Download or read book Master of Seapower written by Thomas B Buell and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2012-09-15 with total page 658 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A comprehensive biography of the most powerful naval officer in the history of the United States who was the controversial architect of the American victory in the Pacific. Someone once asked Admiral Ernest J. King if it was he who said, ""When they get in trouble they send for the sonsabitches."" He replied that he was not -—but that he would have said it if he had thought of it. Although never accused of having a warm personality, Ernest J. King commanded the respect of everyone familiar with his work. His is one of the great American naval careers, his place in history forever secured by a remarkable contribution to the Allied victory in the Second World War. ""Lord how I need him,"" wrote Navy Secretary Frank Knox on December 23, 1941, the day he summoned King to take control of the Navy at its lowest point, the aftermath of Pearl Harbor. Raised in a stern Calvinist home in Lorain, Ohio, Ernest King grew interested in a naval career after reading an article in a boys' magazine. After graduating from Annapolis fourth in his class (1901), King's early career was ""rather ordinary"" according to biographer Robert W. Love. But in 1909, at the end of a stint as a drillmaster at the Naval Academy, King distinguished himself by writing an influential essay entitled, ""Organization on Board Ship."" King performed well in a number of commands between 1914 and 1923, when he began a three-year stint as commander of the submarine base at New London, Connecticut. In 1926 his career took an important turn: he completed the shortened flight course at Pensacola, and from that point on, he would see aviation as the decisive element in naval warfare. This conviction deepened when he served as assistant bureau chief under Rear Admiral William Moffett, widely considered the father of American naval aviation. King's career received another boost when he ably commanded his first aircraft carrier, the Lexington, in the early 1930s. But as his prospects for advancement increased, so did his reputation as a difficult character. "He was meaner than hell," commented one junior officer, reflecting the general opinion that King was as much despised as he was respected. This didn't seem to bother him, though. Love observed that he "seemed almost to pride himself on the fact that he had earned his rank solely on his merits as a professional naval officer, rather than as a result of the friendship of others." In the spring of 1939, the sixty-year-old King coveted the job of Chief of Naval Operations. But his personality and decided lack of political skill or tact led President Roosevelt to pass him over in favor of Admiral Harold Stark. Seemingly banished to duty on the General Board in Washington, King's career was resurrected by the war that soon started in Europe. When Stark grew dissatisfied with the commander of his Atlantic Squadron, he looked to King, who took over in December, 1940. With his slogan ""do all that we can with what we have,"" King ably managed the undeclared war with Germany's U-boats. Although his command was limited to the Atlantic, it brought him to Washington frequently and he stayed abreast of developments in the Pacific. The morning after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Stark called him to Washington; soon after he was running the Navy -—first as Commander in Chief of the U.S. Fleet, soon adding the title Chief of Naval Operations, making him the first man to combine both jobs. In the early months of 1942, King's strategic brilliance earned him the complete confidence of President Roosevelt. When none of the British or American war planners even dared to think of going on the offensive in the Pacific in 1942-43, King successfully lobbied to do just that. "No fighter ever won his fight by covering up -—merely fending off the other fellow's blows," he wrote. "The winner hits and keeps on hitting even though he has to be able to take some stiff blows in order to keep on hitting." It's easy to see why even those who despised Ernest King were glad he was on their side.

Download or read book To Master the Boundless Sea written by Jason W. Smith and published by UNC Press Books. This book was released on 2018-04-13 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As the United States grew into an empire in the late nineteenth century, notions like "sea power" derived not only from fleets, bases, and decisive battles but also from a scientific effort to understand and master the ocean environment. Beginning in the early nineteenth century and concluding in the first years of the twentieth, Jason W. Smith tells the story of the rise of the U.S. Navy and the emergence of American ocean empire through its struggle to control nature. In vividly told sketches of exploration, naval officers, war, and, most significantly, the ocean environment, Smith draws together insights from environmental, maritime, military, and naval history, and the history of science and cartography, placing the U.S. Navy's scientific efforts within a broader cultural context. By recasting and deepening our understanding of the U.S. Navy and the United States at sea, Smith brings to the fore the overlooked work of naval hydrographers, surveyors, and cartographers. In the nautical chart's soundings, names, symbols, and embedded narratives, Smith recounts the largely untold story of a young nation looking to extend its power over the boundless sea.

Download or read book One Hundred Years of Sea Power written by George W. Baer and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1996-07-01 with total page 572 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A navy is a state's main instrument of maritime force. What it should do, what doctrine it holds, what ships it deploys, and how it fights are determined by practical political and military choices in relation to national needs. Choices are made according to the state's goals, perceived threat, maritime opportunity, technological capabilities, practical experience, and, not the least, the way the sea service defines itself and its way of war. This book is a history of the modern U.S. Navy. It explains how the Navy, in the century after 1890, was formed and reformed in the interaction of purpose, experience, and doctrine.

