Mahan's case for naval preparedness

Alfred Thayer Mahan wrote less about destroyers than about the fleet as a whole, but the episode opens with his December 1896 article on preparedness. Modern war material took too long to create after hostilities became imminent. His battleship example separates launching a hull from fitting its battery and making the ship ready for sea. The video also treats Mahan's shorter articles as clearer than some of his books, which places the quotation within his wider work. Destroyers therefore belong to peacetime readiness and deterrence because they cannot simply be improvised once war begins.