To Rule the Waves
To Rule The Waves. How the Royal Navy Shaped the Modern World, by Arthur Herman.
My review:
The title overstates what the book is about, but if you are a bit of a British or naval history fan, this is a wonderful book to read. The "over-statement" part comes from the fact that the book does not in fact go into great detail about how the Royal Navy shaped the modern world. It makes that claim and offers good arguments for it, but they are not detailed arguments and they are not the meat of the book. The meat of the book is a history of the Royal Navy, from its beginnings in piracy, slave-trading, massacre and general high seas criminality (at least by later standards; standards enforced by the Royal Navy itself) to its final decline and fall in the postwar era (presided over, for a crucial period of time, by First Sea Lord, Lord Mountbatten, who performed the same service for another pillar of the British empire! though Herman does not bring up this interesting co-incidence).
The author (an American, who also wrote the very interesting "Gandhi and Churchill", as well other books I have not read) is not politically correct and goes out of his way to show this in his unabashed hero-worship and his straightforward admiration (as long as they were successful) of daring or resourceful ventures, no matter whether they were piratical or imperialist; but he also goes out of his way to describe them (and their consequences) warts and all, without any attempt to hide or underplay the horrors. This may not be enough to satisfy many postmodern readers, but I was happy that as long as you read on, you almost always get all sides of every story.
And this is a surprisingly comprehensive effort. Not just the adventurers and commanders and admirals, but also the intellectuals (including John Dee, Astronomer, mathematician and very prescient naval and imperial strategist!), the bureaucrats (Samuel Pepys is honored in great detail) and the ordinary seamen, get their due. The famous pre-20th century battles are all covered in detail, with the most hagiographic treatment (factually balanced, tonally hagiographic) being reserved of course for Nelson, climaxing with a detailed description of Trafalgar. While most of his hero-worship is factually accurate and the hyperbole is kept within bounds, he does go overboard with his comparison of Nelson with Napoleon, not just as wartime commanders but as a world historical figures, which is a bit too much.
The wars of the 20th century are described relatively broadly, though Jutland is covered in detail; as is "operation Catapult" and the sinking of the Repulse and the Prince of Wales in WW2. Otherwise, famous actions are generally covered in a few lines and sometimes not even mentioned (as with the battle of the River Plate, skipped completely).
The book ends with the Falklands war, told entirely from an elegiac British point of view, but given all that came before, perhaps this too should be excused.
Definitely worth reading if you are interested in the topic or in British history and recent world history in general (concurrent world events and politics is covered fairly well along with the naval story).
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