ABSTRACT
The period between the two world wars, 1919-1939, constitutes somewhat of an interim or transition period as concerns rival basing networks. On the one hand, and even despite the shifts in power balances caused by the war, the period constituted mostly an extension of the nineteenth century, in that basing networks largely were functions of, or correlates of, colonial control; indeed, their primary purpose was that of imperial defense. Likewise, as had been the case between 1815 and 1914, there was little “permanent” (or other than ad hoc) granting of basing access between sovereign states. These facts were, further, correlates of a largely multipolar system devoid (at least immediately after 1919) of an ideological basis for enmity and absent of the kind of structural long-term alliances that would become the hallmarks of post-World War II diplomacy.1
