US Naval History Podcast

This is the first episode of an overview of US Naval History. Each episode will cover an era of naval history including some of the key American battles. 

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Right as we gain our independence, the Napoleonic Wars break out in Europe leading to a brief, undeclared war against our former ally France. Following the Quasi-War, you'll hear about US Navy actions in the Barbary Wars against the pirate states of North Africa featuring bribery, coups, battles, and the story of what legendary British Admiral Nelson called “the most bold and daring act of the age...

Featuring bloody battles, heroic victories, and a few embarrassing defeats!

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After fighting the Quasi-War with France over the rights of American sailors and merchants at sea, we were now facing the same issues with the British...

This week's episode is about the Navy’s role in the Mexican American-War before circling back to talk about a couple piracy smack-downs, trade, and the Navy’s role as the game-changing naval revolution that the steam engines proved to be during this period. 

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So long as the Sun shall warm the earth, let no Christian dare come to Japan; and, let all know that the King of Spain himself, or his Christian’s God…if he violates this command shall pay with his head. -Shogun’s Edict of 1638

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Civil War was a titanic conflict. The Navy began the Civil War with only 42 ships in active service and orders to blockade 3,500 miles of coastline and seize control of the South’s rivers. Over then next four years the Union navy would swell to almost 700 warships, lead the world technologically, and play a vital part in reuniting the nation in the bloodiest war the United States has ever fought...

At the end of the Civil War the United States was (very briefly) a world-class naval power. But in the midst of a worldwide naval revolution, the United States failed to invest in this technological change after the war ended and quickly fell behind as the country focused on westward expansion.  In the nick of time, Congress invested in the dilapidated United States Navy and began the process of creating a force to again be respected...

After WWI ended in November of 1918, the victorious world powers looked around realized that even the winners were losers. Yea, Britain and France gained a bunch of colonies and protectorates from the defeated Central Powers, and yeah they were theoretically going to get a reparations payday down the road, but HOLY SHIT, if you’ll excuse the language, it was not freaking worth it. France alone suffered over a million killed in action with another more than four million wounded...

Starting more than two years before the United States entered WWII following the attack on Pearl Harbor, this episode tells the story of WWII in the Atlantic and Mediterranean theaters, covering the Battle of the Atlantic, the Sinking of the Bismarck, the breaking of the Enigma codes, and all the way up to D-Day, the invasion of northern France on June 6th, 1944.

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WWII in the Pacific tells the story of the greatest naval war in world history, stretching across tens of millions of square miles of ocean, involving thousands of warships, dozens of carrier battles, submarine ambushes, bloody beach landings and harrowing night actions on land and at sea.
This episode starts with some background on why the Japanese launched the attack on Pearl Harbor before talking about the attack on Pearl Harbor itself...