Sea power, Mahan said, was more than a strong navy. It was an economy that could produce goods for export. It was trade ships that could carry the goods.
All of this has depended on freedom of the seas, which in turn has depended on sea power wielded by nations-led by the United States-that believe in such freedom.
If, as is alleged, Germany entertained a notion of challenging American sea power then and there, the presence of British ships must have dispelled that dream.
Mahan wrote that all the great nations in history had possessed great sea power. He said the United States must build up its sea power, too, if it wanted to be a great nation.
Though the German fleet failed to come out and challenge the sea power of the Allies, the battleships of the United States were always ready to do their full duty in such an event.
Within a few months, Spain, remembering the steady decline of her sea power since the days of the Armada and hoping to drive the British out of Gibraltar, once more joined the concert of nations against England.
Both the Department of State and the Navy Department were fully conscious of the strategic relation of the islands to the growth of sea power and watched with anxiety any developments likely to bring them under some other Dominion.