[applause] we should say that because the real event is about to come up here. Its my distinct pleasure to introduce you to our next speaker, admiral James Stavridis is a retired navy admiral whos calling the dean of the Fletcher School of law and diplomacy at tufts university. He has commanded at all levels of the military to include commander, european command and the supreme allied commander europe. I can provide you with a long list of his military assignments but you have probably already looked him up on the internet. So instead i will share some nuggets that provide a better understanding of how his career places him at the book festival today. He is no stranger to books. He started his love of books while his son was stationed in greece in the early 60s. Because there was no Armed Forces Network television, he spend his time at the post library. I can totally relate to this. My family was in france at the same time and my whole family, all seven kids, or over at the post library, too. What is striking to book lovers is that throughout his naval career, admiral stavridis published either articles or books at each successive rank to include midshipman. I suggest he would tell you to his favorite assignment was uss barry from 19931995. His first literary book destroyer captains was about this time as command of the uss barry. It came about a result of his daily journaling using a typewriter of all things. During his two and half years on board ship. The result was a compilation of a sense of wondering and sticks, all of which were intended to convey what was thymic command was successful, not every day was fabulous and the real point of life is not what you accomplish but rather what you overcome. In his most recent book, sea power, admiral stavridis uses his naval experience to guide us on a journey through the seats of the world. Ihe asks us to consider the vale and the challenge from both a personal and an International Economic system. The elses understand the significance of the control and power projection. He asked we be mindful of the geopolitics of the ocean while warning us not to over imagine the importance of her own small voyages on earth. Please join me in welcoming a great friend of the library of congress, admiral James Stavridis. [applause] thank you. And id very much appreciate everybody coming out on this drizzly day. Its kind of a mariners day out there i would say. Normally when people hear that marvelous biography introduction, thank you, karen, the first thing they say when they actually see me is, you know, i thought you would be taller than you appear to be. [laughing] what i like to do today is just show you a few images, and we can go to the first slide police. We are just going to talk about the oceans and were going to take about 15 minutes and kind of walk through the oceans of the world. And then well consider in the second50 minutes what we ought to do about it and what are the importance of these oceans. So let me begin with a line the British Royal navy uses, which is that the sea is one year the sea is one, meaning that connects. Most who dont spend a lot of time on the oceans, and i spent 37 years in the navy, 11 years day for day on the deep ocean in that time, dont consider that 70 of the world is water. And by the way, 70 of your body is water, and 70 of the oxygen that you breathe comes from photosynthesis in the oceans. Next slide, please. 95 of the worlds trade, the lifeblood of the earth economy passes across those oceans on any given day, 50,000 ships at sea, three to 5 million mariners at sea. This is an extraordinary, complex ecosystem, both in the ecological since and the economic sense. To give you one last image to hold in your head about the size of the oceans, consider this. You can take all of the land in the world and it would fit quite nicely inside the Pacific Ocean alone. So the seas are in many ways fundamental to the earth. Well, lets get underway. Lets start in the pacific. This is a 1589 antiquarian chart made by or tell us, a dutch cartographer. And you see the discontinuities and the misunderstandings of the outline of the pacific. But i would invite you to go back 4000 years before that chart was made. Bottom right. The voyages of the polynesians who traversed six, seven, 8000 nautical miles three, 4000 years ago. These are ancient seas and none is more ancient than the pacific. In the american mental map of the pacific, this is what we tend to see, right . Its the Second World War with a vast american armada sales across it by 1945. In this time we have more aircraft carriers than we had ships today. The sea is covered by the United States, and we still sort of see ourselves as a preeminent Pacific Maritime power. But lets look back at chinas history in these seas. Here are two vessels. The little one on the left, you recall from your grade school studies, then nino, the penta and the santa maria. The little one is a model of the santa maria. That Christopher Columbus sailed in 1492 that massive ship behind it built in roughly the same time was the flagship of chinese admiral. It was as you can see ten times the size of these discoveries assailed from european waters. China has a deep and abiding history in the pacific, and that relationship, the maritime reach of the United States balanced with chinas ancient sense of itself as a pacific power, is truly the leitmotif that place in the geopolitics of the pacific today. We see the chinese navy rising. It is reaching out. It is deploying. Heres a chinese corvette arriving for a port call in