Contemporary Authors

1. Sea power : the history and geopolitics of the world's oceans LCCN 2016056758 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James, author. Main title Sea power : the history and geopolitics of the world's oceans / Admiral James Stavridis, USN (Ret.). Published/Produced New York : Penguin Press, 2017. Description 363 pages : maps ; 25 cm ISBN 9780735220591 (hardcover) CALL NUMBER V25 .S73 2017 Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER V25 .S73 2017 CABIN BRANCH Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 2. Division officer's guide LCCN 2017005172 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James, author. Main title Division officer's guide / ADM James Stavridis, USN (Ret.), and RADM Robert Girrier, USN (Ret.), with CDR Jeffrey Heames, USN, and CDR Thomas Ogden, USN. Edition Twelfth edition. Published/Produced Annapolis, Maryland : Naval Institute Press, [2017] Description xxiii, 366 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm. ISBN 9781682471722 (hardcover : alk. paper) CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 2017 CABIN BRANCH Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 3. The leader's bookshelf LCCN 2016050134 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James, author. Main title The leader's bookshelf / Adm. James Stavridis, USN (Ret.) and R. Manning Ancell. Published/Produced Annapolis, Maryland : Naval Institute Press, [2017] Description x, 269 pages ; 24 cm ISBN 9781682471791 (hardcover : acid-free paper) CALL NUMBER Z6724.L4 S73 2017 CABIN BRANCH Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 4. The accidental admiral : a sailor takes command at NATO LCCN 2014017304 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title The accidental admiral : a sailor takes command at NATO / Adm. James Stavridis, USN (Ret.). Published/Produced Annapolis, Maryland : Naval Institute Press, [2014] Description xvi, 246 pages, 24 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm ISBN 9781612517049 (hardcover : acid-free paper) CALL NUMBER E745.S675 A3 2014 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms Shelf Location FLM2016 070011 CALL NUMBER E745.S675 A3 2014 OVERFLOWJ34 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLM2) 5. Command at sea LCCN 2010022121 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Command at sea / James Stavridis, Robert Girrier. Edition 6th ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, c2010. Description x, 387 p. : ill. ; 24 cm. ISBN 9781591147985 (acid-free paper) CALL NUMBER VB203 .S73 2010 Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms Shelf Location FLM2013 002523 CALL NUMBER VB203 .S73 2010 OVERFLOWA5S Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms (FLM1) 6. Partnership for the Americas : Western Hemisphere strategy and U.S. Southern Command LCCN 2010019557 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Partnership for the Americas : Western Hemisphere strategy and U.S. Southern Command / by James Stavridis. Published/Created Washington, D.C. : National Defense University Press : For sale by the Supt. of Docs., U.S. G.P.O., 2010. Description xxiii, 263 p. : col. ill. ; 23 cm. ISBN 9780160870422 CALL NUMBER JZ6009.L29 S73 2010 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER JZ6009.L29 S73 2010 FT MEADE Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 7. Destroyer captain : lessons of a first command LCCN 2007032046 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Destroyer captain : lessons of a first command / James G. Stavridis. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, c2008. Description xii, 201 p. : ill. ; 21 cm. ISBN 9781591148494 (alk. paper) 1591148499 (alk. paper) Links Table of contents only http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip0724/2007032046.html CALL NUMBER V63.S73 A1 2008 Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER V63.S73 A1 2008 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms 8. Watch officer's guide : a handbook for all deck watch officers LCCN 2006100914 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Watch officer's guide : a handbook for all deck watch officers / James Stavridis and Robert Girrier. Edition Fifteenth ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, 2007. Description xiv, 416 p. : ill., maps ; 22 cm. ISBN 9781591149361 (alk. paper) 1591149363 (alk. paper) Links Table of contents only http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip076/2006100914.html CALL NUMBER V133 .S72 2007 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER V133 .S72 2007 Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms 9. Division officer's guide LCCN 2004015760 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Division officer's guide / by James Stavridis and Robert Girrer. Edition 11th ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, c2004. Description 357 p. : ill. ; 20 cm. ISBN 1591147999 Links Table of contents http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip0420/2004015760.html Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy1306/2004015760-b.html Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy1306/2004015760-d.html CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 2004 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 2004 Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms 10. Command at sea LCCN 98038781 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Command at sea / James Stavridis and William P. Mack. Edition 5th ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, c1999. Description xii, 466 p. : ill. ; 20 cm. ISBN 1557508410 (alk. paper) CALL NUMBER VB203 .S73 1999 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER VB203 .S73 1999 FT MEADE Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE CALL NUMBER VB203 .S73 1999 FT MEADE Copy 3 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 11. Division officer's guide LCCN 95014860 Type of material Book Personal name Stavridis, James. Main title Division officer's guide / by James Stavridis. Edition 10th ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, 1995. Description xii, 333 p. : ill. ; 20 cm. ISBN 1557501637 (alk. paper) CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 1995 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 1995 FT MEADE Copy 2 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 12. Division officer's guide LCCN 88029130 Type of material Book Personal name Noel, John Vavasour, 1912- Main title Division officer's guide / by John V. Noel, Jr. and James Stavridis. Edition 9th ed. Published/Created Annapolis, Md. : Naval Institute Press, c1989. Description xii, 327 p. : ill. ; 20 cm. ISBN 0870212052 : CALL NUMBER V133 .N6 1989 Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms

• Wikipedia -

  James G. Stavridis
  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
  James G. Stavridis
  Stavridis EUCOM.jpg
  Birth name James George Stavridis
  Nickname(s) Zorba[1]
  Born February 15, 1955 (age 63)
  West Palm Beach, Florida, U.S.
  Allegiance United States
  Service/branch United States Navy
  Years of service 1976–2013
  Rank US-O10 insignia.svg Admiral
  Commands held Supreme Allied Commander Europe
  U.S. European Command
  U.S. Southern Command
  Awards Defense Distinguished Service Medal ribbon.svg Defense Distinguished Service Medal
  Navy Distinguished Service Medal ribbon.svg Navy Distinguished Service Medal
  Defense Superior Service Medal ribbon.svg Defense Superior Service Medal
  Legion of Merit ribbon.svg Legion of Merit

  James George Stavridis (born February 15, 1955)[2] is a retired United States Navy admiral and the current dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, a graduate school for international affairs.[3] Stavridis serves as the chief international diplomacy and national security analyst for NBC News in New York.[4] He is also chairman of the board of the U.S. Naval Institute [5][6] and a Senior Fellow at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.[7]

  Stavridis graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy in 1976. While in the Navy, Stavridis served as the commander, U.S. Southern Command (2006 to 2009) and commander, U.S. European Command and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe (2009 to 2013).[8][9] the first Navy officer to have held these positions. Stavridis earned a Ph.D and Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in 1984, where he won the Gullion Prize.

  Stavridis retired from the Navy in 2013 after thirty-seven years of service and became dean of The Fletcher School in the summer 2013. His book The Accidental Admiral, describing his time in the Navy, was published in October 2014. His book "The Leader's Bookshelf," published in 2017, describing the top 50 books that inspire better leadership was a #1 best seller in Amazon's "Literary Bibliography and Indexes" category.[10] A second book published in 2017 is called "Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans, published by Penguin Press. Shortly after publication, "Sea Power" was Amazon.com's number one bestseller in the national security and naval/military history categories[11]. It opened at #9 on the Washington Post non-fiction bestseller list.[12] He is an associate fellow of the Geneva Centre for Security Policy and a member of the Inter-American Dialogue.[13][14]

  He was considered as a potential vice-presidential running mate by the Hillary Clinton campaign in 2016 and as a possible U.S. Secretary of State by President-elect Donald Trump in the fall of 2016.[15][16]

  Contents

  1 Early life and family
  2 Naval career
  3 Dean of the Fletcher School
  4 Media and public speaking
  5 Commencement Speeches and Honorary Degrees
  6 Consideration for political office
  7 Awards and decorations
  7.1 U.S. military decorations
  7.2 International decorations
  7.3 Other awards and honors
  8 Published works
  9 References
  10 External links

  Early life and family

  Stavridis was born in West Palm Beach, Florida,[17] son of Shirley Anne (Schaffer) and Paul George Stavridis.[18][19][20] He is married to Laura Hall, author of Navy Spouses Guide. His paternal grandparents were Asia Minor Greeks, born and raised in Western Anatolia, who emigrated to the United States.[21] His mother's family was Pennsylvania Dutch (German).[22]

  In his 2008 book, Destroyer Captain: Lessons of a First Command, Stavridis wrote:

  In the early 1920's, my grandfather, a short, stocky Greek schoolteacher named Dimitrios Stavridis, was expelled from Turkey as part of 'ethnic cleansing' (read pogrom) directed against Greeks living in the remains of the Ottoman Empire. He barely escaped with his life in a small boat crossing the Aegean Sea to Athens and thence to Ellis Island. His brother was not so lucky and was killed by the Turks as part of the violence directed at the Greek minority.

  A NATO exercise off the coast of modern Turkey was the "most amazing historical irony [he] could imagine," and prompted Stavridis to write of his grandfather: "His grandson, who speaks barely a few words of Greek, returns in command of a billion-dollar destroyer to the very city—Smyrna, now called İzmir—from which he sailed in a refugee craft all those years ago."[23]
  Naval career
  ADM James G. Stavridis, former Commander, EUCOM, and NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe.

  Stavridis is a 1976 distinguished graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy. He is a career surface warfare officer and served at sea in aircraft carriers, cruisers, and destroyers. After serving with distinction as Operations Officer on the newly commissioned USS Valley Forge, Stavridis commanded destroyer USS Barry from 1993 to 1995, completing deployments to Haiti, Bosnia, and the Persian Gulf. Barry won the Battenberg Cup as the top ship in the Atlantic Fleet under his command. In 1998, he commanded Destroyer Squadron 21 and deployed to the Persian Gulf in 1998, winning the Navy League's John Paul Jones Award for Inspirational Leadership.

  From 2002 to 2004, Stavridis commanded Enterprise Carrier Strike Group, conducting combat operations in the Persian Gulf in support of both Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. Afterwards, as Vice Admiral, Stavridis served as senior military assistant to the United States Secretary of Defense. On October 19, 2006, he became the first Navy officer to command the United States Southern Command in Miami, Florida. In July 2009, he became Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR).[24] He retired as SACEUR in 2013.

  Ashore, Stavridis served as a strategic and long range planner on the staffs of the Chief of Naval Operations and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. At the start of the "Global War on Terror", he was selected as the director of the Navy Operations Group, Deep Blue, USA. He has also served as the executive assistant to the Secretary of the Navy and the senior military assistant to the United States Secretary of Defense.

  Stavridis has long advocated the use of "smart power," which he defines as the balance of hard and soft power taken together. In numerous articles[25] and speeches, he has advocated creating security in the 21st century by building bridges, not walls. Stavridis has stressed the need to connect international, inter-agency, and public-private actors to build security, lining all of them with effective strategic communications. His message was articulated in his book "Partnership for the Americas", which was published by the NDU Press and was based on his time as Commander of the U.S. Southern Command from 2006-2009. The book was summarized in his 2012 Ted Global talk in Scotland, which has been viewed more than 700,000 times online.

  Based on an anonymous complaint, in early 2011 the DOD Inspector General began investigating allegations that ADM Stavridis “engaged in misconduct relating to official and unofficial travel and other matters.” He was subsequently the subject of a May 3, 2012, report by the Inspector General of the Department of Defense[26] and was later absolved of wrongdoing by the Secretary of the Navy on September 11, 2012. In a Memorandum for the Record,[27] Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus wrote that Stavridis: "has consistently demonstrated himself to be a model naval officer and a devoted public servant whose motivation is to do that which is necessary and appropriate to advance the interests of the United States." Mabus concluded that "I have determined that ADM Stavridis never attempted to use his public office for private gain nor did he commit personal misconduct."[28]

  Stavridis earned a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy in 1983, and a PhD in International Relations in 1984, from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, where he won the Gullion Prize as outstanding student. Stavridis is also 1992 distinguished graduate of the United States National War College.
  Dean of the Fletcher School

  Stavridis was appointed dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University on July 1, 2013. He frequently publishes his thoughts, opinions and analyses in myriad publications, including Foreign Policy, Huffington World Post, TIME Magazine (where he is a monthly columnist), and the United States Naval Institute's magazine, Proceedings.

