why did the us volunterilay enter ww1

The resulting congressional vote brought the United States into World War I. As hostilities broke out between several nations of Europe in 1914, almost immediately, President Wilson declared America’s intent to stay neutral and called on all Americans to remain impartial in thought as well as deed. However, Wilson and the United States found it increasing difficult to remain neutral. The series of events between 1915 and 1917 led Wilson to finally deliver his war message to Congress on April 2, 1917. German submarine warfare had resulted in the sinking of several ships and the loss of American lives.

Joint Address to Congress Leading to a Declaration of War Against Germany (1917)

On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson delivered this address to a joint session of Congress and called for a declaration of war against Germany.

Most remarkable was the attack against the Lusitania, on May 7, 1915, when 128 Americans died. While that ship flew the American flag of neutrality, it also carried several thousand cases of ammunition and shrapnel headed to Britain.

After stern warnings from Wilson, the Germans pledged to abide by traditional rules of search and seizure.

Increasingly, however, America was drawn to the side of the British. In addition to the historic cultural ties to both Britain and France, munitions shipments to those countries from the United States had increased from around $6 million in 1914 to almost $500 million in 1917.

American bankers had loaned the Allies over $2 billion. On the heels of the German announcement to renew unrestricted submarine warfare on February 1, 1917, the British, on February 24, revealed the Zimmerman Telegram. When Wilson released the message to the press on March 1, Americans were shocked and angered. With the support of his entire cabinet, Wilson, who had been reelected in 1916 on the slogan “He kept us out of war,” reluctantly concluded that war was inevitable.

In his speech before a special session of Congress, Wilson, as usual, took the moral high ground and declared that not only had America’s rights as a neutral been violated but that “The world must be made safe for democracy.” Americans must fight “for the rights and liberties of small nations” and to “bring peace and safety to make the world itself at last free.”

Wilson suffered a severe stroke during his second term in office and died in 1924. Though he pledged to keep America out of World War I, Wilson was obliged to declare war on Germany after the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in early 1917.

Woodrow Wilson in World War I

Woodrow Wilson in World War IBACK NEXTWoodrow Wilson (1856–1924) was the 28th President of the United States, serving two terms from 1913 to 1919. As President of Princeton University and later as Governor of New Jersey, Wilson was a leading Progressive, arguing for a stronger central government and fighting for anti-trust legislation and labor rights.

As President of the United States, he passed important legislation on those and many other issues, narrowly winning reelection in 1916 after pledging to keep America out of World War I. Wilson's foreign policy was noted for its idealistic humanitarianism; his Fourteen Points —a statement of national objectives that envisioned a new international order after World War I—ultimately failed, but was one of the clearest expressions of interventionist American values.

He was relatively uninterested in military affairs, but was able to organize the American economy to provide the food and munitions the army needed to fight in France.

At the end of the war, Wilson became the first American president to leave the country during his administration when he sailed for Paris to negotiate the Treaty of Versailles in 1919. Most of Wilson's Fourteen Points advocating for human and democratic rights weren't adopted in the treaty, due to France and Britain seeking punishment for Germany.

However, the most important of the Fourteen Points—the creation of the League of Nations—was adopted. Wilson proved unable to get the Treaty of Versailles ratified by the U. S. Senate, and ironically, America never joined the League of Nations. BACK NEXTCite This Page

Answer The Zimmerman telegram was a communication from German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmerman to the Mexican government meant to persuade Mexico to form an alliance with Germany during World War I. It played a vital role in inflaming the American people against Germany and pushing President Woodrow Wilson to declare war on Germany.

What Was the Role of the Zimmerman Telegram in World War I?

History Modern History World War 1Q: What Was the Role of the Zimmerman Telegram in World War I? A: Quick

Shortly after the telegram became public, the United States entered the war on the side of the Allies. Continue Reading Keep Learning What Is the Zimmermann Note? What Was Not a Major Cause of World War I? What Was the Cause of World War I? Full Answer In 1916, Germany briefly engaged in unrestricted submarine warfare, but halted the practice after strong protests by the United States.

Preparing to resume it in early 1917, Germany sought a contingency plan in case the U. S. declared war. Zimmerman sent the telegram via American and British telegraph lines to its ambassador in Mexico City, who in turn passed the message on to the Mexican government. If Mexico agreed, Germany offered Mexico financial aid and the U. S. states of New Mexico, Arizona and Texas after the war. After considering the offer, Mexico refused, realizing it would be futile to attempt to oppose the United States in its sphere of power in the Western Hemisphere.

In the meantime, the British intercepted and decoded the telegram. They shared the information with the U. S. government, and on March 1, 1917, the story was released to the American press.

The incensed American public clamored overwhelmingly for war. On April 2, President Wilson formally asked Congress for a declaration of war, and four days later it was granted. Learn more about World War 1Sources: history.com militaryhistory.about.com britannica.com Related Questions Q: What Was the Zimmermann Telegram?

A: The Zimmermann Telegram was the proximate cause of American entry to World War I. The telegram was sent in 1917 as a secret communique between Arthur Zimme... Full Answer >Filed Under: World War 1Q: Did Someone Win World War I? A: The Allies, or Entente Powers, defeated the Central Powers and were victorious in World War I. The main members of the Allies were Great Britain, France an... Full Answer >Filed Under: World War 1Q: Who Won World War I?

A: The Allies won World War I. The primary members of the Allies were the British Empire, France, Italy (after 1915) and the Russian Empire, although Russia p... Full Answer >Filed Under: World War 1Q: Wha Were Some of the Alliance Systems During WWI?

A: Alliance systems that were in place during World War I included the Triple Entente (Britain, Russia, France), the Triple Alliance (Italy, Germany, Austria-... Full Answer >Filed Under: World War 1You May Also Like Q: What Is the Role of Coenzyme Q10 in Weight Loss? Q: What Is the Role of Protists? Q: What Is the Role of the Managing Director? Q: What Role Did Denis Diderot Play in the Enlightenment? Q: What Is the Chairman's Role in a Meeting? Q: What Is the Role of the Referee in Football?

The United States entered the war because of the Germans' decision to resume the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, and the so-called ""Zimmerman telegram,"" intercepted by the British, in which Germany floated the idea of an alliance with Mexico.

Why Did The US Enter WW1

"rrteacher | Certified Educator

Unrestricted submarine warfare, a desperate effort to counter the British blockade of Germany, would lead to the sinking of American merchant ships heading for England, and had been employed by the Germans before.

They abandoned it in the face of US pressure earlier in the war. Its resumption was enough to cause Woodrow Wilson to renounce his stated position of neutrality, as his war speech to Congress demonstrates: The new policy has swept every restriction aside.

Vessels of every kind, whatever their flag, their character, their cargo, their destination, their errand, have been ruthlessly sent to the bottom without warning and without thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels of friendly neutrals along with those of belligerents.

While there was significant opposition to the war in the United States, the official position was that the nation could not tolerate such an imposition on its rights as a sovereign nation, to say nothing of the effect of the Zimmerman telegram.

American entry into the war broke what had been a bloody stalemate. US troops were instrumental in repulsing a German offensive, and led the way in an Allied offensive, the combined effect of which fatally weakened the German army.

Politically, many Europeans hoped that US entry in the war would result in a treaty based on Wilson's Fourteen Points, but the Treaty of Versailles that officially ended the conflict contained few of its provisions. Further Reading:https://wwi.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Wilson's_War_Message_to...list Cite link Link "

Mexico never considered going to war with the US, and America declared war because Germany was so desperate to buy time in Europe that they were willing to violate the borders of the United States. Economics had little to do with the reasons the US joined the allies.

Why did the united states declare a war on germany in 1917?

"Arts & Humanities History Why did the united states declare a war on germany in 1917? Follow 7 answers Answers Relevance Rating Newest Old

est Best Answer: The U. S. declared war on Germany officially in 1917 because the British-French Alliance was losing the war that the Americans were so far financing.

The reasons Joe mentioned, the Lusitania and the Zimmerman note, along with the Wilsonian slogan of expanding democracy and self-rule through out the world were the feeding points to the public. In fact, the French-British were not any more disposed to democracy let alone self rule for their vast empires and the Lusitania was 90% filled with Britons.

America had loaned enough money to France and Britain to cover their entire war effort for all 4 years. The British got their guns and explosives from America. The turning point was when the Germans unrestrcited submarine warfare started to impact the trading business America had with the former two.

As it became clear that American boots on the ground were going to be needed to defeat Germany, Wilson already privately biased towards the English, made the move to ask congress to declare war. It was simply a matter of economics.casimir2121 · 1 decade ago1 0 Comment Germany, along with its sister states (the Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian Empires) were pretty much at war with everyone except for the US from 1914-1917.

Tensions were running high. Germany had been escalating their arms productions, strengthening and fortifying their colonial standings very near to other countries possessions and really just not been playing nicely with all of their neighbors.

In 1914, Archduke Ferdinand was shot and all heck broke loose. Agression quickly escalated and all of Europe was at war. America, however, was dedicated to staying out of it as best we could. We did run some trade blockades, and were supporting the rest of Europe throughout those years leading to our entrance into WWI.

Germany sunk the Lusitania. An ocean liner that killed many passengers. Germany said that the boat was running ammunitions, and so it was an act of war. We maintained it wasn't. Personally, while the Lusitania was the prominent contributor to exactly when we entered the war, there were a hundred other why's going on that would have led us there as well.jaisend · 1 decade ago0 1 Comment The sinking of the Lusitania.

The Lusitania was sunk in May 1915 - almost 2 years before USA declared war on Germany. It was therefore not a factor or reason for the US declaration of war on Germany in April 1917.

Ellen · 2 years ago0 0 Comment The importance of the Zimmerman telegram can be seen if look at the results of the war up to that point.

For those who have only studied the war from an American perspective, some might argue that the Allies were losing in 1917, as the Germans had launched an offensive in that year and again drove very close to Paris, but that is the general American History of the war in 1917.

WWI was a global war, fought between many nations and largely fought entirely in Europe. The war must be studied from an international outlook. The Germans were also aware of the diplomatic problems unrestricted submarine warfare had caused with the US, and from time to time, cancelled that warfare when it looked like their submarines would actually bring the US into the war.

Germany eventually picked it up again in 1917, because it was the only way they could challange the British at sea.

The 1917 German offensive saw the largest single gain of territory on the Western Front since 1914, but like the 1914 invasion, the French defeated the Germans at the Marne, again. The failure of the German army to take Paris was a defeat for the army, and they had also sustained heavy casualties in the process of doing so.

The French and British also suffered fairly heavy casualties, but unlike Germany, isolated in the center of Europe, France and Britain could easily draw more power from their global colonies, which Germany could not, as its fleet was not strong enough to challenge the Royal Navy and open up routes for German colonials to enter into the Western Front on the German side. The 1917 German offensive was carried out with the last of Germany's strength, mostly with troops brought from the Eastern Front, which were freed up by Lenin's government signing the Treaty of Brest-Letovsk (SP?).

The failure of the 1917 offensive meant that the absolute best the German Army could produce was stalemate. At the same time the French-British naval blockade of the Central Powers was starving the people at home in Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Ottoman Empire.

They would maintain the blockade until the Versailles Treaty was signed in 1919. Looking at this situation, the army was defeated in a failed offensive, and the French and British appear to be preparing to counterattack with fresh troops, and knowing that the US might join the war anyway, because of Germany's use of unrestircted submarine warfare, they created the Zimmerman telegram in the hopes that if the US fought a war with Mexico, the US couldn't afford to contribute to the fighting on the Western Front. There is only one word that discribes the German actions in 1917... and that is ""desperate"".

Mexico never considered going to war with the US, and America declared war because Germany was so desperate to buy time in Europe that they were willing to violate the borders of the United States. Economics had little to do with the reasons the US joined the allies.

ns. The sinking of the Lusitania enraged Americans and hastened the United States' entrance into World War I. Dates: Sunk May 7, 1915Also Known As: Sinking of the RMS Lusitania

Sinking of the Lusitania

Humanities ›History & Culture Sinking of the Lusitania Share Flipboard Email Print Illustration of the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915.

Picture from the National Defence, courtesy of the Canadian Navy.by Jennifer Rosenberg Updated April 07, 2017On May 7, 1915, the British ocean liner RMS Lusitania, which primarily ferried people and goods across the Atlantic Ocean between the United States and Great Britain, was torpedoed by a German U-boat and sunk.

Of the 1,959 people on board, 1,198 died, including 128 America

Be Careful!Since the outbreak of World War I, ocean voyage had become dangerous. Each side hoped to blockade the other, thus prevent any war materials getting through. German U-boats (submarines) stalked British waters, continually looking for enemy vessels to sink.

Thus all ships headed to Great Britain were instructed to be on the lookout for U-boats and take precautionary measures such as travel at full speed and make zigzag movements. Unfortunately, on May 7, 1915, Captain William Thomas Turner slowed the Lusitania down because of fog and traveled in a predictable line. Turner was the captain of the RMS Lusitania, a British ocean liner famous for its luxurious accommodations and speed capability.

The Lusitania was primarily used to ferry people and goods across the Atlantic Ocean between the United States and Great Britain. On May 1, 1915, the Lusitania had left port in New York for Liverpool to make her 202nd trip across the Atlantic.

On board were 1,959 people, 159 of whom were Americans. Spotted By a U-Boat Approximately 14 miles off the coast of Southern Ireland at Old Head of Kinsale, neither the captain nor any of his crew realized that the German U-boat, U-20, had already spotted and targeted them.

At 1:40 p.m., the U-boat launched a torpedo. The torpedo hit the starboard (right) side of the Lusitania.

Almost immediately, another explosion rocked the ship. At the time, the Allies thought the Germans had launched two or three torpedoes to sink the Lusitania. However, the Germans say their U-boat only fired one torpedo. Many believe the second explosion was caused by the ignition of ammunition hidden in the cargo hold.

Others say that coal dust, kicked up when the torpedo hit, exploded. No matter what the exact cause, it was the damage from the second explosion that made the ship sink. The Lusitania Sinks The Lusitania sunk within 18 minutes. Though there had been enough lifeboats for all passengers, the severe listing of the ship while it sunk prevented most from being launched properly.

Of the 1,959 people on board, 1,198 died. The toll of civilians killed in this disaster shocked the world. Americans Are Angry Americans were outraged to learn 128 U. S. civilians were killed in a war in which they were officially neutral.

Destroying ships not known to be carrying war materials countered accepted international war protocols. The sinking of the Lusitania heightened tensions between the U. S. and Germany and, coupled with the Zimmermann Telegram, helped sway American opinion in favor of joining the war.

The Shipwreck In 2008, divers explored the wreck of the Lusitania, situated eight miles off the coast of Ireland. On board, the divers found approximately four million U. S.-made Remington .303 bullets. The discovery supports the German's long-held belief that the Lusitania was being used to transport war materials. The find also supports the theory that it was the explosion of munitions on board that caused the second explosion on the Lusitania.cite

1. Woodrow Wilson - 28th President of the United States; led the United States in World War I and secured the formation of the League of Nations (1856-1924)P

Woodrow Wilson

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President Woodrow Wilson gave a speech to Congress on April 2, 1917 giving reasons why the United States should declare war on Germany. The speech outlined the military actions that the German government was doing that constituted an act of war. As such, President Wilson urged Congress to declare war on Germany.

The Birth of Television and the Notable Campaigns and Key Terms that Followed

Home Tools and Resources Creative Inspiration The Birth of Television and the Notable Campaigns and Key Terms that... Tools and Resources Creative Inspiration The Birth of Television and the Notable Campaigns and Key Terms that Followed By Editor - February 6, 2018 2016 0Share on Facebook Tweet on Twitter Key Developments Related to the Popularity of the TVTelevision is one of the most important inventions in the history of the world.

It has become a staple in the lives of many people and many aspects of the world’s culture are taken from TV shows.

Here’s a quick look at the history of successful television campaigns. Phrases That Define Advertising Campaigns Not long after the development of television, came a slew of savvy advertising campaigns crafted around memorable advertising slogans.

The most effective and catchy slogans are imprinted in the collective mindset of the masses so that they automatically associate the phrases with the products for the longest time. Some advertising slogans have seeped so deeply into the public consciousness that they become much more than just some catch phrases to sell some products.

For instance, the legendary Nike slogan ‘Just Do It’ has emerged from its advertising shadows to become a mantra of life for many people. Some advertising slogans have such a long life that they become a part of pop culture.dan weiden nike Your browser does not currently recognize any of the video formats available.

Click here to visit our frequently asked questions about HTML5 video.0:00 / 12:04Just like other forms of pop culture, advertising slogans can be just as iconic in defining a generation.

Here are some of the most memorable advertising slogans.25 Popular Ad Slogans and Campaigns:“Don’t leave home without it.” (American Express)“A little dab’ll do ya.” (Brylcreem)“Have it your way.” (Burger King)“M’m! M’m! Good!” (Campbell’s Soup)“You’ll love the way we fly.” (Delta Airlines)“When it absolutely, positively has to be there overnight.” (Federal Express)“Guinness is good for you.” (Guinness)“When you care enough to send the very best.” (Hallmark)“Beanz meanz Heinz.” (Heinz Baked Beans)“I think, therefore IBM.” (IBM)“Snap!

Crackle! Pop!” (Kellogg’s Rice Crispies)“Finger lickin’ good.” (KFC)“Have a break. Have a Kit-Kat” (Kit-Kat)“Betcha can’t eat just one.” (Lay’s)“I’m lovin’ it.” (Mc Donald’s)“The milk chocolate that melts in your mouth, not in your hands.” (M&Ms)“Good to the last drop.” (Maxwell House)“Got Milk?” (Milk)“It’s Miller time!” (Miller)“I love New York.” (New York)“Be all you can be.” (US Army)“Think small.” (Volkswagen)“Where’s the beef?” (Wendy’s)“Breakfast of champions.” (Wheaties)“Let your fingers do the walking.” (Yellow Pages)Definitions of Common Terms and Buzzwords As the television industry grew, so did the vocabulary around it, especially when it comes to marketing and advertising, which has unique lingo for placing advertisements, designing campaigns, measuring results and execution of work.

To help understand the jargon which is used in the marketing and advertising fields, we have put together a few of the more common terms in the section below.

Advertising Terms and Definitions Advertising Impressions The amount of audience delivery of media vehicles, programs or schedules to potential buyers of the advertising message. The number is usually expressed as thousands (000). Air Date The first broadcast or airing of a television or radio commercial. It can also refer to the exact date of a specific television or radio program. Availability Unsold units of time available for television or radio broadcasters to sell to advertisers. It also refers to a television or radio station’s submission of programs and rating estimates for advertising planning and buying.

Average Frequency The number of times the average person or household is exposed to an advertising schedule. It is always derived from Gross Rating Points and Reach. The more exposure that a potential buyer sees a message, the greater the chance of a sale.

Average Quarter Hour Rating The estimated audience numbers reported by Nielsen and Arbitron Companies for television and radio stations. It provides the average number of persons or households who watched/listened for at least 5 minutes of the 15 minute segment being reported.

From the ratings, television and radio stations set advertising rates. Cost Per Rating Point (CPP)The cost to reach one percent of the potential households or individuals, in a specific market or geographic area.

Cost Per Thousand (CPM)The cost to reach 1,000 units of an audience, either households or individuals, for advertising. This number is used as a measure of efficiency among media and media schedules and can help determine effectiveness of the advertising.

Daypart One of the time segments into which the day is divided by broadcast media, determined by type of programming and who provides it (network or local). Based on the daypart, the station will set rates. Piggyback Back-to-back scheduling of two or more commercials of one advertiser in network or spot positions. Advertisers will use piggyback spots to either advertise two separate products or use them in conjunction with each other.

Also, some advertisers will bookend a commercial break with their commercials at the beginning and end of the break. Run of Schedule (ROS)A radio or television broadcast schedule, where specific programs and air times have not been requested by the advertiser. Generally advertisers will get more commercials, but not guaranteed to run at set times. Sweeps The four 4-week periods when all TV markets are measured by Nielsen and Arbitron for station viewing and demographic information.

Sweep months are February, May, July and November. Ten Presidential Speeches Aired on Television Of course, the television also brought compelling content to people around the world, including some of the most moving speeches by American Presidents.

Speeches in Times of War and Peace Over the course of history of the United States, U. S. Presidents have had some of the most memorable and powerful speeches.

These speeches were given in a time of war and peace, good times and also bad times. Selecting the best speeches by U. S. Presidents is subjective, and can be debated by everyone. We will provide a list of some of the top speeches in history. While this may not be the definitive top ten list, it is a starting point for discussion.

In no particular order, here is a listing of the Top Ten Presidential Speeches: Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address On November 19, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln gave a speech at the dedication of the National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. While the speech itself was only two minutes long, it is considered one of the most powerful speeches ever. The speech touched upon the ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the constitutional rights of all men.

The speech was the first step to try and re-unite the country that was torn by the Civil War. Kennedy’s Cuban Missile Crisis Speech Facing a possible nuclear showdown with the Russians who were stockpiling weapons in Cuba, President John F. Kennedy Jr. delivered an address to the world on October 22, 1962.

The speech told the nation of the missiles in Cuba and sent a message to Russia that, while the United States was a peaceful nation that did not want nuclear war, they would not back down. The result of the speech was the easing of the missiles in Cuba, and averting a possible war. Nixon’s Resignation Speech On August 8, 1974, President Richard M. Nixon gave a speech resigning the Presidency of the United States.

Nixon’s speech was in the wake of the Watergate scandal, which proved a link to the cover-up of the break-in at the Democratic National Headquarters to the White House.

The speech touched upon his failings, but also his triumphs as President. Reagan’s Berlin Wall Speech During a visit to Berlin, Germany on June 12, 1987, President Ronald Reagan delivered a speech to the divided city of East and West Berlin.

The city was divided by the Berlin Wall which separated Communist East Berlin from Free West Berlin. The most famous line of the speech was aimed at Russian President Gorbachev, when President Reagan urged “President Gorbachev, tear down this wall!” A few years later, the Berlin Wall came down re-uniting Germany, and bringing a new capitalism for the country.

Washington’s Farewell Address On September 19, 1796, President George Washington delivered his farewell address.

The address announced that he did not want to run for re-election as President. Since the only media available at that time was the newspaper, Washington’s Farewell Address was a written document that was printed and distributed by newspaper. The Address laid the foundation that had started for the new country and also touched on many of the philosophies that the country would follow in the coming years. This Address became a blueprint of our countries government for many years. Roosevelt’s Pearl Harbor Speech The Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor Naval Base in Hawaii on December 7, 1941.

This was the first attack on American soil and on December 8, 1941 President Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed the nation. The Speech declared that the 7 th was a “date that shall live in infamy”. It outlined the actions of Japan and asked Congress to declare war on Japan. The rousing speech was delivered by radio and was a call to action for the American public. As a result, millions of Americans lined up to volunteer for the armed forces, and the war on Japan had begun. Wilson’s Speech Declaring War on Germany

President Woodrow Wilson gave a speech to Congress on April 2, 1917 giving reasons why the United States should declare war on Germany. The speech outlined the military actions that the German government was doing that constituted an act of war. As such, President Wilson urged Congress to declare war on Germany.

The United States Congress agreed and the country entered into World War I. Eisenhower’s Farewell Address President Dwight Eisenhower delivered his farewell address to the nation on January 17, 1961. The speech addressed the issues of the day with the Communists posing a threat to the world, and how peace needs to be attained.

President Eisenhower made a plea for a continued strong military presence to ensure world peace. The address also urged the country and its leaders to unite to face the threats of Communism. Lyndon Johnson’s We Shall Overcome Speech In the mid-1960’s the country was in the middle of race riots and on March 15, 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson gave a speech in front of Congress.

The speech was a week after a deadly race riot in Selma, Alabama and in the speech; President Johnson used the phrase “We Shall Overcome” which had been used by African-American civil rights leaders. In the speech, Johnson asked all Americans to unite in the cause of equal rights for all. He asked that the country not think in terms of black and white, north and south, but think of everyone as Americans. Carter’s Crisis of Confidence Speech The 1980’s was a time of great difficulties for the United States.

With gas shortages, inflation running out of control and our government is powerless to stop the downward spiral. On July 15, 1979, President Jimmy Carter addressed the nation on the subject of the energy crisis and the current state of the economy. President Carter announced that this was a crisis of confidence that is eroding the country. In the speech, President Carter attempted to take command of the difficult situation that the country was facing.

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Sinking ships without warning. German's sunk the Bristish passenger ship Lusitania May 1915. 1200 killed included 130 Americans. Wilson demanded reparations and apology. Bryan instructed to send memo to Germany, hesitant, but did. Germans said Lusitania was armed (false) and carrying military cargo (true, British was using civilians to shield war cargo). Bryan refused to write 2nd note and resigned as Sec of State.

World War 1

"39 terms Kamilio World War 1Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Sort American Neutrality President Wilson sought to distance the US from WWI by issuing a proclamation of neutrality, Wilson's policy of neutrality was consistent with America's traditional policy of avoiding European entanglements, Wilson insisted that all belligerents respect American neutral rights on the high seas.

American Diplomacy Deterred the British and French from recognizing and aiding the Confederacy Unrestricted Submarine Warfare

Replaced by Robert Lansing who DID write 2nd note, and Germans pledged not to use USWarfare, civilians would be allowed to evacuate Zimmerman Telegram March 1917.

Sent from German Foreign Secretary, addressed to German minister in Mexico City. Mexico should attack the US if US goes to war with Germany (needed that advantage due to Mexico's promixity to the US). In return, Germany would give back Tex, NM, Arizona etc to Mexico. US Declaration of War On February 1, 1917, the restarting of unrestricted submarine warfare marked the beginning of the final phase of the war.

For two months the submarine campaign was spectacularly effective, and by April the British found themselves without reserves of industrial raw materials and with only six week's supply of food.

Meanwhile, on April 6, the United States declared war on Germany. The new submarine campaign not only cost U. S. lives, but also, in President Wilson's eyes, demonstrated a malignant militarism that threatened liberal institutions all over the world.

This last point had been brought home to Americans when they discovered that Germany had promised to return the southwestern are of the United States to Mexico if Mexico would attack the United States. Congress supported the president, and Americans entered the war believing they were going ""over there"" to ""make the world safe for democracy.

""The Convoy System Designed to protect Allied supply ships from the German U-boats. Armed destroyers would surround the fleet and end the threat of German U-boa

ts. Americans entered the war in 1917 by declaring war on Germany. This was due to the attack on Lusitania, the unrestricted submarine warfare on American ships heading to Britain, and Germany encouraging Mexico to attack the USA. Lusitania A British passenger ship that was sunk by a German U-Boat on May 7, 1915.

World War 1

ns. Public opinion in the United States began to turn irrevocably against Germany. In late March, Germany sunk four more U. S. merchant ships, and on April 2, President Wilson appeared before Congress and called for a declaration of war against Germany.

U.S. proclaims neutrality in World War I

World War I1914U. S. proclaims neutrality in World War IShare this:facebook twitter google+Print Cite As World War I erupts in Europe, President Woodrow Wilson formally proclaims the neutrality of the United States, a position that a vast majority of Americans favored, on August 4, 1914.

Wilson’s initial hope that America could be “impartial in thought as well as in action” was soon compromised by Germany’s attempted quarantine of the British Isles. Britain was one of America’s closest trading partners, and tension arose between the United States and Germany when several U. S. ships traveling to Britain were damaged or sunk by German mines.

In February 1915, Germany announced unrestricted warfare against all ships, neutral or otherwise, that entered the war zone around Britain.

One month later, Germany announced that a German cruiser had sunk the William P. Frye, a private American vessel that was transporting grain to England when it disappeared. President Wilson was outraged, but the German government apologized and called the attack an unfortunate mistake.

In early May 1915, several New York newspapers published a warning by the German embassy in Washington that Americans traveling on British or Allied ships in war zones did so at their own risk.

The announcement was placed on the same page as an advertisement for the imminent sailing of the British-owned Lusitania ocean liner from New York to Liverpool. On May 7, the Lusitania was torpedoed without warning by a German submarine just off the coast of Ireland. Of the nearly 2,000 passengers, 1,201 were killed, including 128 Americans. It was revealed that the Lusitania was carrying about 173 tons of war munitions for Britain, which the Germans cited as further justification for the attack.

The United States eventually sent three notes to Berlin protesting the action, and Germany apologized and pledged to end unrestricted submarine warfare. In November, however, a U-boat sunk an Italian liner without warning, killing 272 people, including 27 America

On April 4, the Senate voted 82 to six to declare war against Germany. Two days later, the House of Representatives endorsed the declaration by a vote of 373 to 50, and America formally entered World War I.

On June 26, the first 14,000 U. S. infantry troops landed in France to begin training for combat. After four years of bloody stalemate along the Western Front, the entrance of America’s well-supplied forces into the conflict was a major turning point in the war. By the time the war finally ended on November 11, 1918, more than 2 million American soldiers had served on the battlefields of Western Europe, and some 50,000 of these men had lost their lives.

ort Causes of WWI -the sinking of the Lusitania: the Lusitania was a British passenger liner in which Germany torpedoed. Over 1000 people died including a 128 Americans.

