This volume investigates the strategic miscalculations and diplomatic failures that defined the relationship between the Royal Navy and the Imperial Japanese Navy in the years preceding the Pacific War. Arthur J. Marder, a distinguished naval historian, utilizes a comprehensive range of British and Japanese primary sources, including official records and private correspondence, to reconstruct the geopolitical landscape of the late 1930s. The work argues that mutual misconceptions and rigid adherence to outdated naval doctrines blinded both powers to the shifting realities of maritime supremacy in the Far East.

Historians and naval scholars regard this work as a foundational text for understanding the Pacific theater of World War II. Readers frequently note the meticulous research and the balanced perspective Marder provides by synthesizing documentation from both sides of the conflict.