The Navy as a Fighting Machine

The naval machine, including the various vessels of all kinds, the bases and the personnel, having been designed, put together, and prepared for its appointed task of conducting...

Mahan proved that sea power has exercised a determining influence on history. He proved that sea power has been necessary for commercial success in peace and military success in...

In the preceding chapter it was pointed out that the work of preparing the naval machine for use could be divided into two parts: preparing the existing fleet and preparing the...

John Clerk, of Eldin, Scotland, never went to sea, and yet he devised a scheme of naval tactics, by following which the British Admiral Rodney gained his victory over the French...

The nature of naval operations necessitates the expenditure of fuel, ammunition, and supplies; wear and tear of machinery; fatigue of personnel; and a gradual fouling of the bot...

The most important element connected with a navy is the strategy which directs it, in accordance with which all its plans are laid--plans for preparation before war and plans fo...

Strategy is difficult of definition; but though many definitions have been made, and though they do not agree together very well, yet all agree that strategy is concerned with t...

Because the question is widely discussed, whether peace throughout the world may be attained by the friendly co-operation of many nations, and because a nation's attitude toward...

Every country that has a satisfactory navy has acquired it as the result of a far-seeing naval policy, not of opportunism or of chance. The country has first studied the questio...

In a preceding chapter I endeavored to show why it is that the necessities of the naval defense of a country have caused the gradual development of different types of vessels, e...

There has never been a time since Cain slew Abel when men have not been compelled to devote a considerable part of their energies to self-defense. In the early ages, before larg...

In order to realize what principles govern the use of navies, let us first consider what navies have to do and get history's data as to what navies in the past have done. It wou...