WWI

"19 terms suditi1203WWILearn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set? Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later S

-breaking of the Sussex Pledge: After the sinking of the Lusitania, Germany promised to war any nuetral ships and passenger vessels before attacking.

Germany how ever broke that pledge when they attacked 4 American merchant ships killing 36 people -the Zimmerman telegram: the telegram sent by Arthur Zimmerman, which was intercepted by British secret service agents, offered an alliance with Mexico against the US if they did enter the war - in general, causes were militarism, alliance systems, imperialism, and nationalism Archduke Franz Ferdinand -was in line to the of the Austro-Hungarian Empire -was on a state visit to Bosnia with his wife -assaintated there on June 28, 2914 - caused much tension between European countries and eventually started the war Central Powers -consisted of Germany, Belgium, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and the Ottoman Empire (Turkey) (Italy was a Central Power until it switched sides) -had a disadvantage because they were landlocked -very few countries compared to the Allied powers Allied Powers -consisted of the United Kingdom, France, Italy (eventually), Russia, Serbia, America and Japan -many more countries -more of advantage because they were along the coast line and had easy access to many different important resources Western Front -the area in France where the majority of the fighting took place during WWI -in WWI, the region of Northern France where the forces of the Allies and the Central Powers battled each other.

Eastern Front -the area in Russia where a large portion of the fighting took place -in WWI, the region along the German-Russian Border where Russians and Serbs battled Germans, Austrians, and Turks.

Trench Warfare (""No Man's Land"") -trenches were first dug by the Germans for protection, then by the allies -people would sit in the trenches for many days while bombs were exploding constanatly above them -soliders would be crouching down for days in fear that at any point in time a bomb could land in their trench - when they were told to, soliders would climb out of the trench and go over the barbed wire and then advance into ""No Man's Land"" --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -No Man's Land was the space between trenches -bombs would constantly be exploding and machine guns would continuously be firing -was full of impact craters, dead trees and no wildlife New Weapons machine guns: -a gun in which many shots could be fired one after the other -caused many casualties tanks: -could cross battle lines -fire at enemy at a close range -could crush obstacles providing an easier route for advancing troupes poison gas: -could kill or seriously injure anyone who breathed it airplanes: -allowed troops to watch enemy troops' movements -bomb targets -pilots could duel in the sky U-boats: -could carry supplies -could attack enemy ships in the sea

Lusitania -a British passenger vessel which was torpedoed by Germany on May 7, 1915 off the coast of Ireland killing over 1000 people and 128 Americans -attack was carried out by a U-boat -one of the causes of WWIZ

Germany's resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in the spring of 1917 provided the final straw for US politicians, and America declared war. The first and foremost answer would be the sinking of the Lusitania, an British cruise/transport ship, bound for Britain from New York.

"Questions1) What weapons were use in World War 1?2) Why the United States Entered World War I?3) Who started World War 1?4) Was Germany responsible for causing World War 1?5) How many people died in World War 1?6) Was World War 1 avoidable?7) How did the Allies win World War 1?

Answers1) Q What weapons were use in World War 1? ARifles, artillery, machine guns, aircraft ships, submarines, poison gas, tanks, armored cars, grenades and mortars were all used during World War 1. The Americans used the shotgun during the war, which they used to great effect at clearing the enemy trenches of German soldiers.

This provoked a horrified reaction from the German government, as wounds from shotgun hits were difficult to treat. As I'm sure you know, the shots spread out and hit the victim in many different places, which would lead to a long and painful death.

The Germans called on the use of shotguns in warfare to be banned. Aircrafts made their first appearance as weapons in WWI. Germany used Zeppelins a type of aircraft, submarines U-Boats, and tanks. Mustard gas along with other chemicals were used this is the first appearance of chemical warfare. Soldiers wear masks to protect them from a horrible new weapon called poison gas. It caused blinding and death by choking.

One type of gas is mustard gas. That would kill you if you breathed it in. You would eventually choke up your liver and die instantly. The machine gun was another new weapon for World War 1. The submarine was an effective warship, known as a U-boat.2) Q Why the United States Entered World War I? AThere were unauthorized German submarines along the US East coast.

The German U-boat ring sought to sink all supply ships headed for Britain in order to starve the island. It sank the Lusitania as part of its efforts. 1195 people died, including 128 Americans. The Lusitania's sinking was the biggest influence on the American decision to enter the war.

German submarine warfare the Lusitania is included in this sunk many ships over several years. Had it not been for the Lusitania, the US would have stayed out of the War.3) Q Who started World War 1?

AThe war was started by the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, capital of Bosnia, a province of Austria at the time. (June, 28, 1914) Serbia had always wanted to crush the Serbs in Bosnia and Serbia itself, who was helping Austrian- Serbs in an uprising against Austria.

Since the Serbs had always fought the Austrian government and threatened their ""patchwork"" quilt of nations, Austria used the assassination of Franz Ferdinand as an excuse to send an ultimatum to Serbia. The Serbian government would suppress all propaganda coming out of Serbia against Austria-Hungary. Serbia would forbid anti- Austria lessons in schools. Serbia was to fire officials spreading anti-Austria propaganda.

There would be a trial of the members of the Mloda Bosnia and the Black hand terrorist uprising group in an Austrian Hungarian court. Serbia must accept these terms in 48 hours. Serbia accepted all demands but one, they wanted the trial to take place in Serbia. Than Austria had what it had always wanted, an excuse to crush Serbia, they declared war against Serbia on July 28.

Russia, who had always supported the Serbs because of their common origins ordered partial mobilization against Austria Hungary. Germany had already agreed to help Austria- Hungary in the event of war and had given Austria a blank cheque.

At this time Russia, Germany, Serbia and Austria are prepared to fight. And with this Austria- Serbia conflict the World War 1 started and later grew with France, England, Belgium and many other nations.4) Q Was Germany responsible for causing World War 1?

AThey did not bear the sole and total responsibility that was laid on them by the Versaille treaty but they had been actively planning on a war with France for some years for the purpose of gaining territory so they certainly bear the largest part of the responsibility. However, the war first started as a conflict between Austria-Hungary and Serbia. Germany did try to prevent it from becoming a more general war by warning France and Russia not to aid Serbia.

They ignored the warnings and a series of treaties requiring verious contries to help other countries in the event of war all went into effect and suddenly everybody was at war.

Germany went ahead with their plans for teritorial acquisition. Yes Germany was responsible for caussing WWI because of the blank check signed in 1914, June 6th which allowed Austria-Hungary to attack Serbia with Germany's support.

They also pushed Austria to become involved in the War so they, and their allies, would not look weak.5) Q How many people died in World War 1? AThe First World War, known as the Great War and as World War One abbreviated WWI after 1939, was a world conflict lasting from August 1914 to the final Armistice on November 11, 1918.

The Allied Powers led by Britain, France, Russia until 1917, and the United States after 1917, defeated the Central Powers led by the German Empire, Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire.

The war caused the disintegration of four empires Austro-Hungarian, German, Ottoman, and Russian as well as radical change in the European and Middle Eastern maps. The Allied powers before 1917 are sometimes referred to as the Triple Entente, and the Central Powers are sometimes referred to as the Triple Alliance. About 8,500,000 soldiers were killed in World War 1, from all nations. The total with civilians is over 20,000,000.

Military dead was 5 million and Civilian deaths was 3 million.6) Q Was World War 1 avoidable? AProbably not.

The population of Germany was increasing rapidly, and they were running out of land. Both arms technology and industrial capacity were increasing, and leaders of France, Germany and Britian were eager to try their new weapons and claim world supremecy. It's likely that a war would have started, even if Archduke Ferdinand hadn't been assisinated. And, as the previous writer noted, everyone thought when the war started in August that it would be over by Christmas, at the latest.

Many German rail cars carrying troops even carried the promise Home before the leaves fall. Yeah it could have been avoided I mean sereously if Germany and Austria-Hungary had actually attended the peace treaty proposed by Britain things could have actually been worked out instead of causing a WW also I think if any nation had realized that what was about to start wasn't a few months was but a four year war they would have defenetly tried to talk to each other and solve their proplems that way.7) Q How did the Allies win World War 1?

AThe two sides involved in World War I were the Allies and the Central Powers. Both sides had basically the same weapons, and once the war got into the Trench Warfare stage it was nearly impossible for either side to win.

Trench warfare started in 1914, and continued until the end of the war. American did not get involved for the first three years of the fighting.

By that time both the Allies and the Central Powers were worn out. Worn out in lives, money, supplies, etc. By 1917 there was some possibility both sides would have been willing to stop the war with the new boundary between the two lines of trenches.

German submarines made shipping to England difficult, and caused many shortages for the people of England. The British blockade of Germany had the same effect. People in Germany were near starvation. In 1917 the Germans were able to get the Russians to drop out of the war, allowing the Germans to send all the soldiers that fought the Russians to be sent to the fighting in France. This gave the Germans a great advantage. BUT in that same year American entered the war on the Allied side, giving the Allies a great advantage.

It was a race to see who could use their advantage first. The Germans attacked first, and under normal conditions could have won, but the England and French knew that if they could hold out until the Americans came they would win the war. So somehow they were able to stop the Germans in spite of the German advantages. Finally the Americans came.

We had no secret weapons, or anything that wasn't being used before we arrived,but we had not suffered like the others on both sides for three years. We were full of confidence, and determined to prove our abilities to everyone. The Allies, with the help of the Americans were able to attack.

The Americans were important so they refused to quit when a group of Americans were surrounded by the Germans, and yet would not surrender. Also important were the supplies sent from America to the war. Had the war continued it was possible that there would have been a tank for every two American soldiers. We had designed a rifle that would allow every soldier to carry a light machine-gun. American industry was much more powerful than any other nation, and that was also important. "

America's political system has transformed from a democracy into an oligarchy, where power is wielded by wealthy elites. ""Making the world safe for democracy"" was President Woodrow Wilson's rationale for World War I, and it has been used to justify American military intervention ever since.

How the US Became an Oligarchy

"How the US Became an Oligarchy Wednesday, April 08, 2015By Ellen Brown, The Web of Debt Blog | News Analysisfont size Print Tweet According to a new study from Princeton University, American democracy no longer exists. Using data from over 1,800 policy initiatives from 1981 to 2002, researchers Martin Gilens and Benjamin Page concluded that rich, well-connected individuals on the political scene now steer the direction of the country, regardless of – or even against – the will of the majority of voters.

Can we justify sending troops into other countries to spread a political system we cannot maintain at home? The Magna Carta, considered the first Bill of Rights in the Western world, established the rights of nobles as against the king. But the doctrine that ""all men are created equal"" – that all people have ""certain inalienable rights,"" including ""life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"" – is an American original.

And those rights, supposedly insured by the Bill of Rights, have the right to vote at their core. We have the right to vote but the voters' collective will no longer prevails. In Greece, the left-wing populist Syriza Party came out of nowhere to take the presidential election by storm; and in Spain, the populist Podemos Party appears poised to do the same.

But for over a century, no third-party candidate has had any chance of winning a US presidential election. We have a two-party winner-take-all system, in which our choice is between two candidates, both of whom necessarily cater to big money.

It takes big money just to put on the mass media campaigns required to win an election involving 240 million people of voting age. In state and local elections, third party candidates have sometimes won. In a modest-sized city, candidates can actually influence the vote by going door to door, passing out flyers and bumper stickers, giving local presentations, and getting on local radio and TV. But in a national election, those efforts are easily trumped by the mass media. And local governments too are beholden to big money. When governments of any size need to borrow money, the megabanks in a position to supply it can generally dictate the terms.

Even in Greece, where the populist Syriza Party managed to prevail in January, the anti-austerity platform of the new government is being throttled by the moneylenders who have the government in a chokehold.

How did we lose our democracy? Were the Founding Fathers remiss in leaving something out of the Constitution? Or have we simply gotten too big to be governed by majority vote? Democracy's Rise and Fall The stages of the capture of democracy by big money are traced in a paper called ""The Collapse of Democratic Nation States"" by theologian and environmentalist Dr. John Cobb.

Going back several centuries, he points to the rise of private banking, which usurped the power to create money from governments:""The influence of money was greatly enhanced by the emergence of private banking. The banks are able to create money and so to lend amounts far in excess of their actual wealth. This control of money-creation .

. . has given banks overwhelming control over human affairs. In the United States, Wall Street makes most of the truly important decisions that are directly attributed to Washington.

""Today the vast majority of the money supply in Western countries is created by private bankers. That tradition goes back to the 17 th century, when the privately-owned Bank of England, the mother of all central banks, negotiated the right to print England's money after Parliament stripped that power from the Crown.

When King William needed money to fight a war, he had to borrow. The government as borrower then became servant of the lender. In America, however, the colonists defied the Bank of England and issued their own paper scrip; and they thrived.

When King George forbade that practice, the colonists rebelled. They won the Revolution but lost the power to create their own money supply, when they opted for gold rather than paper money as their official means of exchange. Gold was in limited supply and was controlled by the bankers, who surreptitiously expanded the money supply by issuing multiple banknotes against a limited supply of gold.

This was the system euphemistically called ""fractional reserve"" banking, meaning only a fraction of the gold necessary to back the banks' privately-issued notes was actually held in their vaults. These notes were lent at interest, putting citizens and the government in debt to bankers who created the notes with a printing press. It was something the government could have done itself debt-free, and the American colonies had done with great success until England went to war to stop them.

President Abraham Lincoln revived the colonists' paper money system when he issued the Treasury notes called ""Greenbacks"" that helped the Union win the Civil War.

But Lincoln was assassinated, and the Greenback issues were discontinued. In every presidential election between 1872 and 1896, there was a third national party running on a platform of financial reform. Typically organized under the auspices of labor or farmer organizations, these were parties of the people rather than the banks. They included the Populist Party, the Greenback and Greenback Labor Parties, the Labor Reform Party, the Antimonopolist Party, and the Union Labor Party.

They advocated expanding the national currency to meet the needs of trade, reform of the banking system, and democratic control of the financial system. The Populist movement of the 1890s represented the last serious challenge to the bankers' monopoly over the right to create the nation's money.

According to monetary historian Murray Rothbard, politics after the turn of the century became a struggle between two competing banking giants, the Morgans and the Rockefellers. The parties sometimes changed hands, but the puppeteers pulling the strings were always one of these two big-money players. In All the Presidents' Bankers, Nomi Prins names six banking giants and associated banking families that have dominated politics for over a century.

No popular third party candidates have a real chance of prevailing, because they have to compete with two entrenched parties funded by these massively powerful Wall Street banks. Democracy Succumbs to Globalization In an earlier era, notes Dr. Cobb, wealthy landowners were able to control democracies by restricting government participation to the propertied class.

When those restrictions were removed, big money controlled elections by other means:""First, running for office became expensive, so that those who seek office require wealthy sponsors to whom they are then beholden. Second, the great majority of voters have little independent knowledge of those for whom they vote or of the issues to be dealt with.

Their judgments are, accordingly, dependent on what they learn from the mass media. These media, in turn, are controlled by moneyed interests.

""Control of the media and financial leverage over elected officials then enabled those other curbs on democracy we know today, including high barriers to ballot placement for third parties and their elimination from presidential debates, vote suppression, registration restrictions, identification laws, voter roll purges, gerrymandering, computer voting, and secrecy in government.

The final blow to democracy, says Dr. Cobb, was ""globalization"" – an expanding global market that overrides national interests:"" [T]oday's global economy is fully transnational. The money power is not much interested in boundaries between states and generally works to reduce their influence on markets and investments. . . . Thus transnational corporations inherently work to undermine nation states, whether they are democratic or not.

""The most glaring example today is the secret twelve-country trade agreement called the Trans-Pacific Partnership. If it goes through, the TPP will dramatically expand the power of multinational corporations to use closed-door tribunals to challenge and supersede domestic laws, including environmental, labor, health and other protections.

Looking at Alternatives Some critics ask whether our system of making decisions by a mass popular vote easily manipulated by the paid-for media is the most effective way of governing on behalf of the people.

In an interesting Ted Talk, political scientist Eric Li makes a compelling case for the system of ""meritocracy"" that has been quite successful in China.

In America Beyond Capitalism, Prof. Gar Alperovitz argues that the US is simply too big to operate as a democracy at the national level. Excluding Canada and Australia, which have large empty landmasses, the United States is larger geographically than all the other advanced industrial countries of the OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) combined.

He proposes what he calls "" The Pluralist Commonwealth "": a system anchored in the reconstruction of communities and the democratization of wealth.

It involves plural forms of cooperative and common ownership beginning with decentralization and moving to higher levels of regional and national coordination when necessary.

He is co-chair along with James Gustav Speth of an initiative called The Next System Project, which seeks to help open a far-ranging discussion of how to move beyond the failing traditional political-economic systems of both left and Right.. Dr. Alperovitz quotes Prof. Donald Livingston, who asked in 2002:""What value is there in continuing to prop up a union of this monstrous size?

. . . [T]here are ample resources in the American federal tradition to justify states' and local communities' recalling, out of their own sovereignty, powers they have allowed the central government to usurp. ""Taking Back Our Power If governments are recalling their sovereign powers, they might start with the power to create money, which was usurped by private interests while the people were asleep at the wheel.

State and local governments are not allowed to print their own currencies; but they can own banks, and all depository banks create money when they make loans, as the Bank of England recently acknowledged. The federal government could take back the power to create the national money supply by issuing its own Treasury notes as Abraham Lincoln did. Alternatively, it could issue some very large denomination coins as authorized in the Constitution; or it could nationalize the central bank and use quantitative easing to fund infrastructure, education, job creation, and social services, responding to the needs of the people rather than the banks.

The freedom to vote carries little weight without economic freedom – the freedom to work and to have food, shelter, education, medical care and a decent retirement.

President Franklin Roosevelt maintained that we need an Economic Bill of Rights. If our elected representatives were not beholden to the moneylenders, they might be able both to pass such a bill and to come up with the money to fund it. This piece was reprinted by Truthout with permission or license. It may not be reproduced in any form without permission or license from the source.

Ellen Brown Ellen Brown is an attorney, president of the Public Banking Institute and author of 12 books including the best-selling Web of Debt. In The Public Bank Solution, her latest book, she explores successful public banking models historically and globally.

Her websites are The Web of Debt Blog, Public Bank Solution and Public Banking Institute. Related Stories America Beyond Capitalism: An ""Evolutionary Reconstruction"" of the System Is Necessary and Possible By Gar Alperovitz, Democracy Collaborative Press | Book Excerpt America Beyond Capitalism By Gar Alperovitz, Democracy Collaborative Press | Serialized Book America Beyond Capitalism: State and National Innovators By Gar Alperovitz, Truthout | Reportback to top "

Fourteen Points - Background: In April 1917, the United States entered World War I on the side of the Allies. Previously angered by the sinking of Lusitania, President Woodrow Wilson led the nation to war after learning of the Zimmermann Telegram and Germany's resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare.

World War I: The Fourteen Points

"Humanities ›History & Culture World War I: The Fourteen Points Share Flipboard Email Print Woodrow Wilson. Photograph Courtesy of the Library Congressby Kennedy Hickman Updated March 06, 2017

Though possessing a massive pool of manpower and resources, the United States required time to mobilize its forces for war. As a result, Britain and France continued to bear the brunt of the fighting in 1917 as their forces took part in the failed Nivelle Offensive as well as the bloody battles at Arras and Passchendaele.

With American forces preparing for combat, Wilson formed a study group in September 1917 to develop the nation's formal war aims. Known at the Inquiry, this group was headed by ""Colonel"" Edward M. House, a close advisor to Wilson, and guided by philosopher Sidney Mezes.

Possessing a wide variety of expertise, the group also sought to research topics that could be key issues at a postwar peace conference. Guided by the tenets of progressivism which had steered American domestic policy during the previous decade, the group worked to apply these principles to the international stage.

The result was a core list of points which stressed self-determination of peoples, free trade, and open diplomacy. Reviewing the Inquiry's work, Wilson believed that it could serve as the basis for a peace agreement.

Fourteen Points - Wilson's Speech: Going before a joint session of Congress on January 8, 1918, Wilson outlined American intentions and presented the Inquiry's work as the Fourteen Points. He believed that international acceptance of the points would lead to a just and lasting peace. The Fourteen Points as set forth by Wilson were: The Fourteen Points: I. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understandings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view.

II. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, outside territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by international action for the enforcement of international covenants.

III. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance. IV. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety.

V. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.

VI. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will secure the best and freest cooperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and unembarrassed opportunity for the independent determination of her own political development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire.

The treatment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy.

VII. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacuated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sovereignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations.

No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the government of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of international law is forever impaired.

VIII. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of all. IX. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality.

X. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development.

XI. Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated; occupied territories restored; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea; and the relations of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality; and international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into.

XII. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an undoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of an autonomous development, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees.

XIII. An independent Polish state should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indisputably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant.

XIV. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and territorial integrity to great and small states alike.

Fourteen Points - Reaction: Though Wilson's Fourteen Points were well received by the public at home and abroad, foreign leaders were skeptical as to whether they could be effectively applied to the real world. Leery of Wilson's idealism, leaders such as David Lloyd George, Georges Clemenceau, and Vittorio Orlando were hesitant to accept the points as formal war aims.

In an effort to gain support from the Allied leaders, Wilson tasked House with lobbying their behalf. On October 16, Wilson met with British intelligence chief, Sir William Wiseman, in an effort to secure London's approval.

While Lloyd George's government was largely supportive, it refused to honor the point regarding freedom of the seas and also desired to see a point added regarding war reparations. Continuing to work through diplomatic channels, the Wilson Administration secured support for the Fourteen Points from France and Italy on November 1. This internal diplomatic campaign among the Allies paralleled a discourse that Wilson was having with German officials which began on October 5. With the military situation deteriorating, the Germans finally approached the Allies regarding an armistice based on the terms of the Fourteen Points.

This was concluded on November 11 at Compiègne. Fourteen Points - Paris Peace Conference: As the Paris Peace Conference began in January 1919, Wilson quickly found that actual support for the Fourteen Points was lacking on the part of his allies.

This was largely due to the need for reparations, imperial competition, and a desire to inflict a harsh peace on Germany. As the talks progressed, Wilson was increasingly unable to garner acceptance of his Fourteen Points.

In an effort to appease the American leader, Lloyd George and Clemenceau consented to the formation of the League of Nations. With several of the participants' goals conflicting, the talks moved slowly and ultimately produced a treaty which failed to please any of the nations involved. The final terms of the treaty, which included little of Wilson's Fourteen Points on which German had agreed to the armistice, were harsh and ultimately played a key role in setting the stage for World War II. Selected Sources First World War: Fourteen Points Modern History Sourcebook: Fourteen Points Interpretation of the Fourteen Pointscite "

It is his opinion that ""never before or since has so much turned upon the solution of a secret message."" On April 6, 1917, the United States Congress formally declared war on Germany and its allies. The Zimmerman telegram clearly had helped draw the United States into the war and thus changed the course of history.

Zimmermann Telegram (1917)

This telegram, written by German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmermann, is a coded message sent to Mexico, proposing a military alliance against the United States.

The obvious threats to the United States contained in the telegram inflamed American public opinion against Germany and helped convince Congress to declare war against Germany in 1917.

Between 1914 and the spring of 1917, the European nations engaged in a conflict that became known as World War I. While armies battled in Europe, the United States remained neutral. In 1916 Woodrow Wilson was elected President for a second term, largely because of the slogan ""He kept us out of war.""

Events in early 1917 would change that hope. In January of 1917, British cryptographers deciphered a telegram from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann to the German Minister to Mexico, von Eckhardt, offering United States territory to Mexico in return for joining the German cause.

To protect their intelligence from detection and to capitalize on growing anti-German sentiment in the United States, the British waited to present the telegram to President Wilson. Meanwhile, frustration over the effective British naval blockade caused Germany to break its pledge to limit submarine warfare.

In response, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Germany in February. On February 24 Britain released the Zimmerman telegram to Wilson, and news of the telegram was published widely in the American press on March 1. The telegram had such an impact on American opinion that, according to David Kahn, author of The Codebreakers, ""No other single cryptanalysis has had such enormous consequences.""

The German's naval policy was the major reason why the United States declared war on Germany. The sinking of the Lusitania was the biggest influence of American in WWI. It was so much of an influence that it was said without the sinking of the Lusitania, the United States most likely would not of entered the war.

Why did the US enter World War 1?

"Answer by Vago1 Confidence votes 71There were several reasons, two of which were the most prominent at the time. Sinking of the Lusitania (unrestricted submarine warfare)The Zimmerman Telegram Economic Ties to European powers The Russian Revolution The most common answer, and possibly the right one, is the sinking of the British Passenger ship Lusitania, where a number of US citizens died.

In addition to the answer above: ""After submarines sank seven US merchant ships and the publication of the Zimmerman Telegram, Wilson called for war on Germany, which the US Congress declared on 6 April 1917.""

""The Zimmerman Telegram"" was a coded telegram dispatched by the foreign secretary of the German Empire, Arthur Zimmerman.

The telegram, which was forwarded to the German ambassador in Mexico, Heinrich von Eckardt, instructed him that if the United States appeared likely to enter the war he was to approach the Mexican government with a proposal for military alliance. He was to offer Mexico material aid in the reclamation of territory lost during the Mexican-American War, specifically the American states of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.

Eckardt was also instructed to urge Mexico to help broker an alliance between Germany and Japan. The Zimmerman Telegram was intercepted and decoded by British cryptographers.

The revelation of its contents in the American press on March 1st caused public outrage that contributed to the United States' declaration of war against Germany and its allies on April 6. Not just the Lusitania The passenger ship referred to above, the RMS Lusitania, was sunk in May 1915, and the US went to war against Germany in April 1917. In other words, about 23 months passed between the two.

The sinking of the Lusitania helped to turn American opinion against Germany, but it is certainly not the only reason for US involvement. It is far too remote. Most historians agree that it was not a single influence that provoked the US to declare war; rather, it was a confluence of many factors.

Unrestricted submarine warfare: the Germans sunk the Lusitania which was carrying innocent civilians (along with supplies and weapons for Great Britain)The Zimmerman note: an encoded telegram sent from Germany to Mexico.

The message said that Germany would aid Mexico in retaking the land lost to the united states if they became allies with Germany. The British intercepted the telegram translated it and handed it over to the united states government.

Fortunately the British intercepted the message and cracked the code in time to warn us. Economic issues: the US had invested over $2.6 billion in the war. If the allied powers lost, we weren't ever going to get that money back. Russian revolution: the Russians withdrew from the war because they were having a revolution in their own country.

They also signed a peace treaty with Germany. This prompted concerns about the progress of the war, and allowed the US to make it a ""war for democracy. ""1 Economic Reason By April 1917, the US had loaned more than $2 billion to the Allies. This gave the US a tremendous stake in the war; if the Allied Powers had lost, the US might never have recovered its loans from Britain and France.

- Anxious to reduce the flow of war materials to the Allies, Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare against ships, including US ships, carrying material to Britain and France.

- Attempting to divert the US from concern with the war in Europe, the German foreign minister sent the so-called Zimmerman Telegram, an offer to support Mexico in a war to regain territory lost to the US.

it was a telegram from Arthur Zimmermann to the German ambassador in Mexico. The declaration of war on Germany in 1917 was mostly influenced by German naval policy, although American economic interest and Woodrow Wilson's idealism did portray a part.

On February 1915, Germans created a submarine blockade in the British Empire's Ocean's, sinking several belligerent ships, which included the Lusitania. The United States then threatened the German Government causing them to back down. Later in February of 1917, Germany then declared unrestricted submarine warfare threatening the ideals of neutrality, commerce and security. The German U-Boats wanted to sink supply ships in order to starve the Britain islands of their goods.

t. For instance, he sent U. S. troops to Mexico to intervene in their civil war (1913-1917). When World War I broke out in Europe in 1914, Wilson tried to keep the U. S. neutral, but Germany repeatedly violated America's neutral status. When America finally entered the war in 1917 it was because, as Wilson stated,

"Why did the United States enter World War One. The industrial era had many effects, not the least of which was plunging the world into world war. One must consider the relationship between eras and events as a student of history. The industrial era created a perceived need in America for raw materials and markets for goods.

The United States was not alone in this desire for expansion. All the industrial nations were in open competition to develop vast empires that would provide them with the fuel to run the factories of industrialism. This imperialist competition led to tension and the creation of vast armies. The willingness to use these armies was known as militarism.

In order to feel safe (there was a pretty fair degree of paranoia as you can imagine) nations began to sign secret treaties forming alliances and Europe was divided into an armed camp. Tension was high, the subjugation (taking over) of other nations led to feelings of nationalism that would eventually light the spark that would explode Europe into the flames of conflict.

The causes of World War One as discussed above can be summarized by the following acronym as a mnemonic device: A- Alliance: European nations signed secret treaties that created a system of alliances pitting nation versus nation. N - Nationalism: There were intense feelings of nationalism on the part of subjugated nationalities.

These feelings would eventually lead to rash acts. I - Imperialism: Competition to develop vast empires caused tension and conflict. M - Militarism: Nations built huge armies to defend themselves and help to gain these empires. It was a natural feeling for them to want to use these militaries.

