Command of the sea

“ Here again we may discern some of the larger implications of that potent and far-reaching agency of naval warfare, the command of the sea. If a belligerent not aiming at the command of the sea, and having no sufficient naval force wherewithal to secure it, thinks to crush his enemy by directing sporadic attacks on his commerce, he will, if history is any guide, soon find out his mistake. His naval forces available for this purpose, are, by the hypothesis, inferior to those of the enemy. ”

“ But so long as the enemy possesses forces that actually disturb the tranquil enjoyment of sea communications, command is certainly qualified, and if he have in reserve unused and unimpaired forces for attacking and defeating the fleet which secures command, the command of the sea cannot be said to be unconditionally possessed. ”

“ This being so, it is evident that the greater operation of invasion cannot be attempted, much less carried to a successful termination, by the side which cannot make head against the opposing fleet. Command of the sea is the indispensable preliminary condition of a successful military expedition sent across the water. It enables the nation which possesses it to attack its foes where it pleases and where they seem to be most vulnerable. ”

“ By winning command of the sea we remove that barrier from our own path, thereby placing ourselves in position to exert direct military pressure upon the national life of our enemy ashore, while at the same time we solidify it against him and prevent his exerting direct military pressure upon ourselves. ”

“ The command of the sea which makes the exercise of53 these menaces possible, is, as we have seen, the fruit of victory over the enemy’s armed forces. But if that enemy is weaker and follows at sea the course which, as we have seen, an army inferior on land must adopt, viz., declines battle and withdraws his fleet behind defences to postpone it, he thereby to a great extent surrenders the sea command to the stronger. And if the stronger knows his business, he at once uses this command to subject his opponent to the economic disadvantages set out above. ”

“ In a war which is both naval and continental, as in the present war, command of the sea means much more than the power to deny the gain and comfort of sea supplies. The side that is defeated at sea, or avoids fighting for fear of defeat, may lose not only everything which can come to it directly or indirectly from the use of ships, but will suffer from the added disadvantage that a military use can be made of sea communications in the enemy’s possession. ”

“ Nevertheless, the French naval officers did succeed in conveying the greater part of the expeditionary army to a point at which disembarkation was practicable.
Now we have some lessons to learn from this. The advantages conferred by command of the sea must be utilised intelligently; and it was bad management which permitted an important anchorage to remain for more than a fortnight in the hands of an invading force. We need not impute to our neighbours a burning desire to invade us ”

“ An army, variously estimated at from one to five million men, crossed the Hellespont on a bridge of boats to invade the peninsula from the north, while a fleet of 1200 triremes was assembled to insure the command of the sea. ”

“ The command of the sea which we have thus enjoyed has not only enabled our trade to be carried on practically without interruption or serious disturbance, but we have been able to move freely about the world very large numbers of troops. ”

“ Here you will find the young men of gentle birth who govern in our fighting ships, forgetting their own physical miseries, in the brave effort to make the severe conditions more tolerable to the crews they command. Do their dimmed eyes often in the steaming night turn wistfully westward to the cool green English country-side, where the old home lies embowered amid the ancestral oaks? ”

“ If, on the other hand, we have no sufficient promise of our passive attitude effecting what is required to turn the scale, then it may be well to consider the possibility of bringing our Command of the Sea to bear more actively. ”

“ If Great Britain succeeds in getting into close proximity to the hostile fleet with an adequateSeeking the enemy’s fleet. force of her own, her foe cannot obtain command the of the sea, or of any part-of it, whether that part be the Mediterranean or the English Channel, at any rate until he has defeated her. If he is strong enough to defeat her fleet he obtains the command of the sea in general ”

“ Naval warfare, therefore, logically includes operations for the purpose of gaining, maintaining, or disputing command of sea areas, especially under conditions where freedom of movement and the keeping open of sea communications are of vital importance. ”

