The fundamental issues of maritime strategy and naval power in the Mediterranean, when considered over the broad spectrum of past, present and future, clearly touch on the clash of civilizations. In terms of the millennial political situation, this includes issues of migration, the environment, geography, technology, economic power and rivalries in those fields. It also touches on the structure and interplay of international politics and international law, as well as the traditional calculation of naval strength and diplomatic manoeuvre. It is such broad and fundamental themes that are explored in this volume, the product of the third Naval War College-Yale conference on maritime and naval history.
The very name "Mediterranean," stresses context: the sea among lands. In terms of international security policy and strategy in this maritime region, this volume demonstrates that sea power has a variety of contexts. These contexts have changed over time, although many of the contemporary issues that observers emphasize today are themes that have a long history of their own. Many of these same present and future issues have supplied the context for past events in the Mediterranean, but their importance has sometimes gone unnoticed in maritime history, as the maritime side of affairs has sometimes gone unnoticed within the common discussion of other specialized themes. As several contributors to this volume have suggested, it may be our understanding and our interpretations that must be stretched to include both sides of these issues, if we are to understand fully the varied contexts and impacts of events at sea.

This introduction to the years of the Napoleonic wars (1793 to 1815) tells the story of one of the keys to that great conflict, the Ship of the Line - the deadly battleships that played such a vital role in the battles. The author describes the ships' construction and armaments, the daily life of the men who served and the problems faced by commanders of the time in battles that include the Glorious First of June, the Battle of the Nile and Trafalgar.

Marine Maxims is a collection of fifty principle-based leadership lessons that Thomas J. Gordon acquired commanding Marines over a career spanning three decades of service. Dealing with the complexities and challenges of the contemporary operating environment requires an internal moral compass fixed true. These maxims focus on developing inner citadels of character, moral courage, and the resilience to persevere in a contested domain where information is key. Its purpose is to provide future leaders with a professional development plan that will steel their resolve and enable them to lead with honor. Thematically, these maxims build upon a foundation of character, courage, and will. To be effective, a leader must model and inspire the will to persevere in the face of danger or adversity. The essence of effective leadership is credibility. A leader's credibility is derived from a congruence of competence and character. Exceptional leaders are not remembered for what they accomplished, but how they did it. Those that lead with integrity will be remembered as a leader worth following.

The relationship of the United States and Great Britain has been the subject of numerous studies with a particular emphasis on the idea of a "special relationship" based on traditional common ties of language, history, and political affinity. Although certainly special, Anglo-American cooperation arose from mutual necessity. Soybel examines the "special relationship" through a new lens--that of the most intimate of wartime collaborations, the naval intelligence relationship. Rather than looking at the uses of intelligence and espionage, Soybel explores how the cooperation was established and maintained, particularly through the creation of administrative bureaucracies, as well as how World War I and pre-war efforts helped pave the way towards wartime cooperation. The development of the wartime cooperation in naval intelligence between 1939 and 1943 highlights the best and worst of the alliance and shows both its advantages and its limitations. It demonstrates that the Anglo-American partnership during World War II was a necessary one, and its intimacy demanded by the exigencies of the total war then being fought. Its problems were the result of traditional conflicts based on economics, imperial concerns, and national interests. Its successes found their bases in individual partnerships formed during the war, not in the overall one given mythical status by men like Winston Churchill. While still giving credit to the unique alliance that has survived in the last fifty years, this study shows that the close ties were necessary, not special.

