Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-01-06
BY EDWARD PRICE BELL.


Admiral Mahan's large-scope induc-
ton from the major instances of history
being what it is-namely, that sea
power has determined what political
regimes should stand and what ones
should fall-it follows that he deemed
this remarkable force the conserver Of
human liberty in the modern world.
That Judgment, surely, is profoundly
arresting. 1t is exceptionally so, more
over, to those nations Gas Britain and
America) which at once have sea power
and love democracy.
Napoleon, pertinacious as well as
brilliant, intrepid and picturesque, was
an autocratic militariSt, pure and sim
pie. Personal pre-eminence was the
breath of his nostrils, and he measured
] the beauty" of battlefield by the
volume of its bloodshed. De Tocque-
vile, Frenchman, said of him: "He was
as great as man can be without vir-
tue" And Theirs, another Frenchman:
HE inundated 10000 men on the
field of battle" Woodrow Wilson called
him The enemy CT civilized mankind"
Sea Power Served Democracy.
| Not stopping here to consider, how
ever briefly, the good Napoleon did
and, admittedly, he did much-he was
despot and soldier. Land power
fought Intellectually for him. Sea
power fought effectually against him.
And sea power belonged to democratic
| England. Hence sea power, in the ire
mendous and sanguinary ordeal of the
Napoleonic era, fought for liberty and
| saved it.
Liberty for whom?
For the world, so far AS the world
had liberty-even. in the long run,
! France. There appears to be no in
stance of sea power suppressing liberty.
AS 1t is comparatively bloodless power
| it never inundated, and never could
immediate, 1000, 900 men in battle-so it
| is a power with a long and unmatched
record of affiliation with political free
| dom. The pressure Of sea power in
] war, to be sure, is remorseless, but
limited narrowly in violence. Not
, everywhere, moreover, does 1t grant I'M
restricted freedom, but nowhere does it
destroy freedom, root and branch, as so
often does land power.
England Championed Liberty.
| For many years after the Congress
of Vienna Q814), reaction ran riot in
continental Europe-area of armies
| If naval England, at that time, was
none too democratic (the British mid
4
| 1892, she nevertheless was the freeSt
state across the Atlantic. And almost
invariably (Ireland might be judged an
exception) she favored political liberal
| ism beyond her own borders.
| Englands expansion and the freeing
! Of slaves were coeXtenSive. For genera
tons virtually owning the sea. she was
potential mistress of the world. Yet it
was during those years that Belgium
| no ind
Italy achieved her unity, the Latin
American countries escaped Spanish
rule. and the Monroe Doctrine came
into being as great instrument of con-
stitutionalism and peace in the Western
Hemisphere.
Where was sea power during the
American Civil War?
Lincoln's blockade of the extended
Confederate coastline is the answer.
emancipation Of the Negro race in the
United States. Without sea power, Lin
coin might have won, but who can say
so Dramatically?
I Nort1's Navy Big Factor.
The drastic restrictions of exports
and imports, as affecting Lees fate in
the field, was very substantial, If not
decisive, a factor in the warlike eff
cheney of the North. The stoppage of
the marketing of the South's cotton
alone was a body blow to the slave
States.
And what of the Spanish-American
War?
There, again, sea power played q
great role for liberty. 1t freed Cuba
Porto Rico, Guam and the Philippines
from Spanish militarism. American
military power, of course, had its part
in the war, as British and Prussian
military power had their part in the
defeat of Napoleon. But how could
American soldiers have reached the
Caribbean battlehelds, not to mention
the Far East, except by means which
were the concrete expression OF sea
power?
There may be directors to say that
America did not free the Philippine:
stopped short, indeed, of definitively
freeing Cuba-but will any one say that
those islanders are not inmeaSurably
freer than they were in the heyday Q!
Weyler?
Central Powers Land Nations.
It was almost exactly century aftel
Waterloo. however, that sea power hae
another stupendous trial of Its belliger.
ent quality in conflict with land power
In 1914 began the World War. Ger.
many and Austria Hungary, in tina
. struggle, symbolized land power. The!
had the greatest military machine, botf
in itself and in the moral and physica
factors allied with it, ever constructed
|, On the other side, headed by Britain
were the naval powers, relatively i'll
prepared in all the values which go Il
perfect the fighting worth OF nations
Land power in this case, as in tn
classic precedent of the nineteenth cen
: fury was intensely autocratic ant
militarist. 1t had behind it so years o
: philosophical and technical prepare
I ton for war and was out to impos
! its conception of civilization upon tn
; world. It struck with that swiftnes
and terrific force which the circum
! stances made natural High hope ami
r mated it. All the ponderables said
! .l.n,,ia ,,-irn pninrn tntlu do afnef1n be