The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783
(After an already long and distinguished career in the nav...)
After an already long and distinguished career in the naval forces, Captain Mahan sat down one day in Lima, Peru to contemplate an overall theory of what contributed to and shaped the exercise of power over the seas. At the time, land travel was still relatively slow, air travel on any scale was fantasy but the sea offered endless opportunity as well as near endless risk. This book is a considered and reflective account of his ideas on power at sea.
The Influence of Sea Power Upon the French Revolution and Empire, 1793-1812
(If this were so, an analysis of the course of events thro...)
If this were so, an analysis of the course of events through a series of years, directed to show the influence of Sea Power upon History, would at least serve to imbue his hearers with an exalted sense of the mission of their calling; and might also, by throwing light upon the political bearings of naval force, contribute to give the service and the country a more definite impression of the necessity to provide a fleet adequate to great undertakings, lest, if an occasion should arise for what he has ventured to call statesmanship directing arms, we should be found unprepared, through having no sufficient armed force to direct. In avowing this as the original, and, for a time at least, almost the sole motive of his work, the author practically confesses that he at the beginning had no scientific appreciation or reasoned knowledge of the naval history of the past.
The Interest of America in Sea Power, Present and Future
(Alfred Thayer Mahan, a maritime historian, examines the U...)
Alfred Thayer Mahan, a maritime historian, examines the United States relationship with naval forces in the past, and attempts to forecast the country's future as a naval power. Writing at the close of the nineteenth century, Mahan realized that the United States was at the threshold of becoming a major world power. Its burgeoning influence and continental expansion already subsumed substantial portions of the west and east coasts of the North American continent.
The Problem of Asia: Its Effect upon International Politics
(The Problem of Asia, the celebrated American naval histor...)
The Problem of Asia, the celebrated American naval historian and strategist, Alfred Thayer Mahan, analyzes the geopolitical structure of world politics at the dawn of the twentieth century.
Alfred Thayer Mahan was an American naval officer, historian and writer. He also was President of the Naval War College at Newport, Rhode Island from 1886 to 1889.
Background
Alfred Thayer Mahan was born on September 27, 1840, in West Point, New York, United States. He is the son of Dennis Hart and Mary Helena Mahan. His father was an officer at the United States Military Academy at West Point and a professor of civil and military engineering.
Education
After 2 years at Columbia College Alfred entered the United States Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1856, graduating second in his class in 1859.
After graduating from the Naval Academy, Alfred Mahan received his first assignment on the frigate Congress, a massive warship used to help escort other smaller ships. Mahan's life in the navy was not pleasant, though he remained enlisted for the majority of his career because he felt it was the only profession for which he was trained. With the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861, Mahan was made a lieutenant and began serving along the Atlantic coast. While on duty he realized that he actually feared the sea and was frequently overcome with sea sickness. His dislike for the navy in general, which began while at the Naval Academy, surfaced during his sea duty assignments, when he grounded ships and even had collisions while in command. Nevertheless, in 1865, Mahan was promoted to lieutenant commander and then, in 1885, to captain.
Mahan wrote his first book, The Gulf and Inland Waters, a naval history of the Civil War, while working as navigation officer at the New York Navy Yard in Brooklyn. He agreed to write the book when approached by Charles Scribner’s Sons publishing house only because he desperately needed the money. A precise history of the navy that is based on official records and individual accounts of both Union and Confederate soldiers, the book was well received among military and civilian readers.
In July 1884, Captain Stephen B. Luce, founder of the Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, offered Mahan a faculty position to teach naval history and tactics. At sea at the time of the offer, Mahan officially accepted, but did not begin teaching until 1886. Captain Mahan spent the months prior to teaching in New York City, where he researched and prepared for lectures that would focus on the necessity of a country to acquire complete control of the sea. The lectures from his first four years were later published as The Influence of Sea Power upon History, 1660-1783. Mahan argued in his second book that the United States needed to expand into overseas territories if the country wanted to be a great maritime power and claimed that all of the components were already there to do so, but that they just needed to be put in place. The book was extremely popular, bringing him international recognition, and from its success, Captain Mahan became known as a leading naval theorist.
In 1890, he published an article, “The United States Looking Forward,’’ in the December issue of Atlantic Monthly, the first of many articles in which he called for the United States participation in international trade and politics. In 1892 Mahan published two books. The first, The Influence of the Sea Power upon the French Revolution and Empire 1793-1812, he wrote while serving as president of the Naval War College. Here he argued that the United States needed to develop a strong navy and expand outward, modeling his argument on the Royal Navy’s defeat of Napoleon. The second book, Admiral Farragut, portrayed Admiral David G. Farragut as a saintly figure and received much criticism for his naive representation.
A year later, Mahan was sent off to sea again and ordered to command the U.S.S. Chicago, a tour that took him to England and the Mediterranean. Soon after the Chicago returned to New York in 1896, Mahan retired from the Navy and began to write articles for popular magazines in order to supplement the $3,375 annual retirement he received from the navy. Mahan's magazine articles covered current military events in the United States and abroad. Seventy-one of Mahan’s one hundred and seven articles written after he retired were collected and republished as books, including The Interest of America in Sea Power, Lessons of the War with Spain and Other Articles, and The Problem of Asia and Its Effects upon International Policies. He continued writing books after retiring, the most popular of which was The Life of Nelson: The Embodiment of the Sea Power of Great Britain.
In 1898 Mahan was called into active duty again to serve on the Naval War Board during the Spanish American War. The opportunity created many possibilities for his literary career. McClure's magazine, Century magazine, and the New York Journal compeled strongly with each other for Mahan to write a series of articles. In the end, Mahan chose McClure’s. Similar opportunities followed: The Boer War led to a book The Story of War in South Africa, 1899-1900, and the Russo-Japanese War led to five articles in Cobtier’s Weekly. In 1906, Mahan became a rear admiral on the retired list. He died of a heart attack on December 1, 1914.
Mahan was reared as an Episcopalian and became a devout churchman with High Church sympathies. In later life, Mahan often spoke to Episcopal parishes. In 1899, at Holy Trinity Church in Brooklyn, Mahan emphasized his own religious experience and declared that one needed a personal relationship with God given through the work of the Holy Spirit.
Views
Quotations:
"Having therefore no foreign establishments, either colonial or military, the ships of war of the United States, in war, will be like land birds, unable to fly far from their own shores. To provide resting places for them, where they can coal and repair, would be one of the first duties of a government proposing to itself the development of the power of the nation at sea. "
"Whether they will or not, Americans must now begin to look outward. The growing production of the country demands it."
"War, once declared, must be waged offensively, aggressively. The enemy must not be fended off; but smitten down. You may then spare him every exaction, relinquish every gain, but 'til then he must be struck incessantly and remorselessly."
"Organized force alone enables the quiet and the weak to go about their business and to sleep securely in their beds, safe from the violent without or within."
Membership
Mahan was a member of the Philolexian Society debating club, American Historical Association.
Connections
Alfred Thayer Mahan married Ellen Lyle Evans in June 1872. They had two daughters and one son.