Seablindness: How America is Surrendering its Command of Seas

by Seth Cropsey

The challenges to American security in the Western Pacific, the seas that surround Europe, and the Persian Gulf are growing. At the same time, U.S. military commanders seek more naval forces to protect America's interest in the safe transit of American goods, deterrence in a proliferating world, and the defense of our key allies. At the same time U.S. defense budgets are shrinking. American seapower has not been as small as it is today since before World War I. Unless reversed, U.S. seapower will continue its decline into the indefinite future as politicians ignore the widening gulf between the cost of modernizing and expanding American seapower, and the resources devoted to this most strategic arm of the nation's defense. Seablindness explains the dilemma. It looks at the consequences of neglect including the effect of increased deployments on families, global scenarios set in the immediate future, the views of America's most knowledgeable military officers, the anxious reactions of U.S. allies, and hard facts to show how a lack of political will is dismantling the nation's global reach and with it, our position as the world's great power.

296 pages, Hardcover

Published August 8, 2017

Reviews

[Shane · Rating 2 out of 5]

Seablindness is essentially a Neocon diatribe against the Obama Administration, specifically taking issue with reductions in US Navy power going back to the early 90s. The contradictions inherent between pinning this on Obama and the fact that the trend was long standing by 2009 is never resolved. Mr. Cropsey apparently thought that Mr. Obama should reverse the course set by Bush, Clinton and Bush and suddenly start dumping massive funds into Navy spending, something completely contrary to the political and economic reality that brought him to the White House.

And that's barely scratching the surface of the bias and lack of critical thinking. This book is ripe with fluffing of (then incoming) President Trump and full of scenarios that sound less likely than the better Tom Clancy novels. This was a one-star book for me until the last chapter (pp. 335-53) which is a fairly cogent essay on American exceptionalism and military power. It's not an essay I much I agree with, but at least its points are fairly well made.

Not recommended unless you think the best place to spend trillions of dollars is build ships that likely will never be used to preserve a US hegemony that was never actually true, and the time for which has definitely passed. If you can find Chapter 13 (The Morality of Defense) online read that part only and you'll have absorbed the book's redeeming feature.

[David Todd · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seth Cropsey has hit the nail on the head with this book. We are a maritime state and we have been able to keep our enemies far from our coasts with a powerful Navy for decades. However, with recent budget cuts, cancelled projects, and generally taking our military edge for granted, we have found ourselves getting closer and closer to being a hollow military. Mr. Cropsey even covers how budget cuts have affected our Marine Corps and our military families. This book is a must read for our military leaders today!

[Matthew N · Rating 5 out of 5]

Seth Cropsey articulates a potent defense of the restoration and prioritization of American seapower, complete with compelling data, personal accounts and calls to reason. The underlying foundation of his argument shines forth in the final chapter.