Download or read book The Future of Sea Power written by Eric Grove and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2021-05-30 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book, first published in 1990, presents a fundamental reassessment of maritime strategy. It analyses the lessons of twentieth-century naval warfare and examines in detail the changing face of naval warfare, both in terms of the weapons used and the platforms from which they are launched and controlled. It looks at the evolving uses of the seas, both economic and military, and sets sea power against the developing world environment, political, legal and economic, discussing those factors that stimulate nations to exert power at sea and those that limit their naval capabilities. It also develops a theoretical framework for future thinking about maritime strategy and forces, revises and updates Mahan’s classical analysis of the foundations of sea power, and discusses thinking about naval tasks.

Download or read book Sea Power written by Admiral James Stavridis, USN and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-06-05 with total page 386 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From one of the most admired admirals of his generation—and the only admiral to serve as Supreme Allied Commander at NATO—comes a remarkable voyage through all of the world’s most important bodies of water, providing the story of naval power as a driver of human history and a crucial element in our current geopolitical path. From the time of the Greeks and the Persians clashing in the Mediterranean, sea power has determined world power. To an extent that is often underappreciated, it still does. No one understands this better than Admiral Jim Stavridis. In Sea Power, Admiral Stavridis takes us with him on a tour of the world’s oceans from the admiral’s chair, showing us how the geography of the oceans has shaped the destiny of nations, and how naval power has in a real sense made the world we live in today, and will shape the world we live in tomorrow. Not least, Sea Power is marvelous naval history, giving us fresh insight into great naval engagements from the battles of Salamis and Lepanto through to Trafalgar, the Battle of the Atlantic, and submarine conflicts of the Cold War. It is also a keen-eyed reckoning with the likely sites of our next major naval conflicts, particularly the Arctic Ocean, Eastern Mediterranean, and the South China Sea. Finally, Sea Power steps back to take a holistic view of the plagues to our oceans that are best seen that way, from piracy to pollution. When most of us look at a globe, we focus on the shape of the of the seven continents. Admiral Stavridis sees the shapes of the seven seas. After reading Sea Power, you will too. Not since Alfred Thayer Mahan’s legendary The Influence of Sea Power upon History have we had such a powerful reckoning with this vital subject.

Download or read book Maritime Power and the Law of the Sea written by James Kraska and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-19 with total page 485 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Maritime Power and the Law of the Sea: Expeditionary Operations in World Politics, Commander James Kraska analyzes the evolving rules governing freedom of the seas and their impact on expeditionary operations in the littoral, near-shore coastal zone. Coastal state practice and international law are developing in ways that restrict naval access to the littorals and associated coastal communities and inshore regions that have become the fulcrum of world geopolitics. Consequently, the ability of naval forces to project expeditionary power throughout semi-enclosed seas, exclusive economic zones (EEZs) and along the important sea-shore interface is diminishing and, as a result, limiting strategic access and freedom of action where it is most needed. Commander Kraska describes how control of the global commons, coupled with new approaches to sea power and expeditionary force projection, has given the United States and its allies the ability to assert overwhelming sea power to nearly any area of the globe. But as the law of the sea gravitates away from a classic liberal order of the oceans, naval forces are finding it more challenging to accomplish the spectrum of maritime missions in the coastal littorals, including forward presence, power projection, deterrence, humanitarian assistance and sea control. The developing legal order of the oceans fuses diplomacy, strategy and international law to directly challenge unimpeded access to coastal areas, with profound implications for American grand strategy and world politics.

Download or read book The Struggle for Sea Power A Naval History of the American Revolution written by Sam Willis and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2016-02-15 with total page 672 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A fascinating naval perspective on one of the greatest of all historical conundrums: How did thirteen isolated colonies, which in 1775 began a war with Britain without a navy or an army, win their independence from the greatest naval and military power on earth? The American Revolution involved a naval war of immense scope and variety, including no fewer than twenty-two navies fighting on five oceans—to say nothing of rivers and lakes. In no other war were so many large-scale fleet battles fought, one of which was the most strategically significant naval battle in all of British, French, and American history. Simultaneous naval campaigns were fought in the English Channel, the North and Mid-Atlantic, the Mediterranean, off South Africa, in the Indian Ocean, the Caribbean, the Pacific, the North Sea and, of course, off the eastern seaboard of America. Not until the Second World War would any nation actively fight in so many different theaters. In The Struggle for Sea Power, Sam Willis traces every key military event in the path to American independence from a naval perspective, and he also brings this important viewpoint to bear on economic, political, and social developments that were fundamental to the success of the Revolution. In doing so Willis offers valuable new insights into American, British, French, Spanish, Dutch, and Russian history. This unique account of the American Revolution gives us a new understanding of the influence of sea power upon history, of the American path to independence, and of the rise and fall of the British Empire.

