Sea-Power in the Pacific: Free Audiobook and Listening Guide

Sea-Power in the Pacific, credited to Hector Charles Bywater, is available as a LibriVox volunteer audiobook. This guide identifies the recording, its source summary and its audio tracks.

About the work

The LibriVox catalogue summary, preserved with the recording, reads:

LibriVox recording of Sea-Power in the Pacific by Hector Charles Bywater. Read in English by Alister During the three decades preceding the Pacific War, the United States placed no small amount of effort in gaming out what a such a conflict against Japan might look like. Ultimately, the Pacific War looked very little like the crystallization of these efforts expressed in War Plan Orange. The Americans and the Japanese were both heavily influenced by the theories of sea power and decisive battle of Alfred Thayer Mahan, despite the lacklustre absence of any such climactic decision at sea in the Great War. The Pacific War would bear even less resemblance to Naval War College preconceptions as battleships were sidelined by the carrier—initially out of necessity, though as planes improved, and the doctrine for their employment were clarified, the superior capability they provided to shape the battlespace would soon become as clear as daylight. Sea-Power in the Pacific, published in 1921, is military writer Hector Charles Bywater’s prediction which in some respects – together with his 1925 novel, The Great Pacific War – hits far closer to the mark than any actual naval war planning of the interwar period. The impact of these two books in the United States is questionable, but – according to a 1970 article by journalist William H. Honan from American Heritage – both books were translated into Japanese and circulated among naval officers during the interwar period. Pictured on the cover is Yamashita Gentarō who was chief of the Navy General Staff at the time of this book’s publication. He was a member of the Fleet Faction opposed to the Washington Naval Treaty which was the hot coal of contention in the fight for supremacy between the Naval General Staff and the Navy Ministry. It was also the Navy General Staff which very quickly organised and circulated a translation of Sea-Power in the Pacific upon its publication. To what extent this book influenced Japanese military thinking is uncertain, but it clearly did exert an influence on the critical political struggles at play within the Imperial Navy in the 1920s. - Summary by Alister

Recording facts

• Recording title: Sea-Power in the Pacific
• Author credits: Hector Charles Bywater
• Language: English
• Original MP3 tracks: 18
• Listed recording duration: 10:21:13

Catalogue topics

• ships
• wwii
• pacific ocean
• war in the pacific
• world war 2

Track guide

1. 00 - Preface — 5:51
2. 01 - Chapter 1 ♆ A New Era of Naval Power: The Gravitation from West to East — 52:10
3. 02 - Chapter 2a ♆ Japan and the United States: Questions at Issue, Part One — 27:20
4. 03 - Chapter 2b ♆ Japan and the United States: Questions at Issue, Part Two — 33:24
5. 04 - Chapter 3a ♆ The United States Navy: Its Modern Development and Administration, Part One — 36:41
6. 05 - Chapter 3b ♆ The United States Navy: Its Modern Development and Administration, Part Two — 29:09
7. 06 - Chapter 4a ♆ The United States Navy: Men and Material, Part One — 38:06
8. 07 - Chapter 4b ♆ The United States Navy: Men and Material, Part Two — 33:43
9. 08 - Chapter 5a ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Its Inception, Growth, and Purpose, Part One — 25:41
10. 09 - Chapter 5b ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Its Inception, Growth, and Purpose, Part Two — 31:59
11. 10 - Chapter 6 ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Administration, Dockyards, and Shipbuilding Resources — 37:46
12. 11 - Chapter 7a ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Its Men and Ships, Part One — 30:22
13. 12 - Chapter 7b ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Its Men and Ships, Part Two — 46:27
14. 13 - Chapter 8 ♆ Japanese Sea-Power: Torpedo-Craft, Submarines, and Aircraft — 50:39
15. 14 - Chapter 9a ♆ Strategy in the Pacific, Part One — 29:07
16. 15 - Chapter 9b ♆ Strategy in the Pacific, Part Two — 39:48
17. 16 - Chapter 10 ♆ Possible Features of a War in the Pacific — 50:46
18. 17 - Chapter 11 ♆ War or Peace? Political and Economic Factors — 22:14

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