Archive Results For: Interwar
Book Review-‘Hitler’s Attack U-boats: The Kriegsmarine’s WWII Submarine Strike Force’ by J. P. Mallmann Showell,
In 1986 economic historian Corelli Barnet promoted a hypothesis that the German economy was far stronger during the Second World War than appearances may suggest. While evidence does not back this up, German submarine production was, due in no small part to the organizational skills of Albert Speer and to the system of distributed manufacturing […] Read More
Filed under: Atlantic | Interwar | WW2
Subjects include: Battles & Tactics | Submarines
Book Review-‘How Carriers Fought’ by L. Celander
While the tentative naval aerial operations of the First World War and the next two decades’ experiments and exercises had embedded the concept of sea-borne aviation, and even though steps had been taken by three major naval powers to equip their navies and devise potential tactics, it was only during the furious, testing years of […] Read More
Filed under: WW1 | Interwar | WW2
Subjects include: Battles & Tactics | Naval Aviation
Book Review-‘Castaways in Question: A story of British naval interrogators from WW1 to denazification’ by D. Nudd
This is an entertaining book. The subject matter is the work of British interrogators, principally from the navy, in obtaining information from captured German sailors in the two World Wars. The story is largely told through interesting vignettes extracted from the intelligence reports produced on the back of these interrogations. At least for the Second […] Read More
Filed under: WW1 | Interwar | WW2
Subjects include: Battles & Tactics | Strategy & Diplomacy
Book Review-‘Warship Builders: An industrial history of naval shipbuilding, 1922–1945’ by T. Heinrich
This wide-ranging book straddles a range of topics. It will be useful to informed general readers interested in warships and shipbuilding, as well as to economic historians considering the role of the state in wartime. The title (and subtitle) might have been more specific, as much the largest part of the book is about American […] Read More
Filed under: Interwar | WW2
Subjects include: Navies | Shipbuilding & Design | Weapons
Book Review-‘Warships After London: The end of the treaty era in the five major fleets, 1930–1936’ by J. Jordan
Warships After London, John Jordan’s follow-up to 2011’s excellent Warships After Washington, aims to continue the story of naval fleet developments into the 1930s, and more specifically to cover the crucial years of the London Treaty of April 1930. This book, perhaps even more so than its predecessor, captures a period of rapid technological change. […] Read More
Filed under: Interwar
Subjects include: Navies | Shipbuilding & Design | Strategy & Diplomacy
Book Review-‘Churchill’s Admiral in Two World Wars: Admiral of the Fleet Lord Keyes of Zeebrugge and Dover GCB KCVO CMG DSO’ by J. Crossley
This is the first biography of Roger Keyes for some decades and fills a surprising gap in the literature. Keyes had a hugely successful career and was an archetypal son of the British Empire. Born in India in 1872, where his father was commander of the Punjab Frontier Force, he was one of nine children. […] Read More
Filed under: WW1 | Interwar | WW2
Subjects include: Biography
Portugal and the Spanish Civil War at Sea, 1936–1939
At the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in July 1936, Portugal was already monitoring the political situation in Spain very closely since left-leaning Republican governments were seen to pose a major threat to the regime of António Oliveira Salazar (1889–1970), the dictatorial ruler of Portugal. The ensuing conflict, which would set the standard for […] Read More
Filed under: Atlantic | Interwar
Subjects include: Battles & Tactics | Navies | Strategy & Diplomacy
Bellingshausen in Britain: Supplying the Russian Antarctic expedition, 1819
In August and September 1819 the first Russian Antarctic expedition, commanded by Captain Bellingshausen, visited Britain to purchase navigational and scientific instruments, charts and books. Using documents in the Russian Naval Archives, this article describes the visit in detail and reflects on what this information tells us about the framing of the expedition and the […] Read More
Filed under: Interwar | Antarctic
Subjects include: Logistics | Science & Exploration
Book Review-‘Spoils of War: The fate of enemy fleets after the two World Wars’ by A. Dodson and S. Cant
This most interesting new publication by Aidan Dodson and Serena Cant has been aimed at filling a long-noted gap in the histories of the fleets of the defeated nations of the First and Second World Wars after hostilities had ceased, describing the ultimate fates of the surrendered vessels by destruction and accident. It serves as […] Read More
Book Review-‘Trading by the Wind: Sea diaries 1919–1923’ by G. Wicksteed, edited by B. Tyler
Godfrey Wicksteed (1899–1997) came from a prominent dissenting family with Quaker connections, so it is no surprise that he became a conscientious objector in the First World War, though taking the option of enlisting in what was still the Merchant Service was not common. There his service was as deck boy and ordinary seaman with […] Read More
Filed under: Interwar
Subjects include: Biography