pearl harbor hawaii. China is also bringing its allies and Coalition Partners into the pacific. This is a chinese destroyer operating with a russian destroyer. Now, the United States as terrific allies in the pacific. This is also part of our relationship set. This is Prime Minister shinzo abe, a reliable partner in the Japanese Navy is incredibly professional and capable. We also have excellent partners on the Korean Peninsula, south korea. Together we have a challenge that is in many ways maritime. Its from north korea. This of course is kim jongun, and he is well named. He is unpredictable. He is unstable. Hes not irrational. Hes got a really bad haircut. [laughing] and the bad news is, he is developing intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. This will be at least in part i maritime challenge that we will face with our allies and partners, japan, south korea and others. And potentially a place with the u. S. And china could Work Together to solve the significant geopolitical challenge. So i will close on the pacific by just saying north korea, upper left, the rise of china, these are chinese Ballistic Missile submarines, 80 of the worlds trade bottom right flows through the South China Sea. Chinas construction of artificial islands in the pacific today, the western pacific, we see significant geopolitical competition. Lets keep moving. Lets go to the atlantic which for centuries is been in many ways a transit zone. Nobody from the United States inks of the north atlantic without recalling world war i and world war ii, the convoy operations. But again if you step back in history, its the europeans, and particularly the Iberian Peninsula, was given us Christopher Columbus, prince henry the navigator. Upper left is magellan who circumnavigated the world. Bottom left, one less known, bartholomew diaz, the first european to sell into the indian ocean. These mariners from the Iberian Peninsula launched enormous voyages of discovery. And in that atlantic today the geopolitical challenge comes from russia. Vladimir putin is increasing the scope and scale of the russian maritime forces. And will continue to see challenges across the north atlantic, even as we do in the pacific. Not insurmountable, not leading to another war but tension that will play out in this maritime sphere as we see Russian Frontline ships operating as here in the caribbean off our coast. Lets move on. The thirdlargest ocean after the pacific and atlantic is this, the indian ocean, which begins to it the world stage ass a spice route, bottom left. Today is increasingly a zone for everything from piracy off the coast of east africa, hydrocarbons, and he we see the interplay of india, a rising superpower in the century, with pakistan. That will, over the course of the century drive geopolitics in the indian ocean. We see it today tactically in yemen, in the northern reaches of the indian ocean, and up into the persian gulf where the overlay of shia, thats the iranian flag, upper right, sunni, thats the saudi flag, bottom left, played out in the waters around that Arabian Peninsula with our greatest ally in the region israel, parked in the middle of that zone. So the geopolitical challenges here will continue. And, of course, we need to recall that iran is an indian ocean power. On the right you see the modern flag of iran. They do on the upper left of the battle flags of cyrus the magnificent and darius the great. The green on the lower chart was the persian empire. The irene empire at its greatest extent. Note all of the coastline. Again we will see geopolitics playing out in the indian ocean as well. Lets go to the Mediterranean Sea when many of you have sailed on very benign cruises i imagine in the summer of life and i did a wonderful one, two summers ago but let me tell you something very somber about the Mediterranean Sea. If i could snap my fingers and bring back to life every sunken warship and every mariner who died in maritime combat in the Mediterranean Sea, you could walk across that ocean. It is an enormous zone of war. A highlight battle if you will if theres such a thing was a battle of the ponto, the High Water Mark of an islamic drive in the seas off italy against a holholy roman empire in the 15 70s. Whats the situation today . Its the Eastern Mediterranean where we see geopolitics most at play. We see great powers, the United States and russia on opposite sides in the conflict in syria. We see enormous turbulence throughout the levant, and it leads to this. A maritime challenge. 2 million refugees over the last three years, this Eastern Mediterranean will be a zone of challenge if not conflict, and also because under the Eastern Mediterranean is an enormous treasure trove of hydrocarbons, oil, natural gas, disputed among the nations in that region. So the medi mediterranean will challenge us as well. Lets come a little closer to home, the Caribbean Sea was once the vast waterway across which the spanish galleons moved the treasures of the americas. Today, bottom left, panama canal was the beating heart of the u. S. Economy as trade goods flow back and forth. And its challenged. Its not geopolitical challenge nation on nation, but it narcotics. Its gangs. Its natural disasters. Its refugees here as well. All of it leads to significant maritime activity by our coast guard working together with the navy, Law Enforcement of course taking the lead. Lets go to the top of the world, the arctic. This is uss jeannette. It was the ship sent to the arctic in the 1870s when many cartographers, geographers still had a theory