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Home , Alfred Thayer Mahan, Stephen Luce, USS Chicago (1885)

The Influence of Upon History

Frank B. Cook Bi-County Collaborative Franklin, MA

Seminar on Teaching American History: Year 3

Dr. Peter Gibbon September 27, 2012 Cook 2

As students of history we clearly understand how the outcome of the

resonated through succeeding generations of Americans, most notably in the civil rights struggle

of the second half of the 20th Century. Now, as we near the midpoint of the sesquicentennial of

that event, it is similarly interesting to note how an inconspicuous naval ,

who played a relatively obscure role in that conflict, had a profound impact not only on

America’s later rise to world power, but also on political and military leaders of other nations.

Indeed it can be argued that his influence continues to be exerted even today.

The naval officer in question is Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840-1914) who, in 1890,

published the results of his extensive study of history, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History,

1660-1783. Mahan’s scholarly effort, in preparation for a teaching assignment at the Naval War

College in Newport, Rhode Island, lead him to prepare an unprecedented account of “the effect of sea power upon the course of history and the prosperity of nations” (Mahan, v-vi). His research revealed a correlation between a nation’s naval policy and their success, or ultimate failure, as a nation. Mahan clearly linked the importance of sea power and command of the seas

to the commercial and military success of a nation. His primary example was Britain, a nation

which understood these principles long before Mahan canonized them, who became the major

maritime power for several centuries. In some respects it can be argued that like a good

historian, Mahan recognized the importance of learning from the past in order to influence the

future and was determined to see that his country and his learned these lessons.

It is important to remember that Mahan’s thesis and subsequent book was initially designed to provide instruction on to the next generation of officers serving in the

United States Navy. Accordingly it can be argued that he did not realize the potential,

revolutionary significance of his book. In addition, Mahan’s wartime experience, and the post-

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war positions he held, placed him in a unique position to assess the status and level of

preparedness of America’s naval branch. The late 19th Century world witnessed numerous

changes, a time when steam-powered, steel ships replaced wooden sailing vessels, all occurring

against a background of growing nationalist fever. Of greater concern from a military viewpoint

was the failure of the United States to develop and maintain a naval force equipped to respond to

the challenges of the age.

America’s post-war history has been characterized by the rapid demobilization of men

and matériel following the cessation of hostilities, and the Civil War was no different. From a

wartime naval force of 671 ships which had fought to preserve the Union, just 147 remained

active a decade after Appomattox, many of which were no longer seaworthy. Similarly, active

duty naval personnel declined from “about 58,000 officers and men in 1865 ... to a peacetime

level of only 9,361” (Crowl, 469). British surveys conducted in both 1876 and 1881 omitted the

United States from their tabulation of major naval nations, lists which included , , and

Egypt (Cole, 4).

From a technological viewpoint the condition of America’s naval readiness was alarming.

At a time when other nations were applying new technology to ship-building and armaments, the

U.S. continued to prefer wooden ships and “smooth-bored, muzzle-loading cannons” (Crowl,

469). In 1885, the year Mahan began the research which eventually became The Influence of Sea

Power Upon History, he described the U.S. Navy as a “Quaker navy” due to the propensity of the navy to carry “‘Quaker guns,’ simulated cannons made of blackened wood” (Zimmerman,

87). At this time, Mahan was the captain of the Wachusett, an unarmored holdover from the

Civil War, powered by a combination of canvas sails and steam, whose armament boasted outdated guns. Mahan wryly noted how a visiting French naval officer informed him that the

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French Navy had formerly used such guns (Zimmerman, 85, 87). Zimmerman also records that the U.S. Navy “had even fewer armored vessels than largely land-locked Austria-Hungary” (87).

In many respects it is remarkable that Mahan was able to become one of the pre-eminent maritime strategists in military history. Although a graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, he constantly found himself at odds with the naval establishment and was viewed as a loner and complainer. A devout Christian with an enhanced awareness of righteousness, Mahan was a

“natural whistle-blower” perhaps most notably seen when he exposed corrupt practices at the

Boston Navy Yard in 1875 and criticized the secretary of the navy for allowing such conditions to exist. He was subsequently removed from the assignment and placed on half pay while awaiting reassignment, a process which took a year (Zimmerman, 85-6).

