Stephen Biddle has a new article (coauthored with John Severini) in Security Studies titled, “Military Effectiveness and Naval Warfare.”

The article debuts a new dataset on all 573 known surface naval battles since 1649 with at least three major combatants engaged and at least one on each side, and uses these data to contrast trends and patterns in combat outcomes at sea and on land. The data show that surface naval combat outcomes have historically been more sensitive to materiel, quicker, more one-sided, and inflict heavier loss rates. There are also similarities, however, in the importance of material-nonmaterial interaction effects for victory and defeat. The paper draws implications for future A2/AD warfare in East Asia, the balance of skill and materiel in naval resource allocation, and research on military effectiveness. 

You can read the article online here.