As
was perceptible in the Spanish-American war of 1898, as long
as one belligerent's fleet is intact or at large, the other is
reluctant to carry out any considerable expedition over-sea. In
fact, the command of the sea has not been secured whilst the
enemy continues to have a 'fleet in being.'[56]
[Footnote 55: _Influence_of_Sea-power_on_History_, 1890, p. 4.]
[Footnote 56: See _ante_, Sea-Power, p. 50.]
In 1782 a greatly superior Franco-Spanish fleet was covering
the siege of Gibraltar. Had this fleet succeeded in preventing
the revictualling of the fortress the garrison would have been
starved into surrender. A British fleet under Lord Howe, though
much weaker in numbers, had not been defeated and was still at
large. Howe, in spite of the odds against him, managed to get his
supply-ships in to the anchorage and to fight a partial action, in
which he did the allies as much damage as he received. There has
never been a display of higher tactical skill than this operation
of Howe's, though, it may be said, he owes his fame much more
to his less meritorious performance on the first of June. The
revictualling of Gibraltar surpassed even Suffren's feat of the
capture of Trincomalee in the same year. In 1798 the French,
assuming that a temporary superiority in the Mediterranean had
given them a free hand on the water, sent a great expedition to
Egypt. Though the army which was carried succeeded in landing
there, the covering fleet was destroyed by Nelson at the Nile,
and the army itself was eventually forced to surrender.
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