Any veteran of the United States Navy knows about "sea stories." If you served in the Navy, it is almost a 100% certainty that you've heard one (probably many more). And maybe even told "one or two" yourself. "Sea stories" and the tellers of them have all the finest attributes of oral historians that preserve the tradition and lore specific to their society. In the service (all branches) older more experienced personnel share much of their knowledge in just such a way. In their finest sense, the story carries with it a lesson learned-a small slice of experience and specific circumstance. Often leavened with humor, sometimes touching on the tragic-the cold hard facts of the risks involved. Stories connect with our own existence and adjust our thinking based on what we learn from what we hear. Good storytellers have a single intent--to touch the listener in some way. Hank McKinney does that. For those who have served you'll see bits of your own service in these stories. And I would be surprised if some of them don't bring a smile in remembrance. You will also sense the pang of separation from family, an unavoidable price paid by those who serve and their families. For those who haven't served--you'll learn much you didn't know. You'll find stories that cover the gamut of experience and responsibility, from midshipman to admiral, told in a refreshing conversational tone. Come onboard and spend some time with Hank McKinney. You'll come away with a better understanding and appreciation for the "Silent Service" and the men and women who serve. I guarantee you will learn things that you never knew about what was essentially a critical component of our front line defense during the Cold War. About the Author: Rear Admiral Henry C. (Hank) McKinney, USN (Retired) is a native of La Grange, Illinois. He graduated from Princeton University in 1959 with a degree in Engineering and a commission as an Ensign through the Naval ROTC program. He earned a Master of Science degree in Statistics from Stanford University. Originally serving in the surface Navy, he volunteered for nuclear submarine duty and served onboard both SSNs and SSBNs throughout his career including command tours and as Commander of the Submarine Force, U.S. Pacific Fleet. He has been awarded the Distinguished Service Medal with two gold stars, the Defense Superior Service Medal, both the Legion of Merit and the Meritorious Service Medal with two gold stars and the Navy Achievement Medal. He is also a past President and Chief Executive Officer of the Navy Memorial Foundation. He now lives in Minnesota and along with his faithful golden retriever reports to his shore based commander, his wife Mary. Their son is commanding officer of USS Wyoming (SSBN 742) and their daughter is a Chemistry teacher in Maryland.

This work contends that nations embroiled in Continental wars have historically had poor maritime strategies. After an analysis of existing literature on this subject and a discussion of case studies, Rear Admiral Menon develops the argument that those navies that have been involved in such wars have made poor contributions to the overall political objectives. Government neglect, inadequate funding and structures that are more appropriate to purely maritime wars are symptomatic of a universal strategic dilemma that arises from inadequate strategic theory.

Menon argues that current technological trends are likely to lead to fleets re-exerting their lost superiority against land-based means of conducting warfare, so long as the navies involved rebuild their structures to speed up the battle, since faster battle is the current strategic trend. Littoral superiority then becomes a naval objective on which to construct joint warfare.

Challenging the views of Benito Mussolini's Italian biographer, Renzo De Felice, this book argues that the Duce's aggressive war against the predominant Mediterranean powers, Britain and France, was the only means whereby Italy might secure access to the world's oceans. Following Hitler's rise to power in 1933, Mussolini actively pursued the Italo-German alliance which he believed would enable him to conquer a Fascist empire stretching from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean. By the eve of Italy's entry in the world war II, the Fascist administration had commissioned substantial new capital-ship programmes, and created a major surface and underwater fleet that seemed to post a serious challenge to the strategic position of Great Britain in the Mediterranean and Red Sea.
The study covers: the effects of Mussolini's pro-German policy on the policy-making and strategic planning of the Regia Marina; the major political, strategic and economic factors that shaped Italy's naval policy under Mussolini; the effectiveness of naval operational planning in the light of the various international crises that dominated the period before the war; and the part played by the Italian naval high command in Mussolini's quest for empire.

Despite the seemingly never-ending torrent of books about the American Civil War, relatively little has been written about the role of the United States Revenue Marine Service (now the U.S. Coast Guard) in the naval struggle against the Confederacy. The United States Revenue Cutters in the Civil War presents a ship-by-ship study of this neglected aspect of the war, from the decisions of individual cutter commanders as to which side they would take in the struggle to their ships key role in enforcing the Northern blockade of the South s coasts. The author, an expert on the early history of the Revenue Service, also tells the amazing story of the capture of the cutter Caleb Cushing by Confederates under the command of Lieutenant Charles W. Savez Read, CSN in the harbor of Portland, Maine, his daring escape, brief battle with Union ships, and the scuttling of the Cushing. This hard-to-find publication also documents the other combat actions, nautical mishaps, and ultimate fates of these unsung participants in the naval side of the Civil War.

