This People’s Navy: The Making of American Sea Power by Kenneth J. Hagan

Abstract

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 633 Interestingly, Omissi finds that the experience in air control did foster two innovations of some importance: low-pressure balloon tires and auxiliary fuel tanks. These are but some of the revelations to be found in this well-turned monograph. Lee Kennett Dr. Kennett is research professor of history at the University of Georgia, where he specializes in military history. Among his publications are A History ofStrategic Bombing (1982) and The First Air War, 1914-1918 (1991). This People’s Navy: The Making of American Sea Power. By Kenneth J. Hagan. New York: Free Press, 1991. Pp. xiii + 434; illustrations, bibliography, index. $27.95. Kenneth Hagan’s This People’s Navy is a thoughtful and enjoyably written history of the U.S. Navy that tells us much about the relationship between naval strategy and naval technology. Hagan stresses the conventional distinction between the guerre d’escadre and guerre de course (attempts to win the naval war either by destroying the enemy’s battle squadrons or by driving opposing commerce from the seas). According to Hagan, “The competition between these two strategies . . . constitutes the real essence of American naval history from the Revolution to the present” (p. 20). Wisely, Hagan does not try to claim victory for either school, and he is especially critical of Mahan’s claim that “history” has somehow decided in favor of the guerre d’escadre, no matter what changes take place in the technology. Unlike Mahan, Hagan is very sensitive to the ways that strategy and technology are ruled by circumstances. He is even willing to commit the ultimate naval heresy, admitting that many times it makes no difference who wins the naval war. In 1775, the American colonies resolved to fight the world’s greatest sea power. Britain proceeded to win the sea war, smashing the tiny flotillas and blockading American ports—but the Americans won anyway because defeating Britain on land was all that mattered. (Much is made of the temporary FrancoAmerican sea control won near Yorktown, but by then the war was decided; if the British army had any hope of retaking and holding territory it would never have been trapped in coastal enclaves like Yorktown.) The Spanish-American War was merely the colonial mugging of a naval invalid. Vietnam, Korea, the Mexican and Indian wars, even the War of 1812 and World War I fill out the list of wars in which the U.S. Navy played at best a supporting role. As often as not the side enjoying overwhelming naval superiority settled for less than victory, or flat-out lost. Only two major U.S. wars were in any sense decided by sea power—the Civil War and World War II. The Union navy prevented the Confeder­ ates from marketing cotton and being freely supplied by England, 634 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE dooming rebel armies to eventual defeat. World War II in the Pacific was the ultimate guerre d’escadre—the only time two major efficient steam navies have gone head-to-head, fighting to the last ship for sea control. But even these resounding naval victories left no clear strategic lessons. Both the Civil War and World War II were won by massive naval build-ups that began after fighting had broken out. In both cases, battle fleets built during peacetime had little or no effect on the war. Ironclads and aircraft carriers proved to be crucial, not the ships-of-the-line and battleships favored by peacetime navalists. The “secret” of U.S. naval success might easily be keep your navy small until you know what you will need—then build a lot of them. Given the absence of clear strategic necessity, Hagan is correct to note that naval construction is mainly shaped by domestic socialpolitical decisions. Countries build the type of navies they think they need. And Hagan is probably right when he suggests that the United States will now decide to do with even less ofa navy. As long as Germany and Japan remain disarmed at sea, the United States has no real naval rivals. The prolonged attempt to prop up the Soviets as a serious naval challenge is collapsing, and...