British Naval History

To understand why British naval policy in the Far East was so unsuccessful when the Japanese entered World War II, the author takes the reader back to the end of World War I and examines the roots of British naval strategy.

During this period of sixty years, the Royal Navy went through a series of profound changes, responding to financial constraint in the 1930s, the challenge of World War II, the changing world order & the consequent refocusing of the service, as well as huge technical developments.

Using a number of case studies based upon key Royal Navy operations in the 20th century, Ian Speller discusses the enduring principles of maritime power & examines the strengths & limitations of maritime forces as instruments of national policy.

After three months of war the British admiralty realised that the Great War would last a long time. The Royal Navy was charged with preventing Germany receiving an enlarged list of goods. Eric Osborne analyses the impact of the British blockade which is nowadays considered to have been a success.

The purpose of this book is two-fold. First, it presents in a single place a coherent account of the tumultuous naval events that took place in the Eastern Mediterranean between 1940 and 1945, during World War II. Second, it aims to demonstrate in an interesting fashion what naval warfare in the narrow seas is really like.

Alastair Finlan is a Lecturer in Strategic Studies in the Department of International Politics at Aberystwyth University. He has also lectured at the American University in Cairo, Britannia Royal Navy College, Keele University and Plymouth University.

Andidora tells the story of four men who successfully commanded battlefleets in the 20th century: Japan's Heihachiro Togo, England's John Jellicoe, and America's William Halsey and Raymond Spruance. This study provides personality profiles and detailed accounts of their major battles. Analyzing their command decisions based on what each commander knew or could have reasonably inferred at the time decisions were made, Andidora compares their accomplishments to those of Horatio Nelson, who delivered stunning naval victories for England during the Napoleonic Wars. However, he concludes that the Nelsonian standard is inappropriate in the modern naval environment due to the increased size and technological complexity of modern fleets and the political imperative to preserve costly and strategically significant naval assets.

In the introduction to this study of British anti-submarine capability in the inter-war years the author emphasizes that not one exercise in the protection of a slow mercantile convoy against submarine attack took place between 1919 and 1939. The British reliance and confidence in ASDIC was almost fatal.