"Maps by Bill Nelson"--Copyright page. Includes bibliographical references (pages 453-496) and index.
Contents:
Part I. Setting the stage. Prologue: Sea power and the sweep of history ; Warships and navies before 1939 ; Geography, economics, and geopolitical writings -- Part II. Narrative of the great naval war, 1939-42. The early war at sea, September 1939-July 1940 ; The European war at sea, July 1940-December 1941 ; A war in every sea, 1942 -- Part III. The critical year of 1943. Allied control of the seas, 1943 ; The shift in global power balances, 1943-44 -- Part IV. Narrative of the great naval war, 1944-45. Triumph of allied sea power, 1944 ; The allied victory at sea, 1945 -- Part V. Aftermath and reflections. Navies and naval powers in World War II: an audit ; Epilogue: The sweep of history -- Appendices. 1943: The pivotal year of the way, by three measures. Appendix A. Sinking U-boats in the dark, May 6, 1943 ; Appendix B. A hypothetical causation-chain from a bauxite mountain in Suriname to air-sea victory in the Western Pacific, 1943-1944 ; Appendix C. America as number one: overall warship tonnages of the powers, 1930-60.
Summary:
"In this engaging narrative, brought to life by marine artist Ian Marshall's beautiful full-color paintings, historian Paul Kennedy grapples with the rise and fall of the Great Powers during World War II. Tracking the movements of the six major navies of the Second World War--the allied navies of Britain, France, and the United States and the Axis navies of Germany, Italy, and Japan--Kennedy tells a story of naval battles, maritime campaigns, convoys, amphibious landings, and strikes from the sea. From the elimination of the Italian, German, and Japanese fleets and almost all of the French fleet, to the end of the era of the big-gunned surface vessel, the advent of the atomic bomb, and the rise of an American economic and military power larger than anything the world had ever seen, Kennedy shows how the strategic landscape for naval affairs was completely altered between 1936 and 1946"-- Amazon.com.
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