  As dean, Stavridis has initiated a strategic planning process, invited several high level speakers to the campus, and is focusing thematically on the Arctic, the role of women in international relations, synthetic biology and its impact on foreign affairs, cyber, and the role of online media and social networks in public diplomacy.[29]
  Media and public speaking
  Admiral Stavridis in the remote studio at The Fletcher School

  Since leaving active duty, Stavridis has frequently appeared on major broadcast and cable television networks to comment on national security and foreign policy matters. He often commented on CNN,[30] Fox News,[31] BBC[32] and Bloomberg,[33] and is a frequent op-ed contributor in Foreign Policy[34][35] and the Nikkei Asian Review.[36]

  Tufts University had a remote television studio installed[37] on the campus of The Fletcher School so that Stavridis and other faculty and administrators could easily make themselves available to the international media. In August 2016 NBC News named Stavridis as their "chief international security and diplomacy analyst.[38]" Also in August 2016, according to Stavridis' official Twitter account,[39] he began a monthly column for Time.com[40]. The first column was about a "grand bargain" with Russia.[41] Stavridis has also been a public speaker – among his many appearances are multiple appearances at the World Economic Forum[42] in Davos, Switzerland, the Munich Security Conference [43] in 2013, and lectures at Harvard, Yale, Georgetown, The University of Texas at Arlington, and many other universities.
  Commencement Speeches and Honorary Degrees

  Stavridis has given numerous commencement addresses including the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy in 2008[44], University of Miami in 2011[45], and Dickinson College 2017[46].
  Consideration for political office

  On July 12, 2016, The New York Times and other media organizations reported that Stavridis was being vetted by the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign as a possible vice presidential running mate on the Democratic ticket.[47] The Washington Post summarized Stavridis' qualifications in a short video.[48] Publications like Navy Times cited his NATO leadership as pluses.[49] An article in Politico called him "Hillary's Anti-Trump." Stavridis was quoted in that article as joking: "My name is too long for a bumper sticker." Eventually, Clinton selected Tim Kaine.[50] On December 8, 2016, Stavridis went to Trump Tower in New York City to meet with President-elect Donald Trump. Following the meeting, Stavridis told reporters that they had discussed world events, cybersecurity and other matters.[51] Press accounts suggested he was under consideration for Secretary of State or Director of National Intelligence.[52] On December 14, 2016, however, in an interview on MSNBC's Morning Joe, Stavridis said that he would not be taking a position in the Trump administration.[53]
  Awards and decorations
  U.S. Army General David H. Petraeus, right, with the U.S. Navy Admiral James G. Stavridis, commander of European Command and NATO's supreme allied commander for Europe in Brussels in 2011
  U.S. Navy Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. Army General John Craddock and U.S. Navy Admiral James G. Stavridis, incoming commander, salute during the national anthem at the U.S. European Command change of command ceremony at Patch Barracks in Stuttgart in June 2009
  U.S. military decorations

  Stavridis has received the following awards and decorations of the United States military.

  Surface Warfare Officer Insignia.png Surface Warfare Officer badge
  Bronze oak leaf cluster
  Defense Distinguished Service Medal with one bronze oak leaf cluster
  Navy Distinguished Service Medal
  Defense Superior Service Medal ribbon.svg Defense Superior Service Medal
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Legion of Merit with four gold award stars
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Meritorious Service Medal with two gold award stars
  Joint Service Commendation Medal ribbon.svg Joint Service Commendation Medal
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Gold star
  Navy Commendation Medal with three gold award stars
  Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal ribbon.svg Navy Achievement Medal
  Bronze oak leaf cluster
  Joint Meritorious Unit Award with one oak leaf cluster
  U.S. Navy Unit Commendation ribbon.svg Navy Unit Commendation
  Bronze star
  Bronze star
  Navy Meritorious Unit Commendation with 2 bronze service stars
  Navy "E" Ribbon w/ Wreathed Battle E device
  Navy Expeditionary Medal ribbon.svg Navy Expeditionary Medal
  Bronze star
  Bronze star
  National Defense Service Medal with two bronze service stars
  Bronze star
  Bronze star
  Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal with one bronze service stars
  Bronze star
  Southwest Asia Service Medal with one bronze service star
  Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal ribbon.svg Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal
  Global War on Terrorism Service Medal ribbon.svg Global War on Terrorism Service Medal
  Bronze star
  Bronze star
  Armed Forces Service Medal with two bronze service stars
  Silver star
  Bronze star
  Bronze star
  Navy Sea Service Deployment Ribbon with one silver and two bronze service stars
  Bronze star
  Navy & Marine Corps Overseas Service Ribbon with bronze service star
  U.S. Navy Expert Rifleman Ribbon.svg Navy Expert Rifleman Medal
  U.S. Navy Expert Pistol Shot Ribbon.svg Navy Expert Pistol Shot Medal
  International decorations
  Legion Honneur Commandeur ribbon.svg Commander's degree, National Order of the Legion of Honour of France[54]
  BEL Kroonorde Grootkruis BAR.svg Grand Cross Order of the Crown (Belgium)
  GRE Order of the Phoenix - Grand Cross BAR.png Grand Cross Order of the Phoenix (Greece)
  Noribbon.svg Commendation Ministry of Defense: "Cross of Merit and Honour First Class" (Greece)
  EST Order of the Cross of the Eagle 1st Class BAR.png Estonian Order of the Cross of the Eagle First Class[55]
  ITA OMRI 2001 GC BAR.svg Order of Merit of the Italian Republic Knight Grand Cross of the Republic
  GER Bundesverdienstkreuz 5 GrVK Stern.svg Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany Grand Merit Cross with Star[56]
  LUX Order of Merit of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg - Grand Officer BAR.png Grand Officer of the Order of Merit of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg
  HUN Order of Merit of the Hungarian Rep (military) 2class BAR.svg The Commander's Cross with Star of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary
  POL Order Zaslugi RP kl3 BAR.png Commander's Cross of the Order of Merit (Poland)[57]
  Ribbon of the Order of Duke Trpimir.png Order of Duke Trpimir (Croatia)
  LTU Order for Merits to Lithuania - Commander's Cross BAR.svg Cross of Commander of the Order for Merits to Lithuania[58]
  King Willem-Alexander Investiture Medal 2013.gif Investiture Medal of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.[59]
  Order of Naval Merit (Argentina) - ribbon bar.png Order of Naval Merit (Argentina)
  Order of Naval Merit - Grand Officer (Brazil) - ribbon bar.png Order of Naval Merit in the degree of Grand Officer (Brazil)
  Legion Honneur Chevalier ribbon.png Cruz de la Victoria (Chile)[60]
  Ribbon Bar of the Grand Cross The Order of Naval Merit Admiral Padilla.svg Order of Naval Merit Admiral Padilla (Colombia)
  PER Orden al Mérito Naval.png Order of the Peruvian Cross of Naval Merit in the rank of Grand Cross along with a White Ribbon (Peru)[61]
  Romanian Honor Emblem.png The Emblem of Honor of the General Staff of Romania
  LVA Aizsardzības ministra apbalvojums "Atzinības Goda Zīme".png Medal of Honorary Recognition of Latvia[62]
  Grand Cross of the Medal of Military Merit ribbon.jpg Military Merit Grand Cross Medal of the Portuguese Republic
  GEO Vakhtang Gorgasal Order 1rank BAR.svg Order of Vakhtang Gorgasali - I Rank (Georgia)[63]
  Albania gratitude.png Albanian Medal of Gratitude[64]
  SVN Medal for International Cooperation, Grade I (Gold).png Slovenian Medal for multinational cooperation 1st grade
  GTM Cruz de la Marina de Guerra.png Navy National Defense Cross (Guatemala)
  Noribbon.svg Grand Cross (Dominican Republic)
  NATO Meritorious Service Medal bar.svg NATO Meritorious Service Medal
  NATO Medal Yugoslavia ribbon bar.svg NATO Medal for Former Yugoslavia
  Kuwait Liberation Medal (Saudi Arabia) ribbon.svg Kuwait Liberation Medal (Saudi Arabia)
  Kuwait Liberation Medal (Kuwait) ribbon.svg Kuwait Liberation Medal (Kuwait)
  05/21/2016 - Medford/Somerville, Mass. - James Stavridis, Dean of The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University poses with Arianna Huffington at the 2016 Class Day for the school. (Matthew Healey for Tufts University)
  Other awards and honors

  Stavridis has received an array of other awards and honors, including the following (listed by date conferred):

  The Distinguished Graduate Leadership Award of the Naval War College, given annually to a graduate of the college who has "attained positions of prominence in the field of national security" (2003).[65]
  The Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum's Intrepid Freedom Award, "presented to a national or international leader who has distinguished himself in promoting and defending the values of freedom and democracy" (2011).[66]
  The AFCEA's David Sarnoff Award, the group's highest honor, given "to recognize individuals who have made lasting and significant contributions to global peace" (2011).[67]
  The Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate Order of St. Andrew the Apostle's Athenagoras Human Rights Award, accepted on behalf of the U.S. armed forces (2011).[68]
  The Navy League of the United States's Alfred Thayer Mahan Award for Literary Achievement (2011).
  The Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs (JINSA) Henry M. Jackson Distinguished Service Award, given "in recognition of his service to the defense of the United States and our European allies, and for strengthening security cooperation with Israel" (2011).[69]
  The Atlantic Council's Distinguished Military Leadership Award (2011)[70]
  The Business Executives for National Security's Eisenhower Award (2012).[71]
  The Chian Federation's 33rd Annual Homeric Award (2012)[72]
  The first recipient of the Distinguished Ally of the Israel Defense Forces Award presented by IDF Chief of Staff General Benny Gantz April 11, 2013. [73]
  Stimson Center Pragmatist + Idealist Award, for work "to strengthen international security by helping countries in the developing world improve the lives of their people" (2013).[74]
  The Alpha Omega Council's Lifetime Achievement Award, given to a distinguished Greek American citizen (2015)[75]
  The Naval Order of the United States's Distinguished Sea Service Award, for "professional leadership and support to the Sea Services of the United States of America" (2015).[76]
  The Truce Foundation of the USA awarded him their inaugural "Building Bridges Award"[77] at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games.
  The Washington Institute 2016 Scholar-Statesman Award[78]
  Institute for Global Leadership at Tufts University Dr. Jean Mayer Global Citizenship Award, 2017
  Ellis Island Medals of Honor Recipient 2017[79]
  The American Veterans Center 2017 Andrew Goodpaster Prize [80]
  Society for International Development Award for Leadership in Development, December 8, 2017 [81]
  Leadership 100 Conference "Archbishop Iakovos Leadership 100 Award for Excellence," February 3, 2018 [82]

  Published works

  Selected books

  "Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans," Penguin Press, June 6, 2017,
  "The Leader's Bookshelf,"[83] U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2017, ISBN 978-1682471791
  The Accidental Admiral: A Sailor Takes Command at NATO, U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2014 ISBN 978-1-61251-704-9
  Partnership for the Americas: Western Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern Command, NDU Press, November 2010
  Command At Sea, Sixth Edition, Annapolis: U.S. Naval Institute Press, Co-authored with Rear Admiral Robert Girrier, USN, 2010 ISBN 9781591147985
  Destroyer Captain: Lessons of a First Command, U.S. Naval Institute Press, 2007 ISBN 9781591148494
  Watch Officer’s Guide, Twelfth Edition, Annapolis: U.S. Naval Institute Press, Co-authored with Captain Robert Girrier, 2006 ISBN 9781591149361
  Division Officer’s Guide, Eleventh Edition, Annapolis: U.S. Naval Institute Press, Co-authored with Commander Robert Girrier, 2005 ISBN 9781591147992

