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Book Reviews Benjamin Armstrong. Small Boats and tion’s maritime military arm well into Daring Men. Maritime Raiding, Ir- the nineteenth century. regular Warfare, and the Early Ameri- Under these conditions Benjamin can Navy. Norman, OK: University of Armstrong examines the early Ameri- Oklahoma Press, www.oupress.com, can Navy and foregrounds his analysis 2019. xi+264 pp., illustrations, map, on the third tip of the maritime strate- notes, bibliography, index. US $34.95, gic trident, tactics of guerre de razzia, cloth; ISBN 978-0-8061-6282-9. war of raiding. The Navy did not have the ability or materiel to undertake a The early American Navy, through the guerre de d’escadre, fleet-to-fleet bat- mid-nineteenth century, was not an ef- tle. The Revolutionary era Battle of fective blue water force. Most of the Block Island Sound (1776), where a 50 or so Revolutionary-era vessels were single British vessel eluded an entire taken by the British or burned to prevent American squadron, and the destruction capture. The few that survived the war of the Penobscot Expedition (1779) are were sold out or returned to the French. prime examples of the structural and The War of 1812 produced a few sig- operational issues. Guerre de course, nal victories, but by the time the British commerce raiding, was a well known finally paid attention to North Ameri- technique that American civilians took ca, after Napoleon’s exile to Elba, the up with aplomb, seizing thousands of American Navy was bottled up in port vessels during both wars with Britain or worse. Early Republic finance was and the Quasi-War with France. With not attuned to support expenditures for rare exception, the United States had a navy with fleets commensurate to the no access to battle fleets to project na- maritime nation that the United States, tional power and commerce raiding in fact, was. During this era, the Jeffer- could effectively be accomplished by sonian gunboat navy and embargo in no privateers. It is not surprising that the way enhanced American naval prow- composition of the marine military ess. The structural deficit of ships-of- force would evolve strategies that were the-line had a distinct influence upon appropriate to the conditions at hand. the strategy and tactics of the young na- Armstrong’s monograph explores the The Northern Mariner / Le marin du nord, XXIX, No. 1 (Spring 2019), 55-105 56 The Northern Mariner / Le marin du nord under- appreciated tactics of irregular origins of early naval tactics. maritime warfare in coastal waters. As a resident of Rhode Island, this Using chronological examples of reviewer was pleased to read of the Ga- asymmetrical warfare from the Rev- spee Affair (1772), which some might olution and Quasi-War through to consider the first shots of the American America’s early nineteenth-century Revolution. Highlighted as the book’s deployments in the Mediterranean, opening vignette, a British naval officer Great Lakes, Caribbean and Indo/Pa- was shot and his vessel burned. Unfor- cific regions, Armstrong puts forward tunately, this action is reported as tak- numerous examples. Names of famous ing place at Pawtucket, which is where American captains—Jones, Talbot, a falls demarcates the Blackstone River Hull, Porter, Preble, Chauncey and De- above from the Seekonk River below. catur—and their exploits, illuminate The event actually occurred at Paw- the courage and audacity of these men. tuxet, several miles further south. This Inventors and inventions that contrib- initial geographic misidentification of uted to the advancement of naval war- two similarly named areas is a minor fare during a time of rapid material and flaw and appears to be an editorial ab- industrial growth are also presented. erration, in no way detracting from the Finally, the idea of naval officers as attention to detail that obviously went on-site diplomats is introduced while into the book. The volume is well re- focusing on interactions in the Indo-Pa- searched and fully footnoted, with bib- cific during the 1830s. liography and index for the serious re- Armstrong posits numerous themes searcher. that he believes are extant in and con- Small Boats and Daring Men is a nect to each of the selected irregular niche market monograph for the mar- warfare operations analyzed. The ideas itime trade. Those with a military explored range from local partnerships mindset should enjoy the analysis of and intelligence, to the utility of na- the strategic theory of guerre de razza. tion-state partnerships, whether former- Historians of the navy, technology and ly recognized or not. He casts a wide early American diplomacy should also net indeed, finding several other factors find something in the book to pique that link the actions under consideration their interest. Maritime historians, in through the early decades of the Amer- general, should find the