Far Flung Lines shows how the British Empire used its maritime supremacy to construct and maintain a worldwide defence system that would protect its vital imperial interests. By combining a number of different historical threads - particularly imperial history, naval history and military history - Neilson and Kennedy rebut the idea that British defence policy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries was primarily concerned with maintaining the balance of power in Europe.

This exciting book was listed as #1 on The Advocate's (ital) bestseller list for December 1996! In The Masculine Marine, author Steven Zeeland records, for the first time ever, what active-duty Marines have to say about what it means to be a man, to be a Marine, and to desire other men. As the foremost surviving icon of traditional masculinity, Marines are often considered the opposite of "gay." Yet in contemporary gay culture, Marines are stereotyped as likely to play the passive role in sexual encounters with other men. By vividly illustrating some of the startling ways in which gay and Marine attributes can coincide, The Masculine Marine uncovers the wild sexual contradictions built into military hypermasculinity. From ordinary grunts to a major who flies a combat jet, Zeeland's Marine interviewees provide thoughtful and articulate insight into aspects of this rarely documented culture, including: homoerotic bonding among Marines how gay Marines reconcile their sexual identity with the ethos of "hard" Marine supermasculinity how some Marines eroticize the pain and humiliation of Marine Corps boot camp Marines in all-male pornography male attitudes toward women in the Marine Corps hazing and institutional violence These Marines talk candidly about what motivated them to join the United States'most elite fighting force, and they reveal how becoming Marines has shaped their sexual and gender identities. For the student of gay or military studies or anyone sexually intrigued by men in uniform, The Masculine Marine must reading. Visit Steven Zeeland at his home page: http://www.stevenzeeland.com

This unique and comprehensive account describes the interplay of internal and external factors in the emergence of the Austro-Hungarian Navy from a coastal defence force in 1904 to a respectable battle force capable of the joint operations with other Triple Alliance fleets in the Mediterranean by the eve of World War I. By 1914 the Austro-Hungarian Navy was the sixth largest navy in the world and the quality of its officers and men was widely recognised by most European naval observers at the time. The book describes the relationships between naval leaders, the heir to the throne Archduke Francis Ferdinand, and the Parliament in shaping the dual Monarchy's naval policy. It also shows how the changes in foreign policy in Italy and underlying animosities between Rome and Vienna led to a naval race in the Adriatic that eventually bolstered Germany's naval position in respect to Great Britain in the North Sea.

In Sailors and Sexual Identity, author Steven Zeeland talks with young male sailors--both gay- and straight-identified--about ways in which their social and sexual lives have been shaped by their Navy careers.Despite massive media attention to the issue, there remains a gross disparity between the public perception of "gays in the military" and the sexual realities of military life. The conversations in this book reveal how known "gay" and "straight" men can and do get along in the sexually tense confines of barracks and shipboard life once they discover that the imagined boundary between them is not, in fact, a hard line.The stories recounted here in vivid detail call into question the imagined boundaries between gay and straight, homosexual and homosocial, and suggest a secret Pentagon motivation for the gay ban: to protect homoerotic military rituals, buddy love, and covert military homosexuality from the taint of sexual suspicion.Zeeland's interviews explore many aspects of contemporary life in the Navy including: gay/straight friendship networks the sexual charge to the Navy/Marine Corps rivalry the reality behind sailors'reputations as sexual adventurers in port and at sea men's differing interpretations of homoerotic military rituals and initiations sex and gender stereotypes associated with military job specialities how sailors view being seen as sex objectsEveryone interested in the issue of gays in the military, along with a general gay readership, gay veterans, and gay men for whom sailors represent a sexual ideal, will find Sailors and Sexual Identity an informative and entertaining read.Visit Steven Zeeland at his home page: http://www.stevenzeeland.com

