on board the USS California. [39] N.A.M. Diss., Texas A&M University, 2001. [66] By the 1960s and 70s, still more historians, led by Walter LaFeber, portrayed Mahan as an arch-imperialist, consciously designing maritime empire across the Pacific and the Caribbean. [49]In asking what lessons might flow from the influence of Roman sea power on the fall of the Carthaginian Empire, Mahan arrived at the germ of his project. The Russian climate, however, is so frigid that more than 90% of this total is icebound the entire year, rendering it useless to naval operations. [45] The final triumph of British Sea Power was (predictably) the defeat of the Napoleonic Empire through command of the sea after Trafalgarthe Salamis or Armada of its age. Robert Seager II and Doris Maguire (Annapolis: Naval Institute Press, 1975), Vol II, 494. [73] Andrew Lamberts ambitious and engaging Seapower States (2018) is the most critical and provocative of this vein (though Lamberts larger project is much more than a refutation of Mahanian sea power). Nicholas Lambert, What Is a Navy For? U.S. Following the Civil War, Secretary of State William Seward had attempted to The danger inherent in shifting forces over a distance as great as that existing between the Black Sea and Far East fleets was amply proven by the Japanese victory at Tsushima Strait in 1905. Money, Tokyo Less intuitively, poor soil and climate often encourage Sea Power because domestic inadequacies force commercial interests abroad in search of resources and profits. Eight years before the Spanish-American War resulted in the United States becoming a world power with overseas possessions, Mahan wrote an article in the Atlantic Monthly entitled The United States Looking Outward, (1890) in which he urged U.S. leaders to recognize that our security and interests were affected by the balance of power in Europe and Asia. 1898, the United States gained control of territories that could serve as the coaling stations and naval bases that Mahan had discussed, such as Puerto While Mahan recognized clearly that tactics were fluid due to changes in armaments, he did not view strategy in the same way. 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