Before the twentieth century ships when relied upon visual signaling,
vessels beyond range of sight or a cannon shot, were blind, deaf, and
dumb in the dark, making night battles at sea rare, and near always
accidental. The introduction of certain technologies like the torpedo,
the searchlight, radio and then radar, transformed naval warfare by
making night combat feasible and, in some cases, desirable. The process
by which navies integrated these new tools of war and turned the dark
into a medium for effective combat, however, was long and difficult.
Fighting in the Dark tells the story of surface naval combat at night
from the Russo-Japanese War through World War II. The book is about the
process of confronting and mastering problems brought on by
technological change during war. It does this by examining seven periods
focusing on the Imperial Russian Navy in 1904-1905, the Imperial German
Navy from 1914-1918, the Royal Navy from 1916-1939, the Regia Marina
from 1940-1943, the Imperial Japanese Navy in 1942, the U.S. Navy in
1943-1944, and the Royal Navy and Royal Canadian Navy from 1943-1944.The
chapters are written by authors hailing from Australia, Canada, Italy,
and the United States, all recognized masters in their subject.
