ABSTRACT
Admiral Sir John Fisher rarely explained his strategic views in writing, and papers of his that do exist on this subject date for the most part from the period before he became First Sea Lord.1 The paucity of formal expositions of his strategic views and his known disengagement from the preparation of written war plans, have given some historians the impression that he had little interest in, or no capacity for, the conceptualization of strategy. Fisher, in their view, was too preoccupied with ‘matériel policy’.2 Arthur Marder, for example,3 believed it was Fisher’s instinctive response to the challenge of a rapidly expanding German Navy that motivated him to improve the war readiness of the fighting fleet by concentrating naval resources in home waters, re-equipping the battle fleet with new model armoured warships, and other administrative reforms intended to enhance the war readiness of ships in reserve.4 ‘The efficiency and strength of the Navy, one ready for war at a moment’s notice’, Marder declared, was Fisher’s ‘megalomania’.5