“ In the smaller operations of war temporary command of a particular area of water may suffice for the success of an expedition, or at least will permit the execution of the preliminary movements. When the main fleet of a country is at a distance—which it ought not to be except with the object of nearing the opposing fleet—a small hostile expedition may slip across, say the Channel, throw shells into a coast town or burn a fishing village, and get home again unmolested. ”

“ The command of fleets and of single vessels was often given to soldiers, to military men unaccustomed to the sea, and ignorant how to handle the ship, that duty being intrusted to another class of officer. ”

“ The boats were equipped, the paddles were in place, and the sailors with their cutlasses, crouching low in the narrow bows, were ready to do and die.
At the word of command our flotilla of sea-root canoes emerged in two divisions from behind the stern and bow of the Happy Shark. At a rapid rate our boats advanced toward the moving spar, which had now turned and was headed directly for our ship. The voice of the commander of the attacking party could be distinctly heard as he gave orders to his men. ”

“ In all ages the naval commander who sought to achieve his purpose by avoiding battle went to disaster. The true objective must be, now as always, the destruction of the enemy's fleet.
Such are the material and the spiritual essentials of sea power. ”

“ If the sea force of the side possessing command includes means of engaging stationary defences with success, and removing passive sea defences from the approaches to the enemy’s coast and harbours, then it can even beat down the enemy’s coast protection and invade him directly. ”

“ The command of the small vessels thus employed fell largely into the hands of men who had dropped hopelessly out of the race of life, while their more fortunate competitors were scattered on distant seas, and in better ships. ”

“ The ship was named the Bounty: I was appointed to command her on the 16th of August 1787. ”

“ So amid the falling hours of the day the British fleet, under the unswerving impulse of its leader, moved steadfastly forward, to meet a combination of perils that embraced all most justly dreaded by seamen,—darkness, an intricate navigation, a lee shore fringed with outlying and imperfectly known reefs and shoals, towards which they were hurried by a fast-rising wind and sea, that forbade all hope of retracing their steps during the long hours of the night. ”

“ We want at once a navy for our rivers and creeks and bays and sounds; a navy consisting chiefly of vessels that, for the most part, will only be required to keep the sea for a few days at a time.” These ships would be so small as to present little more than a feather-edge as a target to the enemy, and therefore be more invulnerable than the best shot-proof men-of-war. ”

“ When closely looked at, it is one of the strangest manifestations of the spirit of modern navies that, though the issues of land warfare are rarely thought instructive, the peace methods of land forces are extensively and eagerly copied by the sea-service. ”

“ The watching fleets of the present day have none of the charm and change to occupy their mind which accompanied the sailing-ship navy, making and shortening sail, trimming sails, tacking, and wearing, necessary for cruising on the look-out. There were no air-vessels, mines, submarines, or torpedoes in the old days, no under-water warfare. The strain upon officers and men of the sea-going fleet in these days is terrific: nothing to occupy their thoughts as in the days of sailing-ships. ”

“ Naval warfare in the past, in its origin and through long ages, had been waged with vessels moved by oars, which consequently, when conditions permitted engaging at all, could be handled with a scope and freedom not securable with the uncertain factor of the wind. The motive power of the sea, therefore, then resembled essentially that of the land,—being human muscle and staying power, in the legs on shore and in the arms at sea. ”

“ The share of navies in the great movements which have moulded human destiny and shaped the world’s progress, although long obscure and undervalued, has met in our time full recognition. Within a decade the influence of sea power upon history has become the frequent theme of historians and essayists who, in clear and striking form, have shown the cardinal importance, both in war and commerce, of the fleet—the nation’s right arm on the sea. ”

“ At length, as the sun rose, we got before the wind, and it soon moderated so far that we could carry reefed topsails and foresail; and away we all bowled, with a clear, deep, cold, blue sky, and a bright sun overhead, and a stormy leaden-coloured ocean with whitish green-crested billows, below. The sea continued to go down, and the wind to slacken, until the afternoon, when the commodore made the signal for the Torch to send a boat's crew, the instant it could be done with safety, on board the dismasted ship to assist in repairing damages and in getting up a jury-foretopmast. ”

