Dr. Donnelly

Causes of WWI (#1-2 on packet) 1. Imperialism: competition for colonies between

Britain, France, & Germany led to conflict. 2. Militarism: major powers in Europe built up their

armed forces, which then gained more power over their governments and pushed for military solutions to problems.

3. Nationalism: powerful European countries tended to act in their own interests, ALSO – ethnic minorities (Bosnian Serbs) in a diverse country (Austria-Hungary) wanted independence to form their own nation.

4. Alliances: Germany & Austria-Hungary were allies; Russia & France were allies; Russia & Serbia were allies; France & Britain were loosely allied.

The War Begins (#3-4 on packet) Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary was

assassinated by Serbian nationalist & member of Black Hand terrorist group named Gavrilo Princip on June 28, 1914.

This led Austria-Hungary to declare war on Serbia; allies of each side soon declared war on each other, causing a “world war.” Russia declared war on A-H, Germany declared war on Russia, France

declared war on Germany, Britain declared war on Germany….

The war quickly became a stalemate – neither side winning, but millions dying in trench warfare on the Western Front – remained a stalemate for 3 years, until after U.S. joined in 1917.

Death of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary Ignites WWI

The Archduke and his wife shortly before their assassination; the car they were riding in when shot; their assassin, Gavrilo Princip.

Opposing Sides in WWI Central Powers (Germany and

Austria-Hungary) vs. the Allies (Britain, France, and Russia).

Many other nations soon joined on both sides: Ottoman Empire (Turks)

joined the Central Powers with Germans and Austro-Hungarians.

U.S. would eventually join the Allies, but not until 1917.

Italy started out with Central Powers but later switched to the Allies’ side.

Russia made separate peace with Germany & dropped out of the war in 1917.

U.S. Neutrality (#5 on packet) When war began, most (not all) Americans favored the

Allies. Britain & France were democracies (like U.S.); Germany & A-H

were monarchies (unlike us). Historically, the U.S. came from Britain & had often been

supported by France. But German & Irish Americans did tend to be sympathetic to

Central Powers (most Irish didn’t like Brits). British cut telegraph lines from Germany to U.S. early in

war, so Americans only got Britain’s side of the story & were influenced by anti-German propaganda to favor Britain over the “barbaric” German “Huns.”

Also, U.S. trade with Central Powers shrunk to near-nothing, but trade with the Allies nearly quadrupled, so U.S. was far more economically invested in the Allies.

The Preparedness Movement (#18)

Led by former president Theodore Roosevelt, preparedness advocates said that the U.S. needed to build up the military to be prepared for war, and should support the British side in the meantime because our economy depended so much on trade with Britain.

The Antiwar Movement Many

Americans also opposed the war as either “Europe’s problem,” or as pacifists who were against war in general.

The Lusitania Lusitania was a British

passenger ship sunk by a German U-boat in May 1915.

Ship sunk within minutes: 1,200 passengers died, including 128 Americans

Germany pointed out that it had posted warnings that British passenger ships were liable to be sunk by German U-boats.

Most Americans wanted & expected war against Germany after the sinking of the Lusitania.

The Sussex Pledge (#13)

French passenger ship Sussex was sunk by another German U-boat in March 1916; several Americans were injured.

President Wilson ordered Germany to end submarine warfare or face war with U.S.

Sussex Pledge: Germany promised it would no longer sink merchant ships without warning – Wilson accepted this.

Wilson had promised to keep the U.S. out of the war & wanted to keep this promise since he faced reelection in November 1916.

Meanwhile in America... U.S. sent 10,000 troops into Mexico

in pursuit of bandit leader Pancho Villa after Villa’s men attacked Columbus, N.M., and killed 18 Americans on March 9, 1916. Villa escaped, but was killed in 1923 ambush by Mexican government.

Jersey shore shark attacks, July 1-12, 1916: 4 killed, 1 injured. First 3 attacks in ocean at Atlantic City, N.J.; last 2 attacks 16 miles inland in Matawan Creek. Led to widespread fear of sharks & later inspired novel and movie Jaws!

America Moves Closer to War (#8)

January 31, 1917: Germany announced it would end Sussex Pledge and resume unrestricted submarine warfare – no more warnings before sinking merchant ships. German use of U-boats was considered barbaric

because they attacked unseen & without warning – made many Americans want war with Germany.