  References

  USNA 1976 Lucky Bag Yearbook
  "SAE - U.S. Admiral James G. Stavridis appointed NATO Supreme Commander / World Council of Hellenes Abroad". SAE – World Council of Hellenes Abroad. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
  "NATO Commander Admiral James Stavridis Named Next Fletcher Dean". Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  Joyella, Mark. "Retired Navy Admiral Joins NBC and MSNBC". www.adweek.com. Adweek. Retrieved 30 July 2017.
  "Naval Institute Appoints Admiral James G. Stavridis Chair of the Board".
  "Board of Directors". U.S. Naval Institute. Retrieved October 8, 2013.
  "Senior Fellows at Johns Hopkins APL".
  Miles, Donna (June 30, 2009). "Stavridis Assumes Top European Command Post From Craddock". DefenseLink. Retrieved June 30, 2009.
  "NATO Secretary General welcomes new Supreme Allied Commander Europe". May 13, 2013.
  https://www.amazon.com/Leaders-Bookshelf-James-Stavridis/dp/1682471799/ref=la_B001JP2IW8_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1488048173&sr=1-2
  https://www.amazon.com/gp/new-releases/books/5018/ref=zg_b_hnr_5018_1
  https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/2017/06/15/df48ff2e-510b-11e7-b74e-0d2785d3083d_story.html
  GCSP.CH. "Global Fellowship Initiative".
  "Inter-American Dialogue | James Stavridis". www.thedialogue.org. Retrieved 2018-01-01.
  News, A. B. C. (December 6, 2016). "Trump's Expanding List for Secretary of State - Stavridis, Huntsman, Tillerson, Bolton, Manchin".
  "James Stavridis, Retired Admiral, Is Being Vetted as Hillary Clinton's Running Mate". The New York Times. July 13, 2016.
  "Nominations of ADM James G. Stavridis, USN, for Reappointment to the Grade of Admiral and to be Commander, U.S. European Command and Supreme Allied Commander, Europe; Lt. Gen. Douglas M. Fraser, USAF, to be General and Commander, U.S. Southern Command; and LTG Stanley A. McChrystal, USA, to be General and Commander, International Security Assistance Force and Commander, U.S. Forces, Afghanistan" (PDF). NOMINATIONS BEFORE THE SENATE ARMED SERVICES COMMITTEE, FIRST SESSION, 111TH CONGRESS. Government Printing Office. June 2, 2009. p. 793. Retrieved November 28, 2012.
  "P. George Stavridis". Morning Call. September 19, 2001. Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  "Mrs. Minnie Schaffer". Morning Call. April 7, 1985. Retrieved July 8, 2013.
  Laura Hall Stavridis (2002). Navy Spouse's Guide. Naval Institute Press – via Google Books.
  Shanker, Thom (June 29, 2009). "For a Post in Europe, a Renaissance Admiral". The New York Times. Retrieved June 30, 2009.
  Scaros, Constantinos E. "Adm. Stavridis: "21st Century Challenges" - The National Herald".
  Oren, Amir (October 16, 2009). "U.S. NATO chief blames Turkey for 'ethnic cleansing' of Greeks, including own family". Haaretz. Retrieved October 16, 2009.
  NATO biography page retrieved in March 2012, "Archived copy". Archived from the original on February 24, 2012. Retrieved 2012-03-12.
  Oliver Barrett (July 25, 2013). "Talking 'Smart Power' With Admiral Stavridis". U.S. News & World Report. Retrieved February 20, 2014.
  " DOD IG Report No. 11H118481105, of May 3, 2012
  http://www.navy.mil/secnav/SECNAV_letter_09112012.pdf
  "Stavridis II: Winning the Battle, Losing the War". TIME.com. November 12, 2012.
  "The Power of Soft Power: Dean Stavridis Featured in Tufts Magazine | Tufts Fletcher School". Fletcher.tufts.edu. October 29, 2013. Retrieved July 29, 2014.
  "Fmr. NATO Commander: ISIS will replace leader killed - CNN Video". CNN. Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  "Admiral James Stavridis: We must go after ISIS at its source". Fox News. March 23, 2016. Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  "Former NATO Commander: 'Russia confident Assad will stay in power' - BBC News". BBC News. Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  "Trump, Clinton and the Importance of U.S. Foreign Policy". Bloomberg.com. Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  https://foreignpolicy.com/author/james-stavridis/
  "Was a Fake War in the Saudi Desert a Dress Rehearsal for a Syrian Invasion?". Foreign Policy. Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  Stavridis, James (Feb 23, 2016). "Nikkei Asian Review". Retrieved March 29, 2016.
  "Dean's Video: Oct 2015: In the New TV Studio with Ed Schumacher-Matos, Director of The Murrow Center".
  "Retired Navy Admiral Joins NBC and MSNBC".
  "stavridisj on Twitter".
  http://time.com/author/james-stavridis/
  "We Need a New Grand Bargain With Russia".
  "James G. Stavridis - World Economic Forum". World Economic Forum.
  ""We have to share our military and industrial capabilities" - Munich Security Conference". February 22, 2016.
  "Admiral Stavridis' Commencement Address -- Definately worth the read". College Confidential. Retrieved 2018-01-25.
  https://magazine.bus.miami.edu/news-and-media/recent-news/commencement-2011.html. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o6g7Sevx7g. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  Ashley Parker & Maggie Haberman, James Stavridis, Retired Admiral, Is Being Vetted as Hillary Clinton’s Running Mate, New York Times (July 12, 2016).
  "Meet James Stavridis".
  Times, Navy. "former-nato-commander-seen-one-clintons-top-vp-contenders".
  "Hillary's anti-Trump". Retrieved 2016-07-23.
  "Stavridis speaks to media after Trump Tower meeting".
  "Tillerson, Stavridis join secretary of state field".
  "Stavridis says he's not joining Trump's administration".
  "ACO - Allied Command Operations | French Chief of Defence visits SHAPE". Aco.nato.int. July 22, 2011. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
  "Admiral Stavridis Receives Order of the Cross of the Eagle from Estonia". Archived from the original on September 16, 2013.
  "Germany honors SACEUR Stavridis with medal". Archived from the original on May 9, 2013.
  "Postanowienie Prezydenta Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej z dnia 20 kwietnia 2011 r. o nadaniu orderu (M.P. Nr 71, poz. 695)" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on March 30, 2012.
  "The President awards NATO Supreme Allied Commander Admiral James G. Stavridis with the Cross of Commander". Office of the President of the Republic of Lithuania. Retrieved November 16, 2012.
  nl:Inhuldigingsmedaille 2013
  "Ejército de Chile - Noticias". Ejercito.cl. January 9, 2008. Retrieved November 27, 2012.[permanent dead link]
  http://justf.org/files/images/gallery/080421pe01.jpg. Retrieved February 5, 2010. Missing or empty |title= (help)[dead link]
  "Sargs.lv". Sargs.lv. July 17, 2012. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
  "Admiral James G. Stavridis given the Vakhtang Gorgasali award by Saakashvili".
  "President Nishani awards the "Medal of Gratitude" to the Supreme Allied Commander Europe, Admiral Stavridis".
  Distinguished Graduate Leadership Award Archived August 6, 2016, at the Wayback Machine., Naval War College (accessed July 12, 2016).
  "Intrepid Freedom Award". Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum.
  "ADM James G. Stavridis, USN, to receive AFCEA's highest award" (Press release). AFCEA. April 28, 2011. Archived from the original on May 20, 2013.
  "Athenagoras Human Rights Award bestowed upon Admiral Stavridis, Supreme Allied Commander Europe, on behalf of U.S. Armed Forces". Archons of the Ecumenical Patriarchate. October 31, 2011.
  "The 2011 Henry M. Jackson Distinguished Service Award & Grateful Nation Award Dinner - November 7, Washington DC". Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs. July 22, 2011.
  "2011 Atlantic Council Annual Awards Dinner: Biden, Stavridis, Kent, Domingo". Atlantic Council. Archived from the original on October 4, 2012. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
  Washington Forum and the Eisenhower Award Dinner honoring Admiral James G. Stavridis, USN and Maj. Gen. Josue "Joe" Robles Jr., USA (Ret.), Business Executives for National Security (May 22, 2012).
  Dimitri C. Michalakis. "Chian Federation to Present Adm. James G. Stavridis with 33rd Annual Homeric Award". Neo Magazine. Retrieved November 27, 2012.
  https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Stavridis_gets_distinguished_ally_of_the_IDF_award_from_Gantz,_2013.jpg
  "Stimson Center Honors Nokia and James Stavridis with Pragmatist + Idealist Awards Nov. 15" (Press release). Stimson Center. November 12, 2013.
  Lifetime Achievement Award, Alpha Omega Council (accessed July 12, 2016).
  ADM Jim Stavridis, USN (Ret) - 2015 Distinguished Sea Service Award Honoree, Naval Order of the United States (September 2, 2015).
  "World Changers Honored as Messengers of Peace".
  WashingtonInstitute (December 1, 2016). "Admiral James Stavridis Receives 2016 Scholar-Statesman Award" – via YouTube.
  http://www.neco.org/medal-of-honor/2017-medalists
  http://www.americanveteranscenter.org/2017/06/2017-andrew-goodpaster-prize/
  "SID-Washington". sidw.org. Retrieved 2017-12-09.
  "Former NATO Chief James Stavridis to Address Leadership 100 Annual Conference | USA.GreekReporter.com". USA.GreekReporter.com. 2018-01-24. Retrieved 2018-02-05.

  https://www.amazon.com/Leaders-Bookshelf-James-Stavridis/dp/1682471799/ref=la_B001JP2IW8_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1488048173&sr=1-2

  External links
  Wikimedia Commons has media related to James G. Stavridis.

  Appearances on C-SPAN
  An extensive and relevant analysis of the role played by Stavridis in the Mediterranean and in the militarization of the so-called "migrant crisis" in the documentary review OJALA/SanchoPanzaLab n.6 (Paris, January 2017) (in Spanish)]
  U.S. Smart Power: Interview with Adm. Stavridis. Bjoern H. Seibert, Fletcher Forum of World Affairs, Summer 2008 Vol 32:2.
  Interview with Adm. Stavridis. Col David H. Gurney, USMC, Joint Force Quarterly, Issue 50, 3d Quarter 2008
  EUCOM blog
  Stavridis gives testimony regarding Libya crisis, March 28, 2011 - see 4.39pm

  Military offices
  Preceded by
  Bantz Craddock Combatant Commander of United States Southern Command
  2006–2009 Succeeded by
  Douglas Fraser
  Combatant Commander of United States European Command
  2009–2013 Succeeded by
  Philip Breedlove
  Supreme Allied Commander Europe
  2009–2013
  Academic offices
  Preceded by
  Stephen W. Bosworth Dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy
  2013–present Incumbent
  [show]
  Commanders of United States Southern Command
  [show]
  Commanders of United States European Command and Supreme Allied Commanders, Europe
  Authority control

