Claim. America’s marine industry collapsed because of the social cost of long sea absences (broken families, declining vocations), and SMM designated reviving it as the True Parents’ worldwide economic mission — only the Unification movement, with its disciplined Blessed families, can carry it.
Elaboration. SMM diagnoses the collapse plainly: “In America that industry is virtually destroyed. Why is that so? When the men go out on their boats, they stay at sea not for one or two weeks, but for one or two months. So, their wives all have affairs and end up divorcing their husbands” (2.1. The ocean providence centering on North America, 88-250, 1976.9.20). The recovery requires a different kind of family: “That is why there was no other way but to have the Unification Church members invest in this industry, and have our young people take up this task in order to save America.” The scale becomes providential: “I am developing ocean resource businesses in three hundred ports … in order to economically support our future work for the world, without first getting into the marine products industries and creating a successful foundation” (110-200, 1980.11.17). Marine industry is therefore not a side-business but the global economic foundation for the providence.
See also. csg-ocean-church-and-coastal-occupation · csg-marine-industry-solves-the-global-food-problem