Soviet Naval Doctrine and Policy, 1956-1986


Book Description

En omfattende undersøgelse og analyse af den sovjetiske flådepolitik og flådedoktrin fra 1956-1986. Den sovjetiske flådes chef admiral S.G. Gorshkov ændrede i sin tid som flådechef den sovjetiske flåde fra at være en "kystflåde" til at være en moderne flåde, der kunne operere overalt i verden på lige fod med andre stormagts flåder.




Soviet Naval Doctrine and Policy, 1956-1986


Book Description

Dr. Herrick shows in this detailed book the arguments with which Admiral Gorshkov managed to change the Soviet Navy from the coastal force coastal mind-set that he inherited to the ocean-going fleet with, perhaps, an ocean-going mentality that he handed over to his successor. More important than the ships, aircraft, their sensors and weapons, was the navy's new wartime mission: no longer confined to providing support directly to the army, it was also to dispute and deny to the United States and its allies the use of the seaward approaches to the Soviet Union.




Conceptualizing Maritime & Naval Strategy


Book Description

Großmachtkonflikte, die Zukunft von sicherheitspolitischen Institutionen sowie transnationalen Generationenherausforderungen bergen eine neue globale Unsicherheit. Vor diesem Hintergrund bekommen maritime Sicherheit und Seestreitkräfte sowie deren Einordnung im außenpolitischen Werkzeugkasten eine zunehmende Bedeutung. Was sind die Rollen und Einsatzaufgaben von Seemacht, und wie haben Staaten und ihre Institutionen maritime Ziele, Mittel und Wege konzeptualisiert? Dieser Sammelband bringt ausgewiesene Experten aus den USA, Europa und Asien zusammen, die ihre Perspektive auf maritime Strategie teilen. Das Buch dient gleichzeitig die Festschrift für Peter M. Swartz, Kapitän zur See a.D. der US-Marine, der seit seiner Arbeit als einer der Autoren der "Maritime Strategy" (1980er) als Mentor, Freund, intellektueller Leuchtturm und vor allen Dingen als Spiritus Rektor wesentlich zur Schärfung des Verständnisses von Seestrategie in den globalen Beziehungen beigetragen hat. Mit Beiträgen von James Bergeron, Sebastian Bruns, Seth Cropsey, Larissa Forster, Michael Haas, John Hattendorf, Peter Haynes, Andrzej Makowski, Amund Lundesgaard, Narushige Michishita, Martin Murphy, Sarandis Papadopoulos, Nilanthi Samaranayake, Jeremy Stöhs, Eric Thompson, Geoffrey Till, Sarah Vogler, Steve Wills.




China Goes to Sea


Book Description

In modern history, China has been primarily a land power, dominating smaller states along its massive continental flanks. But China’s turn toward the sea is now very much a reality, as evident in its stunning rise in global shipbuilding markets, its vast and expanding merchant marine, the wide offshore reach of its energy and minerals exploration companies, its growing fishing fleet, and indeed its increasingly modern navy. Yet, for all these achievements, there is still profound skepticism regarding China’s potential as a genuine maritime power. Beijing must still import the most vital subcomponents for its shipyards, maritime governance remains severely bureaucratically challenged, and the navy evinces, at least as of yet, little enthusiasm for significant blue water power projection capabilities. This volume provides a truly comprehensive assessment of prospects for China’s maritime development by situating these important geostrategic phenomena within a larger world historical context. China is hardly the only land power in history to attempt transformation by fostering sea power. Many continental powers have elected or been impelled to transform themselves into significant maritime powers in order to safeguard their strategic position or advance their interests. We examine cases of attempted transformation from the Persian Empire to the Soviet Union, and determine the reasons for their success or failure. Too many works on China view the nation in isolation. Of course, China’s history and culture are to some extent exceptional, but building intellectual fences actually hinders the effort to understand China’s current development trajectory. Without underestimating the enduring pull of China’s past as it relates to threats to the country’s internal stability and its landward borders, this comparative study provides reason to believe that China has turned the corner on a genuine maritime transformation. If that proves indeed to be the case, it would be a remarkable if not singular event in the history of the last two millennia.




Burn Before Reading


Book Description

In this "thoughtful, entertaining, and often insightful" book, a former CIA director explores the delicate give-and-take between the Oval Office and Langley. With the disastrous intelligence failures of the last few years still fresh in Americans minds--and to all appearances still continuing--there has never been a more urgent need for a book like this. In Burn Before Reading, Admiral Stansfield Turner, the CIA director under President Jimmy Carter, takes the reader inside the Beltway to examine the complicated, often strained relationships between presidents and their CIA chiefs. From FDR and "Wild Bill" Donovan to George W. Bush and George Tenet, twelve pairings are studied in these pages, and the results are eye-opening and provocative. Throughout, Turner offers a fascinating look into the machinery of intelligence gathering, revealing how personal and political issues often interfere with government business--and the nation's safety.




