If we need instances
we have only to peruse the history of the British Empire.
[Footnote 90: Though raids rarely, if ever, decide a war, they
may cause inconvenience or local distress, and an enemy desiring
to make them should be obstructed as much as possible.]
How was it that--whilst we landed invading armies in many hostile
countries, seized many portions of hostile territory, and drove
more than one enemy's commerce from the sea--our own country has
been free from successful invasion for more than eight centuries,
few portions of our territory have been taken from us even
temporarily, and our commerce has increased throughout protracted
maritime wars? To this there can only be one answer, viz. that
the arrangements for defence were effectual. What, then, were
these arrangements? They were comprised in the provision of a
powerful, well-distributed, well-handled navy, and of a mobile
army of suitable strength. It is to be observed that each element
possessed the characteristic of mobility. We have to deal here
more especially with the naval element, and we must study the
manner in which it operates.
Naval war is sea-power in action; and sea-power, taken in the
narrow sense, has limitations. It may not, even when so taken,
cease to act at the enemy's coast-line, but its direct influence
extends only to the inner side of a narrow zone conforming to that
line. In a maritime contest each side tries to control the ocean
communications and to prevent the other from controlling them.
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