A - Anarchy: There was no international organization to help them deal with their problems. L - Leadership: It was poor.

Just look at the system they set up...quite poor indeed. These were the conditions facing Europe as a crisis emerged in the Balkans. The Archduke of Austria Hungary, a traditional power, was touring the nation of Serbia. Meanwhile Bosnian nationalists desiring freedom from Serbia plotted to assassinate the Archduke. Gabriel Principe, a member of the Black Hand, the aforementioned Bosnian nationalist group, shot and killed Franz Ferdinand on June 28 th 1914.

Austria Hungary blamed the Serbian government for the assassination of the Archduke and issued an ultimatum (demands). The Serbians agreed to all but two of the demands, one of which was the placement of Austro Hungarian troops within Serbia. The Serbians appealed to Russia for support and Russia as the ""protector of the Slavs"" agreed to support Serbia.

Meanwhile the Austro Hungarians still wanting revenge and fearing Russia secured the support of their traditional ally, Germany. In a famous decision Germany issued what has become know as ""Carte Blanche,"" of blank check, to Austria Hungary.

This unqualified military support from Germany made Austria Hungary rather confident that Russia would not attack. At this point the Austro Hungarians declared war on Serbia. In response to the declaration of war Russia mobilized her military forces.

Perhaps it was a bit of saber rattling, perhaps not. Regardless Germany demanded Russia demobilize its army. When Russia refused Germany attacked Russia. The effect of the war on the Russian front were devastating.

The Russians were ill prepared for war and lost millions of men. In the end the Czars refusal to exit the war cost him his throne as the Bolsheviks (Communists) revolted in 1917 overthrowing Czar Nicholas II. When the Russians were attacked by Germany, France was obligated to declare war on Germany as a result of a treaty she had signed with Russia.

The Germans attacked France by marching through Belgium. The Belgians who did not give Germany permission to do this now were in a state of war with Germany as well. The most important byproduct of this was the fact that England had a treaty with Belgium! Now England was obligated to declare war on Germany as well.

Italy, which had a treaty with Germany switched sides so that she might gain territory from Austria Hungary (A gamble that more or less worked) and the Ottoman Empire entered the war on behalf to the Austro Hungarians (they wanted to gain territory from the Russians and gain control in the Balkan region).

Now most of Europe was engulfed in war. In the end the Triple Entente (England, France and Russia later to be joined by Italy, the United States and Japan) defeated the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria Hungary and the Ottoman Empire).

The conflict which was long and bloody was marked by trench warfare and the use of chemical weapons. It was fought mostly in French territory. At the conclusion of hostilities Germany was still in French territory but it was relatively clear that the combined industrial might of the Triple Entente would prevail.

In actuality the influence of the United States is questionable. Germany hoped to negotiate a favorable treaty but as we shall see this was not to be the case. The Treaty of Versailles was signed ending the war and blaming Germany for the entire conflict. This blame and the consequent punishment set the stage for years of resentment and another world war, something American President Woodrow Wilson had hoped to avoid.

So, what did all this have to do with America and why did we enter World War One? Most Americans favored staying out of the conflict and President Wilson publicly and formally stated that the United States would follow a policy of neutrality. In three short years, however, the United States would find itself in the middle of what later became known as the first World War. As the war in Europe raged on America sympathies were clearly on the side of the allies. American propaganda posters urged citizens to buy war bonds and support the allies.

The Kaiser and Germans were painted as the aggressors in the war. True or not Americans came to see Germany as vicious and blood thirsty. The poster below was used by the US Army in 1917 to recruit soldiers. Notice how the Germans are pictured? This is a clear example of anti German propaganda. When the war began England enforced a naval blockade of Germany in the hopes of cutting off supplies. Germany responded by unleashing the U Boats. U Boats were submarines capable of staying submerged for long periods of time.

They would sneak up upon their victims, often at night, an torpedo them. The Germans did not limit their attacks to military vessels. Any ship sailing in the war zone was considered an enemy. This became known as unrestricted submarine warfare. On May 7th 1915 the British cruise ship Lusitania was sunk off the coast of England. Over 1,198 passengers including 128 Americans were killed.

America was furious at the brutality and demanded a stop to this type of attack. In 1916, after the sinking of the passenger liner Sussex, Germany agreed to end unrestricted submarine warfare in the "" Sussex pledge.

""The Sussex pledge only put off the inevitable American entry into the war. America shared a cultural bond with England and France. Woodrow Wilson began to actively campaign for Americans to support the allies. Besides being culturally similar England and France were our trade partners.

From 1914 to 1916 trade with the Allies grew from 825 million dollars to 3.2 billion dollars. If the Allies were to lose the war our trade would be threatened. American increasingly saw Germany as the enemy. Germany was a dictatorship fighting against the great democracies of the world and America as a democratic nation felt an obligation to support them. As America became increasingly less neutral, the British government intercepted a message from the German ambassador Zimmerman to the Mexican government.

This message termed the "" Zimmerman Note "" asked Mexico to attack the United States if war broke out between the U. S. and Germany. Source: National Archives and Records Administration The note was turned over to American government a short time later and eventually published in the newspapers.

Americans were outraged. Then the Kaiser announced that Germany was going to re initiate the practice of unrestricted submarine warfare violating the Sussex Pledge. Wilson had campaigned for office promising to protect freedom of the seas and now it seemed he had little choice.

He had to ask Congress to declare war. Many Americans still wanted to stay out of ""Europe's war"" and there was much debate in Congress. Wilson closed his speech to Congress by saying "" it is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war... But the right is more precious then peace and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried in our hearts. ""

On April 6, 1917, by a vote of 82 to 6 in the Senate and 373 to 50 in the House of Representatives, the United States of America declared war on Germany. Wilson strongly believed that the American system would save the world, meaning:

1. American economic goods2. America's democratic political structure3. America's blend of morality and Christianity Wilson stated:"" When properly directed, there is no people in the world not fitted for self-government. "" Note the caveat, ""when properly directed."" Wilson saw the U. S. as the rightful and natural director.

He was determined to provide that direction in a framework where morality, democracy and economics were closely related. Wilson believed that other nations of the world had to look to the U. S. as an example , at the same time America was dependent on the rest of the world, mostly for economic markets.

The world market must act as the new frontier for the American system. Wilson was determined to direct the affairs of other nations so that they could eventually achieve self-government, as long as this government was based on the American model, and he was even more willing to intervene in other countries than Roosevel

t. For instance, he sent U. S. troops to Mexico to intervene in their civil war (1913-1917). When World War I broke out in Europe in 1914, Wilson tried to keep the U. S. neutral, but Germany repeatedly violated America's neutral status. When America finally entered the war in 1917 it was because, as Wilson stated,

The sinking of the Lusitania helped to turn American opinion against Germany, but it is certainly not the only reason for US involvement. It is far too remote. Most historians agree that it was not a single influence that provoked the US to declare war; rather, it was a confluence of many factors.

Why did the US enter World War 1?

"Answer by Vago1 Confidence votes 71There were several reasons, two of which were the most prominent at the time. Sinking of the Lusitania (unrestricted submarine warfare)The Zimmerman Telegram Economic Ties to European powers The Russian Revolution The most common answer, and possibly the right one, is the sinking of the British Passenger ship Lusitania, where a number of US citizens died.

In addition to the answer above: ""After submarines sank seven US merchant ships and the publication of the Zimmerman Telegram, Wilson called for war on Germany, which the US Congress declared on 6 April 1917.""

""The Zimmerman Telegram"" was a coded telegram dispatched by the foreign secretary of the German Empire, Arthur Zimmerman.

The telegram, which was forwarded to the German ambassador in Mexico, Heinrich von Eckardt, instructed him that if the United States appeared likely to enter the war he was to approach the Mexican government with a proposal for military alliance. He was to offer Mexico material aid in the reclamation of territory lost during the Mexican-American War, specifically the American states of Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.

Eckardt was also instructed to urge Mexico to help broker an alliance between Germany and Japan. The Zimmerman Telegram was intercepted and decoded by British cryptographers.

The revelation of its contents in the American press on March 1st caused public outrage that contributed to the United States' declaration of war against Germany and its allies on April 6. Not just the Lusitania The passenger ship referred to above, the RMS Lusitania, was sunk in May 1915, and the US went to war against Germany in April 1917. In other words, about 23 months passed between the two.

Unrestricted submarine warfare: the Germans sunk the Lusitania which was carrying innocent civilians (along with supplies and weapons for Great Britain)The Zimmerman note: an encoded telegram sent from Germany to Mexico.

The message said that Germany would aid Mexico in retaking the land lost to the united states if they became allies with Germany. The British intercepted the telegram translated it and handed it over to the united states government.

Fortunately the British intercepted the message and cracked the code in time to warn us. Economic issues: the US had invested over $2.6 billion in the war. If the allied powers lost, we weren't ever going to get that money back. Russian revolution: the Russians withdrew from the war because they were having a revolution in their own country.

They also signed a peace treaty with Germany. This prompted concerns about the progress of the war, and allowed the US to make it a ""war for democracy. ""1 Economic Reason By April 1917, the US had loaned more than $2 billion to the Allies. This gave the US a tremendous stake in the war; if the Allied Powers had lost, the US might never have recovered its loans from Britain and France.

- Anxious to reduce the flow of war materials to the Allies, Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare against ships, including US ships, carrying material to Britain and France.

- Attempting to divert the US from concern with the war in Europe, the German foreign minister sent the so-called Zimmerman Telegram, an offer to support Mexico in a war to regain territory lost to the US.

it was a telegram from Arthur Zimmermann to the German ambassador in Mexico. The declaration of war on Germany in 1917 was mostly influenced by German naval policy, although American economic interest and Woodrow Wilson's idealism did portray a part.

On February 1915, Germans created a submarine blockade in the British Empire's Ocean's, sinking several belligerent ships, which included the Lusitania. The United States then threatened the German Government causing them to back down. Later in February of 1917, Germany then declared unrestricted submarine warfare threatening the ideals of neutrality, commerce and security. The German U-Boats wanted to sink supply ships in order to starve the Britain islands of their goods.

The German's naval policy was the major reason why the United States declared war on Germany. The sinking of the Lusitania was the biggest influence of American in WWI. It was so much of an influence that it was said without the sinking of the Lusitania, the United States most likely would not of entered the war.

(5 points) Germany wanted to draw the United States into the war. The German commander mistook it for a warship. Germany practiced unrestricted submarine warfare. Germany had warned Americans not to travel on British ships.

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anonymous 5 years ago Which statement explains why a German submarine sank the Lusitania?

History Stacey Warren - Expert brainly.com Hey! We 've verified this expert answer for you, click below to unlock the details :)SOLVEDAt vero eos et accusamus et iusto odio dignissimos ducimus qui blanditiis praesentium voluptatum deleniti atque corrupti quos dolores et quas molestias excepturi sint occaecati cupiditate non provident, similique sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollitia animi, id est laborum et dolorum fuga.

Et harum quidem rerum facilis est et expedita distinctio. Nam libero tempore, cum soluta nobis est eligendi optio cumque nihil impedit quo minus id quod maxime placeat facere possimus, omnis voluptas assumenda est, omnis dolor repellendus.

Itaque earum rerum hic tenetur a sapiente delectus, ut aut reiciendis voluptatibus maiores alias consequatur aut perferendis doloribus asperiores repellat. UNLOCK FULL ANSWERjamiebookeater 5 years ago I got my questions answered at brainly.com in under 10 minutes.

Go to brainly.com now for free help!anonymous 5 years ago None of these is real good. The Germans thought (correctly, as it turned out) that the Lusitania was carrying war materials (weapons and ammunition) to England, and had previously declared that such ships would be sunk without warning, as part of the German attempt at embargoing war supplies from its enemies. WIth respect to your answer choices: (1) Germany certainly did not want to draw the United States into the war in Europe.

That would've been suicidal. (2) The German commander of the U-20, Walther Schwieger, was wel aware the Lusitania was not a warship, and had already sunk a number of commercial ships on that particular voyage. (3) This is a reasonable answer, as the Germans had announced in February of 1915 that ships entered in the waters around Great Britain might be sunk without warning.

Lusitania was sunk in May of 1915. (4) This is true, and in fact the German embassy specifically warned Americans not to travel on the Lusitania, but that isn't why the boat was sunk.anonymous 5 years ago The reason I say the third is a rasonable but not good answer is that it is true, but doesn't get at WHY the Lusitania was sunk.

The answer is to prevent weapons and ammunition from getting to England.anonymous 5 years ago Correct Answer: C. Germany practiced unrestricted submarine warfare.show full answer Looking for something else? Not the answer you are looking for? Search for more explanations.

The sinking of the Lusitania was not the single largest factor contributing to the entrance of the United States into the war two years later, but it certainly solidified the public's opinions towards Germany.

Sinking of the Lusitania

"May 7 1915

Sinking of the Lusitania On May 7, 1915, the German submarine (U-boat) U-20 torpedoed and sank the Lusitania, a swift-moving British cruise liner traveling from New York to Liverpool, England. Of the 1,959 men, women, and children on board, 1,195 perished, including 123 Americans. A headline in the New York Times the following day—""Divergent Views of the Sinking of The Lusitania""—sums up the initial public response to the disaster.

Some saw it as a blatant act of evil and transgression against the conventions of war. Others understood that Germany previously had unambiguously alerted all neutral passengers of Atlantic vessels to the potential for submarine attacks on British ships and that Germany considered the Lusitania a British, and therefore an ""enemy ship. ""

making the world better one answer at a time. Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war on Germany on April 2, 1917. Germany had resumed unrestricted submarine warfare and also tried to get Mexico to attack the United States and promised to return lost territory to them if they did. Wilson said he wanted to make the world ""safe for democracy.

When and why did Wilson ask Congress for a declaration of war against Germany?

"Answers.com ® Wiki Answers ® Categories History, Politics & Society History History of the United States When and why did Wilson ask Congress for a declaration of war against Germany? Flag When and why did Wilson ask Congress for a declaration of war against Germany? Answered by The Wiki Answers ®Community Answers.com ® is

""2 people found this useful Was this answer useful? Yes Somewhat No Who asked the congress to declare world war 1 on Germany? Woodrow Wilson Woodrow Wilson Richard Hall 10 Contributions When did congress declare war on Germany?

President Woodrow Wilson asked congress to declare war on Germany on April 2nd, 1917- WW1. Congress then declared war on April 6, 1917, with a 82-6 vote in Senate and 373-50 v …Wilson urged congress to declare war on Germany when the Germans?sank 5 united states ships Quincey Hamilton 15 Contributions What action by germany prompted president wilson to ask congress for a declaration of war?

Americans were hungry German U-boats had killed U. S citizens. Who was englands leader that asked to declare war against Germany in World War 2? Winston Churchill. Which action by Germany prompted president wilson to ask congress for a declaration of war? Due to unrestricted submarine warfare President Wilson askedcongress to declare war on Germany. Specifically the sinking of the Lusitania. Wilson urged congress to declare war on Germany when when the Germans? Wilson urged congress to declare war on Germany when the Germans?

J. P. Helm 124,843 Contributions Retired professor of math and computer science having taught for 36 years at a state supported university in Virginia Where did Wilson ask congress to declare war on Germany? Congress meets in the US capitol building in Washington, DC and that is where Wilson went to ask for a declaration of war. Struwwelpeter 963 Contributions Who was the first woman to sit in Congress and vote against a declaration of war against Germany?

Jeannette Rankin, Montana (R), during her first term in the House of Representatives (1917 - 1919)Swilcolette 40 Contributions What was The chief reason given by Woodrow Wilson for requesting a declaration of war against Germany?

The resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare by Germany. Taking the SAT test? Why did Madison ask Congress to declare war against England?he asked congress to declare war because he thought that what can it hurt David Warnick 1,964 Contributions Who declared the war against Germany? Great Brittan & France. Answered In World War 1What event finally caused President Wilson to ask for a declaration of war against Germany? The sinking of ships carrying Americans Answered In World War 1What was the final blow that led president Woodrow Wilson to ask congress to declare war against the central powers in world war 1?

When the Germans sunk many British ships that had Americans on them Darth Binky 1,774 Contributionswill do ""moose stuff"" for a ride.

Answered In World War 1What chain of events finally moved president Wilson to ask congress for a declaration of war against Germany? In May of 1915, German submarines sank the RMS Lusitania , an ocean liner (although it had previously been used as a warship, and was later found to have been carrying muniti …Answered In World War 1What events led Woodrow Wilson to ask Congress to declare war? The Zimmerman Letter Athena Laisy 27 Contributions Answered In Uncategorized What event finally caused president Wilson to ask for a declaration war against Germany? A sinking of ships carrying Americans "

The United States Senate, in a 74 to 0 vote, declared war on Austria-Hungary on December 7, 1917, citing Austria-Hungary's severing of diplomatic relations with the United States, its use of unrestricted submarine warfare and its alliance with Germany.

American entry into World War I

"From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedianavigation search President Woodrow Wilson before Congress, announcing the break in official relations with Germany on 3 February 1917The American entry into World War I came in April 1917, after more than two and a half years of efforts by President Woodrow Wilson to keep the United States out of the war.

Apart from an Anglophile element urging early support for the British, American public opinion reflected that of the president: the sentiment for neutrality was particularly strong among Irish Americans, German Americans and Scandinavian Americans, [1] as well as among church leaders and among women in general.

On the other hand, even before World War I had broken out, American opinion had been more negative toward Germany than towards any other country in Europe. [2] Over time, especially after reports of atrocities in Belgium in 1914 and following the sinking of the passenger liner RMS Lusitania in 1915, the American citizens increasingly came to see Germany as the aggressor in Europe.

As U. S. president, it was Wilson who made the key policy decisions over foreign affairs: while the country was at peace, the domestic economy ran on a laissez-faire basis, with American banks making huge loans to Britain and France — funds that were in large part used to buy munitions, raw materials, and food from across the Atlantic.

Until 1917, Wilson made minimal preparations for a land war and kept the United States Army on a small peacetime footing, despite increasing demands for enhanced preparedness.

He did however expand the United States Navy. In 1917, with Russia experiencing political upheaval following widespread disillusionment there over the war, and with Britain and France low on credit, Germany appeared to have the upper hand in Europe, [3] while Germany's ally, the Ottoman Empire, clung stubbornly to its possessions in the Middle East.

In the same year, Germany decided to resume unrestricted submarine warfare against any vessel approaching British waters; this attempt to starve Britain into surrender was balanced against the knowledge that it would almost certainly bring the United States into the war. Germany also made a secret offer to help Mexico regain territories lost in the Mexican–American War in an encoded telegram known as the Zimmermann Telegram, which was intercepted by British Intelligence.

Publication of that communique outraged Americans just as German U-boats started sinking American merchant ships in the North Atlantic. Wilson then asked Congress for ""a war to end all wars "" that would ""make the world safe for democracy"", and Congress voted to declare war on Germany on April 6, 1917.

[4]On December 7, 1917, the U. S. declared war on Austria-Hungary. [5] [6]U. S. troops began arriving on the Western Front in large numbers in 1918.

Contents [ hide ]1 Main issues1.1 Naval blockade1.1.1 The strategy behind the blockade1.2 Business considerations1.3 Views of the elites2 Public opinion2.1 Parties2.2 Workers, farmers, and African Americans2.3 South2.4 German Americans2.5 Christian churches and pacifists2.6 Jewish Americans2.7 Irish-Americans2.8 Pro-Allied immigrants2.9 Popular pacifism2.10 German agents3 Preparedness movement3.1 Size of military3.2 Navy4 Decision for war4.1 Decision making4.2 Zimmermann Telegram4.3 Sinking of American merchant ships5 Public opinion, moralism, and national interest6 Declaration of war6.1 Germany6.2 Austria-Hungary7 See also8 Footnotes9 Bibliography9.1 Historiography10 Primary sources11 External links Main issues [ edit]Further information: Diplomatic history of World War I and Presidency of Woodrow Wilson Naval blockade [ edit]Britain used its large navy to prevent cargo vessels entering German ports, mainly by intercepting them in the North Sea between the coasts of Scotland and Norway.

The wider sea approaches to Britain and France, their distance from German harbours and the smaller size of the German surface fleet all made it harder for Germany to reciprocate. Instead, Germany used submarines to lie in wait for, and then sink, merchant ships heading for enemy ports.

The United States insisted on maintaining the traditional rights of ships registered in neutral countries and protested strongly against American ships being intercepted or sunk: the British seized American ships for supposed violations, while the Germans sank them — often without warning, in violation of international law that said sailors must be allowed an opportunity to reach their lifeboats.

After several violations, Germany stopped this practice but in early 1917 she decided to resume unrestricted submarine warfare, in the hope that this would starve out the British before the Americans could make any effective military retaliation. The strategy behind the blockade [ edit]The British Royal Navy successfully stopped the shipment of most war supplies and food to Germany.

Neutral American ships that tried to trade with Germany were seized or turned back by the Royal Navy who viewed such trade as in direct conflict with the Allies' war efforts. The strangulation came about very slowly, because Germany and its allies controlled extensive farmlands and raw materials.

It was eventually successful because Germany and Austria-Hungary had decimated their agricultural production by taking so many farmers into their armies. By 1918, German cities were on the verge of starvation; the front-line soldiers were on short rations and were running out of essential supplies.

[7]Germany also considered a blockade. ""England wants to starve us"", said Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz, the man who built the German fleet and who remained a key advisor to the Kaiser Wilhelm II.

""We can play the same game. We can bottle her up and destroy every ship that endeavors to break the blockade"". [8] Unable to challenge the more powerful Royal Navy on the surface, Tirpitz wanted to scare off merchant and passenger ships en route to Britain.

He reasoned that since the island of Britain depended on imports of food, raw materials, and manufactured goods, scaring off a substantial number of the ships would effectively undercut its long-term ability to maintain an army on the Western Front.

While Germany had only nine long-range U-boats at the start of the war, it had ample shipyard capacity to build the hundreds needed. However, the United States demanded that Germany respect the international agreements upon "" freedom of the seas "", which protected neutral American ships on the high seas from seizure or sinking by either belligerent.

Furthermore, Americans insisted that the drowning of innocent civilians was barbaric and grounds for a declaration of war. The British frequently violated America's neutral rights by seizing ships. [9] Wilson's top advisor, Colonel Edward M. House commented that, ""The British have gone as far as they possibly could in violating neutral rights, though they have done it in the most courteous way"".

[10] When Wilson protested British violations of American neutrality, the British backed down. German submarines torpedoed ships without warning, causing sailors and passengers to drown. Berlin explained that submarines were so vulnerable that they dared not surface near merchant ships that might be carrying guns and which were too small to rescue submarine crews.

Britain armed most of its merchant ships with medium calibre guns that could sink a submarine, making above-water attacks too risky. In February 1915, the United States warned Germany about misuse of submarines. On April 22, the German Imperial Embassy warned U. S. citizens against boarding vessels to Britain, which would have to face German attack.

On May 7, Germany torpedoed the British passenger liner RMS Lusitania, sinking her. This act of aggression caused the loss of 1,198 civilian lives, including 128 Americans. The sinking of a large, unarmed passenger ship, combined with the previous stories of atrocities in Belgium, shocked Americans and turned public opinion hostile to Germany, although not yet to the point of war.

Wilson issued a warning to Germany that it would face ""strict accountability"" if it sank more neutral U. S. passenger ships. [11] Berlin acquiesced, ordering its submarines to avoid passenger ships. By January 1917, however, Field Marshal Paul von Hindenburg and General Erich Ludendorff decided that an unrestricted submarine blockade was the only way to achieve a decisive victory.

They demanded that Kaiser Wilhelm order unrestricted submarine warfare be resumed. Germany knew this decision meant war with the United States, but they gambled that they could win before America's potential strength could be mobilized.

[12] However, they overestimated how many ships they could sink and thus the extent Britain would be weakened.

Finally, they did not foresee that convoys could and would be used to defeat their efforts. They believed that the United States was so weak militarily that it could not be a factor on the Western Front for more than a year. The civilian government in Berlin objected, but the Kaiser sided with his military. [13]Business considerations [ edit]The beginning of war in Europe coincided with the end of the Recession of 1913–1914 in America.

Exports to belligerent nations rose rapidly over the first four years of the War from $824.8 million in 1913 to $2.25 billion in 1917. [14] Loans from American financial institutions to the Allied nations in Europe also increased dramatically over the same period.

[15] Economic activity towards the end of this period boomed as government resources aided the production of the private sector. Between 1914 and 1917, industrial production increased 32% and GNP increased by almost 20%. [16] The improvements to industrial production in the United States outlasted the war.

The capital build-up that had allowed American companies to supply belligerents and the American army resulted in a greater long-run rate of production even after the war had ended in 1918. [17]In 1913, J. P. Morgan, Jr. took over the House of Morgan, an American-based investment bank consisting of separate banking operations in New York, London, and Paris, after the death of his father, J. Pierpont Morgan. [15] The House of Morgan offered assistance in the wartime financing of Britain and France from the earliest stages of the war in 1914 through America's entrance in 1917.

J. P. Morgan & Co., the House of Morgan's bank in New York, was designated as the primary financial agent to the British government in 1914 after successful lobbying by the British ambassador, Sir Cecil Spring Rice.

[15] The same bank would later take a similar role in France and would offer extensive financial assistance to both warring nations. J. P. Morgan &Co. became the primary issuer of loans to the French government by raising money from American investors.

[15] Morgan, Harjes, the House of Morgan's French affiliated bank, controlled the majority of the wartime financial dealings between the House of Morgan and the French government after primary issuances of debt in American markets. [15] Relations between the House of Morgan and the French government became tense as the war raged on with no end in sight.

[15] France's ability to borrow from other sources diminished, leading to greater lending rates and a depressing of the value of the franc. After the war, in 1918, J. P. Morgan & Co. continued to aid the French government financially through monetary stabilization and debt relief.

[15]Because America was still a declared neutral state, the financial dealings of American banks in Europe caused a great deal of contention between Wall Street and the U. S. government. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan strictly opposed financial support of warring nations and wanted to ban loans to the belligerents in August 1914.

[15] He told President Wilson that ""refusal to loan to any belligerent would naturally tend to hasten a conclusion of the war."" Wilson at first agreed, but then reversed himself when France argued that if it was legal to buy American goods then it was legal to take out credits on the purchase. [18]J. P. Morgan issued loans to France including one in March 1915 and, following negotiations with the Anglo-French Financial Commission, another joint loan to Britain and France in October 1915, the latter amounting to US$500,000,000.

[15] Although the stance of the U. S. government was that stopping such financial assistance could hasten the end of the war and therefore save lives, little was done to insure adherence to the ban on loans, in part due to pressure from Allied governments and American business interests.

[15]The American steel industry had faced difficulties and declining profits during the Recession of 1913–1914. [19] As war began in Europe, however, the increased demand for tools of war began a period of heightened productivity that alleviated many U. S. industrial companies from the low-growth environment of the recession.

Bethlehem Steel took particular advantage of the increased demand for armaments abroad. Prior to American entrance into the War, these companies benefitted from unrestricted commerce with sovereign customers abroad. After President Wilson issued his declaration of war, the companies were subjected to price controls created by the U. S. Trade Commission in order to insure that the U. S. military would have access to the necessary armaments.

[19]By the end of the war in 1918, Bethlehem Steel had produced 65,000 pounds of forged military products and 70 million pounds of armor plate, 1.1 billion pounds of steel for shells, and 20.1 million rounds of artillery ammunition for Britain and France.

[20] Bethlehem Steel took advantage of the domestic armaments market and produced 60% of the American weaponry and 40% of the artillery shells used in the War.

[20] Even with price controls and a lower profit margin on manufactured goods, the profits resulting from wartime sales expanded the company into the third largest manufacturing company in the country. Bethlehem Steel became the primary arms supplier for the United States and other allied powers again in 1939. [20]Views of the elites [ edit]Historians divide the views of American political and social leaders into four distinct groupings—the camps were mostly informal: The first of these were the Non-Interventionists, a loosely affiliated and politically diverse anti-war movement which sought to keep the United States out of the war altogether.

Members of this group tended to view the war as a clash between British imperialism and German militarism, both of which they regarded as equally corrupt.

Others were pacifists, who objected on moral grounds. Prominent leaders included Democrats like former Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan, industrialist Henry Ford and publisher William Randolph Hearst; Republicans Robert M. La Follette, Senator from Wisconsin and George W. Norris, Senator from Nebraska; and Progressive Party activist Jane Addams.

At the far-left end of the political spectrum the Socialists, led by their perennial candidate for President Eugene V. Debs and movement veterans like Victor L. Berger and Morris Hillquit, were staunch anti-militarists and opposed to any US intervention, branding the conflict as a ""capitalist war"" that American workers should avoid. However, after the US did join the war in April, 1917 a schism developed between the anti-war Party majority and a pro-war faction of Socialist writers, journalists and intellectuals led by John Spargo, William English Walling and E. Haldeman-Julius.

This group founded the rival Social Democratic League of America to promote the war effort among their fellow Socialists. [21]Next were the more moderate Liberal-Internationalists. This bipartisan group reluctantly supported a declaration of war against Germany with the postwar goal of establishing collective international security institutions designed to peacefully resolve future conflicts between nations and to promote liberal democratic values more broadly.

