For the Royal Navy, two centuries of supremacy came to an end in 1945; Britain was replaced as the global sea power by the United States. This development sometimes leads to an underestimation of the British maritime effort over the previous six years. In fact, this ‘swan song’ was of decisive significance in enabling the Allied victory.

About the speaker: Evan Mawdsley was Professor of International History at the University of Glasgow. His recent books include December 1941: Twelve Days That Began a Global War (2011), The War for the Seas: A Maritime History of World War II (2019), and World War II: A New History (2nd ed., 2020). He was also General Editor of The Cambridge History of the Second World War (2015).