“ The military function of a navy is to control the sea, so far as the sea contributes to the maintenance of the war. The sea is the theatre of naval war; it is the field in which the naval campaign is waged; and, like other fields of military operations, it does not resemble a blank sheet of paper, every point of which is equally important with every other point. ”

“ Gently rolling and heaving on the surge of a summer sea lay a mighty fleet of war-vessels. There were the capital ships of the Atlantic Fleet, grim dreadnoughts with their superimposed turrets, their bristling broadsides, their basket-masts—veritable islands of steel. There were colliers, hospital-ships, destroyers, patrol-vessels—in all, a tremendous demonstration of our sea power. ”

“ The object of all the former voyages to the South Seas undertaken by the command of his present majesty, has been the advancement of science and the increase of knowledge. ”

“ Yet it is the hope of the authors that they have not, for that reason, slighted the significance of the story. Naval history is more than a sequence of battles. Sea power has always been a vital force in the rise and fall of nations and in the evolution of civilization. ”

“ The truth is, that in all the larger achievements of sea power—those, that is, to which a combination of naval and military force is indispensable—it is impossible to disengage the influence of one of these factors on the final issue from that of the other, and perhaps idle to attempt do to so. ”

“ Along the bulwarks of the ship, fore and aft, hung rows of large painted wooden shields, which gave an Argus-eyed aspect to the craft. Between them was a double row of thole-pins for the great oars, which now lay at rest in the bottom of the boat, but by which, in calm weather, this "walker of the seas" could be forced swiftly through the yielding element.
VIKING SHIPS AT SEA.
Near the stern, on an elevated platform, stood the commander, a man of large and powerful frame and imposing aspect, one whose commands not the fiercest of his crew would lightly venture to disobey. ”

“ In a sea war, as in all others, two things are from the first essential,—a suitable base upon the frontier, in this case the seaboard, from which the operations start, and an organized military force, in this case a fleet, of size and quality adequate to the proposed operations. ”

“ We are minded to watch them prepare for battle, and even accompany them into the fight, noting the activities, the perils, and the hardships of the seamen, the clever tactics, the moves and counter-moves, the customs of the sea and of the ship especially. Over boundless, deep-furrowed oceans not sighting land for weeks; or in short coasting voyages hurrying from headland to headland before impending tempest ”

“ Every vessel of the Navy that will, when she puts to sea, is, if she desires it, furnished with a sufficient quantity of sounding-twine, carefully marked at every length of one hundred fathoms — six hundred feet — and wound on reels of ten thousand fathoms each. It is made the duty of the commander to avail himself of every favorable opportunity to try the depth of the ocean, whenever he may find himself out upon “blue water.” For this purpose he is to use a cannon ball of thirty-two pounds as a plummet. ”

“ Now there are sails fluttering on every sea, prodigious steamers throbbing like leviathans against wind and wave; harbors are built, and rocks and shoals removed; lighthouses gleam nightly from ten thousand stations on the shore; the great deep itself is sounded by plummet and diving-bell; the submarine world is disclosed; and man is gathering into his hands the laws of the very winds that toss its surface. ”

“ As before, the sea received the tumbling maze of spars, rigging, and sails; the vessel surging at the same instant, from its recumbent position, and rolling far and heavily to windward.
"She rights! she rights!" exclaimed twenty voices which had been mute, in a suspense that involved life and death.
"Keep her dead away!" added the calm but authoritative voice of the young commander. "Stand by to furl the fore-top-sail—let it hang a moment to drag the ship clear of the wreck—cut, cut—cheerily, men—hatchets and knives—cut with all, and cut off all!" ”

“ Its outward and visible sign is a navy, strong in the discipline, skill, and courage of a numerous personnel habituated to the sea, in the number and quality of its ships, in the excellence of its matériel, and in the efficiency, scale, security, and geographical position of its arsenals and bases. History has demonstrated that sea-power thus conditioned can gain any purely maritime object, can protect the trade and the communications of a widely extended empire, and whilst so doing can ward off from its shores a formidable invader. ”