Alfred Thayer Mahan Biography

Dictionary of Literary Biography on Alfred Thayer Mahan

In 1890 Captain Alfred Thayer Mahan, an obscure American naval officer, published a book which revolutionized the way statesmen of the world's major powers looked at the relationship of naval power, foreign policy, and national survival in a state system that was becoming increasingly volcanic. Soon translated into German, French, Russian, and Japanese, Mahan's The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 quickly became the handbook of those political and military leaders who came to believe, during the two decades before World War I, that the power, prosperity, and historical survival of the nation state (their own in particular) depended in substantial measure on policies embracing imperialism and colonialism; and that such policies related specifically to what Mahan in his book called "command of the sea." It is certainly not overstating the case to argue that The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 powerfully affected the thinking and behavior of those statesmen responsible for the outbreak of the Spanish-American War, the Russo-Japanese War, and World War I.

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