This groups's views were advocated by interest groups such as the League to Enforce Peace. Adherents included US President Woodrow Wilson, his influential advisor Edward M. House, former President William Howard Taft, famed inventor Alexander Graham Bell, Wall Street financier Bernard Baruch and Harvard University President Abbott Lawrence Lowell.

[19]Finally, there were the so-called Atlanticists. Ardently pro- Entente, they had strongly championed American intervention in the war since 1915. Their primary political motivation was to both prepare the US for war with Germany and to forge an enduring military alliance with Great Britain.

This group actively supported the Preparedness Movement and was strong among the Anglophile political establishment of the northeast, boasting such luminaries as former President Theodore Roosevelt, Major General Leonard Wood, prominent attorney and diplomat Joseph Hodges Choate, former Secretary of War Henry Stimson, journalist Walter Lippman and Senators Henry Cabot Lodge, Sr. of Massachusetts and Elihu Root of New York.

[22]Public opinion [ edit]A cosmopolitan group of upper and upper-middle class businessmen based in the largest cities took the lead in promoting military preparedness and in defining how far America could be pushed around before it would fight back.

Many public figures hated war—Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan was the most prominent, and he resigned when he thought Wilson had become too bellicose. [23] Grassroots opposition to American entry came especially from German and Irish elements. [24] [25]Parties [ edit]A surprising factor in the development of American public opinion was how little the political parties became involved. Wilson and the Democrats in 1916 campaigned on the slogan ""He kept us out of war! "", saying a Republican victory would mean war with both Mexico and Germany. His position probably was critical in winning the Western states. [26] Charles Evans Hughes, the GOP candidate, insisted on downplaying the war issue.

[27]The Socialist party talked peace. Socialist rhetoric declared the European conflict to be ""an imperialist war"". It won 2% of the 1916 vote for Eugene V. Debs, blamed the war on capitalism and pledged total opposition.

""A bayonet"", its propaganda said, ""was a weapon with a worker at each end"". [28] When war began, however, about half the Socialists, typified by Congressman Meyer London, supported the decision and sided with the pro-Allied efforts. The rest, led by Debs, remained ideological and die-hard opponents. [29] Many socialists came under investigation from the Espionage Act of 1917 and many suspected of treason were arrested, including Debs.

This would only increase the Socialist's anti-war groups in resentment toward the American government. [30]Workers, farmers, and African Americans [ edit]The working class was relatively quiet, and tended to divide along ethnic lines.

At the beginning of the war, neither working men nor farmers took a large interest in the debates on war preparation. [31] [32] [33] Samuel Gompers, head of the AFL labor movement, denounced the war in 1914 as ""unnatural, unjustified, and unholy"", but by 1916 he was supporting Wilson's limited preparedness program, against the objections of Socialist union activists.

In 1916 the labor unions supported Wilson on domestic issues and ignored the war question. [34]The war at first disrupted the cotton market; Britain blockaded shipments to Germany, and prices fell from 11 cents a pound to only 4 cents. By 1916, however, the British decided to bolster the price to 10 cents to avoid losing Southern support. The cotton growers seem to have moved from neutrality to intervention at about the same pace as the rest of the nation.

[35] [36] Midwestern farmers generally opposed the war, especially those of German and Scandinavian descent. The Midwest became the stronghold of isolationism; other remote rural areas also saw no need for war. [37]The African-American community did not take a strong position one way or the other. A month after congress declared war, W. E. B.

Du Bois called on African-Americans to ""fight shoulder to shoulder with the world to gain a world where war shall be no more"". [38] Once war began and black men were drafted, they worked to achieve equality. [39] Many had hoped the community's help in the war efforts abroad would earn civil rights at home.

When such civil liberties were still not granted, many African-Americans grew tired of waiting for recognition of their rights as American citizens.

[40]South [ edit]There was a strong antiwar element in the white South and border states. In rural Missouri for example, distrust of powerful Eastern influences focused on the risk that Wall Street would lead America into war. [41] Across the South poor white farmers warned each other that ""a rich man's war meant a poor man's fight,"" and they wanted nothing of it.

[42] Congressman James Hay, Democrat of Virginia was the powerful chairman of the House Committee on Military Affairs.

He repeatedly blocked prewar efforts to modernize and enlarge the army. Preparedness was not needed because Americans were already safe, he insisted in January 1915: Isolated as we are, safe in our vastness, protected by a great navy, and possessed of an army sufficient for any emergency that may arise, we may disregard the lamentations and predictions of the militarists. [43]German Americans [ edit]German Americans by this time usually had only weak ties to Germany; however, they were fearful of negative treatment they might receive if the United States entered the war (such mistreatment was already happening to German-descent citizens in Canada and Australia).

Almost none called for intervening on Germany's side, instead calling for neutrality and speaking of the superiority of German culture. As more nations were drawn into the conflict, however, the English-languages press increasingly supporting Britain, while the German-American media called for neutrality while also defending Germany's position.

Chicago's Germans worked to secure a complete embargo on all arms shipments to Europe. In 1916, large crowds in Chicago's Germania celebrated the Kaiser's birthday, something they had not done before the war. [44] German Americans in early 1917 still called for neutrality, but proclaimed that if a war came they would be loyal to the United States.

By this point, they had been excluded almost entirely from national discourse on the subject. [45] Once war started, they were harassed in so many ways that historian Carl Wittke noted in 1936, it was ""one of the most difficult and humiliating experiences suffered by an ethnic group in American history.""

[46] German-American Socialists in Milwaukee, Wisconsin actively campaigned against entry into the war. [47]Christian churches and pacifists [ edit]Come on in, America, the Blood's Fine! (1917) by M. A. Kempf.

Leaders of most religious groups (except the Episcopalians) tended to pacifism, as did leaders of the woman's movement. The Methodists and Quakers among others were vocal opponents of the war. [48] President Wilson, who was a devout Presbyterian, would often frame the war in terms of good and evil in an appeal for religious support of the war. [49]A concerted effort was made by pacifists including Jane Addams, Oswald Garrison Villard, David Starr Jordan, Henry Ford, Lillian Wald, and Carrie Chapman Catt.

Their goal was to encourage Wilson's efforts to mediate an end of the war by bringing the belligerents to the conference table. [50] Finally in 1917 Wilson convinced some of them that to be truly anti-war they needed to support what he promised would be ""a war to end all wars"". [51]Once war was declared, the more liberal denominations, which had endorsed the Social Gospel, called for a war for righteousness that would help uplift all mankind.

The theme—an aspect of American exceptionalism —was that God had chosen America as his tool to bring redemption to the world. [52]American Catholic bishops maintained a general silence toward the issue of intervention. Millions of Catholics lived in both warring camps, and Catholic Americans tended to split on ethnic lines in their opinions toward American involvement in the war.

At the time, heavily Catholic towns and cities in the East and Midwest often contained multiple parishes, each serving a single ethnic group, such as Irish, German, Italian, Polish, or English. American Catholics of Irish and German descent opposed intervention most strongly. Pope Benedict XV made several attempts to negotiate a peace.

All of his efforts were rebuffed by both the Allies and the Germans, and throughout the war the Vatican maintained a policy of strict neutrality. Jewish Americans [ edit]Jewish American sympathies likewise broke along ethnic lines, with recently arrived Yiddish speaking Jews inclined to Zionism, and the established German-American Jewish community largely opposed to it. In 1914–1916, there were few Jewish forces in favor of American entry into the war. Many regarded Britain as hostile to Jewish interests.

New York City, with its well-organized element numbering 1.5 million Jews, was the center of antiwar activism. [53] [54]The different Jewish communities worked together during the war years to provide relief to Jewish communities in Eastern Europe.

[55] [56]Of greatest concern to Jews was the tsarist regime in Russia because it was notorious for tolerating pogroms and following anti-Semitic policies. As historian Joseph Rappaport reported through his study of Yiddish press during the war, ""The pro-Germanism of America's immigrant Jews was an inevitable consequence of their Russophobia"".

[57] The fall of the tsarist regime in March 1917 removed a major obstacle for many Jews who refused to support tsarism. [58] The draft went smoothly in New York City, and left-wing opposition to the war largely collapsed when Zionists saw the possibility of using the war to demand a state of Israel. [59]Irish-Americans [ edit]The most effective domestic opponents of the war were Irish-American Catholics. They had little interest in the continent, but were neutral about helping the United Kingdom because it had recently enacted the Government of Ireland Act 1914, allowing Irish Home Rule.

However, the Act was suspended until the war ended. John Redmond and the Irish Parliamentary Party (IPP) declared that Irish Volunteers should support America's pro-Allied war efforts first; his political opponents argued that it was not the time to support Britain in its attempt to ""strengthen and expand her empire"".

[60] The attacks on the IPP and pro-Allied press showed a firm belief that a German victory would hasten the achievement of Irish independence. Yet rather than proposing intervention on behalf of the Germans, Irish American leaders and organizations focused on demanding American neutrality.

But the increased contact between militant Irish nationalists and German agents in the United States only fueled concerns of where the primary loyalties of Irish Americans lay.

[61] Nevertheless, close to 1,000 Irish-born Americans died fighting with the U. S. armed forces in WWI. [62]The Easter Rising in Dublin in April 1916 was crushed within a week and its leaders executed by firing squad. The mainstream American press treated the uprising as foolish and misguided, and theorized it was largely inspired by the Germans.

Overall public opinion remained faithfully pro-British. [63]Irish-Americans dominated the Democratic party in many large cities so Wilson had to take account of their views. They did not prevent him from being hostile to Germany, but they did force him to keep his distance from Britain. Indeed, Irish-American pressure influenced the United States into not accepting Britain's war aims as its own and define its own objectives, primarily self-determination.

The Irish-American community thought they had Wilson's promise to promote Irish independence in exchange for their support of his war policies, but after the war they were bitterly disappointed by his refusal to support them in 1919.

[64] Wilson saw the Irish situation purely as an internal UK matter and did not perceive the dispute and the unrest in Ireland as comparable to the plight of the various nationalities in Europe as a fall-out from World War I. [65] The progress of the Irish Race Conventions give a flavour of the differing and changing opinions during the war.

Pro-Allied immigrants [ edit]Some British immigrants worked actively for intervention. London-born Samuel Insull, Chicago's leading industrialist, for example, enthusiastically provided money, propaganda, and means for volunteers to enter the British or Canadian armies. After the United States' entry, Insull directed the Illinois State Council of Defense, with responsibility for organizing the state's mobilization.

[66]Immigrants from eastern Europe usually cared more about politics in their homeland than politics in the United States. Spokesmen for Slavic immigrants hoped that an Allied victory would bring independence for their homelands. [67] Large numbers of Hungarian immigrants who were liberal and nationalist in sentiment, and sought an independent Hungary, separate from the Austro-Hungarian Empire lobbied in favor of the war and allied themselves with the Atlanticist or Anglophile portion of the population.

This community was largely pro-British and anti-German in sentiment. [68] [69] [70] Albanian-Americans in communities such as Boston also campaigned for entry into the war and were overwhelmingly pro-British and anti-German, as well as hopeful the war would lead to an independent Albania which would be free from the Ottoman Empire.

[71] Polish, Slovak, and Czech immigrants were enthusiastically pro-war and generally pro-British. Popular pacifism [ edit]The song "" I Didn't Raise My Boy To Be A Soldier "" was a hit in 1915, selling 650,000 copies. Its expression of popular pacifist sentiment ""helped make the pacifist movement a hard, quantifiable political reality to be reckoned with.""

[72]Henry Ford supported the pacifist cause by sponsoring a large-scale private peace mission, with numerous activists and intellectuals aboard the "" Peace Ship ' (the ocean liner Oscar II). Ford chartered the ship in 1915 and invited prominent peace activists to join him to meet with leaders on both sides in Europe.

He hoped to create enough publicity to prompt the belligerent nations to convene a peace conference and mediate an end to the war.

The mission was widely mocked by the press, which wrote about the ""Ship of Fools."" Infighting between the activists, mockery by the press contingent aboard, and an outbreak of influenza marred the voyage. Four days after the ship arrived in neutral Norway, a beleaguered and physically ill Ford abandoned the mission and returned to the United States; he had demonstrated that independent small efforts accomplished nothing. [73]German agents [ edit]On July 24, 1915, the German embassy's commercial attaché, Heinrich Albert, left his briefcase on a train in New York City, where an alert Secret Service agent, Frank Burke, snatched it up.

[74] Wilson let the newspapers publish the contents, which indicated a systematic effort by Berlin to subsidize friendly newspapers and block British purchases of war materials. Berlin's top espionage agent, debonnaire Franz Rintelen von Kleist was spending millions to finance sabotage in Canada, stir up trouble between the United States and Mexico and to incite labor strikes.

The British were engaged in propaganda too, though not illegal espionage. But they did not get caught. [75] Germany took the blame as Americans grew ever more worried about the vulnerability of a free society to subversion.

Indeed, one of the main fears Americans of all stations had in 1916–1919 was that spies and saboteurs were everywhere. This sentiment played a major role in arousing fear of Germany, and suspicions regarding everyone of German descent who could not ""prove"" 100% loyalty. [76]Preparedness movement [ edit]This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources.

Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (September 2017) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Main article: Preparedness Movement By 1915, Americans were paying much more attention to the war.

The sinking of the Lusitania had a strong effect on public opinion because of the deaths of American civilians. That year, a strong ""Preparedness"" movement emerged. [77] Proponents argued that the United States needed to immediately build up strong naval and land forces for defensive purposes; an unspoken assumption was that America would fight sooner or later.

General Leonard Wood (still on active duty after serving a term as Chief of Staff of the Army), former president Theodore Roosevelt, and former secretaries of war Elihu Root and Henry Stimson were the driving forces behind Preparedness, along with many of the nation's most prominent bankers, industrialists, lawyers and scions of prominent families.

Indeed, there emerged an ""Atlanticist"" foreign policy establishment, a group of influential Americans drawn primarily from upper-class lawyers, bankers, academics, and politicians of the Northeast, committed to a strand of Anglophile internationalism.

Representative was Paul D. Cravath, one of New York's foremost corporation lawyers. For Cravath, in his mid-fifties when the war began, the conflict served as an epiphany, sparking an interest in international affairs that dominated his remaining career. Fiercely Anglophile, he strongly supported American intervention in the war and hoped that close Anglo-American cooperation would be the guiding principle of postwar international organization.

[78]The advertisement of The Battle Cry of Peace film The Preparedness movement had a ""realistic"" philosophy of world affairs—they believed that economic strength and military muscle were more decisive than idealistic crusades focused on causes like democracy and national self-determination.

Emphasizing over and over the weak state of national defenses, they showed that America's 100,000-man Army even augmented by the 112,000 National Guardsmen, was outnumbered 20 to one by Germany's army, which was drawn from a smaller population. Similarly in 1915, the armed forces of Great Britain and the British empire (the world's most powerful military and economic power at the time [79] ), France, Russia, the Austro-Hungarian empire, Ottoman empire, Italy, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Belgium, Japan and Greece were all larger and more experienced than the United States military, in many cases significantly so.

[80]Reform to them meant UMT or ""universal military training"". They proposed a national service program under which the 600,000 men who turned 18 every year would be required to spend six months in military training, and afterwards be assigned to reserve units. The small regular army would primarily be a training agency. Antimilitarists complained the plan would make America resemble Germany (which required two years' active duty).

Advocates retorted that military ""service"" was an essential duty of citizenship, and that without the commonality provided by such service the nation would splinter into antagonistic ethnic groups. One spokesman promised that UMT would become ""a real melting pot, under which the fire is hot enough to fuse the elements into one common mass of Americanism"".

Furthermore, they promised, the discipline and training would make for a better paid work force. Hostility to military service was strong at the time, and the program failed to win approval. In World War II, when Stimson as Secretary of War proposed a similar program of universal peacetime service, he was defeated.

[81]Underscoring its commitment, the Preparedness movement set up and funded its own summer training camps at Plattsburgh, New York, and other sites, where 40,000 college alumni became physically fit, learned to march and shoot, and ultimately provided the cadre of a wartime officer corps. [82] Suggestions by labor unions that talented working-class youth be invited to Plattsburgh were ignored. The Preparedness movement was distant not only from the working classes but also from the middle-class leadership of most of small-town America.

It had had little use for the National Guard, which it saw as politicized, localistic, poorly armed, ill trained, too inclined to idealistic crusading (as against Spain in 1898 ), and too lacking in understanding of world affairs. The National Guard on the other hand was securely rooted in state and local politics, with representation from a very broad cross section of American society.

The Guard was one of the nation's few institutions that (in some northern states) accepted blacks on an equal footing. The Democratic party saw the Preparedness movement as a threat. Roosevelt, Root and Wood were prospective Republican presidential candidates.

More subtly, the Democrats were rooted in localism that appreciated the National Guard, and the voters were hostile to the rich and powerful in the first place. Working with the Democrats who controlled Congress, Wilson was able to sidetrack the Preparedness forces.

Army and Navy leaders were forced to testify before Congress to the effect that the nation's military was in excellent shape. In fact, neither the Army nor Navy was in shape for war. The Navy had fine ships but Wilson had been using them to threaten Mexico, and the fleet's readiness had suffered.

The crews of the Texas and the New York, the two newest and largest battleships, had never fired a gun, and the morale of the sailors was low. In addition, it was outnumbered and outgunned by the British, German, French, and Italian navies. The Army and Navy air forces were tiny in size. Despite the flood of new weapons systems unveiled by the British, Germans, French, Austro-Hungarians, Italians, and others in the war in Europe, the Army was paying scant attention. For example, it was making no studies of trench warfare, poison gas, heavy artillery, or tanks and was utterly unfamiliar with the rapid evolution of Aerial warfare.

The Democrats in Congress tried to cut the military budget in 1915. The Preparedness movement effectively exploited the surge of outrage over the Lusitania in May 1915, forcing the Democrats to promise some improvements to the military and naval forces. Wilson, less fearful of the Navy, embraced a long-term building program designed to make the fleet the equal of the British Royal Navy by the mid-1920s, although this would not be achieved until World War II.

""Realism"" was at work here; the admirals were Mahanians and they therefore wanted a surface fleet of heavy battleships second to none—that is, equal to Britain. The facts of submarine warfare (which necessitated destroyers, not battleships) and the possibilities of imminent war with Germany (or with Britain, for that matter), were simply ignored.

Wilson's program for the Army touched off a firestorm. [83] Secretary of War Lindley Garrison adopted many of the proposals of the Preparedness leaders, especially their emphasis on a large federal reserve and abandonment of the National Guard. Garrison's proposals not only outraged the localistic politicians of both parties, they also offended a strongly held belief shared by the liberal wing of the Progressive movement.

They felt that warfare always had a hidden economic motivation. Specifically, they warned the chief warmongers were New York bankers (like J. P. Morgan) with millions at risk, profiteering munition makers (like Bethlehem Steel, which made armor, and Du Pont, which made powder) and unspecified industrialists searching for global markets to control. Antiwar critics blasted them. These special interests were too powerful, especially, Senator La Follette noted, in the conservative wing of the Republican Party.

The only road to peace was disarmament, reiterated Bryan. Garrison's plan unleashed the fiercest battle in peacetime history over the relationship of military planning to national goals. In peacetime, War Department arsenals and Navy yards manufactured nearly all munitions that lacked civilian uses, including warships, artillery, naval guns, and shells.

Items available on the civilian market, such as food, horses, saddles, wagons, and uniforms were always purchased from civilian contractors. Armor plate (and after 1918, airplanes) was an exception that has caused unremitting controversy for a century.

After World War II, the arsenals and Navy yards were much less important than giant civilian aircraft and electronics firms, which became the second half of the "" military-industrial complex "" Peace leaders like Jane Addams of Hull House and David Starr Jordan of Stanford redoubled their efforts, and now turned their voices against the president because he was ""sowing the seeds of militarism, raising up a military and naval caste"".

Many ministers, professors, farm spokesmen, and labor union leaders joined in, with powerful support from a band of four dozen southern Democrats in Congress who took control of the House Military Affairs Committee. Wilson, in deep trouble, took his cause to the people in a major speaking tour in early 1916, a warmup for his reelection campaign that fall.

Wilson seems to have won over the middle classes, but had little impact on the largely ethnic working classes and the deeply isolationist farmers. Congress still refused to budge, so Wilson replaced Garrison as Secretary of War with Newton Baker, the Democratic mayor of Cleveland and an outspoken opponent of preparedness (Garrison kept quiet, but felt Wilson was ""a man of high ideals but no principles"").

The upshot was a compromise passed in May 1916, as the war raged on and Berlin was debating whether America was so weak it could be ignored. The Army was to double in size to 11,300 officers and 208,000 men, with no reserve, and a National Guard that would be enlarged in five years to 440,000 men.

Summer camps on the Plattsburg model were authorized for new officers, and the government was given $20 million to build a nitrate plant of its own.

Preparedness supporters were downcast, the antiwar people were jubilant. America would now be too weak to go to war. Colonel Robert L. Bullard privately complained that ""Both sides [Britain and Germany] treat us with scorn and contempt; our fool, smug conceit of superiority has been exploded in our faces and deservedly."" The House gutted the naval plans as well, defeating a ""big navy"" plan by 189 to 183, and scuttling the battleships.

The battle of Jutland (May 31/June 1, 1916) was used by the navalists to argue for the primacy of seapower; they then took control in the Senate, broke the House coalition, and authorized a rapid three-year buildup of all classes of warships. A new weapons system, naval aviation, received $3.5 million, and the government was authorized to build its own armor plate factory. The very weakness of American military power encouraged Berlin to start its unrestricted submarine attacks in 1917.

It knew this meant war with America, but it could discount the immediate risk because the U. S. Army was negligible and the new warships would not be at sea until 1919 by which time the war would be over, with Germany victorious.

The notion that armaments led to war was turned on its head: refusal to arm in 1916 led to war in 1917. Size of military [ edit]Americans felt an increasing need for a military that could command respect. As one editor put it, ""The best thing about a large army and a strong navy is that they make it so much easier to say just what we want to say in our diplomatic correspondence.""

Berlin thus far had backed down and apologized when Washington was angry, thus boosting American self-confidence.

America's rights and America's honor increasingly came into focus. The slogan ""Peace"" gave way to ""Peace with Honor"". The Army remained unpopular, however. A recruiter in Indianapolis noted that, ""The people here do not take the right attitude towards army life as a career, and if a man joins from here he often tries to go out on the quiet"".

The Preparedness movement used its easy access to the mass media to demonstrate that the War Department had no plans, no equipment, little training, no reserve, a laughable National Guard, and a wholly inadequate organization for war. Motion pictures like The Battle Cry of Peace (1915) depicted invasions of the American homeland that demanded action. [84]Navy [ edit]Main article: History of the United States Navy § Preparing for war 1914–1917The readiness and capability of the U. S. Navy was a matter of controversy.

The press at the time reported that the only thing the military was ready for was an enemy fleet attempting to seize New York harbor—at a time when the German battle fleet was penned up by the Royal Navy. The Navy Secretary Josephus Daniels was a journalist with pacifist leanings. [85] He had built up the educational resources of the Navy and made its Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island an essential experience for would-be admirals.

However, he alienated the officer corps with his moralistic reforms, including no wine in the officers' mess, no hazing at the Naval Academy, and more chaplains and YMCAs. Daniels, as a newspaperman, knew the value of publicity. In 1915 he set up the Naval Consulting Board headed by Thomas Edison to obtain the advice and expertise of leading scientists, engineers, and industrialists.

It popularized technology, naval expansion, and military preparedness, and was well covered in the media.

[86] But according to Coletta he ignored the nation's strategic needs, and disdaining the advice of its experts, Daniels suspended meetings of the Joint Army and Navy Board for two years because it was giving unwelcome advice, chopped in half the General Board's recommendations for new ships, reduced the authority of officers in the Navy yards where ships were built and repaired, and ignored the administrative chaos in his department.

Bradley Fiske, one of the most innovative admirals in American naval history, in 1914 was Daniels' top aide; he recommended a reorganization that would prepare for war, but Daniels refused. Instead he replaced Fiske in 1915 and brought in for the new post of Chief of Naval Operations an unknown captain, William Benson.

Chosen for his compliance, Benson proved a wily bureaucrat who was more interested in preparing for an eventual showdown with Britain than an immediate one with Germany. Benson told Sims he ""would as soon fight the British as the Germans"". Proposals to send observers to Europe were blocked, leaving the Navy in the dark about the success of the German submarine campaign.

Admiral William Sims charged after the war that in April 1917, only ten percent of the Navy's warships were fully manned; the rest lacked 43% of their seamen.

Light antisubmarine ships were few in number, as if Daniels had been unaware of the German submarine menace that had been the focus of foreign policy for two years. The Navy's only warfighting plan, the ""Black Plan"" assumed the Royal Navy did not exist and that German battleships were moving freely about the Atlantic and the Caribbean and threatening the Panama Canal. Daniels' tenure would have been even less successful save for the energetic efforts of Assistant Secretary Franklin D. Roosevelt, who effectively ran the Department.

[85] His most recent biographer concludes that, ""it is true that Daniels had not prepared the navy for the war it would have to fight.""

[87]Decision for war [ edit]""Hurting Their Feelings"": Political cartoon from November 9, 1915, shows the British lion and John Bull reading a newspaper about American war protests and crying, while American ships and cargo appear in the harbor behind them By 1916 a new factor was emerging—a sense of national self-interest and American nationalism. The unbelievable casualty figures in Europe were sobering—two vast battles caused over one million casualties each. Clearly this war would be a decisive episode in the history of the world. Every American effort to find a peaceful solution was frustrated.

Decision making [ edit]Kendrick Clements claims bureaucratic decision-making was one of the main sources pushing the United States to declaring war on Germany and aligning itself with the Allies. He cites the State Department's demand that Germany's submarines obey outdated, 18th century sailing laws as one of the first missteps by the United States bureaucracy regarding the war.

By doing so, the United States had essentially given Germany the choice of whether or not the U. S. would enter the war.

Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan spent most of the fall of 1914 out of contact with the State Department, leaving the more conservative Robert Lansing with the ability to shape American foreign policy at the time. One of these decisions was made in response to British protests that the Germans were using U. S. radio towers to send messages to their warships. Immediately prior to the war starting in 1914, Britain had cut all cable communications leading out of Germany, including the trans-Atlantic cable.

The US Government permitted German embassies to use the US cable lines for ""proper"" diplomatic business. Germany argued that usage of the towers was necessary to allow efficient contact between the U. S. and Germany.

Lansing responded by requiring both sides to give the U. S. Navy copies of the messages they sent over the towers. The French and British were still able to use the cables, forcing Germany to be the only belligerent required to provide the U. S. with their messages. This and other seemingly small decisions made by Lansing during this time would eventually stack up, shifting American support towards the Allies.

[88]Zimmermann Telegram [ edit]Main article: Zimmermann Telegram Once Germany had decided on unrestricted submarine warfare in January 1917, and knowing it would be attacking all American ships in the North Atlantic, it tried to line up new allies, especially Mexico.

Arthur Zimmermann, the German foreign minister, sent the Zimmermann Telegram to Mexico on January 16, 1917. Zimmerman invited Mexico (knowing their resentment towards America since the 1848 Mexican Cession) to join in a war against the United States. Germany promised to pay for Mexico's costs and to help it recover the territory annexed by the U. S. in 1848.

These territories included the present day states of California, Nevada, Utah, most of Arizona, about half of New Mexico and a quarter of Colorado. British intelligence intercepted and decoded the telegram and passed it to the Wilson administration.

The White House would release it to the press on March 1st. Anger grew further as the Germans began sinking American ships, even as isolationists in the Senate launched a filibuster to block legislation for arming American merchant ships to defend themselves.

[89] [90]Sinking of American merchant ships [ edit]In early 1917 Berlin forced the issue. Its declared decision on 31 January 1917 to target neutral shipping in a designated war-zone [91] became the immediate cause of the entry of the United States into the war. [92] Five American merchant ships went down in March. Outraged public opinion now overwhelmingly supported Wilson when he asked Congress for a declaration of war on April 2, 1917.

[93]Public opinion, moralism, and national interest [ edit]Historians such as Ernest R. May have approached the process of American entry into the war as a study in how public opinion changed radically in three years' time.

In 1914 most Americans called for neutrality, seeing the war a dreadful mistake and were determined to stay out. By 1917 the same public felt just as strongly that going to war was both necessary and wise. Military leaders had little to say during this debate, and military considerations were seldom raised.

The decisive questions dealt with morality and visions of the future. The prevailing attitude was that America possessed a superior moral position as the only great nation devoted to the principles of freedom and democracy. By staying aloof from the squabbles of reactionary empires, it could preserve those ideals—sooner or later the rest of the world would come to appreciate and adopt them.

In 1917 this very long-run program faced the severe danger that in the short run powerful forces adverse to democracy and freedom would triumph. Strong support for moralism came from religious leaders, women (led by Jane Addams ), and from public figures like long-time Democratic leader William Jennings Bryan, the Secretary of State from 1913 to 1916.

The most important moralist of all was President Woodrow Wilson—the man who dominated decision making so totally that the war has been labelled, from an American perspective, ""Wilson's War"". [94]In 1917 Wilson won the support of most of the moralists by proclaiming ""a war to make the world safe for democracy.""

