tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post1054989022734633513..comments2024-03-29T18:17:34.956+11:00Comments on Thinking Out Aloud: Empires of the Silk Road (2): the rise of the maritime empiresLorenzohttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-46089609656744092612010-08-20T22:55:17.569+10:002010-08-20T22:55:17.569+10:00Nigel, your comment misses my point. It is not tha...Nigel, your comment misses my point. It is not that the Royal Navy and the US Navy combined did not have naval dominance, it was that there was not a single hegemonic navy. American and British policy in the 1919-1942 period was simply not sufficiently coordinated for there to be a joint hegemony, so it was the period between the fading of one naval hegemon and the rise of another.Lorenzohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00305933404442191098noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2197051945822486684.post-44998154128276993042010-08-20T16:32:38.083+10:002010-08-20T16:32:38.083+10:00You talk of a gap in western maritime hegemony bet...You talk of a gap in western maritime hegemony between 1914 and 1945. There was none really, except 1942-3. <br /><br />The Royal Navy - with allies - won the First World War handsomely, and the postwar settlement guaranteed it's continuance. (Though the Japanese were rightly annoyed at the American insistence on the abandonment of the Anglo-Japanese alliance which had made it even more secure. This would eventually cause a two ocean failure of the type that had only threatened in parts of the North Atlantic in wartime in 1917.)<br /><br />Even the Second World War did not challenge this global free trade all that effectively until late 1941, when the combination of Japan finally destroying the Asian system almost led to the Royal Navy losing the Atlantic system (mainly through the disastrous 'second happy time' along the US East Coast).<br /><br />By mid 1944 the Anglo-sphere had regained control, and all is set to continue as usual. (Note - the USN and it's allies, from the RN in the forties to NATO, the Commonwealth navies and Japan more recently.)<br /><br />I would also note that even the RN in the 19C did not have the power to stop all piracy and war problems. (Look at the greatest block on free trade - the US civil war!) Any more than the US navy now has the power to simultaneously intimidate China, North Korea, the Gulf, the East African Coast, and the problem states in the Mediterranean. (Let alone a resurgent Russia or an angry India.) The problem is the same it always was. Not that the US navy, or RN, could not do it if they wanted to, but that the US, or British, taxpayer was never willing to let them.<br /><br />Nevertheless the only serious challenge to ongoing western naval hegemony is the two year period when the West is in conflict with itself, and AT THE SAME TIME as the East explodes.Nigel Daviesnoreply@blogger.com