Of Navies and Power Transition: The United States, Naval Power, and the Rise of China

Abstract

In the Age of Discovery, European powers explored, conquered, and tied together the regional systems of the world. These states—Portugal, the Netherlands, France, and England— were the first world powers and influence events around the globe based on their power projection capabilities. In jockeying for position with other competing states, establishing colonies, and subjugating tribute states, the world powers relied on one particular form of power projection: naval power. Christopher Columbus, James Cook, Bartolomeu Dias, Francis Drake, Vasco da Gama, Henry Hudson, and Ferdinand Magellan all sailed from Europe and explored Africa, South Asia, the Americas, and Oceania. If a map does not show the obvious, these men’s stories do: Europe conquered the world because it could project naval power. Indeed, Europe’s use of land power on these newly-explored continents depended on the ability of its navies to bridge the oceans between the metropoles and the colonies. Nearly seventy-five percent of Earth’s surface is water. In the international system, a blue-water navy is one of the necessary conditions to be the world’s dominant power (Organski 1968, 364).1 From time to time, the dominant state perceives a potential challenger, a rising state that is developing capabilities to rival or overtake those of the dominant power. Power transition scholars seek to shed light on the dominant state-rising state dyad to understand