Mahan on Naval Strategy: Selections from the Writings of Rear Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan

by John B. Hattendorf (Editor)

Book by

Genres: History, War

395 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1911

About the author

Professor John Brewster Hattendorf is the Ernest J. King Professor Emeritus of Maritime History, a chair he occupied at the U.S. Naval War College from 1984 to 2016. He served as chairman of the College’s Advanced Research Department from 1986-2003, chairman, Maritime History Department and director of the Naval War College Museum from 2003-16. A former surface warfare officer, he earned his degrees in history from Kenyon College (A.B., 1964), Brown University (A.M., 1971) and the University of Oxford (D.Phil., 1979; D.Litt., 2016).

Reviews

[Allie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Father of naval analysis.

[Cassandra Williamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mahan was the quintessential naval strategist and thinker whose thinking is applicable today. The very best.

Cassandra

[Nate Huston · Rating 3 out of 5]

Had some good stuff BURIED in there. Certainly there were some lessons that were more applicable than hearing from Jomini about how if I just attacked line JHG in the region of AAAA with interior lines and with my bases of operation both in parallel and perpendicular to my line of operation, I would seize the initiative. Mahan's thoughts on strategy vis-a-vis (he loves that) seapower are perhaps more applicable to today's environment that contains more than the dreary ground situation in which Clausewitz, Jomini and Moltke reveled. Warfare in air/space/cyberspace adjust the paradigm to a similar extent.

That said, this dude LOVES HIM SOME HISTORICAL EXAMPLES. And despite rereading a few times, I am going to have to place a big old WTF across pages 295-319. All I got out of that was something about the Mediterranean. And Great Britain. I think.

BL: Good nuggets buried. Very interesting with regard to sea power, some applicability to air/space/cyberspace power.

[Chantel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Basically Jomni at sea. Mahan seemed to be more of a historian and not that interested in selling his theory because it was all over the place and you had to pick the pieces out of his history lesson.