topic enlight- ican Navy. Is this deep thinking too ening. Academically, the book might much, as the structure of the forces may be appealing as a text for an upper level not have been able to accomplish other or graduate course. Readers who like strategic objectives? One could suggest true adventure, and many of the raiding that pragmatism may have had as much expeditions are, to say the least, adven- influence under the circumstances. It turous, will be fascinated by the auda- might have been instructive to expose ciousness of the mariners of yore in a glaring failure of irregular warfare small boats. It would be nice if a book during this era to test the theories pro- of this quality of scholarship obtained moted. As JFK reportedly said after the an audience beyond a naval/maritime Bay of Pigs, “Victory has a thousand readership. fathers, but defeat is an orphan.” Either way, Armstrong makes well-reasoned Michael Tuttle and evidence-based arguments that Cranston, Rhode Island should get readers thinking about the Book Reviews 57 Doug Bock Clark. The Last Whalers: had its run-ins with Greenpeace and the Three Years in the Far Pacific with a World Wildlife Fund, but contemporary Courageous Tribe and a Vanishing Way Western environmental perspectives are of Life. New York, NY: Little Brown alien to them. They consider the sperm & Co., www.littlebrown.co, 2019. 368 whales rewards from the Ancestors pp., illustrations, maps, glossary, notes. for faithfully keeping to the old ways. US $15.99, CDN $19.99, paper. ISBN This does not blind them to the beau- 978-0-31639-063-7. (Audio book avail- ty or complexities of the natural world. able.) They respect these things and approach all of their hunts with a deep spiritual “Row like you want to feed your fami- connection to their prey and the interre- lies!” (4) With that exhortation ringing lated life web that we moderns can only in their ears, members of a remote Indo- envy. After a successful kill, nothing is nesian tribe pull hard after sperm whales wasted, and the hunters portion out the in the Savu Sea, harpooning them from meat so that everyone in the tribe gets a rickety bamboo platforms. The story of share. According to Clark, this practice these resilient people, known as Lama- makes the Lamalerans one of the most lerans, and their struggle to hold onto generous societies in the world. their ancient lifeways is beautifully told Clark’s focus on four families gives in this absorbing new book by journal- his narrative emotional resonance. ist Doug Bock Clark. Clark lived in- Among the more memorable characters termittently with the Lamalerans over a are Jon Hariona, an aspiring harpoon- period of three years and learned their er; his younger sister Ika, a lighthearted language, took reams of notes, conduct- girl hungry for an education; and Frans ed numerous interviews, and snapped Bediona, an elder struggling to strike 20,000 photographs in his quest to un- an intelligent balance between tradition derstand them as deeply as possible. and encroaching modernity. Perhaps The Lamalerans live on the remote the most consequential character fea- island of Lembata at the southeastern tip tured outside the four families is Salés of Indonesia. Not for nothing do other Bataona, a former town mayor and Indonesians call it “The Land Left Be- energetic entrepreneur determined to hind,” for it is 2,000 miles from main- wed his tribe to the global economy by land Asia and 600 northwest of Aus- building an ice house and a fish factory. tralia. The tribe’s 1500 members live Jon’s odyssey to become a lama- clustered by the water’s edge where they fa, the Lamaleran word for harpooner, can easily spot sperm whales migrating pits his youthful impatience against the close offshore. Perhaps 300 Lamaler- years-long realities of responsible ap- ans regularly participate in these whale prenticeship. Eager to prove himself, hunts, but their take is so modest—at he practices spearing devil rays and best 20 leviathans a year—that there is dolphins. But sperm whales are the no significant impact on this still robust prized prey, requiring close cooperation species. In any case, as Clark makes among hunters. Clark excels at describ- clear, Indonesia has not signed the In- ing these bloody encounters—leaping ternational Convention for the Regula- harpooners, thrashing flukes, roiling tion of Whaling, and even if it does, the seas, and ravening sharks. The skill and Lamalerans’ hunts would still be legal bravery of the lamafa almost beggar be- “under a clause protecting aboriginal lief. Perched at the prow of a wooden subsistence hunts.” (12) The tribe has téna, or local whaling ship, which is 58 The Northern Mariner / Le marin du nord itself considered “a living being, with Indonesian government to ban whale its soul linked to the bloodline’s Ances- hunting and push the Lamalerans into tors,” (28) the lamafa carefully chooses ecotourism.