King’s Research Portal DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.2021.1845516 Document Version Early version, also known as pre-print Link to publication record in King's Research Portal Citation for published version (APA): W E Smith, J. (2021). New Research into the History, Theory and Practice of Naval Wargaming. Mariner's Mirror, 107 (1), 100-103. https://doi.org/10.1080/00253359.2021.1845516 Citing this paper Please note that where the full-text provided on King's Research Portal is the Author Accepted Manuscript or Post-Print version this may differ from the final Published version. If citing, it is advised that you check and use the publisher's definitive version for pagination, volume/issue, and date of publication details. And where the final published version is provided on the Research Portal, if citing you are again advised to check the publisher's website for any subsequent corrections. 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The British seapower state saw Theory and Practice of Naval wargaming as another tool in its arsenal to Wargaming repeat and renew the naval message. That message focused on advocating why Britain It is largely overlooked today that naval war­ had a Royal Navy and why Britain should gaming was a major contributing factor not have a maritime strategy. It used wargaming in only to the development of British naval a wider cultural construct that brought naval thought but also to strategic theory. In glories to life in the minds of the working academia and in government, naval wargaming classes as well as in the minds of the social has often been disregarded and its importance and political elites. The Admiralty and Navy to the development of the art and theory of war League, among other organisations, connected neglected. It has been viewed purely through the with Fleet Street to advertise wargaming and eyes of a land narrative. The disparity between reach new audiences, particularly the young. At land and sea wargaming rose to prominence relatively little expense, wargaming enabled the in 2016 when the author regenerated naval public to refight naval battles, stepping into the wargaming in the War Studies Department at shoes of Lord Nelson at the battle of Trafalgar, King’s College London, which was met with Greek and Roman trireme captains or even the an array of suspicious questions, often from admiral of a fleet which comprised the new ‘all historians. Projects on the history of wargaming big gun’ dreadnoughts that appeared in 1906. and its many branches have been undertaken Wargaming provided a new understanding of previously by the wargaming community, the seapower message, and increased interest but they failed to set their research in a wider in naval history. Wargaming connected distant context. They had become reliant on the same, global maritime campaigns and the complexities often secondary, sources as a cornerstone of of naval warfare more tangibly to the public their understanding of the history of naval war­ than existing cultural forms including paintings, gaming. To their consternation, these were some songs and academic scholarship. of the factors behind why wargamers continued It is no coincidence that wargaming emerged to face the same questions repeatedly on the for serious professional use soon after Prussian role and function of wargames. They often military historian and strategist Carl von failed to demonstrate that naval wargaming was Clausewitz’s classic text, On War, was published both a practical tool and an enabling agent for in 1832.1 Although it could be argued due to the disciplines and topics that it has supported. limited evidence that wargaming existed as far Examples could have been easily shown from back as the classical age, military wargaming the wider narrative of wargaming, and their developed predominantly in the nineteenth interpretation was not just dependent on the century. It is commonly believed that naval classified wargaming found in late twentieth­ wargaming in Britain for naval public relations and early twenty­first­century defence and as a professional tool began in 1873 with practice. With this in mind, the Society for the appearance of Lieutenant W. Castle’s Nautical Research supported a project to fill The Game of Naval Tactics (1873).2 This was a gap in knowledge and address these issues in a direct response to The British Kreigspiel a scholarly manner. Addressing these multide wargame (1872), an officially sanctioned British of imbalances, the research has identifed that Army and War Office evolution of a Prussian naval wargaming became an essential tool to nineteenth­century wargame to teach battlefield support not only historical discussion of naval tactics to its officers.3 British wargaming had topics and questions, but was also critical to the development of strategic theory. This report 1 Clauzewitz, Vom Kriege. The first English summarizes the initial findings. translation was complete in 1874. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth 2 Castle, ‘On the Game of Naval Tactics’, centuries, naval wargaming in theory and in 786–805. practice became an essential tool to support 3 Spenser­Wilkinson, ‘The Practical Value of the discussion of historical naval topics and the Wargame’, 69–88. Notes 101 Figure 1 A meeting of the Portsmouth Naval War Game Society in the Nelson Room at the ‘George’, Portsmouth (‘Strand Magazine’, 27:161, May 1904) become another front where advocates of best­known sets of wargame rules to this day. land­focused continental thought attempted to The development of naval wargaming often displace British maritime strategic policy. To paralleled naval thought, albeit slightly delayed. counter this, the Admiralty, with its significant It developed from being purely about naval influence in Whitehall (and considering that tactics to being about how naval power could be the Royal Navy reigned supreme) dismissed used as part of a wider maritime strategy. This British army officers’ fear of invasion, ensuring can be seen as game rules evolved from ship­on­ that British naval wargamers started to develop ship action to include amphibious operations, their wargames. Captain Colomb’s The Duel: blockades and convoys. A naval wargame of 1879 and Lieutenant H. Naval wargaming earned its place as an Chamberlain’s Game of Naval Blockade of educational and theoretical development tool in 1888 are early examples.4 Naval wargaming the teaching of sophisticated maritime strategy. also gained some influential support from However, it was the Fred Jane Naval Wargame Professor Sir John Knox Laughton (1830– that popularized naval wargaming with the 1915), who recognized wargaming’s utility, public and the Admiralty between 1898 and and Sir Julian Corbett (1854–1922), who linked 1906.5 Although today Fred Jane (1865–1916) wargaming to his history and strategy lessons is better known for his All the Worlds Fighting at the Royal Naval War Course at Portsmouth Ships that he also started in 1898, it was his and Devonport (figure 1). In America naval wargames and understanding of the need to officers Admiral Stephen Luce (1827–1917) and promote the naval message that was equally Captain Alfred Mahan (1840–1914) founded significant (figure 2). His cultural impact and the US Naval War College. Today the War contribution to wargaming was important. College is still actively involved in wargaming, Jane was one of the few who understood the albeit as a classified activity. An example of need to modernize advocacy for the Royal American naval wargaming is Fletcher Pratt’s Navy. Failure to modernize the message would Naval Wargame, which remains one of the leave the service vulnerable to the growing challenges to the Admiralty’s prominence in 4 Columb, ‘Broadside Fire and a Naval War Whitehall, and the loss of naval influence in Game’, 507–35; Chamberlain, ‘The Game of Naval Blockade’, 527–37. 5 The National Archives, Kew: ADM 231/44. 102 The Mariner’s Mirror Figure 2 Fred T. Jane with his famous naval wargame government. Challenges to the Admiralty and Western Approaches Tactical Unit (WATU) Royal Navy reached a conclusion between 1955 in Liverpool, helped to secure victory in the and 1964 with the abolition of the Admiralty Battle of Atlantic by using, designing, testing which was misconceived and ill­judged by and applying new methodologies to naval Earl Mountbatten (1900–79), leading to the wargaming. These outputs were quickly dis­ cancellation of Aircraft Carrier CVA­01 in seminated to the fleet and significantly shaped 1966. Jane’s naval wargame and Corbett’s use of the outcome of the battle. wargaming led to tactical and strategic exercises Although nuclear warfare challenged at the Royal Navy War College Portsmouth existing ideas about future warfare after the by 1914. This process culminated in the Royal Second World War, military wargaming became Navy Wargaming Rules of 1921, rules that indispensable when it was computerized during acknowledged the rise of military aviation and the Cold War.