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The accepted narrative of the interwar U.S. Navy is one of transformation from a battle-centric force into a force that could fight on the “three planes” of war: in the skies, on the water, and under the waves. The political and cultural tumult that accompanied this transformation is another story. Ryan D. Wadle’s Selling Sea Power explores this little-known but critically important aspect of naval history. After World War I, the U.S. Navy faced numerous challenges: a call for naval arms limitation, the ascendancy of air power, and budgetary constraints exacerbated by the Great Depression. Selling Sea Power tells the story of how the navy met these challenges by engaging in protracted ...
The Diffusion of Military Power examines how the financial and organizational challenges of adopting new methods of fighting wars can influence the international balance of power. Michael Horowitz argues that a state or actor wishing to adopt a military innovation must possess both the financial resources to buy or build the technology and the internal organizational capacity to accommodate any necessary changes in recruiting, training, or operations. How countries react to new innovations--and to other actors that do or don't adopt them--has profound implications for the global order and the likelihood of war. Horowitz looks at some of the most important military innovations throughout hist...
In an increasingly urbanized world, urban terrain has become a greater factor in military operations. Simultaneously, advances in military technology have given military forces sharply increased capabilities. The conflict comes from how urban terrain can negate or degrade many of those increased capabilities. What happens when advanced weapons are used in a close-range urban fight with an abundance of cover? Storming the City explores these issues by analyzing the performance of the US Army and US Marine Corps in urban combat in four major urban battles of the mid-twentieth century (Aachen 1944, Manila 1945, Seoul 1950, and Hue 1968). Alec Wahlman assesses each battle using a similar framewo...
Occasionally, during times of peace, military forces achieve major warfighting innovations. Terry Pierce terms these developments 'disruptive innovations' and shows how senior leaders have often disguised them in order to ensure their innovations survived. He shows how more common innovations however, have been those of integrating new technologies to help perform existing missions better and not change them radically. The author calls these 'sustaining innovations'. The recent innovation history suggests two interesting questions. First, how can senior military leaders achieve a disruptive innovation when they are heavily engaged around the world and they are managing sustaining innovations? Second, what have been the external sources of disruptive (and sustaining) innovations? This book is essential reading for professionals and students interested in national security, military history and strategic issues.
In 1914, the armies and navies that faced each other were alike right down to the strengths of their companies and battalions and the designs of their battleships and cruisers. Differences were of degree rather than essence. During the interwar period, however, the armed forces grew increasingly asymmetrical, developing different approaches to the same problems. This study of major military innovations in the 1920s and 1930s explores differences in exploitation by the seven major military powers. The comparative essays investigate how and why innovation occurred or did not occur, and explain much of the strategic and operative performance of the Axis and Allies in World War II. The essays focus on several instances of how military services developed new technology and weapons and incorporated them into their doctrine, organisation and styles of operations.
This book examines America's evolving strategy on the international security environment, and comprehensively analyzes how different strategies position states to compete in the present and future, manage risk, and prevail despite uncertainty.
Edited collection of 16 case studies of why and how nations have conducted commerce raiding in the 18th through 20th centuries.