Maritime Competition
Commerce made navies necessary
- The expansion of European commerce accelerated the growth of a worldwide economic network.
- A network of routes, posts and cargoes is an asset that can be taken, so protecting it requires a fleet.
- So maritime competition is a consequence of 3.4's network, not a separate story.
Commerce made navies necessary because a network of routes and cargoes is...
So maritime competition is a consequence of 3.4's network.
Navies are expensive, and self-justifying
- A fleet is the most capital-intensive thing an eighteenth-century state can own.
- It is paid for by taxing the trade it protects, which makes the trade and the fleet mutually dependent.
- So a state that loses its trade cannot afford its navy, and a state that loses its navy cannot keep its trade.
A fleet is paid for by taxing the trade it protects.
Which makes a defeat at sea a fiscal event as much as a military one.
Competition became war
- Routes and posts are rivalrous: a station held by one power is denied to another.
- 3.6 established that dynastic, state and colonial interests all influenced diplomacy and frequently led to war.
- So the eighteenth century's European wars have overseas causes, which is why 5.3 treats them as world wars.
A cause, a military consequence, or a lasting capacity?
Sort each element of maritime competition.
Routes and posts are ____: a station held by one power is denied to another.
That is what makes a commercial asset a military objective.
A navy and the trade it protects are mutually dependent. The fleet is paid for by taxing the trade, and the trade survives because the fleet protects it — so a defeat at sea is a fiscal event as much as a military one, which is how 5.2 leads to 5.1's crisis.
Select all the lasting capacities naval competition produced.
Mass conscription arrives with the French Revolution in 5.4.
Consequences beyond the fleet
- Naval competition drove state debt, which drove taxation, which is where 5.1's fiscal crisis comes from.
- It also drove shipbuilding, insurance, credit and charting — technical and financial capacity a state keeps afterwards.
- So an answer should give one military and one non-military consequence.
Naval competition connects to 5.1's fiscal crisis through...
The most capital-intensive thing an eighteenth-century state can own.
Causes and consequences
- The objective is the causes and consequences of European maritime competition from 1648 to 1815.
- Causes: a valuable network, rivalrous routes, and mercantilist doctrine treating trade as a state interest.
- Consequences: naval war, state debt and taxation, and durable financial and technical capacity.
A single station commanding a strait is worth more than the ships in its harbour, because holding it decides who may pass. Two states cannot both hold it, and neither can afford to let the other. That is what makes a commercial asset a military objective.
The expansion of European commerce accelerated the growth of a worldwide economic network — an asset that must be protected, so commerce made navies necessary. Fleet and trade are mutually dependent, routes and posts are rivalrous, and the consequences run past the fleet into state debt, taxation and durable financial and technical capacity.