Download or read book Seapower written by Geoffrey Till and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-06-19 with total page 622 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the fourth, revised and updated, edition of Geoffrey Till's Seapower: A Guide for the Twenty-first Century. The rise of the Chinese and other Asian navies, worsening quarrels over maritime jurisdiction and the United States’ maritime pivot towards the Asia-Pacific region reminds us that the sea has always been central to human development as a source of resources, and as a means of transportation, information-exchange and strategic dominion. It has provided the basis for mankind's prosperity and security, and this is even more true in the early twenty-first century, with the emergence of an increasingly globalised world trading system. Navies have always provided a way of policing, and sometimes exploiting, the system. In contemporary conditions, navies, and other forms of maritime power, are having to adapt, in order to exert the maximum power ashore in the company of others and to expand the range of their interests, activities and responsibilities. While these new tasks are developing fast, traditional ones still predominate. Deterrence remains the first duty of today’s navies, backed up by the need to ‘fight and win’ if necessary. How navies and their states balance these two imperatives will tell us a great deal about our future in this increasingly maritime century. This book investigates the consequences of all this for the developing nature, composition and functions of all the world's significant navies, and provides a guide for anyone interested in the changing and crucial role of seapower in the twenty-first century. Seapower is essential reading for all students of naval power, maritime security and naval history, and highly recommended for students of strategic studies, international security and international relations.

Download or read book The Quiet Warrior written by Thomas B Buell and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2009-11-01 with total page 562 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Regarded as the standard biography of World War II naval hero Adm. Raymond A. Spruance, this work is now available in trade paperback for the first time. Spruance, victor of the battles of Midway and the Philippine Sea and commander of the Fifth Fleet in the invasions of the Gilberts, the Marshalls, the Marianas, and Okinawa, is one of the towering figures in American naval history. Yet his reserved, cerebral personality did not make “good copy” for correspondents, and until the publication of The Quiet Warrior he remained an elusive figure. Thomas Buell has succeeded in evoking the nature of the man as well as recording the achievements of the admiral in this brilliant biography, which won the Alfred Thayer Mahan Award for Literary Achievement the year of its publication.

Download or read book Twenty First Century Seapower written by Peter Dutton and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-02 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers an assessment of the naval policies of emerging naval powers, and the implications for maritime security relations and the global maritime order. Since the end of the Cold War, China, Japan, India and Russia have begun to challenge the status quo with the acquisition of advanced naval capabilities. The emergence of rising naval powers is a cause for concern, as the potential for great power instability is exacerbated by the multiple maritime territorial disputes among new and established naval powers. This work explores the underlying sources of maritime ambition through an analysis of various historical cases of naval expansionism. It analyses both the sources and dynamics of international naval competition, and looks at the ways in which maritime stability and the widespread benefits of international commerce and maritime resource extraction can be sustained through the twenty-first century. This book will be of much interest to students of naval power, Asian security and politics, strategic studies, security studies and IR in general.

Download or read book Seapower States written by Andrew Lambert and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 2018-11-27 with total page 539 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A fascinating geopolitical chronicle . . . A superb survey of the perennial opportunities and risks in what Herman Melville called ‘the watery part of the world.’” —The Wall Street Journal In this volume, one of the most eminent historians of our age investigates the extraordinary success of five small maritime states. Andrew Lambert, author of The Challenge: Britain Against America in the Naval War of 1812—winner of the prestigious Anderson Medal—turns his attention to Athens, Carthage, Venice, the Dutch Republic, and Britain, examining how their identities as “seapowers” informed their actions and enabled them to achieve success disproportionate to their size. Lambert demonstrates how creating maritime identities made these states more dynamic, open, and inclusive than their lumbering continental rivals. Only when they forgot this aspect of their identity did these nations begin to decline. Recognizing that the United States and China are modern naval powers—rather than seapowers—is essential to understanding current affairs, as well as the long-term trends in world history. This volume is a highly original “big think” analysis of five states whose success—and eventual failure—is a subject of enduring interest, by a scholar at the top of his game. “An intriguing series of stories of communities thinking seriously about how to stand their own ground when outpowered, how to do so in ways that are consistent with their values, and sometimes how to negotiate the descent from being a great power when the cards just aren’t in their favor any more. These are timely questions.” —Times Higher Education Supplement “Lambert is, without a doubt, the most insightful naval historian writing today.” —The Times