If they truly believed in their ideals, he explained, now was the time to fight. The question then became whether Americans would fight for what they deeply believed in, and the answer turned out to be a resounding ""Yes"". [95]Antiwar activists at the time and in the 1930s, alleged that beneath the veneer of moralism and idealism there must have been ulterior motives.

Some suggested a conspiracy on the part of New York City bankers holding $3 billion of war loans to the Allies, or steel and chemical firms selling munitions to the Allies.

[96] The interpretation was popular among left-wing Progressives (led by Senator Robert La Follette of Wisconsin) and among the ""agrarian"" wing of the Democratic party—including the chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee of the House. He strenuously opposed war, and when it came he rewrote the tax laws to make sure the rich paid the most.

(In the 1930s neutrality laws were passed to prevent financial entanglements from dragging the nation into a war.) In 1915, Bryan thought that Wilson's pro-British sentiments had distorted his policies, so he became the first Secretary of State ever to resign in protest. [97]However, historian Harold C. Syrett argues that business supported neutrality. [98] Other historians state that the pro-war element was animated not by profit but by disgust with what Germany actually did, especially in Belgium, and the threat it represented to American ideals.

Belgium kept the public's sympathy as the Germans executed civilians, [99] and English nurse Edith Cavell.

American engineer Herbert Hoover led a private relief effort that won wide support. Compounding the Belgium atrocities were new weapons that Americans found repugnant, like poison gas and the aerial bombardment of innocent civilians as Zeppelins dropped bombs on London. [94] Even anti-war spokesmen did not claim that Germany was innocent, and pro-German scripts were poorly received.

[100]Randolph Bourne criticized the moralist philosophy claiming it was a justification by American intellectual and power elites, like President Wilson, for going to war unnecessarily.

He argues that the push for war started with the Preparedness movement, fueled by big business. While big business would not push much further than Preparedness, benefitting the most from neutrality, the movement would eventually evolve into a war-cry, led by war-hawk intellectuals under the guise of moralism.

Bourne believes elites knew full well what going to war would entail and the price in American lives it would cost. If American elites could portray the United States' role in the war as noble, they could convince the generally isolationist American public war would be acceptable. [101]Above all, American attitudes towards Germany focused on the U-boats (submarines), which sank the Lusitania in 1915 and other passenger ships ""without warning"".

[102] [103] [104] That appeared to Americans as an unacceptable challenge to America's rights as a neutral country, and as an unforgivable affront to humanity. After repeated diplomatic protests, Germany agreed to stop. But in 1917 the Germany military leadership decided that ""military necessity"" dictated the unrestricted use of their submarines.

The Kaiser's advisors felt America was enormously powerful economically but too weak militarily to make a difference. Declaration of war [ edit]Germany [ edit]On April 2, 1917, Wilson asked a special joint session of Congress to declare war on the German Empire, stating, ""We have no selfish ends to serve"".

[105] To make the conflict seem like a better idea, he painted the conflict idealistically, stating that the war would ""make the world safe for democracy"" and later that it would be a ""war to end war"".

The United States had a moral responsibility to enter the war, Wilson proclaimed. The future of the world was being determined on the battlefield, and American national interest demanded a voice. Wilson's definition of the situation won wide acclaim, and, indeed, has shaped America's role in world and military affairs ever since.

Wilson believed that if the Central Powers won, the consequences would be bad for the United States. Germany would have dominated the continent and perhaps would gain control of the seas as well. Latin America could well have fallen under Berlin's control. The dream of spreading democracy, liberalism, and independence would have been shattered. On the other hand, if the Allies had won without help, there was a danger they would carve up the world without regard to American commercial interests. They were already planning to use government subsidies, tariff walls, and controlled markets to counter the competition posed by American businessmen. The solution was a third route, a ""peace without victory"", according to Wilson. [106]On April 6, 1917, Congress declared war. In the Senate, the resolution passed 82 to 6, with Senators Harry Lane, William J. Stone, James Vardaman, Asle Gronna, Robert M. La Follette, Sr., and George W. Norris voting against it. In the House, the declaration passed 373 to 50, with Claude Kitchin, a senior Democrat, notably opposing it. Another opponent was Jeannette Rankin, who alone voted against entry into both World War I and World War II. Nearly all of the opposition came from the West and the Midwest. [107]Austria-Hungary [ edit]

The United States Senate, in a 74 to 0 vote, declared war on Austria-Hungary on December 7, 1917, citing Austria-Hungary's severing of diplomatic relations with the United States, its use of unrestricted submarine warfare and its alliance with Germany.

[5] The declaration passed in the United States House of Representatives by a vote of 365 to 1. [6]President Wilson also came under pressure from Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, and from former President Theodore Roosevelt, who demanded a declaration of war on Ottoman Empire and Bulgaria, as Germany's allies.

President Wilson drafted a statement to Congress in December 1917 which said ""I... recommend that Congress immediately declare the United States in a state of war with Austria-Hungary, with Turkey and with Bulgaria"". But after further consultations decision on war against Germany's other allies was postponed. [108]See also [ edit]World War I portal Causes of World War IDiplomatic history of World War IUnited States in World War IUnited States home front during World War IFootnotes [ edit]^ Jeanette Keith (2004).

Rich Man's War, Poor Man's Fight: Race, Class, and Power in the Rural South during the First World War. U. of North Carolina Press. pp. 1–5. ISBN 978-0-8078-7589-6.^ Barnes, Harry Elmer. The Genesis of the World War (1925) pp.

590–591^ ""World War One"". BBC History.^ Link, Arthur S. (1972). Woodrow Wilson and the Progressive Era, 1910–1917. New York: Harper & Row. pp. 252–282.^ a b H. J. Res.169: Declaration of War with Austria-Hungary, WWI, United States Senate^ a b Jennifer K. Elsea; Matthew C. Weed (April 18, 2014).

""Declarations of War and Authorizations for the Use of Military Force: Historical Background and Legal Implications"" (PDF). p. 9. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 10, 2006. Retrieved July 21, 2014.^ Eric W. Osborne, Britain's economic blockade of Germany, 1914–1919 (2004)^ Ernest May, The World War and American Isolation, 1914–1917 (1959) p. 115 quote from Dec 1914.^ C. R. M. F. Cruttwell, A history of the Great War, 1914–1918 (2007) p. 191^ Edward House, The intimate papers of Colonel House: Vol 2 (1928) p. 73^ Duffy, Michael (August 22, 2009).

""U. S. 'Strict Accountability' Warning to Germany, 10 February 1915"". Retrieved January 30, 2011^ Spencer Tucker, The Great War, 1914–18 (1997) p. 133^ Ernest May, The World War and American Isolation, 1914–1917 (1959) p. 414^ Krakow, Ira. ""World War I - The Most Unpopular War In Our History"". Archived from the original on February 5, 2013.

Retrieved March 20, 2013.^ a b c d e f g h i j Horn, Martin (Spring 2000). ""A Private Bank at War: J. P. Morgan &Co. and France, 1914–1918"". Business History Review. 1. 74: 85–112. doi: 10.2307/3116353.^ Global Financial Data. ""Industrial Output 1909–1930"". Retrieved March 20, 2013.^ Kendrick, John W. (1961). ""Productivity Trends in the United States"".

National Bureau of Economic Research: 1–50.^ H. W. Brands (2003). Woodrow Wilson: The American Presidents Series: The 28th President, 1913–1921. Henry Holt. pp. 55–56.^ a b c Cuff, Robert D.; Urofsky, Melvin I. (Autumn 1970). ""The Steel Industry and Price-Fixing during World War I"". The Business History Review. 3. 44 (3): 291–306. doi: 10.2307/3112615.^ a b c Metz, Lance E. (November 2006).

""Bethlehem Steel: The Rise and Fall of An Industrial Giant"". Pennsylvania Legacies. 6 (2): 10–15.^ James Weinstein, ""Anti-War Sentiment and the Socialist Party, 1917–1918."" Political Science Quarterly 74#2 (1959): 215–239. in JSTOR^ Ross A. Kennedy, The Will to Believe: Woodrow Wilson, World War I, and America's Strategy for Peace and Security (Kent State University Press, 2009)^ Charles Chatfield, For peace and justice: pacifism in America, 1914–1941 (1973) ch 1^ Nicole Anderson Yanoso (2016).

The Irish and the American Presidency. Transaction Publishers. pp. 90–91.^ Frederick C. Luebke, Bonds of Loyalty: German-American and World War I (Northern Illinois University Press, 1974), ch 1.^ John Milton Cooper, Jr., Woodrow Wilson (2009) pp.

341–2, 352, 360^ Merlo J. Pusey, Charles Evans Hughes (1951) vol 1, p. 356^ Bernard J. Brommel, ""The pacifist speechmaking of Eugene V. Debs."" Quarterly Journal of Speech 52.2 (1966): 146-154.^ Seymour Martin Lipset and Gary Marks, It didn't happen here: why socialism failed in the United States (2001) p. 184^ John Whiteclay Chambers (1999).

The Oxford Companion to American Military History. Oxford UP. p. 203.^ Lawrence O. Christensen, ""World War I in Missouri,"" Missouri Historical Review, 90 (1996), 330-354, 410-428.^ Edwin Costrell, How Maine viewed the war, 1914–1917 (1940)^ John C. Crighton, Missouri and the World War, 1914–1917: a study in public opinion (1947)^ Joseph A. Mc Cartin, Labor's Great War: The Struggle for Industrial Democracy and the Origins of Modern American Labor Relations, 1912–1921 (1998) pp.

34, 57^ Mc Corkle, James L., Jr. (1981). ""Mississippi from Neutrality to War (1914–1917)"". Journal of Mississippi History.

43 (2): 85–125.^ Arthur S. Link, Woodrow Wilson and the Progressive Era (1954) pp. 169–72^ Christopher C. Gibbs, The great silent majority: Missouri's resistance to World War I (1988)^ Panikos Panayi, ""Minorities in Wartime: National and Racial Groupings in Europe, North America, and Australia During the Two World War"" (1992) p. 170^ Mark Ellis, ""America's Black Press, 1914–18,"" History Today, Sept 1991, Vol.

41, Issue 9^ Panikos Panayi, ""Minorities in Wartime: National and Racial Groupings in Europe, North America, and Australia During the Two World Wars"" (1992) p. 171^ Christopher C. Gibbs, Great Silent Majority: Missouri's Resistance to World War I (1988)^ Jeanette Keith (2004). Rich Man's War, Poor Man's Fight: Race, Class, and Power in the Rural South During the First World War.

U. of North Carolina Press. p. 85.^ George C. Herring, ""James Hay and the Preparedness Controversy, 1915–1916."" Journal of Southern History (1964) 30#4 pp. 383–404 quote, p. 386 in JSTOR^ Leslie V. Tischauser, The Burden of Ethnicity: The German Question in Chicago, 1914–1941 (Garland, 1990) pp.

21–23^ Frederick C. Luebke, Bonds of Loyalty: German-Americans and World War I (1974) pp. 200–207^ Carl Wittke, German-Americans and the World War (with Special Emphasis on Ohio's German-Language Press) (Columbus, Ohio, 1936), p. 209^ See Wisconsin Historical Society, ""World War I, at home and in the trenches""^ John F. Piper, The American Churches in World War I (1985).^ Samuel S. Hill, Charles H. Lippy, and Charles Reagan Wilson, Encyclopedia of Religion in the South (2005) p. 297^ Patterson, David S. (1971).

""Woodrow Wilson and the Mediation Movement 1914–1917"". The Historian. 33 (4): 535–556. doi: 10.1111/j.1540-6563.1971.tb01164.x.^ Piper, John F., Jr. (1970).

""The American Churches in World War I"". Journal of the American Academy of Religion. 38 (2): 147–155. doi: 10.1093/jaarel/XXXVIII.2.147. JSTOR 1461171.^ Gamble, Richard M. (2003). The War for Righteousness: Progressive Christianity, the Great War, and the Rise of the Messianic Nation.

Wilmington: ISI Books. ISBN 1-932236-16-3.^ Christopher M. Sterba, Good Americans: Italian and Jewish Immigrants During the First World War (2003), 61–63^ Mary Ann Irwin, and Ann Marie Wilson; ""'The Air is Becoming Full of War': Jewish San Francisco and World War I,"" Pacific Historical Review 74#3 (2005): 331-66^ Zosa Szajkowski, ""Private and Organized American Jewish Overseas Relief (1914–1938),"" American Jewish Historical Quarterly 57#1 (1967) 52–106 in JSTOR^ Zosa Szajkowski, Jews, Wars, and Communism.

Vol. I: The Attitude of American Jews to World War I, the Russian Revolutions of 1917, and Communism (1914–1945) (New York: KTAV, 1973) includes a great deal of undigested information.^ Joseph Rappaport, Jewish Immigrants and World War I: A Study of Yiddish Attitudes (1951), p. 78^ Henry L. Feingold (2007). ""Silent No More"": Saving the Jews of Russia, the American Jewish Effort, 1967–1989. Syracuse UP. p. 13.^ Sterba, Good Americans (2003), 68–69, 76, 79, 167-69^ Malcolm Campbell, Ireland's New Worlds, (2008), p. 164^ Malcolm Campbell, Ireland's New Worlds, (2008), p. 174^ Smolenyak, Megan.

""How Many Irish-Born Died in Service to the U. S. in WWI?"". Irish America. Retrieved April 13, 2015.^ Malcolm Campbell, Ireland's New Worlds, (2008), p. 170^ Leary, William M., Jr. (1967). ""Woodrow Wilson, Irish Americans, and the Election of 1916"". Journal of American History. 54 (1): 57–72. doi: 10.2307/1900319. JSTOR 1900319.^ Kennedy, Billy. ""Woodrow Wilson"". Ulstervirginia.com. ""Archived copy"".

Archived from the original on 2007-12-12. Retrieved 2015-02-08.. Retrieved November 10, 2011.^ Mc Donald, Forrest (2004). Insull: The Rise and Fall of a Billionaire Utility Tycoon. Washington: Beard Books. pp. 162–187. ISBN 1-58798-243-9.^ O'Grady, Joseph (1967). The Immigrants' Influence on Wilson's Peace Policies.

Lexington: University of Kentucky Press.^ The Hungarian-Americans by Steven Béla Várdy; Twayne Publishers, 1985 page 87–99^ Christopher M. Sterba, Good Americans: Italian and Jewish Immigrants During the First World War , (2003) p. 31–32^ Michael T. Urbanski, ""Money, War, and Recruiting an Army: The Activities of Connecticut Polonia During World War I,"" Connecticut History (2007) 46#1 pp.

45–69.^ The Albanian-American Odyssey: A Pilot Study of the Albanian Community of Boston, Massachusetts Front Cover Dennis L. Nagi AMS Press, Jan 1, 1989, pp. 33–35^ Mark W. van Wienen (1997). Partisans and Poets: The Political Work of American Poetry in the Great War. Cambridge UP. p. 57.^ Barbara S. Kraft, The Peace Ship: Henry Ford's Pacifist Adventure in the First World War (1978) p. 81^ Max Wallace, The American Axis (New York, New York: St. Martin's Press, 2003), pp.

224–225.^ H. C. Peterson, Propaganda for war: The campaign against American neutrality, 1914–1917 (1968)^ Link 3:556ff^ George C. Herring, ""James Hay and the Preparedness Controversy, 1915–1916."" Journal of Southern History (1964) 30#4 pp. 383–404 in JSTOR^ Roberts, Priscilla (2005). ""Paul D. Cravath, the First World War, and the Anglophile Internationalist Tradition"".

Australian Journal of Politics and History. 51 (2): 194–215. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-8497.2005.00370.x.^ ""World War I facts, information, pictures | Encyclopedia.com articles about World War I"". Encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 2016-11-06.^ Scott Manning (2007-01-04). ""World War I: Troop Statistics"".

Scottmanning.com. Retrieved 2016-11-06.^ Chambers 93; Weigley Army 345^ Very few young men from wealthy or prominent families considered a career in the Army or Navy then or at any time in American history. The highest social background of cadets, exemplified by George Patton, West Point 1909, and Lucius Clay, 1918, was oldest son of a locally prominent family.^ Link, Woodrow Wilson, pp.

179ff^ Herring, ""James Hay and the Preparedness Controversy, 1915–1916,"" p. 383^ a b Paolo Coletta, American Secretaries of the Navy (1980) 2:526-41^ Theodore A. Thelander, ""Josephus Daniels and the Publicity Campaign for Naval and Industrial Preparedness before World War I,"" North Carolina Historical Review (1966) 43#3 pp.

316–332^ Lee A. Craig (2013). Josephus Daniels: His Life and Times. U. North Carolina Press. pp.

364–65.^ Kendrick A. Clements, ""Woodrow Wilson and World War I."" Presidential Studies Quarterly (2004) 34#1 pp. 62–82.^ Cooper, Woodrow Wilson (2011) pp. 378–79^ Thomas Boghardt, The Zimmermann Telegram: Intelligence, Diplomacy, and America's Entry into World War I (2012) Excerpt and text search, summarized in Thomas Boghardt's The Zimmermann Telegram: Diplomacy, Intelligence and The American Entry into World War I (2003) online^ Compare: Doenecke, Justus D. (2011).

Nothing Less Than War: A New History of America's Entry Into World War I. Studies in Conflict, Diplomacy and Peace Series.

University Press of Kentucky. p. 250. ISBN 978-0-8131-3002-6. Retrieved 2015-12-07. On January 31, Ambassador Bernstorff presented [...] Germany's response to Wilson's recent 'peace without victory' plea [...]: his nation was about to launch an unrestricted submarine campaign, thereby declaring total maritime war against all neutrals.

After February 1, the communique noted, German U-boats would sink without warning belligerent and neutral ships found in a designated zone comprising waters around Great Britain, France, and Italy, and in the eastern Mediterranean. The Admiralty made one minor exception: it would permit one American steamer a week to sail between New York and Falmouth [...]. Initially Germany would grant a period of grace, during which its submarines would not harm neutral ships that either were en route to the war zone or had already arrived.^ Compare: Doenecke, Justus D. (2011).

Nothing Less Than War: A New History of America's Entry Into World War I. Studies in Conflict, Diplomacy and Peace Series. University Press of Kentucky. p. 286. ISBN 978-0-8131-3002-6. Retrieved 2015-12-07. Several factors led to Wilson's choice. Germany's U-boat warfare was paramount. Had it not been for Berlin's announcement of January 31, the president probably would not have issued a call to arms.^ Justus D. Doenecke, Nothing Less Than War: A New History of America's Entry into World War I (2011) ch 10^ a b May, Ernest R. (1966).

The World War and American isolation, 1914–1917.^ Knock, Thomas J. (1995). To End All Wars: Woodrow Wilson and the Quest for a New World Order.^ Syrett, Harold C. (1945).

""The Business Press and American Neutrality, 1914–1917"". Mississippi Valley Historical Review. 32 (2): 215–230. doi: 10.2307/1898209. JSTOR 1898209.^ Robert W. Cherny, A righteous cause: the life of William Jennings Bryan (1994) p. 144^ Syrett, ""The Business Press and American Neutrality, 1914–1917,""^ The German army executed over 6,500 French and Belgian civilians between August and November 1914, usually in near-random large-scale shootings of civilians ordered by junior German officers.

Horne, John; Kramer, Alan (2001). German Atrocities, 1914: A History of Denial. New Haven: Yale U. P. ISBN 0-300-08975-9.^ Bonadio, Felice A.

(1959). ""The Failure of German Propaganda in the United States, 1914–1917"". Mid America. 41 (1): 40–57.^ Bourne, Randolph. ""The War and the Intellectuals."" N.p. : n.p., n.d. 133-46. Print.^ DISASTER BEARS OUT EMBASSY'S WARNING; German Advertisement Practically Foretold Lusitania's Fate on Day She Sailed.

AND IS REPEATED TODAY Passengers Also Said to Have Received Telegrams -- Shipping Men Heard of Threats.^ Germany, U-Boats and the Lusitania^ The Lusitania^ for detailed coverage of the speech see NY Times main headline, April 2, 1917, President Calls for War Declaration, Stronger Navy, New Army of 500,000 Men, Full Cooperation With Germany's Foes^ John Milton Cooper, Jr., Woodrow Wilson: A Biography (2011) pp.

383–89^ Simon Newton Dexter North; et al. (1918). The American Year Book: A Record of Events and Progress. Thomas Nelson & Sons. pp. 10–11.^ Petkov 1991, p. 44. Bibliography [ edit]After war was declared war bond posters demonized Germany Ambrosius, Lloyd E. ""Woodrow Wilson and George W. Bush: Historical Comparisons of Ends and Means in Their Foreign Policies,"" Diplomatic History, 30 (June 2006), 509–43.

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in Ross Kennedy ed., A Companion to Woodrow Wilson (2013) pp. 243–69 Online; covers the historiography Early, Frances H. A World without War: How U. S. Feminists and Pacifists Resisted World War I.

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Becoming Old Stock: The Paradox of German-American Identity. 2004. 390, pp. ISBN 0-691-05015-5OCLC 52509620 German Americans in Philadelphia ponder the war. Kazin, Michael. War Against War: The American Fight for Peace, 1914-1918 (2017). Keene, Jennifer D. ""Remembering the ""Forgotten War"": American Historiography on World War I.""

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Koistinen, Paul. Mobilizing for Modern War: The Political Economy of American Warfare, 1865–1919 Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1997. Knock, Thomas J. To End All Wars: Woodrow Wilson and the Quest for a New World Order New York : Oxford University Press, 1992.

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1972. Link, Arthur S. Wilson: The Struggle for Neutrality: 1914–1915 (1960); Wilson: Confusions and Crises: 1915–1916 (1964); Wilson: Campaigns for Progressivism and Peace: 1916–1917 (1965) all 3 volumes are online at ACLS e-books Link, Arthur S. Wilson the Diplomatist: A Look at His Major Foreign Policies Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1957. online edition OCLC 475072Link, Arthur S. Woodrow Wilson and a Revolutionary World, 1913–1921. 1982. online edition Link, Arthur S. Woodrow Wilson: Revolution, War, and Peace. Arlington Heights, IL: AHM Pub.

Corp., 1979. online edition ISBN 0-88295-798-8 OCLC 5244770Livermore, Seward W. Politics Is Adjourned: Woodrow Wilson and the War Congress, 1916–1918. 1966. Luebke, Frederick C. Bonds of Loyalty: German-Americans and World War I. Dekalb : Northern Illinois University Press, 1974.

ISBN 0-87580-045-9 OCLC 865969Mc Callum, Jack. Leonard Wood: Rough Rider, Surgeon, Architect of American Imperialism. New York : New York University Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0-8147-5699-7 OCLC 60402000Mc Donald, Forrest.

Insull: The Rise and Fall of a Billionaire Utility Tycoon (2004)May, Ernest R. The World War and American Isolation, 1914–1917 (1959) online at ACLS e-books, highly influential study Nash, George H. Life of Herbert Hoover: The Humanitarian, 1914–1917 (Life of Herbert Hoover, Vol. 2) (1988)O'Toole, Patricia. When Trumpets Call: Theodore Roosevelt after the White House. New York : Simon & Schuster, 2005. ISBN 0-684-86477-0 OCLC 56921011Perkins, Bradford. The Great Rapprochement: England and the United States, 1895–1914 1968.

Peterson, H. C. Propaganda for War: The Campaign Against American Neutrality, 1914–1917. Norman, OK: University of Oklahoma Press, 1968. Petkov, Petko M. (1991). The United States and Bulgaria in World War I. Boulder: Eastern European Monographs. Rothwell, V. H. British War Aims and Peace Diplomacy, 1914–1918. 1971. Safford, Jeffrey J. Wilsonian Maritime Diplomacy, 1913–1921. 1978. Smith, Daniel. The Great Departure: The United States and World War I, 1914–1920. 1965. Sterba, Christopher M. Good Americans: Italian and Jewish Immigrants during the First World War.

2003. 288 pp. online edition ISBN 0-19-514754-5 OCLC 49576532Tuchman, Barbara W. (1985). The Zimmermann Telegram. ISBN 0-345-32425-0. Tucker, Robert W. Woodrow Wilson and the Great War: Reconsidering America's Neutrality, 1914–1917. 2007. ISBN 978-0-8139-2629-2Unger, Nancy C. Fighting Bob La Follette: The Righteous Reformer Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000.

ISBN 0-8078-2545-X OCLC 42861557Venzon, Anne Cipriano, ed. The United States in the First World War: An Encyclopedia New York: Garland Pub., 1995. ISBN 0-8240-7055-0 OCLC 32013365Ward, Robert D. ""The Origin and Activities of the National Security League, 1914–1919.""

Mississippi Valley Historical Review 47 (1960): 51–65. online at JSTORWitcover, Jules. Sabotage at Black Tom: Imperial Germany's Secret War in America. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 1989. ISBN 0-912697-98-9 OCLC 18379558Historiography [ edit]Doenecke, Justus D. ""Neutrality Policy and the Decision for War.""

in Ross Kennedy ed., A Companion to Woodrow Wilson (2013) pp. 243–69 Online; covers the historiography Keene, Jennifer D. ""Remembering the ""Forgotten War"": American Historiography on World War I.""

Historian 78#3 (2016): 439–468. Primary sources [ edit]The Papers of Woodrow Wilson edited by Arthur S. Link complete in 69 vol, at major academic libraries. Annotated edition of all of WW's letters, speeches and writings plus many letters written to him Wilson, Woodrow. Why We Are at War (1917) six war messages to Congress, Jan- April 1917External links [ edit]Keene, Jennifer D.: United States of America , in: 1914-1918-online.

International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Ford, Nancy Gentile: Civilian and Military Power (USA) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Strauss, Lon: Social Conflict and Control, Protest and Repression (USA) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Little, Branden: Making Sense of the War (USA) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Miller, Alisa: Press/Journalism (USA) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Wells, Robert A.: Propaganda at Home (USA) , in: 1914-1918-online. International Encyclopedia of the First World War. NY Times main headline, April 2, 1917, President Calls for War Declaration, Stronger Navy, New Army of 500,000 Men, Full Cooperation With Germany's Foes President Wilson's War Address Map of Europe at the time of the US declaration of war on Germany at omniatlas.com World War I: Declarations of War from Around the Globe - How America Entered the Great War Today in History: U. S. Enters World War I [ hide]v t e Woodrow Wilson28th President of the United States (1913–1921) 34th Governor of New Jersey (1911–1913)13th President of Princeton University (1902–1910)Presidency1913 inauguration Suffrage Parade1917 inauguration The New Freedom Clayton Antitrust Act Farm Loan Act Federal Employees' Compensation Act Federal Reserve System Federal Reserve Act Federal Income Tax amendment Federal Trade Commission Act Federal Trade Commission Revenue Act of 1913 Flag Day National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics Occupation of Haiti Bryan–Chamorro Treaty Philippine Autonomy Act World War Ientry campaigns home front Committee on Public Information Espionage Act of 1917Selective Service Act of 1917 Four Minute Men Sedition Act of 1918 National War Labor Board The Inquiry American Commission to Negotiate Peace Paris Peace Conference, 1919 Treaty of Versailles The Big Four Fourteen Points League of Nationscharter1919 Nobel Peace Prize Wilsonian Armenia Silent Sentinels Women's Suffrage amendment Roosevelt desk Judicial appointments Supreme Court Cabinet State of the Union Address 1913 1914 1915 1916 1917 1918 1920Life Birthplace and Presidential Librarypapers and manuscripts Boyhood home in Georgia Boyhood home in South Carolina Princeton University president Summer White House (Harlakenden Shadow Lawn) Woodrow Wilson House Gravesite Books Congressional Government When a Man Comes to Himself The New Freedom (1913)Elections New Jersey gubernatorial election, 1910 1912 Democratic National Convention 1912 U. S. presidential election1916 Democratic National Convention 1916 U. S. presidential election Legacy Wilsonianism Woodrow Wilson Foundation Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs Celestial Sphere Woodrow Wilson Memorial Woodrow Wilson Bridge Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation U. S. Postage stamps U. S. Currency Popular culture Wilson (1944 film) Profiles in Courage (1965 series) Wilson (2013 book)Woodrow Wilson and the Birth of the American Century (2002 documentary)Family Joseph Ruggles Wilson (father) Jessie Janet Woodrow (mother) Ellen Axson Wilson (wife, 1885–1914; death)Edith Bolling Wilson (wife, 1915–1924) Margaret Wilson (daughter) Jessie Wilson Sayre (daughter) Eleanor Wilson Mc Adoo (daughter) William Mc Adoo (son-in-law) Francis Sayre, Jr. (grandson) James Woodrow (maternal uncle)Related Progressive Era Jefferson Literary and Debating Society← William Howard Taft Warren G. Harding →Category Categories: United States in World War I United States home front during World War I "

U-Boats Sink the Lusitania in 1915When Germany torpedoes a British passenger ship believed to be smuggling arms, anger at the resulting American deaths increases pressure on President Wilson to enter World War I.