Wilson broke off diplomatic relations with Germany, U.S. merchant ships were armed. Breaking off diplomatic relations is typically a

precursor to war – it basically means “we’re done talking and about to start fighting.”

The Zimmermann Note German foreign minister Arthur

Zimmermann sent a telegram to the Mexican government on January 16, 1917.

In it, he proposed an alliance between Germany & Mexico – against the U.S.

Plan was that if U.S. declared war on Germany after Germany ended the Sussex Pledge, Mexico would declare war on the U.S.

U.S. would then be busy fighting Mexico and unable to send troops to fight Germans in Europe.

After winning the World War, Germany would then send troops to help Mexico defeat the U.S., and Mexico would take Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, Colorado, & Utah back from the U.S.

The Zimmermann Note Goes Public Note was published on March 1,

1917. Most Americans thought it was a

British fake to get U.S. to declare war on Germany, but Zimmermann admitted on March 3 (and again on March 29) that the note was real.

He stressed that Americans still shouldn’t see it as cause for war, because it was just an idea of what Germany might do if the U.S. declared war on Germany first.

Now that they knew it was real, Americans were angry and many more said we should declare war on Germany.

How did the Zimmermann Note get found out, anyway? Glad you asked…

Britain had cut Germany’s trans-Atlantic cable, but not the U.S.’s. Germany sent telegram to England & on to their embassy in

Washington, D.C. on the U.S. cable (we let them use it). Germans trusted U.S. because we had no codebreaking and naïve policy

against reading foreign messages. But the Brits had tapped our lines & intercepted the message. One

problem – it was in a new code that they couldn’t break. Brits guessed that Germans would switch it back to an older code before

sending it on from D.C. to their Mexico City embassy, and that they’d send the telegram via Western Union.

A British agent called “Mr. H” then bribed the Western Union employee in Mexico City for a copy of the telegram (this was important because the Brits didn’t want to admit they’d tapped the U.S.’s telegraph lines, or let Germany know they’d broken their code).

Now that they had a copy, the Brits went public with the telegram.

The Last Straw – America Declares War Americans were already outraged that Germany

had ended the Sussex Pledge – they were now even angrier because of the Zimmermann Note.

To top it off, Germany sank four U.S. merchant ships between March 12 and March 19, 1917 (including one per day for three straight days).

Wilson had been reelected in 1916 on the slogan “He kept us out of war!,” but now most Americans demanded war – Wilson complied.

Congress declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917.

Summing Up: Role of Public Opinion in U.S. Decision to Go to War (#26)

Public opinion played a major role in the U.S. decision to go to war.

Early in the war, preparedness advocates wanted to increase military size & support Britain.

But they were countered by peace & neutrality activists. As Germany continued using submarine warfare

(sometimes against American ships) and a possible German-Mexican plot against the U.S. was exposed by the Zimmermann Note’s publication, most Americans grew angry.

By the time the U.S. declared war in April 1917, public opinion was strongly in favor of war with Germany.

Americans on the Home Front (#20)

Government financed the war by selling Liberty Bonds, with help from actors, artists, even Boy Scouts.

Ad campaigns were very successful in getting Americans to buy bonds to pay for the war – raised $10 billion for the Allies.

The Home Front: Managing the Economy (#22-23) War Industries Board, Trade Board,

Labor Board, Labor Policies Board were all federal gov’t. agencies created to make sure business & industry supported the war effort. War Industries Board’s duty was to

make sure business supported the war, production was high, prices stayed low.

Food Administration (led by future president Herbert Hoover) worked to increase farm output and cut waste through “voluntary” restraints like Wheatless Mondays and Meatless Tuesdays.

Home Front: Managing the Economy (#7) Fuel Administration created daylight saving

time to lengthen workday & urged people to use less gasoline.

In general, the role of the federal government in the U.S. economy during World War I was to regulate business – this included: Fixing prices Boosting farm output Cutting waste of food Creating daylight saving time to lengthen the

workday

Home Front: Enforcing Loyalty (#15 & 21) Fear of spies & sabotage led to anti-

German laws & prejudices: teaching German in schools was banned, “Hate the Hun!”, avoiding use of German names (Dachshunds/wiener dogs became “Liberty Pups”), etc.

Sedition Act: made it a federal crime to criticize the government or the war (over 1,000 went to prison).