As lead ship of America's first "fast battleship" class, and the US Navy's newest battleship when America entered WWII, the construction of the USS North Carolina was not only a source of encouragement for a depression-wrought nation, but was also a source of pride among a fleet of aging battleships. Earning fifteen Battle Stars, the North Carolina is America's most-decorated battleship, having participated in most of the major campaigns in the Pacific during WWII. This volume documents not only the construction and wartime exploits of this historic vessel, but thoroughly explores the restored vessel, providing a great resource for the armchair historian, a keepsake for those who visit the museum ship, and a superb resource for the detailed model builder. Carefully researched photos, many of which have never before been published, are reproduced in remarkable clarity and put the reader on and beneath the decks of this historic warship. Part of the Legends of Warfare series.

Theodore Roosevelt led the charge in the 1890s for the creation of a US fleet of modern, steel-hulled, heavily-armed warships. The future president and his intellectual soul mate, Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, championed the theory of sea power to fuel America's emerging global expansion. The US victory in the Spanish-American War of 1898 vindicated these views. These essays chart the role of Roosevelt and the war in the origins of US sea power.

World War II sent the youth of the world across the globe in odd alliances against each other. Never before had a conflict been fought simultaneously in so many diverse landscapes on premises that often seemed unrelated. Never before had a conflict been fought in so many different ways - from rocket attacks on London to jungle fighting in Burma to armor strikes in Libya. It was only in time that these battles coalesced into one war. In The Second World Wars, esteemed military historian Victor Davis Hanson examines how and why this happened, focusing in detail on how the war was fought in the air, at sea, and on land-and thus where, when, and why the Allies won. Throughout, Hanson also situates World War II squarely within the history of war in the West over the past 2,500 years. In profound ways, World War II was unique: the most lethal event in human history, with 50 million dead, the vast majority of them civilians. But, as Hanson demonstrates, the war's origins were not entirely novel; it was reformulations of ancient ideas of racial and cultural superiority that fueled the global bloodbath.

Specifically structured around research questions and avenues for further study, and providing the historical context to enable this further research, Modern Naval History is a key historiographical guide for students wishing to gain a deeper understanding of naval history and its contemporary relevance. Navies play an important role in the modern world, and the globalisation of economies, cultures and societies has placed a premium on maritime communications. Modern Naval History demonstrates the importance of naval history today, showing its relevance to a number of disciplines and its role in understanding how navies relate to their host societies. Richard Harding explains why naval history is still important, despite slipping from the attention of policy makers and the public since 1945, and how it can illuminate answers to questions relating to economic, diplomatic, political, social and cultural history. The book explores how naval history has informed these fields and how it can produce a richer and more informed historical understanding of navies and sea power.

A study of the political utility of navies, meant for war, but for over 40 years used in the "violent peace" of the modern era. This book considers what navies might yet do in total war and have actually done in limited war, and it studies their use in gunboat diplomacy, showing the flag, policing the coastal estate and tackling pirates and terrorists. James Cable also looks at proxy war at sea, naval arms control and the case for ocean-going navies. James Cable has also written "Britain's Naval Future", "Diplomacy at Sea", "The Geneva Conference of 1954 on Indochina", "Gunboat Diplomacy 1919-1979", "Political Institutions and Issues in Britain" and "The Royal Navy and the Siege of Bilbao".

