The Influence of Sea Power on the French Revolution. Alfred Thayer Mahan
of Good Hope. The last two alone Great Britain has finally retained; but all of them, as years went by, passed by conquest into her hands after Holland, in 1795, became the dependent of France.
Portugal retained her traditional alliance with Great Britain, and so became a point of supreme importance when the secession of Spain to France compelled the British navy to leave the Mediterranean. The formal connection between the two countries was for a short time severed by the genius and power of Napoleon; but, at the uprising of Spain in 1808, the old sentiment, unbroken, resumed its sway, and Portugal became the base of the British army, as in an earlier day she had been the secure haven of the British fleet.
In northern Italy the extent of Piedmont and its contiguity to the Austrian duchies of Milan and Mantua gave the means of forming a powerful focus of resistance to their common enemy, the French republic, around which the smaller Italian States might feel secure to rally; but the sluggishness and jealousies of the two governments prevented the vigorous, combined action which alone could cope with the energy impressed by the Convention upon its men. In the centre of the peninsula, the Pope inevitably threw his immense spiritual influence, as well as such temporal power as he could exercise, against the revolution; while, in the south, the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies, with its capital at Naples, was chiefly controlled by the queen, herself a sister of Marie Antoinette. The military strength of this kingdom, like that of Spain, was rendered contemptible by miserable administration, and was further neutralized by its remoteness from the seats of actual war; but the bias of the monarchy was undoubted. Like all weak and corrupt governments, it shuffled and equivocated under pressure and was false when the pressure was removed; but, so far as it could, it favored the allied cause and was a useful base to the British fleet in the Mediterranean.
In the eastern Mediterranean, the Turkish empire was not then the element of recognized critical hazard to the whole European system which it has since become; but its territorial limits were far wider than they now are. Extending on the north to the Save and the Danube, Turkey held also beyond the river Wallachia and Moldavia to the banks of the Dniester, and, on the south, the present kingdom of Greece. The islands of the Archipelago, with Crete and Cyprus, also belonged to her. Syria and Egypt likewise acknowledged the authority of the Porte, but in both the submission yielded was only nominal; the former, under Djezzar Pasha, and the latter, under the Mamelukes, were practically independent countries. At the outbreak of the French Revolution Turkey had sunk to the lowest pitch of disorganization and impotence; and her rulers, keenly feeling her condition and her danger from Russia, sought to avoid entanglement in the troubles of western Europe, from which their great enemy kept itself free. In this they were successful until Bonaparte, by his attack upon Egypt, forced them from their security and aroused Great Britain and Europe to their common interest in the East.
The islands of the western Mediterranean had not only the importance common to all members of that geographical family in naval wars, nor yet only that due to their intrinsic values. In so narrow a sheet of water each possessed an added strategic weight due to its nearness, either to some part of the mainland or to some one of the maritime routes traversing the sea. The influence thus exerted would fall naturally into the hands of the nation which, by controlling the water, controlled the communications of the island; but this statement, though generally true, is subject to limitations. The narrowness of the belts of water, or, to use the military phrase, the shortness of the communications from land to land, made evasion comparatively easy. No navy, however powerful, can with certainty stop an intercourse requiring only a night's run, and which, therefore, can be carried on by very many small vessels, instead of having to be concentrated into a few large ones; and this was doubly true in the days of sail, when the smaller could have recourse to the oar while the larger lay becalmed. Thus the British found it impossible to prevent French partisans from passing into Corsica in 1796, when the victories of Bonaparte had placed the French army in Leghorn; and at a later day the emperor succeeded, though with infinite trouble, in sending re-enforcements and supplies from southern Italy to his garrison in Corfu, upon which his far-reaching genius hoped, in a distant future, to base a yet further extension of power in the East. These instances, however, were but the exception, and on the small scale demanded by the other conditions; for the garrison of Corfu was few in number, and the French found the Corsicans friendly. As the communications lengthened, the influence of Sea-Power asserted itself. It was found impossible to relieve Malta, or even to extricate the large vessels blockaded there; and the French army in Egypt remained isolated until forced to surrender, despite the efforts, the uncontrolled power, and the strong personal interest of Bonaparte in the success of an occupation for which he was primarily responsible. So also the narrow strip which separates Sicily from Italy withstood the French arms; not because it was impossible to send many detachments across, but because, to support them in a hostile country, with such insecure communications, was an undertaking more hazardous than was justified by the possible advantages.
The political distribution in 1793 of the islands of the western Mediterranean was as follows. The most eastern, known as the Ionian islands, extending southward from the entrance of the Adriatic along the coast of Greece, from Corfu to Cerigo, were in possession of Venice. When the ancient republic fell before the policy of Bonaparte, in 1797, the islands passed to France and began that circulation from owner to owner which ended in 1863 with their union to Greece. Sicily formed part of the kingdom of the Two Sicilies. It became the refuge of that monarchy from the arms of France, and, by its fertility and the use of its ports, was a resource to Great Britain throughout the Napoleonic period. Malta was still in the hands of the Knights of St. John. Of immense military importance, from its geographical position and intrinsic strength, its transfer, through the medium of France, into the hands of the greatest of naval powers was due to Bonaparte. It is, perhaps, the greatest of Mediterranean strategic positions, Egypt being rather interoceanic than Mediterranean; but, being of scant resources, its utility is measured by the power of the fleet which it subserves. Its fate when in the hands of France, the history of Port Mahon in the hands of Great Britain, nay, even the glorious and successful resistance of Gibraltar, give warning that the fleet depends less upon Malta than Malta upon the fleet.
Sardinia gave its name to the kingdom of which Piedmont, forming the Italian frontier of France, was the actual seat, and Turin the capital. Amid the convulsions of the period, the royal family, driven from the mainland, found an obscure refuge in this large but backward island. France could not touch it; Great Britain needed nothing but the hospitality of its harbors. In Maddalena Bay, at its northern extremity, Nelson found an anchorage strategically well-placed for watching the Toulon fleet, and possessing that great desideratum for a naval position, two exits, one or other of which was available in any wind. The Balearic islands were in the hands of Spain. The maritime importance of the other members of the group was dwarfed by that of Minorca, which contained the harbor, exceptionally good for the Mediterranean, of Port Mahon. Like Malta, though not to the same extent, the fate of Port Mahon depends ultimately upon the sea. The British took possession of the island in 1798, but restored it at the peace of Amiens. In the later hostilities with Spain, from 1804 to 1808, they appear not to have coveted it. Maddalena Bay, though a less agreeable and convenient anchorage than Mahon, is far better fitted for prompt military movement, the prime requisite in the clear and sound judgment of Nelson.
Of the greater islands there remains to give account only of Corsica. This was a recent acquisition of France, received from Genoa in 1769, somewhat contrary to the wish of the people, who would have preferred independence. They were certainly not yet assimilated to the French, and there existed among them a party traditionally well-inclined to Great Britain. The preponderance of this or of the other national preference would be decisive of the final political connection; for if the British navy did control the surrounding sea, it was unable, as before said, entirely to isolate the island and so to compel an unwilling submission. On the other hand, France could not introduce any considerable body of troops, in the face of the hostile ships; and her standard, if raised, would depend for support upon the natives. In 1793, there was at the head of affairs the old leader of the struggle for independence, Paoli, who had passed many years in exile in England and had been recalled to the island by the National Assembly; but the excesses of the later days had shaken his allegiance to France, and the commissioners sent by the Convention into Corsica made themselves obnoxious to him and to the people. Denounced by the republicans of Toulon, Paoli was summoned to the bar