Corbett explained Russia's decision to send the Baltic Fleet to the Pacific as an effort to gain command of the sea and enable an invasion of Japan. Additional coastal-defence ships were included to support the advancing army with naval gunfire. Assembling those ships delayed the battle fleet's departure, showing how a supporting capability could both enable and burden a wider strategy. Corbett connected the case to Peter the Great's use of a galley fleet in the 1710s and treated coast-attack assets as essential to projecting amphibious power. The reading also links that line of thought to Fisher and Wilson and to the Royal Navy's order for monitors in 1914.
Notable Point · 32:54-33:21
Why Corbett treated coast-attack ships as part of amphibious power
Corbett's Russo-Japanese War study shows how shore-bombardment capability could support an invasion while also delaying the fleet assembled to secure command of the sea.