Print Marked Items
Partnership for the Americas: Western
Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern
Command
Joint Force Quarterly.
.60 (Jan. 2011): p1.
COPYRIGHT 2011 National Defense University
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jfq/jfq.htm
Full Text: 
Partnership for the Americas: Western Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern Command
by James G. Stavridis
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Admiral James G. Stavridis, USN, reflects on his tenure as Commander of United States Southern
Command. Not "your father's combatant command commander," Admiral Stavridis broke with tradition
from day one, discarding the customary military model and creating an innovative organization designed not
solely to subdue adversaries, but, perhaps more importantly, to build durable and lasting partnerships with
friends. From his unique perspective as commander, Stavridis uses his engagingly personal style to describe
his vision for the Americas, making the most of limited resources to create goodwill and mutual respect,
while taking care of the serious business of countering illegal drug trafficking and responding to
humanitarian crises. Citing the hemisphere's common geography, culture, economy, and history, Stavridis
makes a passionate case for a common approach and strategy for defending our "shared home of the
Americas."
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Partnership for the Americas: Western Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern Command." Joint Force
Quarterly, Jan. 2011, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A275489726/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=e9c13879. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A275489726
"Skin in the Game": Partnership in
Establishing and Maintaining Global
Security and Stability
Joint Force Quarterly.
.60 (Jan. 2011): p1.
COPYRIGHT 2011 National Defense University
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jfq/jfq.htm
Full Text: 
"Skin in the Game": Partnership in Establishing and Maintaining Global Security and Stability
by Jeffery E. Marshall, with a preface by James G. Stavridis
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
The United States cannot work alone in maintaining the global stability and security that are foundational
requirements for all national vital interests. The size of the globe, the plethora of cultures and interests, and
the high cost of maintaining stability and security mean that the United States needs partners who share
those goals and will share the cost of maintaining them. Sharing the burden in this way actually helps to
promote greater stability and security because more countries are invested in the outcome--they have "skin
in the game." This book offers a detailed analysis of what the United States must do to build and sustain
enduring partnerships, examines the current state of affairs, and provides a roadmap with specific, actionable
recommendations to take a more holistic approach to partnerships.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"'Skin in the Game': Partnership in Establishing and Maintaining Global Security and Stability." Joint Force
Quarterly, Jan. 2011, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A275489727/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=88eec992. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A275489727
Stavridis, James: SEA POWER
Kirkus Reviews.
(Apr. 1, 2017):
COPYRIGHT 2017 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text: 
Stavridis, James SEA POWER Penguin Press (Adult Nonfiction) $28.00 6, 6 ISBN: 978-0-7352-2059-1
A retired Navy admiral tells the history of the seas and gives an updated look at their strategic
importance.Stavridis (Dean, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy/Tufts Univ.; The Accidental Admiral,
2014, etc.) knows his maritime history, but equally important is his firsthand knowledge of the seas as a
naval officer who has steered ships and served as Supreme Allied Commander of NATO. The book is
organized into separate chapters on each of the world's major bodies of water: the Atlantic, Pacific, Indian
and Arctic oceans, plus the Mediterranean, the South China Sea, and the Caribbean. Two final chapters
consider criminal activity on the seas and outline a modern naval strategy for America. The author's
historical summaries are written in broad strokes, with only brief consideration of individual battles. He
vividly relates what it felt like as a young naval officer taking a boat through the Panama Canal or the Torres
Strait between Australia and New Guinea, and he adds personal authority to his more general points about
the different bodies of water. His discussion of the South China Sea and the Arctic Ocean, the two areas he
considers most likely to be the sites of future confrontations between major powers, serves as a reminder
that America is far from the only nation with a legitimate interest in these areas. His assessments of the
South China Sea seem especially apt. Stavridis is optimistic that global rivals can find ways to cooperate
with each other and prevent serious conflict, though his citation of the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a likely
engine for cooperation may need revision in light of the current presidential administration. The chapter on
piracy, overfishing, and destruction of the environment is sobering, and the final chapter, which outlines the
importance of naval power in the coming decades, is a good starting point for consideration of the strategic
options open to the U.S. A highly readable, instructive look at the role of the oceans in our civilization, past
and present.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Stavridis, James: SEA POWER." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Apr. 2017. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A487668554/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=ca3769df.
Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A487668554
Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of
the World's Oceans
Publishers Weekly.
264.15 (Apr. 10, 2017): p65.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text: 
Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans
James Stavridis. Penguin Press, $28 (384p)
ISBN 978-0-7352-2059-1
Stavridis, a retired U.S. Navy admiral, summons the collected knowledge of his extensive career as an
operational commander to provide insight into navies' routine functioning. He structures his case studies of
maritime warfare according to applied naval tactics and strategy, and an analysis of "the influence of the sea
on geopolitics" from a naval perspective--the oceans' physical characteristics and their strategic impacts on
"the vast water world we call earth"--sits at the work's core. The Pacific remains a site of both ambition and
communication, with corresponding possibilities for "an explosive war." The Atlantic, for the first time in its
history, is now "a zone of cooperation and peace." The Indian Ocean and its Arabian satellite are ringed with
potential flashpoints. War at sea began in the "unrelenting arena" of the Mediterranean, which retains its
potential for violence. Stavridis finds its counterpart in the South China Sea, a relative newcomer to
maritime geopolitics but a near-certain "maritime hinge" of the 21st century. He also outlines the roles
played by the Caribbean Sea and Arctic Ocean. It's a stimulating and provocative work, and Stavridis's
chapter on the "outlaw sea" is a timely reminder that oceans may seemed tamed--but that's only true on the
surface. Agent: Andrew Wylie, Wylie Agency. (June)
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans." Publishers Weekly, 10 Apr. 2017, p. 65.
General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A490319301/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=77bde976. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A490319301
Off the shelf
Robert E. Henstrand
Joint Force Quarterly.
.50 (July 2008): p140+.
COPYRIGHT 2008 National Defense University
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jfq/jfq.htm
Full Text: 
A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower, the first post-Cold War revision of U.S. naval strategy,
reminds us of the criticality of the Navy's mission to national security: "70% of the world is water, 80% of
the world lives on or near the coastline and 90% of our commerce sails across it." Secure seas and freeflowing
maritime commerce are enduring, vital national security interests. As we enter the seventh year of
the war on terror, the U.S. Navy now recognizes that conflict prevention is on par with warfighting and
seeks to achieve conflict prevention "through collective maritime security efforts that focus on common
threats (proliferation, smuggling, piracy, terrorism, etc.) and mutual interests." The following two books
offer insight into what the Navy does daily and some of the challenges it faces now and will face in the near
future as it endeavors to achieve "collective maritime security" among our allies and competitors in the
Asia-Pacific region.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Destroyer Captain: Lessons of a
First Command
by James Stavridis
Annapolis: Naval Institute Press,
2008
224 pp. $22.95
ISBN: 978-159-114-849-4
It is not often that we get the chance to delve into the personal diaries of our commanding officers, let alone
a sitting U.S. combatant commander. Yet this is exactly the opportunity that Admiral James Stavridis has
given us by publishing the journal he kept from 1993 to 1995, during his command of the USS Barry, an
Arleigh Burke-class Aegis guided-missile destroyer. He commanded the ship on multiple training exercises
and deployments in support of operations in Haiti, Bosnia, and the Persian Gulf.
This book is not your run-of-the-mill autobiography. Writing in first-person and present tense, and offering
introspective and sometimes self-deprecating insights, Stavridis shares his successes, challenges, concerns,
and, best of all, personal stories and lessons of successful leadership. For example, in the opening pages, a
jaunty Commander Stavridis recounts how after over 20 years of preparing to command his first ship, he
approaches the Barry for the first time and suddenly feels "a curious shortness of breath, for my heart was
beating high, and I had difficulty in swallowing.... Am I afraid?" (p. 9). Anyone who has taken command or
begun a daunting assignment can identify with these feelings, and young officers can benefit from reading
about how Commander Stavridis met his challenges and succeeded.
Despite being an account from 15 years ago, its lessons remain relevant to the contemporary operating
environment. Admiral Stavridis commanded the Barry at a time when the Navy was downsizing, and the
operational tempo was picking up. By his own account, he and his crew spent nearly 75 percent of the 27
months he was in command away from port. Officers in today's operating environment should thus be able
to identify with such observations as, "To sail in a modern ship of war is not unlike walking into a desert
with a few companions. Everywhere around you is nothing but the sky and distant horizon. There is little
outside input and an endless cycle of work and sleep" (p. 108). This window into the thoughts and feelings
of one of the Navy's most successful officers of the era makes this a captivating read and is one of the most
valuable aspects of the book. Every military officer and member of the joint and interagency warfighting
team will gain precious insight into what it is really like commanding a U.S. Navy ship and leading Sailors.
This book will surely become required reading in the Navy but should also be read by all joint warfighters.
Unless you are one of the fortunate few non-Navy people to have served at sea aboard a Navy vessel, you
may never come closer to learning what the Navy is really about.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
The Evolving Maritime
Balance of Power in the
Asia-Pacific:
Maritime Doctrines and
Nuclear Weapons at Sea
edited by Lawrence W.
Prabhakar, Joshua H. Ho,
and Sam Bateman
Singapore: Institute of Defence
and Strategic Studies, 2006
320 pp. $75.00
ISBN: 978-981-256-828-1
The Asia-Pacific is an inherently maritime region that encompasses as many vital U.S. security interests
today as ever--perhaps, in our globalized world, more. The interests of our allies and competitors, as well as
challenges to them, will impact national security, and the U.S. Navy will most likely find itself in the lead on
these issues in the Asia-Pacific. This volume is a collection of essays published by Singapore's Institute of
Defence and Strategic Studies, which researches and develops comprehensive approaches to strategic
thinking in areas related to Singapore's interests. The contributors are maritime security experts from such
regional players as Australia, India, Japan, Singapore, and the United States. The fact that the essays are not
written from a U.S. perspective recommends this work to national security planners and decisionmakers to
inform and assist the implementation of the Navy's strategy of collective maritime security.
The book begins with an introduction (effectively an executive summary) provocatively entitled
"Cooperation or Competition in the Maritime Asia-Pacific?" The author observes that "with the arrival of
new powers [that is, India and China], traditional regional powers may need to reevaluate their strategies in
light of the new environment." In answering the "cooperation or competition" question, the author concludes
that a balance of hard and soft power might be the best prospect for enhancing stability in the region (pp.
13-14). The bulk of the book is organized into four sections dealing with "Issues, Trends, and Paradigms in
Maritime Asia-Pacific"; "National Maritime Doctrines and Capabilities"; "The Maritime Aspects of Nuclear
Weapons and Missile Defenses"; and a concluding section containing two essays. This book is particularly
useful for its analysis of maritime strategy, emergent doctrines, naval orders of battle, the role of nuclear
naval power in the Asia-Pacific, and the implications and impact of nuclear weapons.
The essays reinforce U.S. understanding of trends in the region, such as China's modernization and
expansion of naval capabilities to eventually have a viable blue water force (chapter 4), and present new
considerations about emerging naval powers such as India, which is determined to "leapfrog capability
development, challenge the status quo, and alter the relative balance of power to its favor" (p. 113). Timely
and relevant, this thought-provoking volume will serve U.S. national security planners well.
Other recently published titles recommended for reading:
* Bolt, Paul J., and Albert S. Willner, eds., China's Nuclear Future. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers,
2006. 221 pp. $52.00 (Hardcover).
* Davis, Lance E., and Stanley L. Engerman, Naval Blockades in Peace and War: An Economic History
Since 1750. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006. 464 pp. $91.00 (Hardcover).
* Elleman, Bruce A., and S.C.M. Paine, eds., Naval Blockades and Seapower: Strategies and CounterStrategies,
1805-2005. New York: Routledge, 2006. 319 pp. $150.00 (Hardcover).
* Erickson, Andrew S., et al., eds., China's Future Nuclear Submarine Force. Annapolis, MD: Naval
Institute Press, 2007. 400 pp. $45.00 (Hardcover).
* Howarth, Peter, China's Rising Sea Power: The PLA Navy's Submarine Challenge. New York: Routledge,
2006. 208 pp. $150.00 (Hardcover).
* Swain, Michael D., et al., eds., Assessing the Threat: The Chinese Military and Taiwan's Security.
Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2007. 432 pp. $22.50 (Paperback).
* Winkler, David F., Amirs, Admirals, and Desert Sailors: Bahrain, the U.S. Navy, and the Arabian Gulf.
Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 2007. 256 pp. $34.95 (Hardcover).
Henstrand, Robert E.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
Henstrand, Robert E. "Off the shelf." Joint Force Quarterly, July 2008, p. 140+. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A183044517/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=bdd45d70.
Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A183044517
Convergence: Illicit Networks and National
Security in the Age of Globalization
Joint Force Quarterly.
.70 (July 2013): p121.
COPYRIGHT 2013 National Defense University
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jfq/jfq.htm
Full Text: 
Edited by Michael Miklaucic and Jacqueline Brewer, with a foreword by Admiral James G. Stavridis, USN
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
This new title from NDU Press for the Center for Complex Operations delves deeply into important aspects
of transnational crime and other illicit networks. Contributors describe the dangers and the magnitude of the
challenge of converging and connecting illicit networks; the ways and means used by transnational criminal
networks and how illicit networks actually operate and interact; how the proliferation, convergence, and
horizontal diversification of illicit networks challenge state sovereignty; and how different national and
international organizations are fighting back.
Convergence is available for download at . Other books are also
available at the NDU Press Web site.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Convergence: Illicit Networks and National Security in the Age of Globalization." Joint Force Quarterly,
July 2013, p. 121. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A338119413/ITOF?
u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=bec75a5d. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A338119413
Convergence: illicit networks and national
security in the age of globalization
Admiral James G. Stavridis
Joint Force Quarterly.
.71 (Oct. 2013): p109.
COPYRIGHT 2013 National Defense University
http://www.dtic.mil/doctrine/jfq/jfq.htm
Full Text: 
Edited by Michael Miklaucic and Jacqueline Brewer, with a foreword
This new title from NDU Press for the Center for Complex Operations delves deeply into important aspects
of transnational crime and other illicit networks. Contributors describe the dangers and the magnitude of the
challenge of converging and connecting illicit networks; the ways and means used by transnational criminal
networks and how illicit networks actually operate and interact; how the proliferation, convergence, and
horizontal diversification of illicit networks challenge state sovereignty; and how different national and
international organizations are fighting back.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Convergence is available for download at . Other books are also
available at the NDU Press Web site.
by Admiral James G. Stavridis, USN
Stavridis, Admiral James G.
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
Stavridis, Admiral James G. "Convergence: illicit networks and national security in the age of
globalization." Joint Force Quarterly, Oct. 2013, p. 109. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A350578166/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=11c94c85.
Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A350578166
Is a grand strategy for America even
possible? Three of our finest flag officers
attempt to offer unifying visions for the
United States, but run aground on the same
political polarization that flummoxes
everything else
Heather Hurlburt
Washington Monthly.
47.1-2 (January-February 2015): p68+.
COPYRIGHT 2015 Washington Monthly Company
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/
Full Text: 
Don't Wait for the Next War: A Strategy for American Growth and Global Leadership
by Wesley K. Clark
PublicAffairs, 272 pp.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
The Accidental Admiral: A Sailor Takes Command at NATO
by James Stavridis
Naval Institute Press, 288 pp.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Before the First Shots Are Fired: How American Can Win or Lose Off the Battlefield
by Tony Zinni and Tony Koltz
Palgrave Macmillan Trace, 256 pp.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Fall 2014 produced a bumper crop of books from retired four-star flag officers: James Stavridis's The
Accidental Admiral, Wesley Clark's Don't Wait for the Next War, and Tony Zinni's Before the First Shots
Are Fired. (Zinni shares authorial credit with Tony Koltz, coauthor of previous works with Zinni, Colin
Powell, and the late Tom Clancy.) Midway through his own tour of security policy, Stavridis sums up the
role of the U.S. military leadership in policymaking: "[I]n a sense we were car mechanics evaluating a
vehicle for the owner ... and then unemotionally executing the direction from the car's owner, in this case the
United States."
Stavridis, Clark, and Zinni were the "lead mechanics" for U.S. military interventions in Libya and Kosovo,
and played key roles in the first Gulf War, Bosnia, Iraq, and Afghanistan. They counseled and watched half
a dozen presidents and uncounted congressional committee chairs, seeing those leaders perhaps as closely as
anyone outside their inner circles is ever allowed. The three men are soldier-statesmen, perhaps as close as
our time comes to "Renaissance men": classics-quoting, economics-teaching, tweeting, Daily Showappearing
warriors. They hold degrees from Annapolis, West Point, Harvard, Oxford, and other elite
institutions, most acquired at taxpayer expense. The operations of the last two decades forced them to get to
know, and partner with, social workers and rape counselors, engineers and social media gurus, management
consultants and diplomats. Together they gave their country more than a century of service--and at least two
of their children followed them into uniform.
And they have a message for our country. Though their three 2014 books cover strategy, autobiography,
history, and politics, they can be summed up in one urgent sentence: The "car" of U.S. national strategy
needs a new GPS.
Each man points to the 2003 invasion of Iraq as a catastrophic failure, for which they indict the leadership of
the Bush administration explicitly. Zinni calls the failure to plan "a clear disaster" and refers to "the stupidity
of believing their own bumper stickers." Implicitly or explicitly, though, all three point the finger more
broadly: at our broken politics, weak connections between civilian and military leaders, problematic
construct of leadership, outdated civilian institutions, and, above all, a disregard for strategic planning.
If the three books share a villain, they also share a hero: President, also General, Dwight D. Eisenhower.
"Modern American strategy really begins with Eisenhower," Clark writes, and then explains what he means:
"Ike created a politically supported, unified national strategy using the Cold War--not a hot war--as the
motivating force. This strategy was not just about actions abroad, it was also about building strength at
home.... [H]e used the leverage of profound challenges abroad to gain domestic political cooperation
between the parties."
The three are in broad agreement on some key approaches to American national security policy. They retain
immense confidence in U.S. power, and the possibility and desirability of U.S. leadership--for both
pragmatic and moral ends. They tie this confidence not as much to the military strength they oversaw as to
what they perceive as the reality or potential of American society. Zinni expresses this as faith in a rising
generation of civil and military leaders; Stavridis enthuses over the American dynamism and innovation he
sees from his own immigrant past to the idea-driven whizzes he commands; and Clark lays out an extensive
vision of how American resources and ingenuity could make the United States a net energy exporter,
address climate change, and provide new impetus to efforts to help poor and conflict-ridden societies.
Their approach--you could call it "muscular military multilateralism"--lines up excellently, as well, with the
characteristics Americans tell pollsters they want to see in our security policy: a strong military, stronger
diplomacy, and a willingness to both talk to our enemies and shoot them.
What keeps them awake at night? For Stavridis it is not the Chinese navy (though he writes with longing of
his dreams of commanding a ship again) but "convergence": "deviant globalization" that combines
traditional threats such as terrorism and weapons of mass destruction with the networks of criminals, drug
dealers, and human traffickers. Clark ranks climate change and the weakness of the U.S. financial system
with terrorism and China as key strategic challenges that Washington must organize to overcome.
It has become de rigeur for civilian advocates--conservative, progressive, realist--to argue that the place of
some or all transnational challenges in U.S. national security policy, from terrorism and cybersecurity to
climate change and poverty, has been overblown. Realists will argue passionately that Washington must
refocus on state-sponsored threats, or their absence. Progressives critique a security-industrial complex and
its focus on constricting freedom in order to combat terrorism and cybersecurity. Conservatives dismiss
worries about climate, disease, and other challenges whose effects are felt most viciously beyond our shores.
These three men would disagree. All three treat transnational threats--terrorism and cybersecurity but also
crime and climate--as central problems for U.S. strategy. "Our house," Zinni writes, "can no longer be
defined by our geographic borders.... You can choose to play defense and wait for problems to wash up on
your shores, or you can deal with them at their origins." They treat transnational threats--terrorism and
cybersecurity but also crime and climate--as central problems for U.S. strategy.
They find less agreement among themselves on where U.S. military strength ought to be focused and, by
extension, how much of a threat is posed by China. Clark supports the Obama administration's "rebalance"
of resources to Asia and, by inference, away from Europe and the Middle East. Zinni, on the other hand, is
nearly contemptuous of some features of the U.S. buildup in Asia. He--as might be expected of a Marine--
advocates a focus on expeditionary forces that can be sent wherever tomorrow's crisis arises, in lieu of new
outposts. Stavridis, whose last assignment was Allied Supreme Commander Europe, the head of NATO's
military, makes an eloquent plea for the importance of the alliance and Europe.
Alliances, economic diplomacy, mediation: the three men call for more U.S. attention to these civilian tools,
rather than a reversal of sequestration-mandated Pentagon cuts or the 4 percent of GDP floor for defense
spending urged by some civilian advocates. The life of a modern flag officer, to hear these three tell it, is as
much taken up with high-level diplomacy, dealing with public-relations problems, and studying up on
models of innovation as with contemplating plans for war fighting.
Not that they believe war fighting is passe--all three believe that we should and will be engaging in military
interventions, including some elements of occupation, if not nation building (a phrase they do not use) going
forward. Stavridis and Zinni have given considerable thought to both the political and diplomatic elements
that make military interventions succeed or fail. They stress strategy, planning, and deep regional and
cultural knowledge; but also the legality and legitimacy accorded by the United Nations, regional
organizations, and close adherence to international law. In Zinni's words, "Any narrative making the case for
war has to be based and presented on strong legal, ethical and moral grounds."
What do they want from the civilian leadership? A "big, inclusive picture," Clark writes, that "links both our
foreign policy and security issues with our economy at home, a strategy that is not so completely derived
from one administration that it is automatically distrusted by the rival political party."
But when it comes to explanations of why such leadership is lacking, or strategies to bring it back, the men
are largely silent. Is it because U.S. politics is producing weak leaders? Clark and Stavridis must not think
so, for, with the exception of George W. Bush, they have little but praise for the presidents and senators they
mention. Zinni extends his scorn for Bush to Obama and Hillary Clinton, and calls for elected officials to
keep their military advisers closer--but only the right kind of military advisers, not what he calls "chateau
generals."
Is it because of the media? Stavridis offers a thoughtful chapter of how-tos for leaders dealing with the 24/7
media environment. For readers with backgrounds in government, the advice will be tremendous, while for
others it may seem rudimentary: Have a good message, understand your audience, don't miss your moment,
tell the truth. Zinni worries over the passing of journalists who sympathized with the soldiers they covered.
Clark stresses the importance of rebuilding global perceptions of America. But all three, ultimately, seem to
believe that the media can be part of the solution.
Is it because of decay in the quality of American institutions? Clark raises concerns with education, but, if
the quality of incoming young servicemembers is as high as all three men say it is, that can't be it.
Is it because of polarization and partisan acrimony? Clark decries all of these, describes past moments of
American success as featuring strategic unity, and suggests that any strategy will have to enjoy acceptance
from both parties to be effective.
The narratives share a nostalgia for a time of "good wars" and clear and consensus national strategies. Clark,
for example, describes the Manifest Destiny of the first half of the nineteenth century as "just a daring,
grand project that the vast majority of Americans agreed on." Today a strategy that disenfranchised more
than half the population, enslaved blacks, and drove Native Americans from their lands couldn't command
majority support of even the white men remaining--and that, of course, is progress.
Zinni writes, "Ah for the good old days of the Good War! The old-fashioned and simple conventional war:
defeat the enemy's military forces, remove the regime, and reconstruct a defeated and compliant
population." But it is only in retrospect that the choices and results seem so simple: the Spanish-American
War's atrocities, the decision to firebomb German cities while sparing the train lines to Auschwitz, the use of
nuclear weapons on Japan, the failed attempt to reconstruct Germany and the global order after World War I.
Next to them, Libya and even Syria are, well ... simple.
Clark is shooting at a bigger target than the other two authors: he wants to use national strategy to mend the
woes of political polarization as well as institutional weakness and economic drift. His strategy has several
interlinked core elements: ramp up energy production to become a net exporter, while accelerating the move
away from fossil fuels through a carbon tax and government incentives; use some of the resulting national
income to create a sovereign wealth fund that would both fuel strategic development at home and change
the shape of U.S. development assistance abroad, by finding and supporting industries and infrastructures
whose emergence would promote stronger governance and the rule of law as well as hastening indigenous
growth, thus lessening the health, security, and criminal threats to the United States that breed in
environments of injustice and poverty.
Conservatives will dislike this strategy because of the depth of government engagement and market shaping
it foresees; progressives will bristle at its embrace of fossil fuels and the optimism that greater economic
development leads to better governance. Clark argues that it represents a compromise, a grand bargain
between the best insights of both strands of American ideology.
Yet that kind of compromise is exactly what our political system is unable to produce right now, as voters
tell pollsters they want leaders to work together and then vote for candidates who promise obstruction.
Voters seem to perceive past glories as the outcome of winning arguments and triumphant personalities
rather than compromise--and civilian historians might not disagree. It's no surprise that flag officers have no
more idea than the public, political scientists, or good-government crusaders of how to produce any set of
coherent policy outcomes, much less grand strategy, in our turbulent, atomized, and polarized political
landscape.
What these books offer, finally, is less specific policy prescriptions than a debunking of the ideology-heavy,
experience-light sound bites that constitute much of what non-experts are fed as "strategy": Close the
borders to protect ourselves from Ebola-infected terrorists. Build firehouses at home instead of firehouses in
Iraq.
Stavridis, the most recently retired of the three, offers two meditations on current realities that might assist
civilian strategists. One could be summarized as "When you're in a hole, stop digging." Know when you've
lost a fight, whether over personal ethics, strategic communications, or military offensive--and retire with
grace. Recognize when time-honored strategies, such as badgering allies to make good on commitments to
burden sharing that neither leaders nor publics have any intention of keeping, have become
counterproductive. Invite the allies to do what they are good at--economic development, policing, legal
system reform--instead.
He also muses at considerable length about the death of strategic planning--a radical idea indeed for a
military officer. Yet if it is true that the twenty-first century "acceleration of knowledge and events" is
pushing military planning into "a relentlessly tactical period," look at what it has done to planning and
strategy in the civilian world. A few years ago, a senior official from the State Department's Policy Planning
staff described its function as "looking six months ahead." George Kennan's bones may have been rattling in
his grave, but if that is the new reality, how can leaders and government, not just the military, adapt to it?
Surprisingly, the answer just may lie with Eisenhower. Stavridis and Zinni both cite a quote that is less well
known to civilians than, perhaps, it should be: "Plans are nothing, planning is everything." All three stress
over and over that it is the process of planning, debating, thinking through options and possible outcomes,
and asking seemingly unthinkable questions that is the bedrock of good policymaking. Establishing
resources and space to do that--in the National Security Council and Cabinet departments but also in
Congress and public dialogue--might not lead us to Clark's future of climate security and energy riches, but
it could hardly lead us further away. It would likely have prevented the full extent of the Iraq catastrophe. It
wouldn't end partisan competition--our system is designed for that--but it would make our partisans more
informed, and more able to sample the best ideas of their opponents, without credit, in the best American
tradition. That alone would be a worthy fusion of the twin traditions of military strategy and partisan
governance.
Heather Hurlburt directs the New Models of Policy Change project at New America. Her two decades in
national security policy include service on Capitol Hill, the State Department, and the Clinton White House.
Hurlburt, Heather
Source Citation   (MLA 8th
Edition)
Hurlburt, Heather. "Is a grand strategy for America even possible? Three of our finest flag officers attempt to
offer unifying visions for the United States, but run aground on the same political polarization that
flummoxes everything else." Washington Monthly, Jan.-Feb. 2015, p. 68+. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A398072666/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=74e1003f.
Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A398072666

