Book Review: "Fleet Tactics"

Hey all,

I just got a bunch of my books out of storage, and came across a few
that I
thought some people on the list might find interesting.

One is "Fleet Tactics: Theory and Practise" by Wayne P Hughes Jr, Capt
USN,
Ret. 
318 pages, published 1986 by the Naval Institute Press at Annapolis. 

Hughes is a former destroyer captain and taught at the US Naval
Postgraduate
School, where he held the Chair of Tactical Analysis. Acording to the
dust
jacket, "It was in this newly formed position...that he first began
asking
himself `Where are all the tactics books?' Finding none, he began to
write
his own."

After laying down some basic principles, Hughes traces the development
of
naval technology and tactics from the 17th century to the present. He
does a
great job of examining both the trends of changing tactics and
technology, as
well as the constants that have remained unchanged. The remainder of the
book
is devoted to discussing modern fleet tactics. For those like me who are
more
familiar with land-based warfare, Hughes does a great job of
illustrating the
differences between naval and ground tactics. 

Although this book is obviously about "wet" navies, I found it gave me a
great base from which to speculate about space naval tactics. I'm not
saying
the book will help you win your next FT game -- the last 2 games I won
were
both against first-time players, so who am I to talk! -- but I found it
well
worth the read. It might be hard to find, though, as Naval Institute
Press
isn't exactly a major publishing house, but a good rare-book-search
outfit
should be able to turn it up.

Hope some of you enjoy it,
Scott Field

To "know" a woman: This biblical absurdity makes a filthy song out of
"Getting to Know You," an unutterable blasphemy out of the phrase "God
knows," and transforms Socrates' "Know thyself" into "Go f___ yourself!"
    -- Allan Sherman