ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that the character and application of sea power will change in the next century due to transformations in technological innovation and national economic dependence upon the sea. Various interconnected phenomena, including an advanced rate of technological advancement, the changed international system, and the evolving international economic system, together have the capability of greatly impacting the development and sustainment of sea power in the twenty-first century. The United States may not enjoy such an overwhelming technological advantage in its next war; America may find itself roughly equal, or even inferior, to an opponent's military technology. The United States suffered amazingly light casualties in the Gulf War. Technological supremacy over the Iraqi military has widely been credited with this saving of American lives. In 1942 an American naval officer's chance personal knowledge that Midway Island often had fresh water problems led to the breaking of an important Japanese Imperial Navy code.