"Partnership for the Americas: Western Hemisphere Strategy and U.S. Southern Command." Joint Force Quarterly, Jan. 2011, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A275489726/ITOF? u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. "'Skin in the Game': Partnership in Establishing and Maintaining Global Security and Stability." Joint Force Quarterly, Jan. 2011, p. 1. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A275489727/ITOF? u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. "Stavridis, James: SEA POWER." Kirkus Reviews, 1 Apr. 2017. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A487668554/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. "Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans." Publishers Weekly, 10 Apr. 2017, p. 65. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A490319301/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. Henstrand, Robert E. "Off the shelf." Joint Force Quarterly, July 2008, p. 140+. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A183044517/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. "Convergence: Illicit Networks and National Security in the Age of Globalization." Joint Force Quarterly, July 2013, p. 121. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A338119413/ITOF? u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. Stavridis, Admiral James G. "Convergence: illicit networks and national security in the age of globalization." Joint Force Quarterly, Oct. 2013, p. 109. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A350578166/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018. Hurlburt, Heather. "Is a grand strategy for America even possible? Three of our finest flag officers attempt to offer unifying visions for the United States, but run aground on the same political polarization that flummoxes everything else." Washington Monthly, Jan.-Feb. 2015, p. 68+. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A398072666/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF. Accessed 30 Jan. 2018.