HMS Cavalier is a 'C'-Class destroyer, one of 96 War Emergency Programme destroyers that were ordered between 1940 and 1942. She saw action on convoy duty off Russia, and later, in 1945, was sent to the Far East where she provided naval gunfire support during the battle of Surabaya. She continued with the British Pacific Fleet until May 1946. Now designated as a war memorial to the 142 RN destroyers and 11,000 men lost during WWII, she is on display at Chatham Historic Dockyard. As is the case for many museum ships there is a surprising shortage of informative and well illustrated guides, for reference during a visit or for research by enthusiasts - ship modellers, naval buffs, historians or students. This book, in the Seaforth Historic Ship series, redresses the gap. Containing more than 200 specially commissioned photographs, the book takes the reader on a superbly illustrated tour of the ship, from bow to stern and deck by deck. Significant parts of the vessel - for example, the gun turrets and engine rooms - are given detailed coverage both in words and pictures, so that the reader has at hand the most complete visual record and explanation of the ship that exists.In addition, the importance of the ship, both in her own time and now as a museum vessel, is explained. No other book offers such superb visual impact nor brings the ship so vividly to life.

View the Table of Contents. Read Chapter 1.

Winner of the 2006 Richard W. Leopold Prize from the Organization of American Historians

Winner of the 2006 George Pendleton Prize from the Society for History in the Federal Government

aNot only has [Schneller] given us his remarkable insight into one manas story of courage, perseverance and determination, but he has framed that dramatic experience within the larger narration of American race relations in the twentieth centurya]. Anyone desiring a more complete understanding of African Americansa struggle to desegregate the armed forces will find this book indispensable.a
--"Journal of American History"

aA marvelous book. Schneller takes what might first appear to be a fairly narrow topic and offers a sweeping, well-researched account which places the question of race at the Naval Academy in the context of the Navy and the Nation.a
--"International Journal of Maritime History"

aDescribes for the first time the difficulties Wesley Brown endured and the concerted effort by a atight knota of southern upperclassmen to oust him using racial epithets, ostracism, and demerits."
--"Washington Post"

"This detailed story is one that has been long overdue in being told. Dr. Schneller has told it exceedingly well."
--"Proceedings/US Naval Institute"

"This richly researched and judiciously written study facilitates deeper comprehension of how institutional racism preserved white hegemony in the U.S. Navy until Midshipman Wesley Brown detonated its color barrier."
--Darlene Clark Hine, author of "A Shining Thread of Hope: The History of Black Women in America"

"A comprehensive and compelling work. Schneller explores thelives of the pioneering black midshipmen in intensely interesting detail."
--David P. Colley, author of "Blood For Dignity: The Story Of The First Integrated Combat Unit In The U.S. Army"

"A remarkable book. Wesley Brown's journey through the U.S. Naval Academy shortly after WWII is a story of one man's strength, perseverance and courage in forging a new era in the grand tradition of naval leadership."
--John Lehman, former Secretary of the Navy, member of the 9/11 Commission

"In well-documented detail and vivid prose, Breaking the Color Barrier captures the arduous, often tragic struggle black naval cadets were compelled to wage. This is history that rises to its memorable subject."
--William Loren Katz, author of "Black Indians: A Hidden Heritage"

"Traces the long and bitter struggle to integrate the U.S. Naval Academy. . . . "Breaking the Color Barrier" is an engrossing account of how an American institution struggled to deal with its racist past and ultimately triumphed in the fight to become integrated."
--"Shipmate Magazine"

>"A thoroughly researched, well-balanced account."
--"Choice"

Only five black men were admitted to the United States Naval Academy between Reconstruction and the beginning of World War II. None graduated, and all were deeply scarred by intense racial discrimination, ranging from brutal hazing incidents to the institutionalized racist policies of the Academy itself.

Breaking the Color Barrier examines the black community's efforts to integrate the Naval Academy, as well as the experiences that black midshipmen encountered at Annapolis. Historian Robert J. Schneller analyzes how the Academy responded to demands for integration fromblack and white civilians, civil rights activists, and politicians, as well as what life at the Academy was like for black midshipmen and the encounters they had with their white classmates.

In 1949, Midshipman Wesley Brown achieved what seemed to be the impossible: he became the first black graduate of the Academy. Armed with intelligence, social grace, athleticism, self-discipline, and an immutable pluck, as well as critical support from friends and family, Congressman Adam Clayton Powell, and the Executive Department, Brown was able to confront and ultimately shatter the Academyas tradition of systematic racial discrimination.

