Alfred Thayer Mahan (1840–1914) was an American naval officer, considered one of the most important naval strategists of the nineteenth century. In 1885 he was appointed Lecturer in Naval History and Tactics at the US Naval War College, and served as President of the institution between 1886 and 1889. His series of books examining the role of sea power in history influenced the rapid growth of international navies in the period before World War I. This two-volume study of the Anglo-American war of 1812 was first published in 1905. Mahan examines the causes of the conflict, arguing that its roots went back to the seventeenth century. Although naval battles in the war of 1812 were small-scale rather than large fleet actions, Mahan shows that they were nevertheless crucial to the outcome. Volume 1 covers the background to the war - commercial relations, and Britain's war with France.