ABSTRACT
However sensible her views on other things, Anne was wrong about there being 'no science nor stratagem in sea fights'. More seriously, there is concern that the consequences of such thinking might prove too prescriptive and deadening for free-ranging operations on the open ocean. In addition to providing a great deal of information on navigation in the Indian Ocean, Ahmad bin Majid, the 'Lion of the Sea', emphasised the financial benefits to be expected from sea trade, and provided much advice to mariners to help them set about it. The eighteenth century was an era in which naval officers were court-martialled, and sometimes shot, through combat failure brought about by not appearing to adhere to the rules laid down in the Fighting Instructions. The US Navy's The Maritime Strategy, the public version of which appeared in 1986, was an even more dramatic demonstration of the fact that the Mahanian tradition was alive and well in the late twentieth century.