Lusitania

Zimmermann note,secret telegram sent on Jan. 16, 1917, by German foreign secretary Arthur Zimmermann to Count Johann von Bernstorff, the German ambassador to the United States. In it Zimmermann said that in the event of war with the United States, Mexico should be asked to enter thewar as a German ally. In return, Germany promised to restore to Mexico the lost territories of Texas,New Mexico, and Arizona.

Zimmermann note

"Zimmermann note

British intelligence intercepted and deciphered the telegram and sent it to President Woodrow Wilson, who released it on Mar.

1, 1917, to the press. The Zimmermann notehelped turn U. S. public opinion against Germany during World War I and strengthened the advocates of U. S. entry into the war. Bibliography See B. W. Tuchman, The Zimmermann Telegram (1966). The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia™ Copyright © 2013, Columbia University Press.

Licensed from Columbia University Press. All rights reserved. www.cc.columbia.edu/cu/cup/Want to thank TFD for its existence? Tell a friend about us, add a link to this page, or visit the webmaster's page for free fun content . Link to this page:Zimmermann noteFacebook Twitter "

On April 6, 1917, by a vote of 82 to 6 in the Senate and 373 to 50 in the House of Representatives, the United States of America declared war on Germany. Wilson strongly believed that the American system would save the world, meaning:

"Why did the United States enter World War One. The industrial era had many effects, not the least of which was plunging the world into world war. One must consider the relationship between eras and events as a student of history. The industrial era created a perceived need in America for raw materials and markets for goods.

The United States was not alone in this desire for expansion. All the industrial nations were in open competition to develop vast empires that would provide them with the fuel to run the factories of industrialism. This imperialist competition led to tension and the creation of vast armies. The willingness to use these armies was known as militarism.

In order to feel safe (there was a pretty fair degree of paranoia as you can imagine) nations began to sign secret treaties forming alliances and Europe was divided into an armed camp. Tension was high, the subjugation (taking over) of other nations led to feelings of nationalism that would eventually light the spark that would explode Europe into the flames of conflict.

The causes of World War One as discussed above can be summarized by the following acronym as a mnemonic device: A- Alliance: European nations signed secret treaties that created a system of alliances pitting nation versus nation. N - Nationalism: There were intense feelings of nationalism on the part of subjugated nationalities.

These feelings would eventually lead to rash acts. I - Imperialism: Competition to develop vast empires caused tension and conflict. M - Militarism: Nations built huge armies to defend themselves and help to gain these empires. It was a natural feeling for them to want to use these militaries.

A - Anarchy: There was no international organization to help them deal with their problems. L - Leadership: It was poor.

Just look at the system they set up...quite poor indeed. These were the conditions facing Europe as a crisis emerged in the Balkans. The Archduke of Austria Hungary, a traditional power, was touring the nation of Serbia. Meanwhile Bosnian nationalists desiring freedom from Serbia plotted to assassinate the Archduke. Gabriel Principe, a member of the Black Hand, the aforementioned Bosnian nationalist group, shot and killed Franz Ferdinand on June 28 th 1914.

Austria Hungary blamed the Serbian government for the assassination of the Archduke and issued an ultimatum (demands). The Serbians agreed to all but two of the demands, one of which was the placement of Austro Hungarian troops within Serbia. The Serbians appealed to Russia for support and Russia as the ""protector of the Slavs"" agreed to support Serbia.

Meanwhile the Austro Hungarians still wanting revenge and fearing Russia secured the support of their traditional ally, Germany. In a famous decision Germany issued what has become know as ""Carte Blanche,"" of blank check, to Austria Hungary.

This unqualified military support from Germany made Austria Hungary rather confident that Russia would not attack. At this point the Austro Hungarians declared war on Serbia. In response to the declaration of war Russia mobilized her military forces.

Perhaps it was a bit of saber rattling, perhaps not. Regardless Germany demanded Russia demobilize its army. When Russia refused Germany attacked Russia. The effect of the war on the Russian front were devastating.

The Russians were ill prepared for war and lost millions of men. In the end the Czars refusal to exit the war cost him his throne as the Bolsheviks (Communists) revolted in 1917 overthrowing Czar Nicholas II. When the Russians were attacked by Germany, France was obligated to declare war on Germany as a result of a treaty she had signed with Russia.

The Germans attacked France by marching through Belgium. The Belgians who did not give Germany permission to do this now were in a state of war with Germany as well. The most important byproduct of this was the fact that England had a treaty with Belgium! Now England was obligated to declare war on Germany as well.

Italy, which had a treaty with Germany switched sides so that she might gain territory from Austria Hungary (A gamble that more or less worked) and the Ottoman Empire entered the war on behalf to the Austro Hungarians (they wanted to gain territory from the Russians and gain control in the Balkan region).

Now most of Europe was engulfed in war. In the end the Triple Entente (England, France and Russia later to be joined by Italy, the United States and Japan) defeated the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria Hungary and the Ottoman Empire).

The conflict which was long and bloody was marked by trench warfare and the use of chemical weapons. It was fought mostly in French territory. At the conclusion of hostilities Germany was still in French territory but it was relatively clear that the combined industrial might of the Triple Entente would prevail.

In actuality the influence of the United States is questionable. Germany hoped to negotiate a favorable treaty but as we shall see this was not to be the case. The Treaty of Versailles was signed ending the war and blaming Germany for the entire conflict. This blame and the consequent punishment set the stage for years of resentment and another world war, something American President Woodrow Wilson had hoped to avoid.

So, what did all this have to do with America and why did we enter World War One? Most Americans favored staying out of the conflict and President Wilson publicly and formally stated that the United States would follow a policy of neutrality. In three short years, however, the United States would find itself in the middle of what later became known as the first World War. As the war in Europe raged on America sympathies were clearly on the side of the allies. American propaganda posters urged citizens to buy war bonds and support the allies.

The Kaiser and Germans were painted as the aggressors in the war. True or not Americans came to see Germany as vicious and blood thirsty. The poster below was used by the US Army in 1917 to recruit soldiers. Notice how the Germans are pictured? This is a clear example of anti German propaganda. When the war began England enforced a naval blockade of Germany in the hopes of cutting off supplies. Germany responded by unleashing the U Boats. U Boats were submarines capable of staying submerged for long periods of time.

They would sneak up upon their victims, often at night, an torpedo them. The Germans did not limit their attacks to military vessels. Any ship sailing in the war zone was considered an enemy. This became known as unrestricted submarine warfare. On May 7th 1915 the British cruise ship Lusitania was sunk off the coast of England. Over 1,198 passengers including 128 Americans were killed.

America was furious at the brutality and demanded a stop to this type of attack. In 1916, after the sinking of the passenger liner Sussex, Germany agreed to end unrestricted submarine warfare in the "" Sussex pledge.

""The Sussex pledge only put off the inevitable American entry into the war. America shared a cultural bond with England and France. Woodrow Wilson began to actively campaign for Americans to support the allies. Besides being culturally similar England and France were our trade partners.

From 1914 to 1916 trade with the Allies grew from 825 million dollars to 3.2 billion dollars. If the Allies were to lose the war our trade would be threatened. American increasingly saw Germany as the enemy. Germany was a dictatorship fighting against the great democracies of the world and America as a democratic nation felt an obligation to support them. As America became increasingly less neutral, the British government intercepted a message from the German ambassador Zimmerman to the Mexican government.

This message termed the "" Zimmerman Note "" asked Mexico to attack the United States if war broke out between the U. S. and Germany. Source: National Archives and Records Administration The note was turned over to American government a short time later and eventually published in the newspapers.

Americans were outraged. Then the Kaiser announced that Germany was going to re initiate the practice of unrestricted submarine warfare violating the Sussex Pledge. Wilson had campaigned for office promising to protect freedom of the seas and now it seemed he had little choice.

He had to ask Congress to declare war. Many Americans still wanted to stay out of ""Europe's war"" and there was much debate in Congress. Wilson closed his speech to Congress by saying "" it is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war... But the right is more precious then peace and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried in our hearts. ""

On April 6, 1917, by a vote of 82 to 6 in the Senate and 373 to 50 in the House of Representatives, the United States of America declared war on Germany. Wilson strongly believed that the American system would save the world, meaning:

1. American economic goods2. America's democratic political structure3. America's blend of morality and Christianity Wilson stated:"" When properly directed, there is no people in the world not fitted for self-government. "" Note the caveat, ""when properly directed."" Wilson saw the U. S. as the rightful and natural director.

He was determined to provide that direction in a framework where morality, democracy and economics were closely related. Wilson believed that other nations of the world had to look to the U. S. as an example , at the same time America was dependent on the rest of the world, mostly for economic markets.

The world market must act as the new frontier for the American system. Wilson was determined to direct the affairs of other nations so that they could eventually achieve self-government, as long as this government was based on the American model, and he was even more willing to intervene in other countries than Roosevel

t. For instance, he sent U. S. troops to Mexico to intervene in their civil war (1913-1917). When World War I broke out in Europe in 1914, Wilson tried to keep the U. S. neutral, but Germany repeatedly violated America's neutral status. When America finally entered the war in 1917 it was because, as Wilson stated,

On 2nd April, Woodrow Wilson asked for permission to go to war. This was approved in the Senate on 4th April by 82 votes to 6, and two days later, in the House of Representatives, by 373 to 50. Still avoiding alliances, war was declared against the German government (rather than its subjects).

United States Declares War

"United States Declares War At the beginning of the 20th century the United States was the most powerful country in the world. The world leader in coal and steel production, the USA was also a major producer of raw materials. The most important of these being wheat, cotton and oil, which accounted for more than a third of all the USA's exports.

With a population of over 100,000,000, the USA had the potential to decide the outcome of the First World War. However, in 1914, the country had no overseas alliances and on 19th August, President Woodrow Wilson declared a policy of strict neutrality. Although the USA had strong ties with Britain, Wilson was concerned about the large number of people in the country who had been born in Germany and Austria.

Other influential political leaders argued strongly in favour of the USA maintaining its isolationist policy. This included the pacifist pressure group, the American Union Against Militarism. First World War Encyclopedia (3,250 pages - £4.95)Some people in the argued that the USA should expand the size of its armed forces in case of war.

General Leonard Wood, the former US Army Chief of Staff, formed the National Security League in December, 1914. Wood and his organisation called for universal military training and the introduction of conscription as a means of increasing the size of the US Army. The war helped the USA economy with exported goods to Allied countries increasing from $825 in 1914 to $3.2 billion in 1916.

This made it possible for Britain and France to keep fighting the war against the Central Powers and this influenced Germany's decision to announce its unrestricted submarine warfare policy. Opinion against Germany hardened after the sinking of the Lusitania. William Jennings Bryan, the pacifist Secretary of State, resigned and was replaced by the pro-Allied Robert Lansing. After the sinking of the Lusitania, Wilson announced an increase in the size of the US armed forces.

However, in the 1916 Presidential election campaign, Woodrow Wilson stressed his policy of neutrality and his team used the slogan: ""He kept us out of the war"". On 31st January, 1917, Germany announced a new submarine offensive. Wilson responded by breaking off diplomatic relations with Germany. The publication of the Zimmerman Telegram, that suggested that Germany was willing to help Mexico regain territory in Texas and Arizona, intensified popular opinion against the Central Powers.

War against Austria-Hungary was not declared until 7th December, 1917. Frank Holland, John Bull Magazine (1917) "

On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany. On April 6, Congress granted the request and the United States was formally at war with Germany. Several key events leading up to this act included the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915, and the Zimmerman Telegram sent to Mexico by Germany in January 1917.

U.S. Declares War on Germany...

"U. S. Declares War on Germany... By John Keilers, U. S. Army Military History Institute. March 13, 2008Share on Twitter Share on Facebook Share on Reddit Share on Linked In Share via Email1 / 4Show Caption +Image shows a World War 1 recruiting poster. The sinking of the passenger ship ""Lusitania"" prompted this enlistment poster (AHM Poster Collection). (Photo Credit: Army Heritage Museum (AHM))VIEW ORIGINAL2 / 4Show Caption +The image shows the first members of the A. E. F. [American Expeditionary Force] killed in action in the World War- in France, 1917 (World War 1 Signal Corps Collection).

(Photo Credit: USAMHI)VIEW ORIGINAL3 / 4Show Caption +Photograph taken , July 4, 1917 during a pause in the parade of elements of the 16th Infantry Regiment participatin in the Fourth of July parade in Paris , France. The soldier with the ""X"" above his hat is ? ????. The Color Sergeant next to our national flag is Sergeant Baily.

The Color Sergeant next to the regimental flag is Sergeant Fink. On his left is Private baily and Corporal Brozosky, looking to his left."" (Photo Credit: U. S. Army)VIEW ORIGINAL4 / 4Show Caption +This is a insignia painted helmet from the 1st Infantry Division (AHM Collection). (Photo Credit: Army Heritage Museum (AHM)VIEW ORIGINAL

The resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare by Germany on February 1, 1917 was the key event that turned the American public from neutral ground at home to the trenches of Europe. The task of training, supplying and transporting the U. S. forces was one that the Army had to create and maintain.

General John J. Pershing was put in command of U. S. forces in Europe, the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) and he requested that they stay intact and not fill gaps in French and British trenches.

He sailed to France with elements of the first American forces, the First Expeditionary Division. This group changed its name in July 1917 to the 1st Infantry Division and formed the basis of the AEF.

The 1st Infantry Division was mobilized in May 1917 and the first official U. S. troops, part of the 28th Regiment, landed in St. Nazaire, France on June 26, 1917. After being trained by the French in trench warfare tactics and the 75mm French artillery gun parts of the 1st Division held the line in the Somerville Sector on the Lorraine Front in late October.

The first American-manned artillery gun fired a shell on 23 October by Battery C, 6th Field Artillery.

The 18th Infantry captured the first prisoner taken by American forces on October 27, and on the night of November 2, the Germans raided the American trenches after an artillery barrage and captured 11 Americans.

The first official deaths were during this raid as well. Private Thomas F. Enright, Private Merle D. Hay and Corporal James B. Gresham were laid to rest in Bathelemont with full honors. One soldier, named Donald D. Kyler, was assigned to the 16th Infantry Regiment before the division came to France.

In his memoirs he gives great details into his training, weapons, trenches, fighting and his experience in the war. His company was to the left of the German raid that night. By January 1918, the rest of the division was ready to line the parapets and was sent to the Ansauville Sector, near Toul.

In April the division was moved to the Cantigny Sector where the division would soon help liberate the town in the first all American operation. The attack was staged for the early morning of 28 May 28, 1918. The 28th Infantry Regiment led the attack. Kyler mentions that regiment was sent to the rear to train for the attack. His regiment took over for the 28th Infantry a few days after they captured Cantigny.

After multiple campaigns for the rest of the war, including occupation duty, the majority of the 1st Division returned to the U. S. in August and September 1919. Even now the Fighting First is still fighting. RELATED LINKS1st Infantry Division16th Infantry Regiment.

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Bills congratulates culinary competition award winners March 28, 2018NEWCOMERS: 25th Infantry Division and U. S. Army-Hawaii March 28, 201825th Infantry Division Inspector General and 25th ID Policy Letters March 28, 2018678th Air Defense Artillery Brigade uncases colors in Ansbach, Germany March 28, 2018Fender benders in Germany -- What to do March 27, 2018COL Rick Ullian March 27, 2018MG Ronald ""Ron"" P. Clark March 23, 2018Soldiers from 1-32 Infantry return to Fort Drum after Horn of Africa deployment March 22, 2018Marine Artillery Detachment celebrates St. Pat's with Irish bowling March 22, 2018U. S. Army Trains Nigerian Infantry March 22, 2018U. S. Army Trains Nigeria Infantry March 20, 2018USAG Ansbach Soldiers pitch-in to help clean up local neighborhoods, roadways. "

What did the Zimmerman note promise to the Mexican government if they would help Germany? Germany would help Mexico get land back in New Mexico, Texas and Arizona from the United States What effect did the United States have on the Allied war effort? fresh troops and financial aid

history ww1

"42 terms campb411426history ww1Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set?

Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort What were things that helped bring down morale in 1917? troops mutinied, food shortages,casualties What country was impacted the most from the war? Russia Why did Russia experience lower moral during the war? corruption and revolution that over threw the monarchy Who took power after the revolution in Russia over threw the monarchy?

Lenin and the Bokhevils What did Lenin promise the people when he took power? end the Russian involvement in the war What was the treaty that Lenin sign with Germany to end Russia involvement in the war?

Treaty of Brest-Lotovsk Why was it so important for Germany to sign a treaty with Russia? Germany could focus on the Western front What forced the Monarchy in Russia (Nicholas II) to end Bread Riots, corruption What was it call when German U boats sunk any ship going to the allied ports, in an attempt to stop supplies getting to the allies.

unrestricted submarine warfare Why did unrestricted submarine warfare by the Germans push American into the war? Sinking of the British Lusitania, killing many civilians. Wilson felt we should be able to travel the seas freely What side did America fight with or ally with? (BECAUSE AMERICA felt closer to these two democratic countries) Allies (France and Britian))Who sent a note to Mexico that was intercepted by the British? German foreign minster ,Arthur Zimmerman

What did Wilson institute in January 1918 to try and still be a peace maker? It was a list of terms for peace The fourteen points (a list of terms for peace)What is the right of people to choose their own government?

self-determination Who favored self-determination? Wilson What did Wilson want to create to help keep peace? general association of nations These are part of what: Freedom of the seas, Free trade, reduction of arms and end to secret treaties Wilson's Fourteen Points Who were the big three?

Wilson (USA), David Lloyd George (Britain), Georges Clemenceau (France)Who stepped down in Germany because he was losing the war? czar William IIWhen was the armistice signed between German and the Allies ending the Great War? November 11th 1918What governments collapsed as a result of the war? Russia, Germany, Ottoman Empire and Austria-Hungry After the war what did the BIG Three powers attend?

Paris Peace Conference Who preached ""Peace without Victory"", wanting the Fourteen points to be the basis for peace? Woodrow Wilson Who wanted harsh treatment for Germany? David Lloyd George of Britain Who wanted to weaken Germany so that it could no longer be a threat to his country?

Georges Clemenceau of France (""THE TIGER"")Who wanted their secret treaty up held and land returned to them from Austria-Hungry Italy (Prime minister Vittorio Orlando)What was collective security where a group of nations would act as one to keep peace for all League of Nations What was the League of Nations supposed to do?

Peace and correct any mistakes made at Paris Peace Conference What were the Germans ordered to sign by the Allies after the war, which ordered them to pay for the war and give back land to France? Treaty of Versailles Germany paying Reparations, giving land back (alsace, Lorraine) and limiting their military, were all terms of what? Terms of Versailles What countries came into existence after ww I Hungary, Austria, Checzolvakia, Yugosalvia What was administered by western powers to rule territories until they could rule themselves?

Mandate Systems How did the Mandate System change the face of the Middle East? European Colonies ruled by France and Britain What did the British intercept from the German Foreign minister? Zimmerman N

ote What did the Zimmerman note promise Mexico from Germany? If Mexico helped Germany, then Germany would help Mexico get back, New Mexico, Arizona and parts of Texas from the USWhy did the United States join the war effort on the side of the Allies? Felt close to Britain and France because they were democratic

history ww1

relations with Germany were severed. In a Special Session of Congress held on 2 April 1917, President Wilson delivered this 'War Message.' Four days later, Congress overwhelmingly passed the War Resolution which brought the United States into the Great War. Gentlemen of the Congress:

Wilson's War Message to Congress

"Wilson's War Message to Congressnavigation search WWI Document Archive > Official Papers > Wilson's War Message to Congress2 April, 1917Woodrow Wilson, War Messages, 65th Cong., 1st Sess. Senate Doc. No. 5, Serial No. 7264, Washington, D. C., 1917; pp. 3-8, passim. On 3 February 1917, President Wilson addressed Congress to announce that diplomatic

I have called the Congress into extraordinary session because there are serious, very serious, choices of policy to be made, and made immediately, which it was neither right nor constitutionally permissible that I should assume the responsibility of making.

On the 3d of February last I officially laid before you the extraordinary announcement of the Imperial German Government that on and after the 1st day of February it was its purpose to put aside all restraints of law or of humanity and use its submarines to sink every vessel that sought to approach either the ports of Great Britain and Ireland or the western coasts of Europe or any of the ports controlled by the enemies of Germany within the Mediterranean.

That had seemed to be the object of the German submarine warfare earlier in the war, but since April of last year the Imperial Government had somewhat restrained the commanders of its undersea craft in conformity with its promise then given to us that passenger boats should not be sunk and that due warning would be given to all other vessels which its submarines might seek to destroy, when no resistance was offered or escape attempted, and care taken that their crews were given at least a fair chance to save their lives in their open boats.

The precautions taken were meagre and haphazard enough, as was proved in distressing instance after instance in the progress of the cruel and unmanly business, but a certain degree of restraint was observed The new policy has swept every restriction aside. Vessels of every kind, whatever their flag, their character, their cargo, their destination, their errand, have been ruthlessly sent to the bottom without warning and without thought of help or mercy for those on board, the vessels of friendly neutrals along with those of belligerents.

Even hospital ships and ships carrying relief to the sorely bereaved and stricken people of Belgium, though the latter were provided with safe-conduct through the proscribed areas by the German Government itself and were distinguished by unmistakable marks of identity, have been sunk with the same reckless lack of compassion or of principle.

I was for a little while unable to believe that such things would in fact be done by any government that had hitherto subscribed to the humane practices of civilized nations. International law had its origin in the at tempt to set up some law which would be respected and observed upon the seas, where no nation had right of dominion and where lay the free highways of the world. By painful stage after stage has that law been built up, with meagre enough results, indeed, after all was accomplished that could be accomplished, but always with a clear view, at least, of what the heart and conscience of mankind demanded.

This minimum of right the German Government has swept aside under the plea of retaliation and necessity and because it had no weapons which it could use at sea except these which it is impossible to employ as it is employing them without throwing to the winds all scruples of humanity or of respect for the understandings that were supposed to underlie the intercourse of the world.

I am not now thinking of the loss of property involved, immense and serious as that is, but only of the wanton and wholesale destruction of the lives of noncombatants, men, women, and children, engaged in pursuits which have always, even in the darkest periods of modern history, been deemed innocent and legitimate.

Property can be paid for; the lives of peaceful and innocent people can not be. The present German submarine warfare against commerce is a warfare against mankind. It is a war against all nations. American ships have been sunk, American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of other neutral and friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed in the waters in the same way.

There has been no discrimination. The challenge is to all mankind. Each nation must decide for itself how it will meet it. The choice we make for ourselves must be made with a moderation of counsel and a temperateness of judgment befitting our character and our motives as a nation.

We must put excited feeling away. Our motive will not be revenge or the victorious assertion of the physical might of the nation, but only the vindication of right, of human right, of which we are only a single champion.

When I addressed the Congress on the 26th of February last, I thought that it would suffice to assert our neutral rights with arms, our right to use the seas against unlawful interference, our right to keep our people safe against unlawful violence.

But armed neutrality, it now appears, is impracticable. Because submarines are in effect outlaws when used as the German submarines have been used against merchant shipping, it is impossible to defend ships against their attacks as the law of nations has assumed that merchantmen would defend themselves against privateers or cruisers, visible craft giving chase upon the open sea.

It is common prudence in such circumstances, grim necessity indeed, to endeavour to destroy them before they have shown their own intention.

They must be dealt with upon sight, if dealt with at all. The German Government denies the right of neutrals to use arms at all within the areas of the sea which it has proscribed, even in the defense of rights which no modern publicist has ever before questioned their right to defend.

The intimation is conveyed that the armed guards which we have placed on our merchant ships will be treated as beyond the pale of law and subject to be dealt with as pirates would be. Armed neutrality is ineffectual enough at best; in such circumstances and in the face of such pretensions it is worse than ineffectual; it is likely only to produce what it was meant to prevent; it is practically certain to draw us into the war without either the rights or the effectiveness of belligerents.

There is one choice we can not make, we are incapable of making: we will not choose the path of submission and suffer the most sacred rights of our nation and our people to be ignored or violated.

The wrongs against which we now array ourselves are no common wrongs; they cut to the very roots of human life.

With a profound sense of the solemn and even tragical character of the step I am taking and of the grave responsibilities which it involves, but in unhesitating obedience to what I deem my constitutional duty, I advise that the Congress declare the recent course of the Imperial German Government to be in fact nothing less than war against the Government and people of the United States; that it formally accept the status of belligerent which has thus been thrust upon it, and that it take immediate steps not only to put the country in a more thorough state of defense but also to exert all its power and employ all its resources to bring the Government of the German Empire to terms and end the war.

What this will involve is clear. It will involve the utmost practicable cooperation in counsel and action with the governments now at war with Germany, and, as incident to that, the extension to those governments of the most liberal financial credits, in order that our resources may so far as possible be added to theirs. It will involve the organization and mobilization of all the material resources of the country to supply the materials of war and serve the incidental needs of the nation in the most abundant and yet the most economical and efficient way possible.

It will involve the immediate full equipment of the Navy in all respects but particularly in supplying it with the best means of dealing with the enemy's submarines.

It will involve the immediate addition to the armed forces of the United States already provided for by law in case of war at least 500,000 men, who should, in my opinion, be chosen upon the principle of universal liability to service, and also the authorization of subsequent additional increments of equal force so soon as they may be needed and can be handled in training. It will involve also, of course, the granting of adequate credits to the Government, sustained, I hope, so far as they can equitably be sustained by the present generation, by well conceived taxation....

While we do these things, these deeply momentous things, let us be very clear, and make very clear to all the world what our motives and our objects are.

My own thought has not been driven from its habitual and normal course by the unhappy events of the last two months, and I do not believe that the thought of the nation has been altered or clouded by them I have exactly the same things in mind now that I had in mind when I addressed the Senate on the 22d of January last; the same that I had in mind when I addressed the Congress on the 3d of February and on the 26th of February.

Our object now, as then, is to vindicate the principles of peace and justice in the life of the world as against selfish and autocratic power and to set up amongst the really free and self-governed peoples of the world such a concert of purpose and of action as will henceforth ensure the observance of those principles.

Neutrality is no longer feasible or desirable where the peace of the world is involved and the freedom of its peoples, and the menace to that peace and freedom lies in the existence of autocratic governments backed by organized force which is controlled wholly by their will, not by the will of their people.

We have seen the last of neutrality in such circumstances. We are at the beginning of an age in which it will be insisted that the same standards of conduct and of responsibility for wrong done shall be observed among nations and their governments that are observed among the individual citizens of civilized states.

We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling towards them but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse that their Government acted in entering this war. It was not with their previous knowledge or approval.

It was a war determined upon as wars used to be determined upon in the old, unhappy days when peoples were nowhere consulted by their rulers and wars were provoked and waged in the interest of dynasties or of little groups of ambitious men who were accustomed to use their fellow men as pawns and tools.

Self-governed nations do not fill their neighbour states with spies or set the course of intrigue to bring about some critical posture of affairs which will give them an opportunity to strike and make conquest.

Such designs can be successfully worked out only under cover and where no one has the right to ask questions.

Cunningly contrived plans of deception or aggression, carried, it may be, from generation to generation, can be worked out and kept from the light only within the privacy of courts or behind the carefully guarded confidences of a narrow and privileged class. They are happily impossible where public opinion commands and insists upon full information concerning all the nation's affairs.

A steadfast concert for peace can never be maintained except by a partnership of democratic nations. No autocratic government could be trusted to keep faith within it or observe its covenants. It must be a league of honour, a partnership of opinion. Intrigue would eat its vitals away; the plottings of inner circles who could plan what they would and render account to no one would be a corruption seated at its very heart.

Only free peoples can hold their purpose and their honour steady to a common end and prefer the interests of mankind to any narrow interest of their own.

Does not every American feel that assurance has been added to our hope for the future peace of the world by the wonderful and heartening things that have been happening within the last few weeks in Russia?

Russia was known by those who knew it best to have been always in fact democratic at heart, in all the vital habits of her thought, in all the intimate relationships of her people that spoke their natural instinct, their habitual attitude towards life.

The autocracy that crowned the summit of her political structure, long as it had stood and terrible as was the reality of its power, was not in fact Russian in origin, character, or purpose; and now it has been shaken off and the great, generous Russian people have been added in all their naive majesty and might to the forces that are fighting for freedom in the world, for justice, and for peace.

Here is a fit partner for a league of honour. One of the things that has served to convince us that the Prussian autocracy was not and could never be our friend is that from the very outset of the present war it has filled our unsuspecting communities and even our offices of government with spies and set criminal intrigues everywhere afoot against our national unity of counsel, our peace within and without our industries and our commerce.

Indeed it is now evident that its spies were here even before the war began; and it is unhappily not a matter of conjecture but a fact proved in our courts of justice that the intrigues which have more than once come perilously near to disturbing the peace and dislocating the industries of the country have been carried on at the instigation, with the support, and even under the personal direction of official agents of the Imperial Government accredited to the Government of the United States.

Even in checking these things and trying to extirpate them we have sought to put the most generous interpretation possible upon them because we knew that their source lay, not in any hostile feeling or purpose of the German people towards us (who were, no doubt, as ignorant of them as we ourselves were), but only in the selfish designs of a Government that did what it pleased and told its people nothing.

