195 
I the Germans began their unrestricted submarine campaign when 
a transition had begun in world politics “from an imperialist war 
to an imperialist peace;’’ and the campaign represented Berlin’s “last 
chance, if not to achieve victory, then at least to gain an honorable 
peace.” After the fall of France in 1940, 
It looked as though the plan of Hitler’s Germany to gain 
supremacy in Western Europe with ground troops and aviation 
alone was near success. But England was still unsubdued and 
it was impossible to compel her surrender without sufficient naval 
forces... .6° 
And so on.®! Almost every historical example in the series is used 
to show the value of seapower, in the later and not the earlier stage 
of the armed struggle, in righting (or partially righting) an unfavorable 
balance already struck in the land battle or, more commonly, in 
ratifying a favorable decision attained on land and forcing the enemy 
to acknowledge his defeat and accept a dictated peace. 
This comes out most clearly in Gorshkov’s reversal of previous 
Soviet judgments on the Battle of Jutland in 1916. Admiral Belli 
had contended in 1964 that both the German and the British Navies 
had a ‘“‘doctrine of conserving forces” in World War I, their ““method”’ 
being that of the ‘‘fleet-in-being.”” German doctrine was only partly 
motivated by the desire ‘‘to have an argument when conducting peace 
negotiations,” but this was said to be the entire sum and substance 
of the British approach: The admiralty sought to preserve its fleet 
‘as an important factor at the moment of concluding peace.” In 
Belli’s view this ‘“‘politico-strategic’’ approach was wrong; military 
strategy should have been allowed to take its course.™ 
Gorshkov, in his series, takes note of previous Soviet criticism of 
British “indecisiveness” and ‘‘reluctance to risk major combatants in 
order to achieve complete victory,” but insists that the criticism “lacks 
objectivity.’ The Entente was winning the ground war on the con- 
tinent; all England had to do was ‘“‘maintain her existing position 
on the seas’’ and not permit the Germans to reverse the unfavorable 
balance on land through naval superiority. 
Along with positive hints of a wartime military-political mission 
for the navy, other items appeared in the series which seemed to 
be compatible with and only fully explicable when considered in the 
light of a withholding mission. The most important of these is the 
matter of submarine vulnerability against enemy ASW. In the past 
Soviet military strategists, Gorshkov included, had contended that 
SSBNs were ‘‘in reality vulnerable”’ and could be ‘‘successfully”’ com- 
6In the American Revolution, according to Gorshkov, the main missions were accomplished by 
the armies; after Britain had lost “several battles on land” and taken into account the “unfavorable 
relative strength of her forces at sea,” she was “forced to recognize” colonial independence. In the 
Napoleonic Wars, ‘“‘even though France had the necessary ground troops at her disposal,” the loss of 
the French fleet at Trafalgar made Britain and her colonies ‘“‘practically invulnerable to attacks from 
sea axes. England was able to deprive the enemy of the weapon most dangerous for her—the 
navy. . . . The liquidation of the threat from the sea gave the English bourgeoisie a free hand to organize 
and finance new alliances to continue the struggle. . . . Thus, the course of the war at sea and the 
gaining of domination by the English Navy had a great effect on the further policy of the bel- 
ligerents.” See Gorshkov in MS, No. 2, 1972, pp. 27-29. 
§1 McConnell, op. cit., 78-79. 
®[bid., 79. 
63 Gorshkov in A. A. Grechko (ed.), Yadernyy vek i voyna (Moscow, 1964), 66, Gorshkov in Prav- 
da, July 28, 1968; McConnell, op. cit., 81. 
69-315 O - 76 -- 14 
