The Influence of Sea Power Upon History (Mint Editions (Military Narratives and Nonfiction))

The Influence of Sea Power Upon History (1890) is a work of naval history and strategy by Alfred Thayer Mahan. Drawing on decades of experience as a naval officer, researcher, and university lecturer, Mahan develops his theory of sea power in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in this popular and important text. Despite a lack of primary sources, The Influence of Sea Power would prove essential to the expansion of European and American imperialism through the use of naval might and has been cited as one of the most influential works of the nineteenth century. “The history of Sea Power is largely, though by no means solely, a narrative of contests between nations, of mutual rivalries, of violence frequently culminating in war.” For Alfred Thayer Mahan, there was no greater indicator of national might throughout history than control of the planet’s oceans. In this detailed study of the subject, drawn from years of research and lectures given at the Naval War College in Rhode Island, Mahan traces the influence of sea power on such conflicts as the English Revolution and the Seven Years’ War to argue that supremacy of the seas coincides with global commercial and political dominance throughout history. Immediately successful, The Influence of Sea Power Upon History would justify the expansion of imperialism as well as shape the naval arms race between Great Britain and Germany in the years preceding the First World War.

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Alfred T. Mahan (1840-1914) was an American naval officer and historian. Born in West Point, New York, Mahan was the son of a United States Military Academy professor. Despite his military background, Mahan enrolled in the Naval Academy after two years at Columbia University and graduated second in his class in 1859. For the next several years he served on the frigate Congress before joining the Pocahontas. Commissioned as a lieutenant during the Civil War, Mahan sailed on the USS Worcester and James Adger, earning a series of promotions that would culminate with his ascendance to the rank of captain. As commander of the USS Wachusett, he defended American interests in Callao, Peru in the waning months of the War of the Pacific. Mahan later worked as a lecturer of naval history and tactics at the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island. Encouraged by College President Rear Admiral Stephen B. Luce, he developed the research and lectures that would eventually become his highly influential studies of sea power, including The Influence of Sea Power upon History (1890) and The Life of Nelson: The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain (1897). Central to his academic work was the theory that sea power is an essential aspect of national greatness and historical prowess. Despite a lack of evidence and dependance on secondary sources, Mahan’s work was used to justify European and American imperialism in Africa and Asia and earned him an international reputation as a leading strategist and intellectual of the nineteenth century.