Despite opposition from the American naval establishment - including the Naval

Academy - and Congress, the opened in 1885 and Mahan was assigned to join the faculty in the fall of 1886. However, upon arrival he was appointed acting president when the college’s founder, and Mahan’s mentor, Rear Admiral , was re-assigned.

The following year, Mahan’s search for a guest lecturer on the brought him in contact with a promising, young writer and politician, . Their friendship and commonality of belief that America “needed a big navy with large ships and a global reach” would change not only the nation’s naval policy, but also its foreign policy (Zimmerman, 92).

Influence Upon the United States

From his initial study Mahan, like Theodore Roosevelt, had concluded that the naval policy of the United States was a by-product of the War of 1812. Accordingly, the nation had

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developed a navy primarily comprised of small cruisers whose primary mission was the defense

of America’s coast and the disruption of an enemy’s mercantile capability. Yet as he continued

preparing his War College lectures, reinforced by his sea experiences, he realized that this

approach did not match the results of his study on the influence of sea power on a nation’s

prosperity. Mahan understood the necessity of a large navy to protect America’s coasts, yet also

realized that such a fleet had to be comprised of and heavy cruisers capable of conducting operations in foreign waters. To complement this offensive naval strategy, Mahan recognized the need for distant naval bases. Although an avowed anti-imperialist, Mahan now realized that this stance was incompatible with his new philosophy (Zimmerman, 93).

Arguably, Roosevelt was Mahan’s greatest benefactor, who found in the naval captain a kindred spirit who prescribed to the centrality of a large, offensively-oriented fleet as the country’s preferred military defense system (Cole, 9). Throughout his political career, including service as President McKinley’s assistant secretary of the navy (1897-98) and later when he became president, Roosevelt consistently upheld Mahan’s philosophy relative to maritime policies. Roosevelt regularly consulted with him, even following the captain’s retirement.

In addition to Roosevelt, Mahan’s writings influenced the policies followed by secretary of the navy Benjamin Franklin Tracy, and his successor, Hilary Herbert, who together served between 1889 and 1897. These two individuals, as policy makers, are credited with the development of the U.S. Navy as a global power at the end of the 19th Century. The influence of

Mahan’s consultation is evident in the proposal Tracy made to President Benjamin Harrison calling for “the construction of twenty new armored battleships to be organized into two fleets.”

The result was the Naval Act of 1890 in which Harrison requested eight, but received only three, battleships (Crowl, 471).

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Herbert served as secretary of the navy during President ’s second term and came to that office as an unlikely supporter of Mahan. On an austerity drive, Herbert planned to close the Naval War College until he read Mahan’s sequel, The Influence of Sea

Power Upon the French Revolution and Empire, 1793 - 1812, published in 1892. Subsequently

Herbert read Mahan’s original Influence of Sea Power book, in which he found supporting

material for his later successful proposal to Congress for five battleships (Crowl, 471). In 1898,

the was ranked third in the world behind Britain and Germany (Zimmerman,

120) and by 1907 was second only to Britain (Cole, 4).

Mahan’s influence resonated with several members of Congress, most notably Henry

Cabot Lodge, the Republican senator from Massachusetts, who found that Mahan’s position

coincided with his desire to see the United States become a global power. In First Great

Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country a World Power, career U.S. Foreign

Service officer Warren Zimmerman identifies how Lodge effectively collaborated with

Roosevelt and Mahan to press “for a larger navy, for the acquisition of Caribbean and Pacific

bases, and for a war with Spain” (120).

In 1939, U.S. Navy Captain William Puleston stated, “today, in the American Navy,

every officer who prepares for or discusses war, follows the methods and invokes the ideas of

Mahan” (Crowl, 475). Evidence of this is apparent in the adoption of the Orange Plan, the U.S.

strategy developed earlier in the century for a future war with Japan. A key concept of this

strategy was the single, climactic battle espoused by Mahan. Based on Mahan’s theory, it was

assumed that the Philippines would be captured early in the war and that the U.S. Navy would

subsequently engage and destroy the main Japanese fleet, ending the war in three or four months.

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In the interwar decades this scenario was played out at the Naval War College 127 times

(Kennedy, 534-535).

