ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews the nature of navies, the most obvious of the constituents of seapower, and focuses on the likely impact of technology on their composition, functions and future importance. Refining previous work done by Michael Morris and Eric Grove, Lindberg and Todd have produced a classification system that divides navies into ten categories. The fact that Israel managed to sail its fast attack craft (FAC) direct from France, or South African units sail across the South Atlantic to participate in exercises with South American navies does not make either of them 'regional' in the sense that the Indian Navy. The capacity to operate naval forces at a distance is a useful partial indicator of the relative strength of a navy. As Nicholas Rodger explains, the Royal Navy moved into a higher league when it graduated from sea-denial in local waters to sea control in distant ones. Peter Haydon has an attractively simple function-based naval hierarchy.
