Alfred Thayer Mahan - The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783

See note at end of Introductory Chapter, page 23.

The battle of Navarino (1827) between Turkey and the Western Powers was fought in this neighborhood.

A "containing" force is one to which, in a military combination, is assigned the duty of stopping, or delaying the advance of a portion of the enemy, while the main effort of the army or armies is being exerted in a different quarter.

By a base of permanent operations "is understood a country whence come all the resources, where are united the great lines of communication by land and water, where are the arsenals and armed posts."

An interesting proof of the weight attributed to the naval power of Great Britain by a great military authority will be found in the opening chapter of Jomini's "History of the Wars of the French Revolution." He lays down, as a fundamental principle of European policy, that an unlimited expansion of naval force should not be permitted to any nation which cannot be approached by land,—a description which can apply only to Great Britain.

Gougeard: La Marine de Guerre; Richelieu et Colbert.

Whatever may be thought of Clerk's claim to originality in constructing a system of naval tactics, and it has been seriously impugned, there can be no doubt that his criticisms on the past were sound. So far as the author knows, he in this respect deserves credit for an originality remarkable in one who had the training neither of a seaman nor of a military man.

La Serre: Essais Hist. et Crit. sur la Marine Française.

Lapeyrouse-Bonfils: Hist. de la Marine Française.

Jurien de la Gravière: Guerres Maritimes.

Since the above was written, the secretary of the navy, in his report for 1889, has recommended a fleet which would make such a blockade as here suggested very hazardous.

The word "defence" in war involves two ideas, which for the sake of precision in thought should be kept separated in the mind. There is defence pure and simple, which strengthens itself and awaits attack. This may be called passive defence. On the other hand, there is a view of defence which asserts that safety for one's self, the real object of defensive preparation, is best secured by attacking the enemy. In the matter of sea-coast defence, the former method is exemplified by stationary fortifications, submarine mines, and generally all immobile works destined simply to stop an enemy if he tries to enter. The second method comprises all those means and weapons which do not wait for attack, but go to meet the enemy's fleet, whether it be but for a few miles, or whether to his own shores. Such a defence may seem to be really offensive war, but it is not; it becomes offensive only when its object of attack is changed from the enemy's fleet to the enemy's country. England defended her own coasts and colonies by stationing her fleets off the French ports, to fight the French fleet if it came out. The United States in the Civil War stationed her fleets off the Southern ports, not because she feared for her own, but to break down the Confederacy by isolation from the rest of the world, and ultimately by attacking the ports. The methods were the same; but the purpose in one case was defensive, in the other offensive.

The confusion of the two ideas leads to much unnecessary wrangling as to the proper sphere of army and navy in coast-defence. Passive defences belong to the army; everything that moves in the water to the navy, which has the prerogative of the offensive defence. If seamen are used to garrison forts, they become part of the land forces, as surely as troops, when embarked as part of the complement, become part of the sea forces.

Davies: History of Holland.

République d'Angleterre.

Lefèvre-Pontalis: Jean de Witt.

Martin: History of France.

Gougeard: Marine de Guerre.

Since the above was written, the experience of the English autumn manœuvres of 1888 has verified this statement; not indeed that any such experiment was needed to establish a self-evident fact.

Chabaud-Arnault: Revue Mar. et Col. 1885.

The recent development of rapid-firing and machine guns, with the great increase of their calibre and consequent range and penetration, reproduces this same step in the cycle of progress.

Gougeard: Marine de Guerre.

Vol. lxxxii. p. 137.

Mémoires du Cte. de Guiche. À Londres, chez P. Changuion. 1743 pp. 234-264.

See Map of English Channel and North Sea, page 107.

Plate I., June 11, 1666, Fig. 1. V, van; C, centre; R, rear: in this part of the action the Dutch order was inverted, so that the actual van was the proper rear. The great number of ships engaged in the fleet actions of these Anglo-Dutch wars make it impossible to represent each ship and at the same time preserve clearness in the plans. Each figure of a ship therefore represents a group more or less numerous.

Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

Plate I., June 12, Fig. 1, V, C, R.

Plate II., June 14, Fig. 1, E, D.

Fig. 1, V, C, R. This result was probably due simply to the greater weatherliness of the English ships. It would perhaps be more accurate to say that the Dutch had sagged to leeward so that they drifted through the English line.

Lefèvre-Pontalis. Jean de Witt.

Mémoires, pp. 249, 251, 266, 267.

Chabaud-Arnault: Revue Mar. et Col. 1885.

The true significance of this change has often been misunderstood, and hence erroneous inferences as to the future have been drawn. It was not a case of the new displacing the old, but of the military element in a military organization asserting its necessary and inevitable control over all other functions.

Chabaud-Arnault: Revue Mar. et Col. 1885.

Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

Lapeyrouse-Bonfils: Hist. de la Marine Française.

Campbell: Lives of the Admirals.

Martin: History of France.

Martin: History of France.

Lapeyrouse-Bonfils.

Annual Reg., vol. xxvii. p. 10.