Influence Upon Foreign Nations

Yet Mahan’s influence was not restricted to the United States. The Influence of Sea

Power Upon History was simultaneously published in Britain, where it was well-received and further encouraged that nation’s naval rebuilding program which had recently begun following a period of decline originating in the 1850’s (Cole, 11). On his last voyage in 1893-94 as of the USS , Mahan visited several ports in Europe and was graciously received, particularly in England where he was invited to dinner with Queen Victoria and her grandsons, the later King Edward VII and Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II, and received honorary degrees from Cambridge and Oxford (Zimmerman 117, Crowl, 447).

Germany’s Kaiser Wilhelm II was exceptionally enthusiastic about the book and claimed he was trying to memorize it. He further reported that it was “on board all my ships and constantly quoted by my Captains and officers” (Crowl, 473). Alfred Tirpitz, a self-proclaimed disciple of Mahan, recognized that Germany needed a “powerful navy, with a strong force of battleships at its core” in order to become a world power. In 1897, the Kaiser appointed Tirpitz state secretary and by the end of March the following year he had gotten the First Navy Bill approved by the Reichstag. This measure, which authorized construction of nineteen battleships and eight armored cruisers, was followed three years later by the Second Navy Bill doubling the size of the German fleet to thirty-eight battleships and twenty armored cruisers (Massie, 9).

Mahan’s book was similarly received to great acclaim in Japan where a copy was presented to the emperor and crown prince and an imperial edict placed the book in every school in the nation. More importantly it “was adopted as a text in all Japanese naval and military

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Tsuchima, validating the strategy advocated by Mahan (Herman, 473). Subsequently, the

Imperial Japanese Navy began planning for a future war with the United States, again based on

Mahan’s theories.

Their plan called for the capture of Guam and the Philippines, which would draw the U.S. naval fleet across the Pacific, where after being harassed in route, it would encounter an overwhelming superior Japanese force and be destroyed (Kennedy, 533).

Influence Upon the Post-World War II World

To be fair, Mahan’s theories were not totally followed either by the United States or any other nation. For example, the War in the Pacific, although periodically fought in accordance with the dictums of Mahan, never witnessed the expected climatic battle both the Empire of

Japan and the United States prepared for during the interwar period. However, as the world entered the Cold War era Mahan’s “core concepts - deterrence, sufficiency, detente, globalism -

... were to return as principles of American foreign policy” (Zimmerman, 115).

More recently, historian Jon Sumida has argued that Mahan’s theory should be viewed not as naval supremacy by a single nation, but rather as a “transnational naval consortium protecting a large and growing system of international trade.” He finds support for this position in Mahan’s discussion of the relationship between the United States and Britain in which both countries embrace his mutual policy of “global political-economic developments” (Sumida, 108).

Although Mahan’s extensive writings of books and articles on naval strategy were not completely adhered to, it is clear that he had a profound effect on the political and military leaders who make policy, not only in the United States but also in other nations. Although this influence was most notable at the turn of the last century, his impact is present in the new

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century. Mahan rightly earned his place among the great military strategists in history and his

philosophy continues to be a source of inspiration for naval leaders and discussion among

historians. His writings were not only read but also adopted and applied in the development of naval strategy and foreign policy, a profound influence that very few figures in history can similarly claim.

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Bibliography

Cole, Bernard D. Maritime Strategy in the Twentieth Century: Alfred Thayer Mahan and Julian S. Corbett. (lecture, Norwich University, Northfield, VT, April 4, 2011).

Crowl, Philip A. “Alfred Thayer Mahan: The Naval Historian,” in Makers of Modern Strategy from Machiavelli to the Nuclear Age, ed. Peter Paret. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986.

Herman, Arthur. To Rule the Waves: How the British Navy Shaped the Modern World. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, Inc., 2004.

Kennedy, David M. Freedom From Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929- 1945. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.

Mahan, Alfred Thayer. The Influence on Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783. New York: Dover Publications, 1987. Originally published by Little, Brown, and Company, Boston, 1890.

Massie, Robert K. Castles of Steel: Britain, Germany, and the Winning of the Great War at Sea. New York: Random House, 2003.

Sumida, Jon Tetsuro. Inventing Grand Strategy and Teaching Command: The Classic Works of Alfred Thayer Mahan Reconsidered. Washington, DC: The Center Press, 1997.

Zimmerman, Warren. First Great Triumph: How Five Americans Made Their Country A World Power. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2002.