But they have played their part in serving to convince us at last that that Government entertains no real friendship for us and means to act against our peace and security at its convenience. That it means to stir up enemies against us at our very doors the intercepted [Zimmermann] note to the German Minister at Mexico City is eloquent evidence.

We are accepting this challenge of hostile purpose because we know that in such a government, following such methods, we can never have a friend; and that in the presence of its organized power, always lying in wait to accomplish we know not what purpose, there can be no assured security for the democratic governments of the world.

We are now about to accept gage of battle with this natural foe to liberty and shall, if necessary, spend the whole force of the nation to check and nullify its pretensions and its power.

We are glad, now that we see the facts with no veil of false pretence about them, to fight thus for the ultimate peace of the world and for the liberation of its peoples, the German peoples included: for the rights of nations great and small and the privilege of men everywhere to choose their way of life and of obedience.

The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty.

We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind. We shall be satisfied when those rights have been made as secure as the faith and the freedom of nations can make them.

Just because we fight without rancour and without selfish object, seeking nothing for ourselves but what we shall wish to share with all free peoples, we shall, I feel confident, conduct our operations as belligerents without passion and ourselves observe with proud punctilio the principles of right and of fair play we profess to be fighting for.

I have said nothing of the governments allied with the Imperial Government of Germany because they have not made war upon us or challenged us to defend our right and our honour.

The Austro-Hungarian Government has, indeed, avowed its unqualified endorsement and acceptance of the reckless and lawless submarine warfare adopted now without disguise by the Imperial German Government, and it has therefore not been possible for this Government to receive Count Tarnowski, the Ambassador recently accredited to this Government by the Imperial and Royal Government of Austria-Hungary; but that Government has not actually engaged in warfare against citizens of the United States on the seas, and I take the liberty, for the present at least, of postponing a discussion of our relations with the authorities at Vienna.

We enter this war only where we are clearly forced into it because there are no other means of defending our rights.

It will be all the easier for us to conduct ourselves as belligerents in a high spirit of right and fairness because we act without animus, not in enmity towards a people or with the desire to bring any injury or disadvantage upon them, but only in armed opposition to an irresponsible government which has thrown aside all considerations of humanity and of right and is running amuck.

We are, let me say again, the sincere friends of the German people, and shall desire nothing so much as the early reestablishment of intimate relations of mutual advantage between us -- however hard it may be for them, for the time being, to believe that this is spoken from our hearts.

We have borne with their present government through all these bitter months because of that friendship -- exercising a patience and forbearance which would otherwise have been impossible.

We shall, happily, still have an opportunity to prove that friendship in our daily attitude and actions towards the millions of men and women of German birth and native sympathy, who live amongst us and share our life, and we shall be proud to prove it towards all who are in fact loyal to their neighbours and to the Government in the hour of test. They are, most of them, as true and loyal Americans as if they had never known any other fealty or allegiance.

They will be prompt to stand with us in rebuking and restraining the few who may be of a different mind and purpose.

If there should be disloyalty, it will be dealt with with a firm hand of stern repression; but, if it lifts its head at all, it will lift it only here and there and without countenance except from a lawless and malignant few. It is a distressing and oppressive duty, gentlemen of the Congress, which I have performed in thus addressing you.

There are, it may be, many months of fiery trial and sacrifice ahead of us. It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the balance.

But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts -- for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.

To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God helping her, she can do no other. WWI Document Archive > Official Papers > Wilson's War Message to Congress "

m (Since the coded Zimmermann Telegram was originally written in German, the text below is a translation of the German message. )We intend to begin on the first of February unrestricted submarine warfare.

The History of the Zimmerman Telegram

"Humanities ›History & Culture The History of the Zimmerman Telegram The WWI Coded Message That Helped Change the Tide of Public Opinion in the U. S. Share Flipboard Email Print Photostat of the Zimmermann Telegram as received by the German ambassador to Mexico (Jan. 19, 1917).

(Picture from the National Archives and Records Administration. )by Jennifer Rosenberg Updated March 17, 2017The Zimmermann Telegram was a coded message sent from Germany to Mexico in January 1917.

Once the Zimmermann Telegram was intercepted and decoded by the British, the contents were leaked to the U. S. and helped change the tide of American public opinion and brought the U. S. into World War I. The Story of the Zimmermann Telegram The Zimmermann Telegram was secretly sent from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann to Germany's ambassador in Mexico, Heinrich von Eckhardt. The British managed to intercept this coded message and their cryptologists were able to decipher it. Within this secret message, Zimmermann revealed Germany's plan to restart unrestricted submarine warfare as well as offered Mexico territory from the United States if Mexico were to declare war on the United States.

On February 24, 1917, the British shared the contents of the Zimmermann Telegram with U. S President Woodrow Wilson, who had been elected to a second term on the slogan ""He kept us out of the war.

""The contents of the Zimmermann Telegram then appeared in newspapers five days later, on March 1. Upon reading the news, the American public was outraged. For three years, Americans had prided themselves on safely keeping out of World War I, a war they believed to be contained to Europe, which seemed far away.

The American public now felt the war was being brought to their own land. The Zimmermann Telegram helped change public opinion in the United States away from isolationism and toward joining World War I with the Allies. Just a month after the contents of the Zimmermann Telegram were published in U. S. papers, the United States declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917. The Full Text of the Zimmermann Telegra

We shall endeavor in spite of this to keep the United States of America neutral. In the event of this not succeeding, we make Mexico a proposal of alliance on the following basis: make war together, make peace together, generous financial support and an understanding on our part that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona.

The settlement in detail is left to you. You will inform the President of the above most secretly as soon as the outbreak of war with the United States of America is certain and add the suggestion that he should, on his own initiative, invite Japan to immediate adherence and at the same time mediate between Japan and ourselves.

Please call the President's attention to the fact that the ruthless employment of our submarines now offers the prospect of compelling England in a few months to make peace.cite "

U. S. President Woodrow Wilson learned of the telegram’s contents on February 26; the next day he proposed to Congress that the U. S. should start arming its ships against possible German attacks. He also authorized the State Department to make public the Zimmermann Telegram. On March 1, the news broke.

Zimmermann Telegram published in United States

World War I1917Zimmermann Telegram published in United States Share this:facebook twitter google+Print Cite

On this day in 1917, the text of the so-called Zimmermann Telegram, a message from the German foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, to the German ambassador to Mexico proposing a Mexican-German alliance in the case of war between the United States and Germany, is published on the front pages of newspapers across America.

In the telegram, intercepted and deciphered by British intelligence in January 1917, Zimmermann instructed the ambassador, Count Johann von Bernstorff, to offer significant financial aid to Mexico if it agreed to enter any future U. S-German conflict as a German ally. If victorious in the conflict, Germany also promised to restore to Mexico the lost territories of Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.

Best Answer: America fought Germany twice, first WWI and again in WWII. In World War One, the incident that finally made the US declare war on Germany was the Zimmerman Telegram, in which the Germans offered to Mexico: Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and California. But this was only the final straw in a series of aggressive actions taken by Germany that the US didn't like.

Why did the united states declare war on germany?

"Arts & Humanities History Why did the united states declare war on germany?1 following 7 answers Answers Relevance Rating Newest Oldest

For much of the war, the Germans used their U-boats to target any ship bound for Britain and these actions ended up killing American citizens traveling by sea. The sinking of the Lusitania is the best known submarine incident. These attacks angered President Wilson and already made him supportive of the British and French. In World War II, the US actually never declared war on Germany. FDR declared war on Japan on Dec 8, and soon after, Hitler in one of his ""smarter"" moments declared war on America, dooming Nazi Germany to eventual defeat.

Sam N · 9 years ago5 1 Comment This Site Might Help You. RE: why did the united states declare war on germany?

Source (s):united states declare war germany: https://shortly.im/C7BWc Keslie · 3 years ago0 0 Comment Officially, the United States was neutral. But Americans and American companies were far from neutral. We sympathized with the Belgians who were invaded. We sympathized with the British, who went to war because the Germans invaded Belgium. We especially sympathized with the Canadians who we shared the longest undefended frontier in the world.

So we sold the Allies, everything that was not nailed down, and we got rich on it. We sold american grain, delivered in American ships.

We sold American steel for French Armaments. We sold half the enfield riffles in the British army. These were the shipments the Germans were trying to stop. The Germans never sank an American ship that was not caring steel, ammunition, riffles, TNT.

In fact the Germans offered to pay for any ship they sank that was not caring contraband. But by 1917, that was not good enough. And the Allies were loosing. The Germans had a reputation of being bully boys. They invaded Belgium, and were making plans to keep Belgium as a German province.

The Germans also had a plan to invade Porto Rico, and take it from the US. The Germans had the opportunity to make peace favorable to Germany. But the Germans wanted it all. Wilson figured that sooner or later we would have to fight the Germans.

Phuc · 2 years ago0 0 Comment The US declared war on Germany On December 11, 1941.... Germany and Italy both declared war on the US earlier that same day.. Germany had what they called an ""Iron Pact"" with Japan.

As soon as Japan attacked the US Germany was treaty bound to declare war on us. As soon as they did.. we responded with our own declaration.. Matt · 4 years ago0 0 Comment It was Germany who declared war on the US after the US (and UK) declared war on Japan.

Sean · 9 years ago1 0 1 comment It was because Germany wouldn't stop their unrestricted submarine warfare on ships and the Zimmerman note in WW1. WW2 Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor and Germany was ally of Japan. Germany declared war on us first. Frosty · 9 years ago4 2 Comment OK, in WW1 or WW2?

WW1 Entry of the United States Isolationism The United States originally pursued a policy of isolationism, avoiding conflict while trying to broker a peace.

This resulted in increased tensions with Berlin and London. When a German U-boat sank the British liner Lusitania in 1915, with 128 Americans aboard, U. S. President Woodrow Wilson vowed, ""America was too proud to fight"" and demanded an end to attacks on passenger ships. Germany complied. Wilson unsuccessfully tried to mediate a settlement. He repeatedly warned the U. S. would not tolerate unrestricted submarine warfare, in violation of international law and U. S. ideas of human rights. Wilson was under pressure from former president Theodore Roosevelt, who denounced German acts as ""piracy"". [66] Wilson's desire to have a seat at negotiations at war's end to advance the League of Nations also played a significant role.

[67] Wilson's Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan, resigned in protest of the President's decidedly warmongering diplomacy.

Other factors contributing to the U. S. entry into the war include the suspected German sabotage of both Black Tom in Jersey City, New Jersey, and the Kingsland Explosion in what is now Lyndhurst, New Jersey. Making the case In January 1917, after the Navy pressured the Kaiser, Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare.

Britain's secret Royal Navy cryptanalytic group, Room 40, had broken the German diplomatic code. They intercepted a proposal from Berlin (the Zimmermann Telegram) to Mexico to join the war as Germany's ally against the United States, should the U. S. join.

The proposal suggested, if the U. S. were to enter the war, Mexico should declare war against the United States and enlist Japan as an ally. This would prevent the United States from joining the Allies and deploying troops to Europe, and would give Germany more time for their unrestricted submarine warfare program to strangle Britain's vital war supplies.

In return, the Germans would promise Mexico support in reclaiming Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. U. S. declaration of war on Germany American recruitment poster by Louis D. Fancher After the British revealed the telegram to the United States, President Wilson, who had won reelection on his keeping the country out of the war, released the captured telegram as a way of building support for U. S. entry into the war.

He had previously claimed neutrality, while calling for the arming of U. S. merchant ships delivering munitions to combatant Britain and quietly supporting the British blockading of German ports and mining of international waters, preventing the shipment of food from America and elsewhere to combatant Germany. After submarines sank seven U. S. merchant ships and the publication of the Zimmerman telegram, Wilson called for war on Germany, which the U. S. Congress declared on 6 April 1917.

[69] Crucial to U. S. participation was the massive domestic propaganda campaign executed by the Committee on Public Information overseen by George Creel.

The campaign included tens of thousands of government-selected community leaders giving brief carefully scripted pro-war speeches at thousands of public gatherings. Along with other branches of government and private vigilante groups like the American Protective League, it also included the general repression and harassment of people either opposed to American entry into the war or of German heritage.

Other forms of propaganda included newsreels, photos, large-print posters (designed by several well-known illustrators of the day, including Louis D. Fancher), magazine and newspaper articles, etc. In WW2, Japan attacked Pearl Harbour and declares war on the USA. Germany declares war on the USA, convinced hat Japan will help Germany in its attack of Russia.

Source (s):http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WW1#1917. E2... Quoi · 9 years ago2 2 Comment Need more detailsginny · 2 years ago0 0 Comment WELL IN WORLD WAS 2 IT WAS BECAUSE GERMANY INVADED POLAND, AND THE USA HAD TIES WITH POLAND SO IT IMEDIATLEY DECLARED WAR ON GERMANY.sammy · 9 years ago0 6 Comment Don't believe that is right Mary · 2 years ago0 0 Comment Maybe you would like to learn more about one of these? Need new business cards? Train To Be a Project Manager Want to build your own website? Find Abstract Art On Sale! "

IAfter running on the campaign, ""He Kept Us Out of the War,"" Woodrow Wilson brings the United States into World War I in April 1917.

What was the Zimmermann Telegram?

"History Stories What was the Zimmermann Telegram? History Stories What was the Zimmermann Telegram? By Evan Andrews// May 21, 2014U. S. Entry into World War

Print Cite Most historians agree that American involvement in World War I was inevitable by early 1917, but the march to war was no doubt accelerated by a notorious letter penned by German foreign secretary Arthur Zimmermann.

On January 16, 1917, British code breakers intercepted an encrypted message from Zimmermann intended for Heinrich von Eckardt, the German ambassador to Mexico. The missive gave the ambassador a now-famous set of instructions: if the neutral United States entered the war on the side of the Allies, Von Eckardt was to approach Mexico’s president with an offer to forge a secret wartime alliance.

The Germans would provide military and financial support for a Mexican attack on the United States, and in exchange Mexico would be free to annex “lost territory in Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.” In addition, Von Eckardt was told to use the Mexicans as a go-between to entice the Japanese Empire to join the German cause.

The British cryptographic office known as “Room 40” decoded the Zimmermann Telegram and handed it over to the United States in late-February 1917. By March 1, its scandalous contents were splashed on the front pages of newspapers nationwide. Diplomatic relations between Germany and the United States had already been severed in early February, when Germany resumed unrestricted submarine warfare and began preying on U. S. vessels in the Atlantic.

While many Americans remained committed to isolationism—President Woodrow Wilson had only just won reelection using the slogan, “He kept us out of war”—the Zimmerman cipher now served as fresh evidence of German aggressi

on. Coupled with the submarine attacks, it finally turned the U. S. government in favor of entering the fray. On April 2, 1917, President Wilson abandoned his policy of neutrality and asked Congress to declare war against Germany and the Central Powers.

What was the Zimmermann Telegram?

mia Due to the cold temperature of the water, what did many die from Sinking passenger ships was against the rules of naval warfare, they didn't think German U-boats had the guts to do it, they thought the Lusitania was too big and too fast Why did the Lusitania owners and passengers not heed the german warning that a state of war exists and that German U-boats would sink passenger ships (short answer)British knew there were American passengers on board, and they thought this could outrage the Americans enough to enter the war against Germany

Lusitania Facts

"21 terms sarenanvaughn Lusitania Facts Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set?

Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort128 How many Americans died in the sinking?129 How many total children were on the Lusitania35 How many children survived the sinking39 How many babies total were on the Lusitania4 How many babies survived the sinking1,959 How many total lives were on board764 How many total people survived289 How many of the dead bodies were recovered65 How many lives were unidentified New York Where did the lusitania leave from May 1, 1915 When did the Lusitania leave its starting place May 7, 1915 When did the Lusitania sink10 miles off the coast of Ireland Where did the Lusitania sink48 How many life boats were on board6 How many life boats were they able to launch To ship a large amount of supplies from the ""neutral"" United States to Germany's enemies What were passenger ships such as the Lusitania used for (short answer)Liverpool, England Where was the Lusitania headed52 degrees Fahrenheit What was the temperature of the water where the Lusitania sank Hypother

What is a possible explanation as to why the Lusitania was allowed to follow the dangerous route into the war zone unprotected by the British navy (short answer)Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Features Quizlet Live Quizlet Learn Diagrams Flashcards Mobile Help Sign up Help Center Honor Code Community Guidelines Students Teachers About Company Press Jobs Privacy Terms Follow us Language© 2018 Quizlet Inc. "

He based his re-election campaign around the slogan, ""He kept us out of war"", but U. S. neutrality was challenged in early 1917 when the German government began unrestricted submarine warfare despite repeated strong warnings, and tried to enlist Mexico as an ally. In April 1917, Wilson asked Congress to declare war.

Woodrow Wilson

"3 terms reyeswil000Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson (December 28, 1856 - February 3, 1924) was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921. A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913.

With Progressive (""Bull Moose"") Party candidate Theodore Roosevelt and Republican nominee William Howard Taft dividing the Republican Party vote, Wilson was elected President as a Democrat in 1912.

In his first t…Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set?

Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort Woodrow Wilson Thomas Woodrow Wilson Born December 28, 1856 (1856-12-28) Staunton, Virginia, U. S. Died February 3, 1924 (1924-02-03) (aged 67) Washington, D. C., U. S. Political party Democratic Party Spouse (s) Ellen Axson (1885-1914) Edith Bolling (1915-1924) Children Margaret Jessie Eleanor Alma mater Davidson College Princeton University University of Virginia Johns Hopkins University Profession Academic Historian Political scientist Religion Presbyterianism (December 28, 1856 - February 3, 1924) was the 28th President of the United States, from 1913 to 1921.

A leader of the Progressive Movement, he served as President of Princeton University from 1902 to 1910, and then as the Governor of New Jersey from 1911 to 1913.

In his first term as President, Wilson persuaded a Democratic Congress to pass major progressive reforms including the Federal Reserve Act, Federal Trade Commission Act, the Clayton Antitrust Act, the Federal Farm Loan Act and an income tax. Wilson brought many white Southerners into his administration, and supported the introduction of segregation into many federal agencies. Narrowly re-elected in 1916, he had full control of American entry into World War I, and his second term centered on World War I and the subsequent peace treaty negotiations in Paris.

During the war, Wilson focused on diplomacy and financial considerations, leaving the waging of the war itself primarily in the hands of the Army. On the home front in 1917, he began the United States' first draft since the American Civil War, raised billions of dollars in war funding through Liberty Bonds, set up the War Industries Board, promoted labor union cooperation, supervised agriculture and food production through the Lever Act, took over control of the railroads, and suppressed anti-war movements.

While he did not encourage the wave of anti-German sentiment sweeping the country in 1917-18, he did nothing to stop it. In the late stages of the war, Wilson took personal control of negotiations with Germany, including the armistice.

In 1918, he issued his Fourteen Points, his view of a post-war world that could avoid another terrible conflict. In 1919, he went to Paris to create the League of Nations and shape the Treaty of Versailles, with special attention on creating new nations out of defunct empires.

In 1919, during the bitter fight with Henry Cabot Lodge and the Republican-controlled Senate over the U. S. joining the League of Nations, Wilson collapsed with a debilitating stroke.

He refused to compromise, effectively destroying any chance for ratification. The League of Nations was established anyway, but the United States never joined. An intellectual—the only president with a Ph D—he bitterly fought other intellectuals such as Roosevelt and Lodge.

A Presbyterian of deep religious faith, Wilson appealed to a gospel of service and infused a profound sense of moralism into his idealistic internationalism, now referred to as ""Wilsonian"". Wilsonianism calls for the United States to enter the world arena to fight for democracy, and has been a contentious position in American foreign policy.

William Howard Taft William Howard Taft Born September 15, 1857 (1857-09-15) Cincinnati, Ohio, U. S. Died March 8, 1930 (1930-03-08) (aged 72) Washington, D. C., U. S. Political party Republican Spouse (s) Helen Herron Children Robert Helen Charles Alma mater Yale University University of Cincinnati Profession Lawyer Jurist Religion Unitarianism (September 15, 1857 - March 8, 1930) was the 27th President of the United States (1909-1913) and later the tenth Chief Justice of the United States (1921-1930). He is the only person to have served in both offices. Born in 1857 in Cincinnati, Ohio, into the powerful Taft family, ""Big Bill"" graduated from Yale College Phi Beta Kappa in 1878 and from Cincinnati Law School in 1880.

He worked in local nondescript legal positions until he was tapped to serve on the Ohio Supreme Court in 1887. In 1890, Taft was appointed Solicitor General of the United States and in 1891 a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.

In 1900, President William Mc Kinley appointed Taft Governor-General of the Philippines. In 1904, President Theodore Roosevelt appointed Taft Secretary of War with the hope that he might groom Taft, then his close political ally, into his handpicked presidential successor.

Riding a wave of popular support for fellow Republican Roosevelt, Taft won an easy victory in his 1908 bid for the presidency. In his only term, Taft's domestic agenda emphasized trust-busting, civil service reform, strengthening the Interstate Commerce Commission, improving the performance of the postal service, and passage of the Sixteenth Amendment. Abroad, Taft sought to further the economic development of underdeveloped nations in Latin America and Asia through ""Dollar Diplomacy"".

However, Taft often alienated his own key constituencies, and was overwhelmingly defeated in his bid for a second term in the presidential election of 1912.

After leaving office, Taft spent his time in academia, arbitration, and the search for world peace through his self-founded League to Enforce Peace. In 1921, after the First World War, President Warren G. Harding appointed Taft Chief Justice of the United States.

Taft served in this capacity until shortly before his death in 1930. He is the only former president to administer the oath of office to another President and the only Chief Justice to serve with associate justices whom he had appointed to the court.

Theodore Roosevelt Theodore ""Teddy"" Roosevelt ( /ˈroʊzəvɛlt/ roh-zə-velt; Born October 27, 1858 (1858-10-27) New York City, New York, U. S. Died January 6, 1919 (1919-01-06) (aged 60) Oyster Bay, New York, U. S. Political party Progressive Party (1912-1916) Other political affiliations Republican Party (Before 1912) Spouse (s) Alice Lee (1880-1884) Edith Carrow (1886-1919) Children Alice Theodore Kermit Ethel Archie Quentin Alma mater Harvard University Columbia University Profession Author Historian Explorer Conservationist Civil servant Religion Dutch Reformed.

October 27, 1858 - January 6, 1919) was the 26th President of the United States (1901-1909). He is noted for his exuberant personality, range of interests and achievements, and his leadership of the Progressive Movement, as well as his ""cowboy"" persona and robust masculinity. He was a leader of the Republican Party and founder of the short-lived Progressive (""Bull Moose"") Party of 1912. Before becoming President, he held offices at the city, state, and federal levels. Roosevelt's achievements as a naturalist, explorer, hunter, author, and soldier are as much a part of his fame as any office he held as a politician.

Born into a wealthy family, Roosevelt was a sickly child who suffered from asthma and stayed at home studying natural history. To compensate for his physical weakness, he embraced a strenuous life. Home-schooled, he became an eager student of nature.

He attended Harvard University, where he boxed and developed an interest in naval affairs. In 1881, one year out of Harvard, he was elected to the New York State Assembly as its youngest member. Roosevelt's first historical book, The Naval War of 1812 (1882), established his professional reputation as a serious historian. After a few years of operating a cattle ranch in the Dakotas, Roosevelt returned to New York City and gained fame fighting police corruption.

The Spanish-American War broke out while Roosevelt was, effectively, running the Department of the Navy. He promptly resigned and led a small regiment in Cuba known as the Rough Riders, earning a nomination for the Medal of Honor, which was received posthumously on his behalf on January 16, 2001. After the war, he returned to New York and was elected Governor in a close-fought election. Within two years, he was elected Vice President of the United States.

In 1901, President William Mc Kinley was assassinated and Roosevelt became President at the age of 42, taking office at the youngest age of any U. S. President in history. Roosevelt attempted to move the Republican Party toward Progressivism, including trust busting and increased regulation of businesses. Roosevelt coined the phrase ""Square Deal"" to describe his domestic agenda, emphasizing that the average citizen would get a fair share under his policies.

As an outdoorsman and naturalist, he promoted the conservation movement. On the world stage, Roosevelt's policies were characterized by his slogan, ""Speak softly and carry a big stick"". Roosevelt was the force behind the completion of the Panama Canal, sent the Great White Fleet on a world tour to demonstrate American power, and negotiated an end to the Russo-Japanese War, for which he won the Nobel Peace Prize. Roosevelt was the first American to win the Nobel Prize in any field. Roosevelt declined to run for re-election in 1908. After leaving office, he embarked on a safari to Africa and a tour of Europe. On his return to the U. S., a bitter rift developed between Roosevelt and his anointed successor as president, William Howard Taft.

In 1912, Roosevelt attempted to wrest the Republican nomination from Taft, and when he failed, he launched the Bull Moose Party. In the ensuing election, Roosevelt became the only third-party candidate to come in second place, beating Taft but losing to Woodrow Wilson.

America's entry into the war (April 1917) was the climax of the Progressive Era: Wilson's aim was the extension of democracy and the creation of a just world order.

The Progressive Era

"The Progressive Era During the period known as the Progressive Era (1890s to about 1920) the U. S. government became increasingly activist in both domestic and foreign policy.

Progressive, that is, reform-minded, political leaders sought to extend their vision of a just and rational order to all areas of society and some, indeed, to all reaches of the globe. America Looks Outward. During the 1890s, U. S. foreign policy became aggressively activist. As American industrial productivity grew, many reformers urged the need for foreign markets.

Others held that the United States had a mission to carry Anglo-Saxon culture to all of humankind, to spread law and order and American civilization. In 1895 the United States intervened bluntly in the Venezuela Boundary Dispute between Venezuela and imperial Britain, warning that, under the Monroe Doctrine, American force might be used if Venezuela were not treated equitably.

A Cuban revolution against Spain, begun in 1895, finally led to the Spanish-American War (1898), undertaken to free Cuba. From that war the United States emerged with a protectorate over Cuba and an island empire consisting of the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and Guam.

The United States also annexed the Hawaii in 1898, completing a bridge to the markets of the Far East. In 1900 the American government announced the Open Door Policy, pledging to support continued Chinese independence as well as equal access for all nations to China's markets.

William Mc Kinley's assassination brought Theodore Roosevelt to the presidency in 1901. A proud patriot, he sought to make the United States a great power in the world. In 1903 he aided Panama in becoming independent of Colombia, then secured from Panama the right for the United States to build and control a canal through the isthmus.

In 1904, in the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine, he asserted the right of the United States to intervene in the internal affairs of Western Hemisphere nations to prevent ""chronic wrongdoing.""

The following year his good offices helped end the Russo-Japanese War. Having much strengthened the navy, Roosevelt sent (1907) the Great White Fleet on a spectacular round-the-world cruise to display American power.

Progressivism at Home. Meanwhile, the Progressive Era was also underway in domestic politics. City governments were transformed, becoming relatively honest and efficient; social workers labored to improve slum housing, health, and education; and in many states reform movements democratized, purified, and humanized government.

Under Roosevelt the national government strengthened or created regulatory agencies that exerted increasing influence over business enterprise: the Hepburn Act (1906) reinforced the Interstate Commerce Commission; the Forest Service, under Gifford Pinchot from 1898 to 1910, guided lumbering companies in the conservation of-and more rational and efficient exploitation of-woodland resources; the Pure Food and Drug Act (1906) attempted to protect consumers from fraudulent labeling and adulteration of products.

Beginning in 1902, Roosevelt also used the Justice Department and lawsuits (or the threat of them) to mount a revived assault on monopoly under the Sherman Anti-Trust Law.

William Howard Taft, his successor as president (1909-13), drew back in his policies, continuing only the antitrust campaign. He approved passage of the Sixteenth Amendment (the income tax amendment, 1913), however; in time it would transform the federal government by giving it access to enormous revenues.

Republicans were split in the election of 1912. The regular nomination went to Taft, and a short-lived Progressive party was formed to run Theodore Roosevelt.

Democrat Woodrow Wilson (1913-21) was therefore able to win the presidency. Attacking corporate power, he won a drastic lowering of the tariff (1913) and establishment of a Tariff Commission (1916); creation of the Federal Reserve System (1913) to supervise banking and currency; a broadened antimonopoly program under the Clayton Anti-Trust Act (1914); control over the hours of labor on the railroads (Adamson Act, 1916); and creation of a body to ensure fair and open competition in business (Fair Trade Commission, 1914).

During the Progressive Era, southern governments imposed a wide range of Jim Crow laws on black people, using the rationale that such legalization of segregation resulted in a more orderly, systematic electoral system and society.

Many of the steps that had been taken toward racial equality during the Reconstruction period were thus reversed. The federal government upheld the principle of racial segregation in the U. S. Supreme Court case Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), as long as blacks were provided with ""separate but equal"" facilities. In the face of the rigidly segregated society that confronted them, blacks themselves were divided concerning the appropriate course of action.

Since 1895, Booker T. Washington had urged that blacks should not actively agitate for equality, but should acquire craft skills, work industriously, and convince whites of their abilities. W. E. B. Du Bois insisted instead (in The Souls of Black Folk, 1903) that black people ceaselessly protest Jim Crow laws, demand education in the highest professions as well as in crafts, and work for complete social integration.