• Naval Historical Foundation
  https://www.navyhistory.org/2017/09/book-review-sea-power-the-history-and-geopolitics-of-the-worlds-oceans/
  Word count: 821

  BOOK REVIEW – Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans
  September 21, 2017Book Reviews, Books, Featured, History, Newsbook review, James Stavridis, John Satterfield, naval history, sea power

  By Adm. James Stavridis, USN (Ret.), Penguin Press, New York (2017)

  Reviewed by John R. Satterfield, DBA

  Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans is a companion to The Accidental Admiral, Admiral Stavridis’ earlier best seller that provided many Americans with a basic education in national and global security. Stavridis, the first and only admiral to serve as NATO Supreme Allied commander, shifts his focus from continental concerns and prescriptions in the earlier book to the oceans surrounding the continents. Stavridis’ dual naval and scholarly career makes the author uniquely qualified to take on these topics. There seem to be few places he has not sailed in 37-years in uniform that included more than a decade afloat. His current role as dean of Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, where he earned a Ph.D. in 1984, adds to his authority.

  In seven chapters covering maritime regions with currently strategic significance, Stavridis addresses today’s policy issues from the broad context of maritime history, and by weaving his personal story throughout, his narrative is informal and conversational. His stylistic approach makes sense for readers with little or no background in naval and national security affairs, but there is nothing shallow or dull about the messages he imparts.

  Stavridis has long been an advocate of “smart power,” a combination of hard and soft power applications to achieve national goals. Based on his experience in combined commands, Stavridis is a stellar proponent of complementary military and diplomatic means to security and peace, and few can claim clearer practical experience with global alliances to facilitate these methods.

  The Atlantic and Pacific Oceans surround the U.S., but they are both relatively stable today. Stavridis argues that the situations in more distant seas and the littorals that frame them raise greater concerns for our nation and democracy. The U.S. Navy and its seagoing allies are crucial elements in the use of the smart power continuum to support not only American interests but also global progress. These five strategic areas include the Indian Ocean and the Arabian Gulf, the Mediterranean, the South China Sea, the Caribbean, and the Arctic Ocean.

  Stavridis considers the Indian Ocean, along with the Red Sea and Arabian Gulf, as centrally vital 21st century maritime and diplomatic spheres. With half of the world’s shipping, 70 percent of oil supplies on its sea lanes and 90 percent of the Islamic world living around it, the Indian Ocean’s importance should be obvious. To promote peace, Stavridis calls for greater involvement with India, with emphasis on resolution of the Indian-Pakistani conflict; more U.S. Navy deployments and combined exercises in the region; and more energetic efforts to stabilize the Arab states through pragmatic alliances.

  In the Mediterranean, the home of Western civilization, Stavridis recommends more NATO maritime involvement, better intelligence collection efforts, and a long-term solution to the current, dangerous instability in Libya.

  The South China Sea is the locus of an accelerating arms race, and the Peoples Republic of China has staked claims in the area to contain offshore threats. Stavridis suggests continued U.S. contact and collaboration among the region’s military and naval forces and more extensive use of organizations such as the International Court of Justice in The Hague to resolve disputes. He also supports the now beleaguered Trans-Pacific Partnership as a strategic as well as a commercial tool.

  The Caribbean also needs attention. Stavridis calls for an evolution of policy beyond the paternalistic Monroe Doctrine, a coherent regional strategy, and allocation of economic and other resources to advance laggard economies.

  Finally, the Arctic Ocean cannot be ignored. First, the environmental threat to the region is virtually incalculable and must be addressed. Global warming is destroying the polar ice cap and dangerously raising the sea level. Without decisive action, many of today’s continental coastlines will vanish under water by the next century. Stavridis also believes the nation must increase its limited presence in the region to face down Russian territorial aspirations.

  The book closes with a chapter on recent antipiracy activities, a paradigm for international maritime cooperation that has been successful, and a plan for the U.S. Navy’s critical role in future global affairs. Given the current political and economic climate, it’s doubtful that Stavridis’ vision, even a far more modest version, will be implemented.

  Nevertheless, the accidental admiral’s ideas, clear-headed and based on vast experience, would likely benefit the nation and the world and deserve serious attention.

  Jack Satterfield teaches military history and business and writes about military topics.

• Christian Science Monitor
  https://www.csmonitor.com/Books/Book-Reviews/2017/0627/Sea-Power-views-the-world-s-oceans-as-crucial-avenues-of-hope-and-danger
  Word count: 931

  Books Book Reviews
  'Sea Power' views the world's oceans as crucial avenues of hope and danger

  'Sea Power' author and admiral James Stavridis has created a thoroughly fascinating look at how the world's major bodies of water and politics intersect.
  What Are You Reading?
  Tell us about the book that's currently on your bedside table.

  Steve Donoghue

  June 27, 2017 —Admiral James Stavridis tells us that he was just a lowly plebe at the US Naval Academy when he first read Alfred Thayer Mahan, the author of the explosively influential 1890 book "The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783," in a class called simply “Sea Power.”

  Mahan, Stavridis writes, had “a desire to read, think, write, and publish occasionally,” a desire that drew him icy disdain from the Navy itself: “It is not the business of naval officers to write books.” Admiral Stavridis politely points out that he himself has written seven books, and his latest, the thoroughly fascinating Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans, announces with its very title that it will be deliberately Mahanesque.

  It would be difficult to overstate the impact that Mahan's book had on the collective thinking of the world. “More than any other strategic philosopher,” Edmund Morris wrote in his "The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt," “Alfred Thayer Mahan was responsible for the naval buildup which preoccupied [America, Great Britain, Germany, and Japan] at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.” Mahan contended that although kingdoms and land wars have their places in human history, no factor has been more important in determining the life of nations than sea power.

  In the 21st century, it's misleadingly tempting to think this no longer applies. Thousands of surveillance satellites circle the globe; military drones guided from the safety of fortified land positions can strike targets anywhere in the world; cyber warfare isn't bounded by borders or bodies of water; in such a world, it's easy to wonder, can there really be much relevance any longer to blue-water navies?

  Stavridis, who spent 35 years on active service and was the Supreme Allied Commander for Global Operations at NATO before his retirement, dispels such thinking early and often in the pages of "Sea Power."
  Under the Sea: How much do you know about our watery planet? Take our quiz!

  His chapters deal in sequence with all the world's major bodies of water – the Atlantic, the Pacific, the Mediterranean, the South China Sea, the Indian Ocean (“The twenty-first century will be more about the Indian Ocean than either [the Atlantic or the Pacific],” he somewhat surprisingly but convincingly declares, “and the sooner we fully realize that in the United States, the better”), the Caribbean, and the rapidly-opening Arctic Ocean, with a chapter about the piracy that afflicts all the world's major waterways. There is also a chapter titled “America and the Oceans,” that specifically opens a dialogue with Mahan's book, challenging and updating it for the 21st century.

  "Sea Power" gives readers the chance to imagine they are sitting in a well-appointed Naval Academy lounge and listening to a seasoned old sailor discourse at length on history and pause whenever it suits him in order to pepper his lessons with challenging predictions and personal anecdotes.

  Writing about the edgy brinksmanship that sometimes seems to be characterizing the modern Pacific, he has surprisingly optimistic things to say, for example. “Despite the tensions and the risks in our modern Pacific Rim, the odds are better than even that the region will develop peacefully,” Stavridis writes. “None of the societies have a long tradition of imperialist behavior, and most have found ways to cooperate and collaborate in a variety of dimensions, despite the arms buildup.”

  Mentioning his friend commander Robb Chadwick prompts a reminiscence about the morning of 9-11, when Stavridis invited Chadwick to leave his desk at the Navy Intelligence Center and cross the complex for a visit – thus saving him from death when a plane crashed “more or less directly” into his office, killing all his officemates.