Maritime Strategy and Sea Denial


Book Description

This book focuses on the theory and practice of maritime strategy and operations by the weaker powers at sea. Illustrated by examples from naval and military history, the book explains and analyzes the strategies of the weaker side at sea in both peacetime and wartime; in defense versus offense; the main prerequisites for disputing control of the sea; and the conceptual framework of disputing control of the sea. It also explains and analyzes in some detail the main methods of disputing sea control – avoiding/seeking decisive encounters, weakening enemy naval forces over time, counter-containment of enemy naval forces, destroying the enemy’s military-economic potential at sea, attacks on the enemy coast, defense of the coast, defense/capturing important positions/basing areas, and defense/capturing of a choke point. A majority of the world’s navies are currently of small or medium-size. In the case of a war with a much stronger opponent, they would be strategically on the defensive, and their main objective then would be to dispute control of the sea by a stronger side at sea. This book provides a practical guide to such a strategy. This book would be of much interest to students of naval power, maritime security, strategic studies and military/naval history.




The Royal Navy in the Cold War Years, 1966–1990


Book Description

During the period covered by this new book the Royal Navy faced some of its greatest challenges, both at sea confronting the increasingly capable and impressive Soviet Navy, and on shore when it faced policy crises that threatened the survival of much of the fleet. During this remarkable period, the Navy had rarely been so focussed on a single theater of war – the Eastern Atlantic – but also rarely so politically vulnerable. The author sets out to analyze shadowing operations and confrontations at sea with Soviet ships and submarines; the Navy’s role in the enormous NATO and Warsaw Pact naval exercises that acted out potential war scenarios; individual operations from the Falklands and the 1990–91 Gulf War to the Beira and Armilla patrols; the development of advanced naval technologies to counter Soviet capabilities; policy-making controversies as the three services fought for resources – including the controversial 1981 Nott defense review; and what life was like in the Cold War navy for ratings and officers. The book, the first to cover this subject in depth for more than thirty years, will make use of the full range of archival sources that have been publicly available over the last two decades, but of which little use has been made by historians. This work is destined to become a definitive naval history of the period, and also provide a fascinating and gripping narrative of a navy under threat from many directions but which survived and eventually prospered, winning a remarkable victory in the far South Atlantic more than 7,000 miles from its expected battleground in the North Atlantic. Elegantly written for a wide audience, it will be a very significant volume for professional and enthusiast alike.




Nasser's Gamble


Book Description

Nasser's Gamble draws on declassified documents from six countries and original material in Arabic, German, Hebrew, and Russian to present a new understanding of Egypt's disastrous five-year intervention in Yemen, which Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser later referred to as "my Vietnam." Jesse Ferris argues that Nasser's attempt to export the Egyptian revolution to Yemen played a decisive role in destabilizing Egypt's relations with the Cold War powers, tarnishing its image in the Arab world, ruining its economy, and driving its rulers to instigate the fatal series of missteps that led to war with Israel in 1967. Viewing the Six Day War as an unintended consequence of the Saudi-Egyptian struggle over Yemen, Ferris demonstrates that the most important Cold War conflict in the Middle East was not the clash between Israel and its neighbors. It was the inter-Arab struggle between monarchies and republics over power and legitimacy. Egypt's defeat in the "Arab Cold War" set the stage for the rise of Saudi Arabia and political Islam. Bold and provocative, Nasser's Gamble brings to life a critical phase in the modern history of the Middle East. Its compelling analysis of Egypt's fall from power in the 1960s offers new insights into the decline of Arab nationalism, exposing the deep historical roots of the Arab Spring of 2011.




A Companion to American Military History


Book Description

With more than 60 essays, A Companion to American MilitaryHistory presents a comprehensive analysis of the historiographyof United States military history from the colonial era to thepresent. Covers the entire spectrum of US history from the Indian andimperial conflicts of the seventeenth century to the battles inAfghanistan and Iraq Features an unprecedented breadth of coverage from eminentmilitary historians and emerging scholars, including little studiedtopics such as the military and music, military ethics, care of thedead, and sports Surveys and evaluates the best scholarship on every importantera and topic Summarizes current debates and identifies areas whereconflicting interpretations are in need of further study




Architects of Continental Seapower


Book Description

This book describes and analyses two iconic figures in twentieth-century naval history: the German Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz and the Russian Admiral Sergei Gorshkov. It examines the men, what they thought and wrote about seapower, the fleets they created and the strategic consequences of what they did. More broadly, it draws on the respective histories of the post-1897 Imperial German Navy and the post-1956 Soviet Navy to examine the continental bid for large-scale seapower. The work argues that both individuals built navies that did not, and could not, fulfil the objectives for which they were created. Drawing on the legacies of both men, the book also develops some wider ideas about the creation of large navies by continental states, with cautionary lessons for today’s emerging powers, India and China. Both admirals have received book-length biographies, but this is the first attempt at a comparative study and the first to draw broader strategic lessons from their respective attempts as continental navalists to challenge maritime states. This book will be of much interest to students of naval history, strategic studies and International Relations.