Saturnino Monteiro, "The Decline and Fall of Portugese Seapower, 15831663," Journal of Military History 65/1: 9-20.
By the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century, the little kingdom of Portugal, situated on the western tip of Europe, emerged as a great seapower. Using its navy at world level for the first time in history, the Portuguese became the masters of a vast seaborne empire that encompassed many Atlantic islands, Brazil, and numerous strongholds in Africa and Asia. Above all, they obtained the monopoly of the rich maritime commerce of the Indian Ocean and China seas. By the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth century, when the great naval clashes in the Atlantic and in the East began, first with the English (1583) and later with the Dutch (1596), it became evident that the old Portuguese superiority in naval warfare had given place to a well-marked inferiority. This essay seeks to clarify the reasons for the downfall of Portuguese seapower.
Ricardo A. Herrera, "Self-Governance and the American Citizen as Soldier, 17751861," Journal of Military History 65/1: 21-52.
American soldiers from the War for Independence through the first year of the Civil War demonstrated and defined their understanding of the nature of American republicanism and how they, as citizens and soldiers, were active participants in the republican experiment through their military service. One of the themes that constituted this core of soldierly beliefs on republican citizenship was that of self-governance, or in other words the soldier's belief in his right of exercising some form of independence or individualism as a free citizen of the Republic. The key manifestations of soldierly self-governance were in their personal independence, their enlistment negotiations, their petitions to superior officers, militia constitutions, and in their negotiation of military discipline. The soldiers of this study represent a broad regional, rank, and service spectrum; they include regulars, volunteers, militiamen, officers, enlisted men, and Union and Confederate soldiers.
Miklós Szabó, "The Development of the Hungarian Aircraft Industry, 1938-1944," Journal of Military History 65/1: 53-76.
No abstract.
Michael J. Whitby, "Matelots, Martinets, and Mutineers: The Mutiny in HMCS Iroquois, 19 July 1943," Journal of Military History 65/1: 77-104.
On 29 July 1943, 190 sailors in the Canadian destroyer HMCS Iroquois mutinied to protest a stoppage of leave. More than a crew expressing displeasure at an unpopular superior, the incident was symptomatic of the problems facing a navy caught in the midst of unprecedented wartime expansion, where inexperienced volunteer personnel collided head-on with the unfamiliar routines and discipline of the regular navy. This often produced friction, but here the combination caused a complete breakdown in discipline. Using a wide variety of previously unused documentation and interviews, this essay examines the causes and aftermath of the incident, and analyzes its wider impact on the Canadian navy.
Michael Coles, "Ernest King and the British Pacific Fleet: The Conference at Quebec, 1944 ('Octagon')," Journal of Military History 65/1: 105-30.
Despite strong resistance from Ernest J. King, his Chief of Naval Operations, President Franklin D. Roosevelt agreed to Royal Navy participation in the final naval operations against Japan. The article argues that King's opposition had merit, there being valid economic and operational reasons why a British Pacific Fleet in the Central Pacific could prove counterproductive. American politics further complicated the matter, as did the long history of tension between the two navies. The article concludes that the role played by the British might have been undertaken more effectively by the U.S. Navy, and that their Pacific fleet did little to advance their national interests.
John A. Lynn, "The Treatment of Military Subjects in Diderot's Encyclopédie," Journal of Military History 65/1: 131-65.
Diderot's Encyclopédie, one of the pivotal works of the Enlightenment, appeared as seventeen volumes of text (175165) and eleven volumes of plates (176272). This massive work attempted to cover the full range of human knowledge, including military subjects. Of the Encyclopédie's 74,044 entries, the editors classified nearly 1,250 under specifically military subject headings, such as Art militaire. While a number of noted philosophes contributed to military entries, the great majority of the military entries were the work of Guillaume Le Blond, a competent but uninspired mathematician and writer on technical military subjects. The next most prolific military contributor was Louis, the chevalier de Jaucourt, an energetic compiler. Several others, including such luminaries as Diderot himself, wrote a small number of relevant articles. The treatment of military subjects follows the program of the Enlightenment and makes constant reference to Puységur, Feuquières, de Saxe, Montecuccoli, Saint Rémy, Blondel, and other prominent military authorities of the era. The balanced but unexciting treatment of military subjects in the Encyclopédie constitutes its greatest value for historians today, for this compendium provides a measure of what the Enlightenment read and thought about force-composition, weaponry, tactics, operations, and strategy. Appended to this article is a list of all the military entries within the Encyclopédie, giving title, author, subject, and length. This list should be of great use to those who wish to mine the military riches of Diderot's great summa of eighteenth-century knowledge.