  Stavridis strikes a perfect balancing tone between the theoretical and the personal; he's read widely in the annals of naval history, and he's also seen years of that history in the making.
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  His strong conviction in "Sea Power" isn't only that Mahan was right in crediting naval force with a key role – perhaps the key role – in geopolitics but also that there are many dimensions to that key role, sometimes surprising dimensions verging on the diplomatic and the humanitarian. Stavridis in his career oversaw such humanitarian missions, and he's very convincing on their effectiveness. “We spend a great deal of time in the military conducting lethal combat operations – that is who we are,” Stavridis writes, referring to the US military establishment with which he's so familiar. “But we also can deploy soft power in massive ways that can make a real difference in the world. And the result – a changed view of our nation – is so often the way we can create real security over the long haul."

  "Sea Power" is clear-eyed about the dangers of the modern nautical realities, but it doggedly retains this tone of hope throughout. And hope or danger, on one point the book compels agreement: the oceans are still the crucial theaters of this water world.

• U.S. Naval Institute
  https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2017-06/sea-power-history-and-geopolitics-worlds-oceans
  Word count: 2384

  Home » Magazines » Proceedings Magazine - June 2017 Vol.
  143/6/1,372

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  Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans
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  Admiral James Stavridis, U.S. Navy (Retired). Penguin Press, 2017. 384 pp. Illus. Biblio. Index. $28.

  Reviewed by Captain Peter M. Swartz, U.S. Navy (Retired)

  This is a marvelous and essential addition to that groaning Leader’s Bookshelf that Admiral James Stavridis himself just wrote about in his previous book (Naval Institute Press, 2017). Why? Because in it the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe (SACEUR) and present dean of Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy not only describes what his subtitle promises—the history and geopolitics of the world’s oceans—but also seeks to accomplish something far more elusive, sophisticated, and significant: To show how service at sea in one of the world’s great global navies simultaneously expands tactical, operational, strategic, and policy knowledge and skills in an officer and—most important—develops insights in him or her regarding myriad possible interconnections among those levels of conflict. The result: Navy senior leaders such as Admiral Stavridis in his last several tours who can employ their unique backgrounds at sea in a highly nuanced fashion to deal with burning contemporary and future national military problems.

  The theme of interconnectedness of levels of military and naval thought flows through the book, along with demonstrations of its utility. But another powerful theme also flows through it—the interconnectedness of the world’s many separate seas and oceans forming one “world ocean” (the book’s first chapter is “The Sea is One”). These two interrelated and interwoven themes reinforce each other powerfully throughout the author’s narrative.

  Keenly aware of the geopolitical heritage of every strait, bight, bay, gulf, canal, sea, and ocean through which he sailed in a career that included almost 11 years out of sight of land, Admiral Stavridis both applied that awareness to problems at hand, on the ship, and stored it away for use in future situations. He writes about the whole world and himself, on personal and geopolitical levels, past, present, and future. He highlights the breadth that service at sea in the U.S. Navy gives the nation’s naval leaders. It is a model of how sailors reflect on their sea experiences and those of their forebears, bringing them to bear not only on tactical and operational problems, but also on matters of national policy and grand strategy.

  The main body of the book is a stately march of comprehensive chapters, through the centuries and over the waves. The admiral considers, in turn, the Pacific, the Atlantic, the Indian Ocean (styled “the Future Sea”), the Mediterranean, the South China Sea, the Caribbean, and the Arctic. His sympathetic and sober consideration of the Caribbean (“Stalled in the Past”) is particularly thoughtful, as is his discussion of the “Promise and Peril” of the Arctic. Curiously, however, for the only SACEUR to have worn a Navy uniform, he barely mentions the Baltic—a body of water that figures prominently in current daily U.S., NATO, and Russian concerns. Perhaps that is because the Baltic—of all the world’s seas—has almost never loomed large in the U.S. Navy’s attention, or because Admiral Stavridis had not often sailed that sea as a sailor (probably not unrelated phenomena). Or perhaps because he plans to turn his attention to that sea in his next book or article.

  A particularly valuable chapter is entitled “The Outlaw Sea: Oceans as Crime Scenes,” analyzing acute global issues of piracy, overfishing, and the environment, with prescriptions for each. In his final chapter, “America and the Oceans: A Naval Strategy for the Twenty-First Century,” Admiral Stavridis pulls it all together, providing policy nostrums based on a lifetime of sea and shore duty at all levels of command and informed by his keen sense of the legacy bequeathed to him by sailors and sea contests long past.

  He finishes the final chapter with another look at each of the world’s oceans, but from a contemporary strategic sense. Buttressed by his historical understanding and wide personal experience at sea, he takes stands and argues positions: For a 350-ship U.S. Navy battle force with at least 12 carrier battle groups; the possibility of reconstituting a U.S. Navy Eighth Fleet (and a Ninth); internationalization of the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; a drastic increase in U.S. Navy warship numbers in the Mediterranean; and an aggressive cyber campaign to sabotage the North Korean weapons program, among other recommendations. He concludes where he started: “the thought that there is both a deeply individual component to sailing and understanding the oceans and a key geostrategic element to the idea that the sea is truly one.” This is a book for all sailors and policymakers, and especially for those who are both.

  Captain Swartz is a naval strategy and policy analyst and group director at Center for Naval Analysis, supporting all three Sea Services. During his 26-year naval career he did two tours in Vietnam as an advisor to the South Vietnamese Navy. He served as a maritime strategist and special assistant under three Chiefs of Naval Operations, Secretary of the Navy John F. Lehman Jr., and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Colin Powell.

  Admiral Stavridis talks about Sea Power

  PROCEEDINGS: Thank you for talking with us about your book, Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans. You have written many other books and articles about the sea and sailors. Why did you feel compelled to write this particular book in this particular way? What is special in this book that you are trying to get across?

  Stavridis: Three things drew me to doing the book at this time. One is that I have finally realized that I have come to the end of my own long voyage on the seas, and I wanted to try to bring together what it is like to be a mariner in each of the world’s oceans in which I was privileged to sail over my 37 years in the Navy.

  Second, as I continue in my life and career at Tufts University, being the dean of the Fletcher School, again and again, I see the importance of history and geopolitics in the oceans collectively. I have had to contemplate how important the oceans are historically.

  Finally, as you look at the world today, you can see so many of the crises and the difficulties we face ultimately end up involved in or on the oceans, including the return of great power conflicts with China and Russia, the challenges of migration moving across these oceans, competition in the Arctic, and the enormous geopolitical challenge in the South China Sea.

  We are really moving into a maritime era, so all three of those things really came together over the last couple of years for me. Sea Power is the result.

  PROCEEDINGS: Your book is about sea power and more. It is also about the power of the seas and their hydrology, geography, and choke points and how they can limit the power of China and Russia in the coming decades. Could you address that please?

  Stavridis: The United States enjoys, without question, the most enviable geographic position of any great nation. We have access to two enormous oceans. There are no choke points that confine us. We have enormous coastlines, north, south, east, and west, yet we are buffered and protected by the seas. As you look at the rest of the world, many of our competitors are constrained by the seas.

  Think of it as an enormous, complex jigsaw puzzle. In a sense, the United States is an island nation that has a key to each of the puzzles in each direction on the compass. Therefore, we ought to leverage that as a nation, not strictly for the interest of the United States, but really for the betterment of the world. We do that by ensuring that the global commons are open and that our own national interests are protected, but also that international commerce is free to flow, that we can harvest responsibly the protein and hydrocarbons from the oceans, and that we are working collectively to protect the oceans.

  We are in an extraordinarily lucky position given our geography. We ought to understand how important that is and what an advantage it is for us as we go forward in the 21st century.

  PROCEEDINGS: You have had some wonderful titles and influence in your career, including Supreme Allied Commander. If you could direct one great outcome, with regard to sea power, what would it be?

  Stavridis: I would hope that the United States will ensure it has a fleet of sufficient size and, more important, skilled mariners to crew it such that we would always know that we could control the ocean around us. We have to be able to project power. At the end of the day, it is sea control that is crucial for our nation. We have to be able to do both. To do that, we need a fleet of sufficient size, which we are lacking today. If I could wave a magic wand, I would increase the size of our Navy and ensure that we could crew it effectively with the men and women who would ensure that we could continue to enforce control of the seas around the world.

  PROCEEDINGS: You finish your book with an analysis of the U.S. Navy’s current strategy, now more than two years old, that you seem to generally endorse. At the same time, you discuss hybrid threats, such as transnational crime, piracy, overfishing, destruction of the environment, migration, and human trafficking. How should the strategy be modified to address these threats?

  Stavridis: We should recognize that part of sea control is ensuring that oceans do not become the “world’s largest crime scene” and understand that an enormous amount of damage is done to the global economy through these kinds of hybrid offenses directed against the environment and directed against the merchant fleets of the world.

  We have to recognize that the oceans are an enormous resource to mankind. If we strictly focus on a military-to-military confrontation in the oceans, we miss the importance of all these additional challenges we face. I think this is also a point to be made about the U.S. Coast Guard. Collectively the U.S. Navy, U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Marine Corps, and of course our Merchant Marines are all part of ensuring that we face not only the obvious state-on-state challenges but that we also are prepared to deal with the other topics that you mentioned.

  PROCEEDINGS: You brought up earlier that the South China Sea and the Arctic may be regions of superpower confrontations. How can the U.S. Navy act to deter such confrontations?

  Stavridis: First, these are two very different scenarios, so let me take each in turn quickly. The Arctic today is a zone of competition but not of conflict. I think there are diplomatic measures: science diplomacy and search-and-rescue operations, for example. There are cooperative approaches that we can apply to the Arctic before the situation moves out of being competition and moving toward conflict. In the Arctic, we have a good shot at working to create a zone of cooperation. For the U.S. Navy to operate in the Arctic, we need our Coast Guard colleagues to have effective icebreakers. We need to understand more about operations in the high North, particularly as the icecaps continue to melt.

  Unfortunately, the South China Sea today is already a zone of conflict. It is at the moment relatively low in scale. It is more hybrid than it is full-blown state-on-state. The trajectory of the South China Sea is toward a broader sense of conflict, most obviously between the United States and China. That would be disastrous for the global economy if we were to fall into what some have called the Thucydides trap. It is the idea that a rising power almost always confronts an established power in a military sense. We have to avoid that. We have the diplomatic tools to do so. The South China Sea will require both military activity to confront China when the Chinese are in clear violation of international law as well as diplomatic and economic tools so we can move that scale back toward one of competition and over time perhaps to one of cooperation.

  In the South China Sea, our traditional forward-leaning, forward-deployed posture, freedom of navigation are the things that we traditionally have done there, and they are important. These are two very different scenarios, but both are of critical maritime importance.

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  https://www.npr.org/2017/06/06/531701056/stavridis-book-sea-power-explains-why-oceans-matter-in-global-politics
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  Stavridis' Book 'Sea Power' Explains Why Oceans Matter In Global Politics
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  June 6, 20175:00 AM ET
  Heard on Morning Edition

  Steve Inskeep talks to retired Admiral James Stavridis, former supreme allied commander for NATO, about his new book: Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World's Oceans.

  STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

  And I'm Steve Inskeep with some of the History of Our Time. We're discussing big trends that shape our unsettling moment. Last week, for example, writer Richard Reeves described the growing privilege of the upper middle class.

  (SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED BROADCAST)

  RICHARD REEVES: And the fact that they are not only separate from the rest of society but unaware of the degree to which the system works in their favor strikes me as one of the most dangerous political facts of all time.

  INSKEEP: We've also heard of the rise of nationalism and threats to liberal democracy. And this morning, we go to sea. Retired Admiral James Stavridis has spent almost 11 years of his life at sea as part of the world's most powerful navy, the U.S. Navy. In a new book, he vividly describes the view from the helm of a ship.

  JAMES STAVRIDIS: It's an office with the best view in the world. And you know what you see when you look out the bridge of a ship? You see eternity.

  INSKEEP: There would be a temptation to think that it's unchanging and dull. Does it ever get dull?

  STAVRIDIS: Never. The oceans are constantly changing. And you have to remember the oceans are dangerous. They'll kill you in a minute.

