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This paper builds on ten years of research, including a Master of Research thesis from 2015, ‘The End of Admiralty and Its impact on British Defence Policy 1955-1964’. It considers critical issues facing strategic theory which, it is argued, should be based on the insight that the study of history offers. A key theme is the study of strategy within the context of the centralisation, unification, reorganisation and reform of defence that took place in the United States of America and the United Kingdom in the immediate post-war decades. These have been a constant source of debate in defence and war studies with continuing modern relevance when considering matters such as military doctrine, strategy and theoretical concepts. The paper details the abolition of the British Admiralty and how Britain increasingly distanced itself from sea power and underinvested in its maritime strategy resulting in the rise and subsequent dominance of America’s Navy.

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About James W.E. Smith: James Smith is a PhD researcher in the Department of War Studies, Kings College London, under the supervision of the Laughton Chair for Naval History, Professor Andrew Lambert. In addition to his PhD on defence, strategy and naval thought following the Second World War, he is also working in the department on war gaming and conducting research into future naval space concepts.