America Becoming a World Power
... should build a large modern navy. He felt as though this large naval fleet could protect the interests of the country. Mahan lectured often…he in fact taught at the Naval War College. He also summed up his lectures and published a book called The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783. In this book, Mahan discussed the many world powers before America, and their quest to have the greatest Navies in the world. Many of the powers, such as the British and Dutch, used their large fleets to protect their numerous merchant ships that traded all over the world. Mahan also felt that along with a large naval force, overseas territories were a necessary complement. These locations were needed to fuel the ships and resupply them. Mahan was very for expansion. Josiah Strong, much like Mahan, felt that expansion was necessary for our country to continue to grow. He had other reasons behind this though. Strong was a minister. His expansion beliefs were that America should spread the word to the world. Strong felt that Americans were destined to rule the world, so we might as well get God on our side in the process. Strong believed in missionary work, and he believed in Anglo-Saxonism, so he basically combined the two, and that was his view on expansion. Strong influenced many people, and often convinced them that imperialism and American expansion overseas were very necessary. Frederick Jackson Turner tried to explain America’s ideas on expansion more than he did take sides to whether it was right or not. Turner explained that when America was brand new, it had unlimited amounts of land for people to settle and conquer. He claimed that this evolved to the mindset of most Americans. When we...