  INSKEEP: The waters are dangerous. The weather is dangerous. Strategically, the oceans can also be dangerous. Admiral Stavridis' book "Sea Power" argues that the oceans continue to matter in global politics.

  Now, when we talked, I told Admiral Stavridis it's tempting to think of sea power as an artifact of the past. You know, we think of the Spanish Armada being defeated or the battles of World War II or the sea lanes that once connected Europe to its colonies in past centuries.

  I get the importance of sea power then, but what is it now?

  STAVRIDIS: First and foremost, it's international trade. Ninety-five percent of the world's trade moves across the oceans. Secondly, there are still nations contending. In fact, I'd point to two very hot spot parts of the world today.

  One is the eastern Mediterranean, where the United States and Russia are jostling. And the other, most obviously, is the South China Sea, where China makes extravagant claims of territoriality. And it is another manifestation of the importance of the oceans.

  INSKEEP: We better explain each of those situations you described. You said the eastern Mediterranean. You're reminding me that Russia is deeply involved in the war in Syria. And people say the reason for that is Russia happens to have a Mediterranean Sea naval base on the coast of Syria.

  STAVRIDIS: They do, owned and operated by the Russians on the territory of the dictator Assad. They are very covetous of that strategic asset. First, it gives them influence by presence. Secondly, there's real military utility. The Russians have launched strikes from that area, much as we used a Tomahawk missile against Syria a few weeks back.

  And thirdly, it allows them to train and exercise with other nations who are in that region, and that increases their military influence.

  INSKEEP: How has it affected American history that for the last couple of generations or a little more, the United States has had the world's most powerful navy by far?

  STAVRIDIS: It's been enormously helpful. The nation that profits the most from a peaceful global commons, from oceans upon which 50,000 ships can sail in a given day moving cargo, is the United States. That trade, that ability to be part of a global system benefits us enormously.

  But the rise, again, of the Russian and Chinese navies is significant and over time will allow them potentially to constrain those sea lanes of communication.

  INSKEEP: What's the Chinese navy like?

  STAVRIDIS: Let's go back 20 years ago. The wall is falling down - the Berlin Wall. China at this point is really a coastal navy. Twenty years on, they've been adding to their fleet 10, 15 percent per year. Their ships are becoming much more capable. They're now ranging into the deep Pacific. So this is a significant geopolitical turn that's occurring in front of us.

  INSKEEP: And I guess if we think about them turning submerged reefs, building them up to become airstrips in the middle of the South China Sea, that's an unsinkable aircraft carrier.

  STAVRIDIS: Exactly. They have tens of thousands of acres they have developed in the South China Sea. And it allows them under international law to make claim to the entire South China Sea, and that is their real objective.

  INSKEEP: What is the United States getting, or what would the United States get by keeping China from dominating the South China Sea?

  STAVRIDIS: We would get a network of allies, partners and friends, all of us working together in order to ensure we have a vibrant democratic human rights-oriented region of the world.

  INSKEEP: How has American strategic thinking changed now that there's less and less ice on top of the Earth?

  STAVRIDIS: I mentioned those two tactical hotspots, the eastern Mediterranean and the South China Sea. The strategic hotspot is going to be the Arctic, where the ice is melting rapidly. It will open up shipping lanes. It will fuel territorial disputes.

  So as that ice breaks up, this becomes a treasure trove of resources, of shipping lanes, of fragile ecological area. For all those reasons, this Arctic Sea may be the most important geostrategic zone of competition in the coming decades.

  INSKEEP: Can you take us back out to sea for a moment here?

  STAVRIDIS: Sure.

  INSKEEP: Because I'm thinking about a passage in which you write of your first time heading into Pearl Harbor, where you were in charge of docking the ship.

  STAVRIDIS: (Laughter) Yeah. I had many adventures developing myself as a ship handler. Admiral Ernest King, who was a classic crusty old World War II admiral, once said that the mark of a great ship handler is never getting in a situation that requires great ship handling skills.

  What he meant was don't take chances with the ship. Be very steady. Use tugs to help you maneuver. I was very impulsive as a ship handler as a young man and managed to bang my ship pretty hard on the pier any number of times. As people always say about Admiral Stavridis, it's one thing that he made admiral, we just can't figure out how he made captain.

  INSKEEP: (Laughter) And this happened to you in Pearl Harbor? You could have ordered up a tugboat to help you get into the...

  STAVRIDIS: Sure.

  INSKEEP: So I thought about that phrase - the mark of a great ship handler is not getting in a situation where you need great ship handling - and I wondered if it was a sort of metaphor. Do you need to think on a strategic level that way?

  STAVRIDIS: You do. As I look at America in today's environment, we need to avoid that tendency to be overly impulsive. We need to work with our allies and friends. The allies are the tugboats of this metaphor. You don't have to operate unilaterally in the world. It's a powerful metaphor for almost everything in life.

  INSKEEP: Retired U.S. Navy Admiral James Stavridis is the author of "Sea Power: The History And Geopolitics Of The World's Oceans." Thanks very much.

  STAVRIDIS: Thanks, Steve.

  INSKEEP: And that's some of the History of Our Time. You can find more talks in the series at npr.org.

  (SOUNDBITE OF FORT FAIRFIELD'S "THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS")

• Center for International Maritime Security
  http://cimsec.org/sea-power-history-geopolitics-worlds-oceans/34213
  Word count: 1402

  Book Review
  Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans
  September 26, 2017 Guest Author Leave a comment

  Admiral James Stavridis (ret.), Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans. New York City: Columbia University Press, 2017, 384 pages. $18.00/hardcover.

  By Chad Pillai

  Since the dawn of civilization, the seas have been a part of the human story. It has shaped commerce, the spread of ideas, and even wars. When someone thinks of geography, they usually associate it with features on land and its impact on mankind. However, the seas and by extension the oceans have played a bigger role since they are nature’s super highways that have and continue to connect far flung landmasses and people together. Where the oceans have met the land, especially areas that present an opportunity to constrict movement, represent key terrain known as chokepoints for people and nations to control and benefit while denying others such privilege.

  The private intelligence company known as Strategic Forecasting (STRATFOR) recently published a report titled “The Geopolitics of Maritime Chokepoints” that states, “Area where geography constrict movement by land or water, known as chokepoints, has been fought over time immemorial…for most of history, commerce and military ambition were limited to small localities and confined regions. In these contexts, contested chokepoints usually meant points where roads or rivers narrowed enough to allow disruption by hostile actors…while land and riverine chokepoints are still relevant to business and military planners, maritime chokepoints have taken center stage in power politics.” This precise explanation on the importance of maritime chokepoints fits well with Admiral (Retired) James Stavridis’s new book, Sea Power: The History and Geopolitics of the World’s Oceans. While many cite Harold Mackinder, the twentieth century British geographer who coined the term “World Island” for Eurasia (and updated recently by Robert Kaplan as Afro-Eurasia) and the warnings associated with its dominance, the real maximum should be the nation that controls the seas and the chokepoints dominates the world. Since the end of WWII, the U.S. has been that nation.

  Before I discuss Sea Power, I recommend all readers enjoy the book with a glass of scotch, or whatever libation suites them, a cigar, and a map of the world to visualize the geography and its associated history. Sea Power is part biography of Admiral Stavridis’s career in the Navy, part history of the world’s oceans influence on mankind, and part modern geopolitical analysis impacting foreign relations, global economics, and military strategy. In his opening chapter, Admiral Stravridis states his central thesis when he writes that “Some observers may not be interested in the geopolitics of the oceans, but they will haunt our policy and our choices in this turbulent twenty-first century. The oceans will matter deeply to every aspect of human endeavor.” Along those lines, George Friedman, the founder of STRATFOR and GEOPOLITICAL FUTURES, and Jacob Shapiro, wrote that “Geopolitics is the supposition that all international relationships are based on the interaction between geography and power.” The oceans as geopolitical entities has shaped mankind’s quest for power and glory throughout the ages because they have served as the highways that have linked distant civilizations and made commerce both possible and profitable between them, which caused competition and friction that have led to war. To highlight the history and geopolitics of the oceans, Admiral Stavridis takes the reader on an oceanic voyage across the world by focusing the chapters on four oceans (Atlantic, Pacific, Indian, and Arctic) and three seas (Mediterranean, South China Sea, and Caribbean).

  The advantage the United States has, according to Admiral Stavridis, is that it can look at the oceans from a strategic sense by elaborating that “while the essence of sea power is the connective power of the unity of the oceans into a single global commons, there are historical, cultural, political, economic, and military reasons to think about each from a strategic perspective.” The United States grapples with an increasingly complex security environment described as contested norms and persistent disorder according to the Joint Operating Environment. It is being challenged to develop a strategy to maintain the world order it established post-WWII. Admiral Stavridis provides the reader with a chapter proposing “A Naval Strategy for the Twenty-First Century.” The central premise of the strategy is that the United States, the “World Island,” enjoys a geopolitical competitive advantage over challengers such as China and Russia. Their persistent vulnerabilities from lack of warm-water ports to being enclosed by island chains and chokepoints allows the U.S. and its allies and partners to, “contain powerful nations that have concentrated their use of forces ashore, ignoring the sea out of lack of interests, or an inability to see the force of the sea power argument, or simply because the lack the geography, character, and political will to exploit the oceans.”

  The Russians and the Chinese are not standing idle though when it comes to sea power as both nations have increased their investment in their naval capabilities. As I wrote previously for CIMSEC, with China opening its first overseas base in Djibouti, the critical chokepoint at the mouth of the Red Sea and Russia’s active military engagement in Syria, both are setting the conditions to potentially counter U.S. influence in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf Region. As the Joint Force continues to develop the Multi-Domain Battle Concept, there is potential to utilize maritime geography to our advantage. This ranges from employing long-range land-based surface-to-sea missiles to hold Russian and Chinese naval forces at risk (a reversal of their A2/AD concepts), exploiting vulnerabilities in undersea cables, practicing “hybrid warfare—disruption and degradation with little overt engagement,” to the employment and aggregation of land forces from multiple locations to create complex dilemmas. Admiral Stavridis states that we should follow “Mahan’s advice to keep a weather eye on the rising power of both of these potential competitors at sea and maintain the ability to defeat both.”
  The author had the privilege of attending a meeting between Admiral (Retired) James Stavridis, then the Supreme Allied Commander – Europe (SACEUR) and the current Chairman of the Joint Chiefs (CJCS) General Joseph Dunford, then Commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Kabul, Afghanistan in 2013. He also had the humorous privilege of being present at NATO HQ in Brussels when former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta called the Stavridis as General Stavridis while doing his best to not look shocked or surprise. (Photo courtesy of Chad Pillai)

  Throughout the book and especially in his final chapter on a twenty-first century naval strategy, Admiral Stavridis balances his approach by highlighting both the dangers and opportunities for the U.S. due to its unique geographical location and how its economic, military, and political might give it the means and opportunity to shape and influence the development of regional powers across the globe. The geopolitics of the oceans, its “supposition on geography and power” stated by George Friedman and Jacob Shapiro, ensure that the oceans will play a critical role in the national security decision-making of the U.S. and other global powers. Tim Marshall in his book Prisoners of Geography succulently reinforces this proposition when he wrote that, “as the twenty-first century progresses, the geographical factors that have shaped our history will mostly continue to determine our future.”

  As an Army Strategist who studies the nature of war and character of war, I have a profound appreciation of the world’s oceans and their geopolitical significance. And while I may not root for Navy during Army-Navy football games, I know full well that America’s Army cannot win without America’s Navy.

  Lieutenant Colonel Chad M. Pillai is an Army Strategist stationed at Macdill Air Force Base who has previously contributed to CIMSEC with the following articles: “Counter Influence Activities to U.S. posture in the Mediterranean and Persian Gulf,” “India as the Pivotal Power of the 21st Century Security Order,” and “Bear, Dragon & Eagle: Russian, Chinese & U.S. Military Strategies.” He holds a Masters in International Public Policy from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advance International Studies (SAIS).

  These views are presented in a personal capacity and do not necessarily reflect the views of any government agency.

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