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Britain's War At Sea, 1914-1918
In Britain, memory of the First World War remains dominated by the trench warfare of the Western Front. Yet, in 1914 when the country declared war, the overwhelming expectation was that Britain’s efforts would be primarily focussed on the sea. As such, this volume is a welcome corrective to what is arguably an historical neglect of the naval aspect of the Great War. As well as reassessing Britain’s war at sea between 1914 and 1918, underlining the oft neglected contribution of the blockade of the Central Powers to the ending of the war, the book also offers a case study in ideas about military planning for ’the next war’. Questions about how next wars are thought about, planned for and conceptualised, and then how reality actually influences that thinking, have long been - and remain - key concerns for governments and military strategists. The essays in this volume show what ’realities’ there are to think about and how significant or not the change from pre-war to war was. This is important not only for historians trying to understand events in the past, but also has lessons for contemporary strategic thinkers who are responsible for planning and preparing for possible future conflict. Britain’s pre-war naval planning provides a perfect example of just how complex and uncertain that process is. Building upon and advancing recent scholarship concerning the role of the navy in the First World War, this collection brings to full light the dominance of the maritime environment, for Britain, in that war and the lessons that has for historians and military planners.
238 pages, Hardcover
Published May 10, 2016
About the author
Greg Kennedy
25 booksGreg Kennedy is an independent scholar and received his PhD in Philosophy from the University of Ottawa.
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July 4, 2024
A great book, providing a series of essays on how Britain’s leadership envisioned fighting World War I in the years prior to the conflict and how those policies and concepts worked in execution. The editor, foreign policy professor Greg Kennedy, assembles a wide array of subjects in these essay. The topics covered include relations with neutral powers, plans for economic warfare, technological advancement, and decisive naval engagements. Economic warfare, in particular, receives wide coverage, both with dedicated chapters and as a major theme within chapters focusing on foreign affairs. The book does not delve too closely in the tactical questions of the dreadnought age, though topics of concentration, span of control, and the means of tactical evolution are discussed. Kennedy and the other authors continually drive home the unanticipated expansion of this Great War and the importance of organizational flexibility. They make the point that the ability of British institutions to evolve and react were key factors in overcoming a material parity (and sometimes even inferiority) with Germany, especially when the neutral powers constrained Britain’s favorable geographic position. Highly recommended for any strategic thinker in an era of globalized great power competition.
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