The Rise and Fall of British Naval Mastery - Couverture souple

First published in 1976, this book is the first detailed examination of the history of British sea power since A.T. Mahan's classic The Influence of Sea Power on History, published in 1890. In analyzing the reasons for the rise and fall of Great Britain as a predominant maritime nation in the period from the Tudors to the present day, Professor Kennedy sets the Royal Navy within a framework of national, international, economic, political and strategical considerations.

To this new paperback edition the author has added a new introduction that brings the discussion of naval power up to date, with special emphasis on today’s enormous U.S. Navy as the prime contemporary example of the use of naval forces to wield global influence.

"As soon as it appeared in 1976, Paul M. Kennedy's magisterial survey of the historical role and significance of British seapower was recognized by serious naval historians as a work of the first importance. The book's publication in paperback provides an opportunity to recommend it to students of international relations, for its main objective is to place British naval power in broad geopolitical context. This is by far the most important survey of British naval history since Sir Herbert Richmond's Statesmen and Sea Power (1946) and in some ways it is more important."

—International Historical Review