Download or read book God and Sea Power written by Suzanne Geissler and published by US Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Table of Contents -- List of Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. Family -- 2. Youth and Early Manhood -- 3. Crisis and Conversion -- 4. Family Man and Burgeoning Author -- 5. Providence and Sea Power: Our Jomini Is Here -- 6. A Public Christian -- 7. Final Days -- Notes -- Selected Bibliography -- Index -- About the Author

Download or read book A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy written by James Holmes and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2019-12-01 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Brief Guide to Maritime Strategy is a deliberately compact introductory work aimed at junior seafarers, those who make decisions affecting the sea services, and those who educate seafarers and decision-makers. It introduces readers to the main theoretical ideas that shape how statesmen and commanders make and execute maritime strategy in times of peace and war. Following in the spirit of Bernard Brodie's Layman's Guide to Naval Strategy, a World War II-era book whose title makes its purpose plain, it will be a companion volume to such works as Geoffrey Till's Seapower and Wayne Hughes's Fleet Tactics and Coastal Combat, the classic treatise that explains how to handle navies in fleet actions. It takes the mystery out of maritime strategy, which should not be an arcane art for practitioners or policy-makers, and will help the next generation think about strategy.

Download or read book Seapower written by Geoffrey Till and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-02-21 with total page 432 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the third, revised and fully updated, edition of Geoffrey Till's Seapower: A Guide for the 21st Century. The rise of the Chinese and other Asian navies, worsening quarrels over maritime jurisdiction and the United States’ maritime pivot towards the Asia-Pacific region reminds us that the sea has always been central to human development as a source of resources, and as a means of transportation, information-exchange and strategic dominion. It has provided the basis for mankind's prosperity and security, and this is even more true in the early 21st century, with the emergence of an increasingly globalized world trading system. Navies have always provided a way of policing, and sometimes exploiting, the system. In contemporary conditions, navies, and other forms of maritime power, are having to adapt, in order to exert the maximum power ashore in the company of others and to expand the range of their interests, activities and responsibilities. While these new tasks are developing fast, traditional ones still predominate. Deterrence remains the first duty of today’s navies, backed up by the need to ‘fight and win’ if necessary. How navies and their states balance these two imperatives will tell us a great deal about our future in this increasingly maritime century. This book investigates the consequences of all this for the developing nature, composition and functions of all the world's significant navies, and provides a guide for anyone interested in the changing and crucial role of seapower in the 21st century. Seapower is essential reading for all students of naval power, maritime security and naval history, and highly recommended for students of strategic studies, international security and International Relations.

Download or read book US Naval Strategy and National Security written by Sebastian Bruns and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-09-22 with total page 310 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book examines US naval strategy and the role of American seapower over three decades, from the late 20th century to the early 21st century. This study uses the concept of seapower as a framework to explain the military and political application of sea power and naval force for the United States of America. It addresses the context in which strategy, and in particular US naval strategy and naval power, evolves and how US naval strategy was developed and framed in the international and national security contexts. It explains what drove and what constrained US naval strategy and examines selected instances where American sea power was directed in support of US defense and security policy ends – and whether that could be tied to what a given strategy proposed. The work utilizes naval capstone documents in the framework of broader maritime conceptual and geopolitical thinking, and discusses whether these documents had lasting influences in the strategic mind-set, the force structure, and other areas of American sea power. Overall, this work provides a deeper understanding of the crafting of US naval strategy since the final decade of the Cold War, its contextual and structural framework setting, and its application. To that end, the work bridges the gap between the thinking of American naval officers and planners on the one hand and academic analyses of Navy strategy on the other hand. It also presents the trends in the use of naval force for foreign policy objectives and into strategy-making in the American policy context. This book will be of much interest to students of naval power, maritime strategy, US national security and international relations in general.

Download or read book Sea Power written by E. B Potter and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2014-06-15 with total page 440 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A classic work covering over 2,000 years of naval history, from Greek and Roman galley warfare to Vietnam.

Download or read book Mahan on Naval Strategy written by Alfred Thayer Mahan and published by Naval Institute Press. This book was released on 2015-02-15 with total page 433 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mahan on Naval Strategy, available in paperback for the first time, provides a selection of key writings from one of the greatest naval theorists of all time. An original contributor to the study of strategic thinking, Alfred Thayer Mahan presented concepts and theories in The Influence of Seapower and his other writings that provide guidance in developing strategies to deal with the maritime challenges of the twenty-first century. With this unique collection of key articles and chapters from Mahan’s works, readers have a single, convenient reference to help them toward a full understanding of Mahan’s logic and thinking.