that the top of the world had a hidden temperate zone in it. This is just over 100 years ago. The u. S. It should not try to get to the ice, was frozen in place. Many of his crew died. Today the arctic is little less icy. Heres a newsflash. Global warming is real. The ice is melting and is going to open that northern trade route, increase geopolitical competition, uncover hydrocarbons. On one site is russia, on the other side are five nato nations took the arctic has never seen war. It will be our challenge to ensure that we can continue to say that as the century unfolds. If we are able to say it it will be the result of the work of organizations like this, the Arctic Council which brings together russia and nato, one of the few places we have a coherent conversation at the moment. The United States needs to up its again. Im showing a picture of the one operational icebreaker, the u. S. Has. Denmark, a nation of 5 million, operates six icebreakers. We need to improve ourselves in this zone. So those are the oceans, not if i could for one moment ill just address the challenges broadly on all the oceans. Because the sea is one. Fishing, Illegal Fishing, one fish and five, on the ocean of the world is caught illegally. Fish stocks declining. Probably 50 over the last 40 years. Thithis is a multimulti billion dollars business, and it is exacerbated by piracy and illegality. Additionally, again, Global Warming is going to change the oceans and attack the ability to conduct the photosynthesis for the oxygen we breathe. With apologies to former Vice President al gore who has often said the lungs of the earth are the amazon, they contribute. The lungs of the earth are the oceans. So thats a quick, a very quick voyage around the world. As a right about now you want to be saying, okay, admiral, a lot of challenges out there, what do you think . What should we do about it . What can we do about it . What are the opportunities to engage in this Maritime World . This is really what the book sea power is about. What are the strategic ideas for the 21st century for our nation, and for the world, in engaging . Let me bring you a quick shot from the game of thrones picked if you would want a maritime strategist, is and said build me 1000 chips and i will give you this world. We do need to be capable mariners but how do we do that . Im going to start with this. We ought to listen better. We ought to listen more to the oceans themselves, to their health. Whawent to listen to our alliesd partners. We ought to listen to our opponents. This by the way is not photoshop. Thithis is a belgian air Defense System from about 80 years ago. Its not still in operation. [laughing] hes listening for incoming aircraft. Its quite innovative but i put it here force as metaphor. We need to listen more. We need to do exactly what you doing here at this marvelous book festival,, listen to ideas, challenge ideas. This is the Naval War College in Newport Rhode island, a center will be take a break from the day to day not only listening but studying, reading, writing, publishing. What else can we do for the oceans . We can hold on to our values. We can hold on to our values. They come to us from the ancient greek, socrates, from the ancient eastern asians. Thats the buddha to our founding fathers, upper left, the enlightenment, voltaire, too principled leaders like angela merkel. We need to Work Together with democracy, liberty, freedom of speech, those values will help us in the oceans. We need to work with partners. The United States should not become the worlds maritime policeman. We should be maritime coalitio coalitions. These are French Special forces capturing somali pirates. They have flown from a danish warship. They refueled from an italian frigate. They operate under the surveillance of a portuguese Maritime Patrol aircraft, u. S. Intelligence from satellites. These kind of multinational coalitions to create security and environmental improvement are vital. Alliances and coalitions. Our allies can help us in things like freedom of navigation challenges. We need to do more of this as well from the sea. As i look at the tragedy unfolding in houston, im so proud of the u. S. Navy sending to massive ships, a big deck amphibious carrier, a large landing ship dock. Right behind them potential bigots in a hospital ship. When i was commander of Southern Command before being the nato commander, i deployed in this hospital ships routinely throughout the caribbean, latin america. My counterpart indopacific does the same. This kind of humanitarian work from the sea is part of our ability to leverage the synergy of the ocean. We need new partners. I would focus in the century on india which will be a rising maritime power. With exercises every year with india, japan and the United States. And we need to work jointly within our own military, our marines, our coast guard, our navy working together. Within the context that ive laid out here of International Interagency privatepublic, all of that allows us to interact, for example, with the International Maritime organization, to work with private sector maritime entities. Entities. Bluewater metrics, a Small Company that uses commercial shipping to measure the oceans health. Its a powerful, private, public connected idea. We need conversations at all levels about the oceans, and we need to read more about the sea and thats why im so happy to see so many people turn out to a talk about the oceans. And it can be fiction. If you never read nicholas, the cruel sea, get up now, leave, go read it. Its such