States also had sedition laws to punish people for being unpatriotic (Montana was one of the harshest – 73 went to prison for offenses as minor as calling wartime food restrictions “a big joke.”

Home Front: Enforcing Loyalty Socialists and radical union

members called Wobblies (members of IWW – Industrial Workers of the World) were often targeted by police & vigilantes for being anti-American.

Wobbly leader Frank Little was killed by vigilantes (possibly off-duty cops or Pinkerton detectives) in Butte, Mt., on August 1, 1917. He was in Butte on an

antiwar campaign leading a strike of Anaconda Company miners – shutting the mines down would hurt the U.S. war effort.

Home Front: Changing People’s Lives (#24) Because of so many white

men joining the military, women and minorities had more job opportunities.

The “Great Migration” of African Americans to the North began, as black men moved to northern cities to take over factory jobs vacated by whites who’d joined the military; this continued from 1916 to 1930, with 1.5 million blacks moving from the South to the North.

Building an army (#14)

U.S. military was fairly small when war was declared.

Selective Service Act, 1917: created a military draft & drafted 3 million men into U.S. military.

Millions more volunteered – U.S. military soon included 10 million men.

U.S. army in WWI was called the AEF – American Expeditionary Force.

Commanded by General John J. “Black Jack” Pershing (former commander of Ft. Assiniboine near Havre, Montana!).

The A.E.F. (#6) Draftee training was intense,

but rushed. Pershing ensured that the

A.E.F. fought as an independent, American army; was not used as reinforcements for British & French armies.

Minorities and women: 25,000 women, 300,000 African Americans, and an unknown number of Native Americans joined the millions of white men who fought in the A.E.F.

The Convoy System (#9) One fear was that German U-

boats would sink U.S. troop ships and our soldiers would be lost before they could even reach Europe to fight the Germans.

Convoys: merchant and troop ships traveled in groups surrounded by warships to protect from U-boat attacks.

Very effective – cut merchant ship losses & not one American troop ship was lost crossing the Atlantic – all of our troops made it to Europe to join the fighting.

The Allies Needed Saving (#16-17) Russia was an ally to France & Britain, but

had been taken over by Vladimir Lenin’s communist Bolsheviks in 1917 – Lenin (right) then made peace with Germany .

One million German troops who had been fighting Russia were now sent to the Western Front – these reinforcements gave Germany the strength to push back the British & French.

Germany was trying to win the war before the U.S. could get there to help France & Britain.

By late May 1918, Germans were only 50 miles from Paris.

America Saves Paris and Turns the Tide of the War (#19)

A.E.F. recaptured Cantigny from Germans, May 28, 1918.

Stopped German attack at Belleau Wood, June 1-26, 1918. General Pershing compared the U.S. victory to the

Union’s defeat of Pickett’s Charge at Gettysburg. France renamed Belleau Wood “The Wood of the Marine

Brigade” in honor of U.S. Marines who fought there. Stopped another German attack toward Paris at Battle

of Chateau-Thierry on July 18, 1918. U.S. & France also stopped German attack at 2nd Battle

of the Marne in mid-July 1918.

Allied Counterattack Tanks (new weapon introduced in WWI) broke

through German trenches. U.S. defeated Germans at Sedan and St. Mihiel.

St. Mihiel: Sept. 12-15, 1918 – first use of terms “D-Day” and “H-Hour” by U.S. military; U.S. tank assault led by Col. George S. Patton; U.S. breakthrough was supported by 1,500-plane bombing raid led by U.S. officer Billy Mitchell – this was the first mass aerial bombing raid in history and also the first version of the “blitz” because it combined tanks & planes in attack.

Tanks! Tanks played a

vital role by the end of World War I. Although primitive compared to what was to come later, tanks provided a tool that could help soldiers break through enemy trenches.

Other new weapons in WWI The Germans used U-boats (submarines); poison gas and

flamethrowers were also introduced in attempts to break through the nearly insurmountable barriers of trench warfare.

The Meuse-Argonne Offensive Beginning in September

1918 and continuing until the war ended in November 1918, U.S. and Allies pushed Germans out of France & began invasion of Germany.

Alvin York: October 8, 1918, during the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, Corporal York personally killed 25 German machine gunners with his rifle and captured 132 German soldiers. For this, he won the Medal of Honor and the French Croix de Guerre. He was promoted to sergeant and later memorialized by the hit movie Sergeant York, which starred one of Hollywood’s most popular actors of all-time, Gary Cooper – who was originally from Helena, Montana!