Based on the Navyas documentary records and on personal interviews with scores of midshipmen and naval officers, Breaking the Color Barrier sheds light on the Academyas first step in transforming itself from a racist institution to one that today ranks equal opportunity among its fundamental tenets.

This book, first published in 1990, presents a fundamental reassessment of maritime strategy. It analyses the lessons of twentieth-century naval warfare and examines in detail the changing face of naval warfare, both in terms of the weapons used and the platforms from which they are launched and controlled. It looks at the evolving uses of the seas, both economic and military, and sets sea power against the developing world environment, political, legal and economic, discussing those factors that stimulate nations to exert power at sea and those that limit their naval capabilities. It also develops a theoretical framework for future thinking about maritime strategy and forces, revises and updates Mahan's classical analysis of the foundations of sea power, and discusses thinking about naval tasks.

A New Naval History brings together the most significant and interdisciplinary approaches to contemporary naval history. The last few decades have witnessed a transformation in how this field is researched and understood and this volume captures the state of a field that continues to develop apace. It examines - through the prism of naval affairs - issues of nationhood and imperialism; the legacy of Nelson; the socio-cultural realities of life in ships and naval bases; and the processes of commemoration, journalism and stage-managed pageantry that plotted the interrelationship of ship and shore. This bold and original publication will be essential for undergraduate and postgraduate students of naval and maritime history. Beyond that, though, it marks an important intervention into wider historiographies that will be read by scholars from across the spectrum of social history, cultural studies and the analysis of national identity. -- .

This Companion is part of the Oxford Reference Collection: using sustainable print-on-demand technology to make the acclaimed backlist of the Oxford Reference programme perennially available in hardback format. The most comprehensive and authoritative reference book of its kind, The Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea was first published in 1976 to huge acclaim, hailed as 'a beguiling book' (Daily Telegraph), 'marvellous' (The Times), and 'totally absorbing' (Financial Times). This second edition was published in 2006 and brought together more than 2,600 entries on every imaginable aspect of the seas and the vessels that sail on them, from shipbuilding, yachting, diving, and marine mammals, to tidal power, piracy, and the literature and language of the sea. This edition provides significant material on topics that have come to prominence in recent times, such as oceanography and marine archaeology: key contributions on these subjects from marine expert Dr Martin Angel at Southampton Oceanography Centre include climate change, environmental issues, marine pollution, and marine wildlife. Entries added to this edition are underwater vehicles, tsunamis, warfare at sea, marine pollution, the Economic Exclustion Zone, and ship preservation. This Companion also includes authoritative and fascinating entries on maritime history: its naval battles, its great ships, from Noah's Ark and the Bounty to the Titanic and the Mary Rose; and its most famous individuals, both real and fictional, including Christopher Columbus, Horatio Nelson, and Robinson Crusoe. Entries are fully cross-referenced, and the text is illustrated with over 260 detailed drawings.

This is the only current book on maritime Djibouti, and the only one available in English since 1968. It describes the geography, naval history, and present strategic role of this small country, and indicates its possible future. Naval Strategy East of Suez includes previously little-known facts of French covert action in "Italian East Africa, 1938-1941"; and of "Operation Toreador "(1956), which served to aid Operation Musketeer. It also turns a spotlight on the Allied blockade of Djibouti in 1940-1942. In a sense, this book is a more readable, and less technical, treatment of what sailors call sailing directions.

Djibouti's naval base, 600 miles closer to the Strait of Hormuz than Diego Garcia, is the nearest base to Middle East oil centers likely to be available to France and its allies in the future--facts often ignored or unknown to all but the most specialized of specialists. Koburger believes that the troubles in the Middle East are only beginning. His book offers a background and strategy about an area little known to Anglophones that is of considerable potential usefulness.