In the latter part of the 19th century, technology was rapidly growing, offering new and, in most cases, better ways of doing things. Steam propulsion offered an alternative to the caprices of the winds, rifling was improving the marksmanship of naval gunners, and armor was transforming ships into fortifications as well as mobile artillery platforms. This technological growth was alluring and captured the imagination of many of the less conservative elements of the naval profession, as well it should.
Like any competent naval officer, Rear Admiral Stephen Bleecker Luce understood the value of applied science and engineering—indeed, he was esteemed as the Navy’s greatest expert seaman and was the author of the Navy’s first seamanship textbook. But this officer, who had commanded nine ships under both sail and steam, saw something that many others did not. While some were immersing themselves in these new developments and actively seeking ways to implement them, Luce felt that this was putting the cart before the horse. He believed that chasing after the ever-growing, constantly changing technologies that were then rapidly emerging was the wrong approach, that naval officers should instead focus their education on the best use of navies in a strategic sense and then tailor technology to those uses—in other words, to first learn the art of war and then apply the science of war to support and enhance that art.
Luce’s experiences during the Civil War had convinced him that while naval officers were generally very good at conducting naval operations, they were often limited by parochial thinking, only rarely able to think and act strategically. He had participated in the frustrating siege of Charleston, South Carolina, and had realized that despite the commitment of a great deal of naval force, it was not until the Union Army approached from the landward side late in the war that the Confederates at last evacuated the city. In the aftermath, Luce concluded that what the Navy lacked at Charleston was not courage, nor technology, nor logistical support. What was missing was the kind of strategic thinking that would have combined the direct pressure provided by naval forces with the indirect pressure on the lines of communication by land forces to bring about victory much sooner.
After the war, Luce’s impressive reputation and his ever-potent pen enabled his influence in the Navy to grow. Eventually, he was able to put his simple, but profound, conclusions to tangible effect when he persuaded Secretary of the Navy William Chandler to create the Naval War College. Established at Newport, Rhode Island, in 1884, with Luce as its first president, the college nurtured strategic thought and provided an antidote to that temptation of focusing on technology for its own sake, promoting instead Luce’s more sensible approach of applying relevant technologies only after strategic and tactical needs had been identified.
While Luce’s wisdom is sometimes forgotten, and the struggle for dominance between art and science re-emerges—as manifested by periodic curriculum shifts at the Naval Academy and elsewhere in the Navy’s education system—Stephen Luce had established a vital beachhead by creating the Naval War College. He ensured that strategic thinking had a permanent home in a Navy that was becoming ever more immersed in the extremely important, but seductive, growth of technology.