The relationship of naval historians with the contemporary navy is a discussion we need to have. Arguably, it is part of a wider question as to the relationship which naval historians should have to allthe services. Past conversations about the interactions between the military and historians have too often been conducted within a context that relates much more to the concerns of the army than the navy, and for that reason the dialogue has been limited and incomplete. Indeed, much of the paradigm of what is described as ‘Professional Military Education’ (PME) is that of a combat arm officer of the army. Naval historians may not always have been sufficiently active in making military (that is, land warfare) historians aware of the wider dimensions of the PME problem – although John Hattendorf 's quiet voice has been one of the most effective in attempting to restore the balance. It is also true, however, that naval officers have not been particularly successful in making their voices heard within what passes for inter-service discourse on PME matters.

There is more to do. There is much within the PME debate that is relevant to the navy, but also much that is left out. Far too much of PME and the role of history within it is about the management and direction of conflict on land and the relationships between policy makers and military leaders, rather than the wider problems associated with the management and direction of organisations and of technology in peace as well as war. There is something here of C.P. Snow's ‘Two Cultures’ because it may be partly driven by an aversion, however unconscious, to the complexities of technology in favour of the emotional satisfactions of human relationships. But if you are going to understand navies, you have to cover both – and more.

There are other contemporary problems with the naval profession with which historians may be able to help. They relate not only to naval form, but naval function. In many ways, they are the same problems being faced by other complex organisations in the contemporary world, but the nature of navies and the difficulty, to use modern management terms, of assessing their outputs makes their challenges even greater.