In my past weeks reading about the Civil War I read about the Union blockade and the battle between the newly made ironclad ships Virginia and Monitor. The Virginia, previously known as the Merrimack, was attacking the Union blockade and doing a very good job of it, they had destoryed about half of the ships in the blockade. A blockade seems like a good idea to protect your land from naval attacks, but it also closes off trade coming in from the water. It encourages conflict that may possibly have been avoided otherwise. The unions blockade did it's job so it could be said that it was a good use of a blockade. Whether a blockade is neccesary or not is very dependent on the situation.
