America No Longer Rules the Waves

Mr. Kaplan is a writer and an analyst of U.S. military and foreign affairs.

Alfred Thayer Mahan, a 19th-century naval officer and pre-eminent military strategist, believed his young country was destined to be great because of its Navy. Toward the end of his service, Mahan, then a U.S. Navy captain, wrote a landmark book about the age of sailing ships. Read avidly by kings, prime ministers and presidents — including Theodore Roosevelt, Kaiser Wilhelm II and the young Winston Churchill — the book posited the idea of a free world anchored by American sea power.

Mahan believed America needed a large number of ships to fight decisive battles and to keep sea lanes open and international commerce flowing. This vision, which was both humanitarian and self-serving, soon came to pass, starting with the........

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