Air War Planes, hot air balloons, & zeppelins were used in WWI

– very exciting but didn’t much affect war’s outcome.

The Allies Win World War I The Central Powers collapsed

(militarily, politically, & economically) in fall 1918.

Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany abdicated and fled to Holland November 9, 1918.

New German Weimar Republic government surrendered on November 11, 1918 – armistice (cease fire) was signed that day at 11:00 a.m. – World War I was over.

Results of World War I Over 9 million soldiers & 7 million civilians died (total for

all countries) – France, Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary all had over 1 million killed.

U.S.: 116,708 military deaths. The Armenian Holocaust: 500,000 to 1.5 million Armenian

Christians killed by Ottoman (Turkish) government, starting with arrest of 250 Armenian intellectuals on April 24, 1915. Turkey denies that this was a genocide of Armenians, but

most historians & the governments of 20 countries do officially call it a genocide.

Influenza Pandemic, 1918-1921: spread by troops traveling to and from the war in Europe – spread worldwide & estimated to have infected 500 million people – killing 50 to 100 million. 500,000 Americans died from this pandemic.

People were understandably fearful of the Spanish Flu pandemic:

U.S. as Global Peacemaker Wilson’s 14 Points: President

Wilson introduced 14 provisions to eliminate the causes of war.

The 14 Points called for: An end to alliances. Removal of trade barriers. Reduction of military forces. An international

peacekeeping organization to work out problems between countries without going to war: The League of Nations.

The Paris Peace Conference (partly answers #10)

Wilson’s goal was to prevent future wars by basing the treaty on his 14 Points.

European Allied leaders wanted to punish Central Powers & take over German colonies.

Wilson compromised – let France & Britain punish Germany, but insisted on creation of the League of Nations as a group to prevent future wars.

The League of Nations (#11) The league was an

international peacekeeping organization – goal was to prevent future wars.

Wilson considered this the most important of all his 14 Points.

Had no military forces. But every member nation

was supposed to consider an attack on one an attack on all.

The Versailles Treaty Created New Countries (answers the rest of #10)

Nine new nations were created in Europe: idea was to put a buffer zone between Europe and Russia.

New countries created by the treaty: Poland, Czechoslovakia, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Austria, Hungary, and Yugoslavia (made up of Serbs, Croats, & Slovenes). Ethnic tensions remained in multiethnic countries like

Czechoslovakia & Yugoslavia. Much of Germany was “taken away” to become parts of

these new countries – Germans were bitter. *Britain and France also took colonies in the Middle East, and Turkey was created from the old Ottoman Empire.

Versailles Treaty Punished Germany (#25)

France and Britain insisted on making Germany pay reparations and take blame for starting the war.

Germany had to pay $33 billion – ruined its economy.

German money became worthless in the 1920s and the country was constantly in crisis.

Germany never forgave the Allies.

Germans also blamed the Versailles Treaty and their own Weimar Republic government for their country’s problems – this eventually led to the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.

America Reacts to the Versailles Treaty (#12) Many senators (called

“irreconcilable”) opposed the Versailles Treaty because they didn’t want the U.S. to join the League of Nations – said it would drag the U.S. into foreign countries’ problems.

Wilson suffered a stroke while touring the U.S. to gain support for the treaty & lost his ability to actively push the Senate to ratify the treaty – Senate then rejected the treaty, and the U.S. never joined the League of Nations.

Postwar Adjustments

U.S. turned away from foreign affairs (rejecting Versailles Treaty & refusing to join League of Nations are examples of this) – and turned toward isolationism instead.

U.S. was now world’s biggest creditor – other nations owned the U.S. $11.5 billion.

No plan to merge troops returning from Europe back into the workforce – many had trouble finding jobs; competition for jobs between whites and minorities became more bitter.

Most female workers quit or were fired from their jobs when men returned from the war (to make room for the men).

Frank Buckles: America’s Last Doughboy Frank Buckles, America’s last

surviving World War I veteran (American troops in WWI were called Doughboys – or “Yanks” by the British), died on February 27, 2011 in his West Virginia home at the age of 110.

Buckles had joined the Army at age 16 so he could fight in WWI (he lied about his age).

He also survived WWII after being taken as a civilian prisoner of war by Japanese troops in the Philippines.