In 1910 the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was founded to advance these ideals. Intervention and World War. President Taft continued to stress the economic aspects of Roosevelt's interventionist spirit. Under Taft's foreign policy (called dollar diplomacy) U. S. firms were encouraged to increase investments in countries bordering the Caribbean in the hope that the American economic presence would ensure political stability there.

President Wilson went a step further, seeking not simply to maintain order, but to advance democracy and self-rule.

In 1915 he sent troops into Haiti to put an end to the chaos of revolution-and to protect U. S. investments there-and in 1916 he did the same in the Dominican Republic; the two countries were made virtual protectorates of the United States. With Nicaragua he achieved the same end by diplomacy. In hope of tumbling the Mexican dictator Victoriano Huerta, Wilson at first denied him diplomatic recognition, then in April 1914 sent troops to occupy the Mexican port city of Veracruz and keep from Huerta its import revenues.

The Mexicans were deeply offended, and in November 1914, Wilson withdrew American forces. The bloody civil war that racked Mexico until 1920 sent the first large migration of Mexicans, perhaps a million people, into the United States.

After the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, Wilson sought vainly to bring peace. In early 1917, however, Germany's unrestricted use of submarine attacks against neutral as well as Allied shipping inflamed American opinion for war. Wilson decided that if the United States was to have any hope of influencing world affairs, it was imperative that it enter the war and fight to protect democracy against what he called German autocracy.

America's entry into the war (April 1917) was the climax of the Progressive Era: Wilson's aim was the extension of democracy and the creation of a just world order.

W I April 6, 1917 The US entered World War One on April 6, 1917. This was a declaration of war by the US Senate. US declaired war against Germany on April 6, 1917 and later the same year against Austria - Hungary, December 7, 1917.

When did the US enter World War 1?

Answers.com ® Wiki Answers ® Categories History, Politics & Society History War and Military History World War 1 When did the US enter World War 1?

Flag When did the US enter World War 1? Answer by Tayben1996 Confidence votes 207The US declared war on April 6, 1917. However, it took time to mobilize soldiers for the army, and US forces were not fully engaged in France until the Spring offensive of 1918.

This allowed the US forces to be engaged to the greatest effect along many of the lines of battle. After Germany lost most of its territorial gains from the early part of the war, they were forced to end the war on November 11, 1918.

Although Woodrow Wilson opposed US involvement, he came to see it as unavoidable, given Germany's submarine warfare against US shipping. An attempt to draw Mexico into the conflict (the Zimmerman Telegram) also helped to sway US opinions. (see related questions) Start of W

The war came to an end on November 11, 1918 [armistice]. The Versailles treaty was signed on June 28, 1919.208 people found this useful Was this answer useful? Yes Somewhat No How did the US enter World War 1? Because of the assasination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria The assassination of Archduke Ferdinand started WW I, but it did not bring the US into the war. The US ca …Justin Blevins 19 Contributions How and Why Did the US Enter World War 1? The United States joined WW1 in 1917 It started in 1914.

For 5 Reasons . The Sinking Of The Lusitania . British Propaganda . Zimmerman Telegram . Germany resumes unrestr …Ayah Stayin'Strong 1 Contribution When did us enter World War 1? The U. S entered WW1 on April 6, 1917. Geechy Sir Stez 30 Contributions What year did the US enter World War 1?1917 smart What was the impact of the US entering World War 1?

On April 6, 1917, two days after the U. S. Senate votes 82 to 6 todeclare war against Germany, the U. S. House of Representativesendorses the decision by a vote of 373 to 50, an …Meagan Chrysanthemum 7,073 Contributions Why did the US enter War world 1?

Three reasons. 1. The Germans sunk the British cruise liner Lusitania. 128 of the dead were American citizens. 2. The Germans sent a telegram to Mexico to offer aid for an inv …Meagan Chrysanthemum 7,073 Contributions When and why did the US enter the world war 1? April of 1917 was the official American declaration of war on the Central Powers. Congress was driven to the decision by three things.

1. The 1915 sinking of the British Lusit …Why did the US enter into World War 1? The cruise ship RMS Lusitania was sunk by Germany killing 1198people, among whom were 128 Americans. This act, along with therelease of the Zimmermann Telegram in 1917, galvan …When did the US enter war world 1? In spite of the fact that many Americans wanted the country toremain neutral, the United States entered World War I on April 6,1917. World War I ended on November 11, 1918. When did the US enter world war 1 and 2?1941Why did US entered the world war 1?

To make the world a safer for democracy. Rugbykats 112 Contributions What year did the US entered world war 1? The U. S. entered World War I in 1917. Answered In US Civil War Why the US Delay Entering World War 1?

The US felt Europe should handle Europe's problem. Listening To Pink Floyd 15 Contributions Answered In World War 1What caused World War 1 and why did the US enter the war?

It was the assassination of Archduke Franz Firdinand that started World War I. The Americans were brought into WWI for that fact that the Germans sank some American ships, and …ADMYAMAMOTO 112 Contributions Answered In World War 1How did the US entering the World War 1 change World War 1?

Germany feared that if they could not defeat France before large American forces arrived they would have no chance. Germany launched its Kaiserslacht offensive in France in an …Answered In World War 1Why did the US enter the war World War 1? One of the reasons was the British interception of the Zimmerman Note or Zimmerman Telegram. This was when Arthur Zimmerman telegraphed the Germany ambassador in Mexico to tel …Answered In World War 1Why did US enter the world war 1 and when did they enter? The USA joined in the war because the USA was part of the Triple alliance in the first place, and after Germany attacked the USA's submarines and battleships, they then joined …

. Wilson cited Germany's violation of its pledge to suspend unrestricted submarine warfare in the North Atlantic and the Mediterranean, and its attempts to entice Mexico into an alliance against the United States, as his reasons for declaring war. On April 4, 1917, the U. S. Senate voted in support of the measure to declare war on Germany. The House concurred two days later. The United States later declared war on Austria-Hungary on December 7, 1917.

American Entry into World War I, 1917

"American Entry into World War I, 1917On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson went before a joint session of Congress to request a declaration of war against Germany

Germany's resumption of submarine attacks on passenger and merchant ships in 1917 was the primary motivation behind Wilson's decision to lead the United States into World War I. Following the sinking of an unarmed French boat, the Sussex, in the English Channel in March 1916, Wilson had threatened to sever diplomatic relations with Germany, unless the German Government refrained from attacking all passenger ships, and allowed the crews of enemy merchant vessels to escape from their ships prior to any attack. On May 4, 1916, the German Government had accepted these terms and conditions in what came to be known as the "" Sussex pledge.

""By January 1917, however, the situation in Germany had changed. During a wartime conference that month, representatives from the German navy convinced the military leadership and Kaiser Wilhelm II that a resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare could help defeat Great Britain within five months.

German policymakers argued that they could violate the ""Sussex pledge,"" because the United States could no longer be considered a neutral party after supplying munitions and financial assistance to the Allies. Germany also believed that the United States had jeopardized its neutrality by acquiescing to the Allied blockade of Germany. Germany's Chancellor, Theobald von Bethmann-Hollweg, protested this decision, as he believed that resuming submarine warfare would draw the United States into the war on behalf of the Allies.

This, he argued, would lead to the defeat of Germany. Despite these warnings, the German Government decided to resume unrestricted submarine attacks on all Allied and neutral shipping within prescribed war zones, reckoning that German submarines would end the war long before the first American troopship arrived in Europe.

Accordingly, on January 31, 1917, the German Ambassador to the United States, Count Johann von Bernstorff, presented U. S. Secretary of State Robert Lansing with a note declaring Germany's intention to restart unrestricted submarine warfare the following day. Stunned by the news, President Wilson went before Congress on February 3 to announce that he had severed diplomatic relations with Germany.

However, he refrained from asking for a declaration of war because he doubted that the American public would support him unless there was ample proof that Germany intended to attack U. S. ships with no warning. Wilson left open the possibility of negotiating with Germany if its submarines refrained from attacking American shipping. Nevertheless, throughout February and March 1917, German submarines targeted and sunk several American ships, and many American passengers and seamen died. On February 26, Wilson asked Congress for authority to arm American merchant ships with U. S. naval personnel and equipment.

While the measure would probably have passed in a vote, several anti-war Senators led a successful filibuster that consumed the remainder of the Congressional session. Despite the rebuff from Congress, Wilson decided to arm American merchant ships by executive order, claiming that an old anti-piracy law gave him the authority to do so.

While Wilson weighed his options regarding the submarine issue, he also had to address the question of Germany's attempts to cement a secret alliance with Mexico. On January 19, 1917, British naval intelligence intercepted and decrypted a telegram sent by German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmerman to the German Ambassador in Mexico City. The ""Zimmerman Telegram"" promised the Mexican Government that Germany would help Mexico recover the territory it had ceded to the United States following the Mexican-American War.

In return for this assistance, the Germans asked for Mexican support in the war. The British had initially not shared the news of the Zimmerman Telegram with U. S. officials, because they did not want the Germans to discover that British code breakers had cracked the German code.

However, following Germany's resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare in February, the British decided to use the note to help sway American official and public opinion to join the war. The British finally forwarded the intercept to Wilson on February 24. The American press carried the story the following week.

Despite the shocking news of the Zimmerman Telegram, Wilson still hesitated to ask for a declaration of war. He waited until March 20 before convening a Cabinet meeting to broach the matter--almost a month after he had first seen the telegram.

The precise reasons for Wilson's decision to choose war in 1917 remain the subject of debate among historians, especially in light of his efforts to avoid war in 1915 after the sinking of the British passenger liners Lusitania and Arabic, which had led to the deaths of 131 Americans.

However, by 1917, the continued submarine attacks on American merchant and passenger ships, and the ""Zimmerman Telegram's"" implied threat of a German attack on the United States, had served to sway American public opinion in support of a declaration of war.

Furthermore, international law stipulated that the placing of U. S. naval personnel on civilian ships to protect them from German submarines already constituted an act of war against Germany. Finally, the Germans, by their actions, had demonstrated that they had no interest in seeking an end to the conflict. These reasons all contributed to President Wilson's decision to ask Congress for a declaration of war against Germany. They also encouraged Congress to grant Wilson's request and formally declare war on Germany. "

How did the submarine warfare help lead the United States into World War 1? The submarine sank and all the supplies were gone Identify 3 factors that led to the outbreak of World War 1?

Chapter 20 and 21

"131 terms sannidhi Chapter 20 and 21Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set? Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort How did the United States demonstrate its growing interest in the pacific and in the latin America? Trade, acquired new land, and created foreign policies. How did the United States acquired the new territory and expand trade in the Asia - pacific region?

They asked them politely, if they say no then they would get killed How did the United States get Japan to open trade? Matthew C. Perry presented Japan a letter from the president to open trade How did the United States get Alaska?

Russia wanted to sell it so Seward bought it for $7.2 million about 2cent per acre Isolationism: avoiding involvement in other countries affair Imperialism: building empires by imposing political and economic control over peoples around the world increase world affair increase sphere of influence biggest impact was on Africa What is the Turner thesis?

idea that started the western frontier had defined American history What arguments did expansionists make? some accepted because it will help the nation renew its vitality and strength How did the United States get Hawaii?

Americans annexed Hawaii then Congress made Hawaii a territory of the U. SSpheres of influence: areas where another nation has economic and political control What is the open door policy/goal? open door policy is that he wanted all nations to trade with china on an equal basis What is the boxer rebellion? Boxers wanted to expel foreigners What benefit did Seward seen in acquiring Alaska? stepping stone for trade with Asia and the Pacific Why did people call the purchase of Alaska lands "" Seward's Folly"" looked like a frozen wasteland In what 3 ways did U.

S supporters of expansion justify increased involvement in world affairs? Isolationism, imperialism and sphere of influence How did the division of samoa and the annexation of the Hawaiian Islands benefit the United States?

- it gave beauty, sunshine, beaches, and rolling surf - could serve as a military and commercial outpost in the pacific What were the causes and effects of the Spanish American war?

Causes - Spain and Cuba were fighting Effects: U. S got many land/colonies got self governmentreconcentration: is the forced movement of large #'s of people into detention camps for military or political reasons Why was the Maine in havana harbor?

to protect American lives and property Why did the U. S go to war? Spanish American War settlement would disrupt the U. S economy What lands did Spain lose in the Caribbean? Cuba, Philippines, Puerto Rico Protectorate: is an independent country whose policies are controlled by an outside power How did the treatment of Cuba, puerto rico, and the Philippines differ?

the US controlled each differntly What role did the press play in rallying American support for a war in Cuba? gave news What motivated the United States to enter into a war with Spain? Spain and Cuba may disrupt US economy What were the terms of the peace treaty between the United States and Spain?

all colonies have their own self government How had the United States replaced Spain as a colonial power in the world? it gave them the right to have their own self government How did the United States use the Monroe Doctrine to justify intervention in Latin America?

it prevented the US spread of influenceisthmus: is a narrow strip or land joining two larger areas of land How did the revolt in Panama Start? dislike, forced by U. SHow did the United States help rebels in Panama? fight, allies, weapons What disease was common while building the canals? malaria and yellow fever What was the ""big ditch""? they had to dig a mile ditch through mountains What problems did canal builders overcome?

death, diseases Roosevelt corollary: he wanted to prevent European nations using military force to collect over due debts from the Dominican Republic Corollary logical extension of a doctrine or Proposition William Howard Taft Dollar Diplomacy: urged US bankers and business to invest heavily in Asia and Latin America Dollar Diplomacy a policy based on the idea that economic tries were the best way to expand american influence How did Roosevelt build on the Monroe Doctrine?

he created the Roosevelt Corollary Why was the building of a canal important to the United States? Shorter route between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans What event led to the eventual building of the Panama Canal?

Panama Vs Colombia According to president wilson what was the goal of U. S Foreign Policy? to support and nurture democracy throughout the world How did the Foreign Policies of president Roosevelt and Taft differ?

Roosevelt extended the monroe Doctrine while Taft was to help American influence How did imperialism conflict with isolationism in U. S Foreign Policy? isolationism didn't want involvement with other countries affairs but imperialism was thatwhy did foreign nations want to establish spheres of influence in china?

everyone receives fair amount Why was Theodore Roosevelt's foreign policy seen as a corollary to the monroe doctrine? because it claimed the right to use force to prevent intervention in Latin Americawhat was the goal of Taft's dollar diplomacy? protect US economic investments in Latin America and in other regions Why was an isthmus a good place to build a canal?

the panama canal was to connect two places like an isthmus How did buying Alaska provide economic benefits? stepping stone for trade with Asia and the pacific In what region of the world did European powers gain control by 1900? Cuba, Panama, philippines Puerto Rico, Spain What impact did the expansion policies of European countries have on the foreign policy or the united states? it made it create the policies How did the United States gain overseas empires? They brought warfare so if they said no, they would get killed How did Roosevelt apply his ""big stick"" policy to Latin America?

The claim was the leader of the Western Hemisphere How was Taft's dollar diplomacy like the Roosevelt Corollary?

helped the U. S economy Frederick Jackson Turner: created Turner thesis that the western Frontier had defined American History Jose Marti cuban exiles leader, urged the U.

S to help with rebels William Randolph Hearst Journalist of the New York journal; tried to outdo Pulitzer in the use of sensational stories and headlines ( yellow journalism)Emilio Aguinaldo a rebel leader, helped seized Manila from the spanish What were the causes and effects of world war I? Causes: imperialism, nationalism, militarism, secret alliances, and assassination of arch duke Ferdinand effects: many loses and Germany was blamed Militarism The glorification of the military qualification of the military leaders have european influence gaining military status Nationalism Pride in once nation or ethnic group big role great powers thought they could win not good (could be good) pride in culture (country)How did nationalism contribute to the war?

boosted tensions Stalemate deadlocktrench warfare soldiers fire on one an other from opposing lines of dug out trenches groups shelter themselves to keep away from gunfire caused by machine guns underground holes did not protect them best way to put poison gas How did technology make the war more deadly? By having new weapons like poison gases, machine guns Propaganda is a spread of information designed to win support for a cause How did the war in Europe divide Americans? some wanted to stay out of the war and some wanted to fight agains Europe What was the Zimmerman Telegram/ Note it proposed that Mexico should join Germany's side

How did the submarine warfare help lead the United States into World War 1? The submarine sank and all the supplies were gone Identify 3 factors that led to the outbreak of World War 1?

imperialism, nationalism, and militarism What alternatives did European nations and when their Allies entered the war? faced hardships, toughness How did Wilson try to maintain neutrality? he kept the US from entering into the war, gave supplies to the British What steps did the United States government take to prepare the nation for war? trained military, drafts, and made everyone involved in the war by slogans, advertisements, newspapersmoblize is to prepare for warilliterate unable to read and write How did the United States built its military force?

drafts, volunteers, nurses How did the government build public support for the war effort? propaganda, patriotism, cartoons, posters, Liberty Bonds What steps did the United States take to mobilize for the war? high military training, drafts, everyone should be involved in the war How did the arrival of American troops in Europe affect the course of the war?

we were much strongerconvoy is al large group of merchants vessels sailing togethercommunism is an economic and political system based on the idea that social classes and the right to private property should be eliminated What role did American troops play at Belleau Wood?

contributed to the wararmistice is a halt in fighting that allows peace talks to begin How did the war end? many soldiers lost their lives Identify two ways the Americans contributed to the Allied victory? treaty and armistice How did the Treaty of Versailles and the league of Nations disappoint President Wilson? wilson didn't agree with itself determination is the right of a group to decide its own form of government What was the goal of the 14 points?

peace plan, to prevent future warsreperations payments to over war damages How did the Treaty of Versailles punish Germany? they didn't allow German leaders to come into the meeting to create the treaty Why did Lodge oppose the League of Nations?

the thinks that it would restrict the right of the United States to act independently in its own interestdeported returned to their home country What problems affected the postwar United States?

influenza epidemic, labor unrest, and red scare How did the Treaty of Versailles meet Wilson's goal? they both ended the war so all nations can have peace Why did Wilson refuse to compromise with critics of the League of Nations?

it wouldn't let the United States act independently John J. Pershing commander of the American Expeditionary Force Vladimir Lenin leader of a radical faction known as the Bolsheviks What did Wilson want to do? spread democracydid many americans support or not support imperialism in the 20th century? many americans supported itlist the order of who declared war?

Austria Hungary declares war on Serbia Russia declares war on Austria Hungary Germany declares war on Russia France declares war on Germany List the central powers Germany Austria Hungary Bulgaria Ottoman Empire List the allied powers France Russia Great Britain What were the the positive effects of the war? more jobs for women and minorities better wages and working conditions How did the Espionage and Sedition Acts impact Americans?

it violated the 1st amendment What did Congress issue for the first time in the Civil War? they instituted a draft War Industry Board settlement disagreements between workers and management so production stays high What is ""No mans land""?

is land between the trenches What is the Treat of Brest Litovsk? separate treaty between central powers and Russia left the war What is the Big Four? US, Great Britain, France, and Italy What was the controversy about the peace treaty? how deeply the central powers should be punished What were Wilson's 14 points?

plan for postwar in Europe plan for avoiding future wars describe future of specific places self determination league of nations What was the vision of the League of Nations? prevent future wars settle disputes protect democracy IT FAILEDWhat was included in the Treaty of Versailles?

Germany lost land, they had to pay reparations, and took blame Poland was restored Austria Hungary splitalliances Germany formed alliance with France formed friendship so they get help if there in any conflictstalemate deadlock no one was winning nothing was happening no movementpropaganda spread of untrue information Americans fought against France and they spread untrue information What was the result of the Boxer Rebellion in China?

The boxers were defeated, and the United States reaffirmed its right to trade in China Which of the following was made easier by the building of the Panama Canal? shipping Which of the following happened first? the destruction of the battleship Maine Who directed the effort to overcome yellow fever and malaria in the Panama Canal Zone William C. Gorgas Alfred T. Mahan was in favor of building a powerful American Navy Which of the following is incorrectly paired?

Matthew C. Perry-Liberty Bonds Which of the following would a European opponent of Wilson's Fourteen Points peace plan be most likely to say?

""The League of Nations would not punish the Central Powers enough. ""During World War I, which of the following was NOT a stateside action taken by individuals to support the war effort?

making weapons by hand Which of the following did NOT rebel against foreign influences? Alaska The United States acquired Hawaii as a result of a treaty of annexationwhen Theodore Roosevelt said, ""Speak softly and carry a big stick,"" he meant that the United States wanted to solve problems through diplomacy but would not hesitate to use military force What happened in Russia in March, 1917?

Tsar Nicholas II was overthrown What was the American Protective League? an organized group of people who spied on their neighbors How did Herbert Hoover assist America in World War I by heading up a new Food Administration Soldiers returning home after the war and seeking jobs resulted in high unemployment "

Answer The United States fought Germany, Austria-Hungary and other members of the Central powers in World War I. America's primary enemy was Germany due to several of its actions designed to shift the war to its advantage. The main factors that contributed were the sinking of the Lusitania and the Zimmermann Telegram.

Who Did We Fight in World War I?

History Modern History World War 2Q: Who Did We Fight in World War I? A: Quick

Continue Reading Keep Learning Why Did World War I Begin in August 1914? What Were Some of the Long-Term Effects of World War II? Who Was in World War I? Full Answer German U-Boat submarines sank a British transatlantic liner, the RMS Lusitania, on May 7, 1915. The ship was carrying 128 American passengers. Up until this point, German submarine warfare was unrestricted. After a warning from President Wilson about violating international law concerning submarine warfare, the Germans relented but proceeded to attack merchant ships that were carrying goods to the United Kingdom and other Allied nations.

The other cause for the United States' entry into World War I was the Zimmermann Telegram. This was a telegram Germany sent to Mexico, urging Mexico to become Germany's ally and attack the United States' southern border. In return, Germany promised to provide Mexico with its former territories of Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

President Wilson received the note from the United States embassy in Great Britain and made the note public. The American public and Congress then resolved to go to war against Germany. Learn more about World War 2Sources: mtholyoke.edu historymatters.gmu.edu Related Questions Q: What Were the Causes and Effects of World War II?

A: The main cause of World War II was the rise of the Nazi Party in Germany and its subsequent invasion of other countries. The causes can be linked back to W... Full Answer >Filed Under: World War 2Q: Could World War II Have Been Prevented?

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The events of the first few months of 1917, from the resumption of unrestricted submarine attacks to the Zimmerman telegram, broke the back of the antiwar movement and substantially increased enthusiasm for American intervention.

"home | many pasts | evidence | www.history | blackboard | referencetalking history | syllabi | students | teachers | puzzle | about us“It Has No Popular Support”: Robert M. La Follette Votes Against a Declaration of War

But some dissident voices remained. Among the firmest congressional opponents was the progressive Wisconsin senator Robert M. La Follette. On April 4, 1917, two days after President Woodrow Wilson’s call for war, La Follette argued in this speech before Congress that the United States had not been even-handed in its treatment of British and German violations of American neutrality.

A Republican senator from a state with a large agricultural and German-American population, La Follette worried that the war would divert attention from domestic reform efforts. But even in Wisconsin La Follette met opposition; the state legislature censured him, as did some of his longtime progressive allies.

One of them said that he was “of more help to the Kaiser than a quarter of a million troops.”Mr. President, I had supposed until recently that it was the duty of senators and representatives in Congress to vote and act according to their convictions on all public matters that came before them for consideration and decision.

Quite another doctrine has recently been promulgated by certain newspapers, which unfortunately seems to have found considerable support elsewhere, and that is the doctrine of “standing back of the President” without inquiring whether the President is right or wrong. For myself, I have never subscribed to that doctrine and never shall. I shall support the President in the measures he proposes when I believe them to be right.

I shall oppose measures proposed by the President when I believe them to be wrong. The fact that the matter which the President submits for consideration is of the greatest importance is only an additional reason why we should be sure that we are right and not to be swerved from that conviction or intimidating in its expression by any influence of its power whatsoever.

If it is important for us to speak and vote our convictions in matters of internal policy, though we may unfortunately be in disagreement with the President, it is infinitely more important for us to speak and vote our convictions when the question is one of peace or war, certain to involve the lives and fortunes of many of our people and, it may be, the destiny of all of them and of the civilized world as well.

If, unhappily, on such momentous questions the most patient research and conscientious consideration we could give to them leave us in disagreement with the President, I know of no course to take except to oppose, regretfully but not the less firmly, the demands of the Executive.

. . . Mr. President, many of my colleagues on both sides of this floor have from day to day offered for publication in the Record messages and letters received from their constituents I have received some 15,000 letters and telegrams.

They have come from forty-four states in the Union. They have been assorted according to whether they speak in criticism or commendation of my course in opposing war. Assorting the 15,000 letters and telegrams by states in that way, 9 out of 10 are an unqualified endorsement of my course in opposing war with Germany on the issue presented.

I offer only a few selected hastily just before I came upon the floor which especially relate to public sentiment on the question of war. . . . I have this from Sheboygan, Wis. Sheboygan is a rather strong German county in the State of Wisconsin.

I expected to have had here noted on the telegram the exact percentage of the German vote. I glanced at it myself in my office, but I did not have at hand the last census. The Wisconsin Bluebook, which gives the figures for 1905, shows there were then over 50,000 population and 10,000 of German birth. This telegram is dated April 3. I might say that our spring election is held in Wisconsin on the 2d day of April, when all the municipal officers in the townships and in the villages and cities are elected. It brings out a fairly representative vote: Sheboygan, Wis. April 3, 1917. Hon. Robert M. La Follette.

Washington, D. C.: By referendum vote taken the last two days of the qualified electors of the city of Sheboygan on the question, Shall our country enter into the European war? 4,082 voted no and 17 voted yes. Certified to as correct. F. Volrath,O. A. Bassuener,Adam Trester,Canvassers.

I received also the following. A vote was taken not only in the city of Sheboygan, but in the county of Sheboygan, representing the country or farmer vote: Sheboygan, Wis. April 4, 1917. Hon. Robert M. La Follette. Washington, D. C.: Dear Sir: Since sending the last telegram, in the referendum vote taken by the qualified electors of Sheboygan County outside the city of Sheboygan 2,051 voted against our country entering into the European war.

No votes were cast in favor of war. Certified to as correct by the canvassers. Otto A. Bassuener. F. Volrath. Adam Trester. The next telegram is not a report upon any election. I presume very few of them were held.

It is a telegram from Melrose, Mass., sent to me by Mr. Henry W. Pinkham. I do not know him. I read it as handed to me by one of my secretaries: Melrose, Mass., April 3, 1917. Senator Robert M. La Follette. Washington, D. C.: The President’s message explicitly and completely vindicates you in opposing armed neutrality.

Stand firm against war and the future will honor you. Collective homicide can not establish human rights. For our country to enter the European war would be treason to humanity. Henry W. Pinkham. And the following: Wallace, Idaho, April 3, 1917.

Senator La Follette. Washington, D. C.: Mailed to you to-day 400 signatures of endorsement from this district to you and colleagues on your stand of March 4. L. Schuller. Racine, Wis., April 4, 1917. Senator Robert M. La Follette. Washington, D. C.: Four thousand people assembled at the auditorium last night: lots American sentiment: no enthusiasm for war: recruits were asked for: only seven men offered themselves for enlistment. This shows there is no war sentiment in Racine. Resolutions were spoke of, but no attempt was made to pass them.

Audience was not for war. I approve your stand. Arthur Ehrlick. Seattle, Wash., April 4, 1917. Robert M. La Follette. Senate Chamber Washington, D. C.: Good work. People with you. Straw referendum signed to-day at public market, city streets, shows 31 for war declaration, 374 against.

Press brazenly reporting war demand of meetings where vote is against war. If presidential election were tomorrow, you would have best chance.

Anna Louise Strong. Member Seattle School Board Berkeley, Cal., April 4, 1917. Senator R. M. La Follette. Washington, D. C.: Having sounded the opinions of juniors and seniors taking electrical engineering at the University of California to-day, I have foundation on which to base my statement that practically none of us enthuse at all over war.

We believe the country can do most good by avoiding it. We put trust in you. Glenn K. Morrison. Mr. La Follette.

In addition to the foregoing telegrams, I submit the following, which has just been placed in my hands: A wire from Chicago received this afternoon from Grace Abbott, of Hull House, says that in City Council election held yesterday, John Kennedy received the largest plurality of any of the city councilmen elected.

His plurality was 6,157 votes in his ward. On account of his stand against war, every newspaper in Chicago opposed him bitterly throughout the campaign. Mr. Kennedy made his campaign on the war issue, and in every speech he took occasion to declare himself as against war.

There was received in Washington today a petition against war with over 6,120 bona-fide signers, which were secured in the city of Minneapolis in one day; and a wire late this afternoon states that 11,000 more names have been secured to that petition. In New Ulm, Minn., at an election, according to a telegram received this afternoon, 485 votes were cast against war to 19 for war.

. . . These messages indicate on the part of the people a deep-seated conviction that the United States should not enter the European war?

. . . It is unfortunately true that a portion of the irresponsible and war-crazed press, feeling secure in the authority of the President’s condemnation of the senators who opposed the armed-ship bill, have published the most infamous and scurrilous libels on the honor of the senators who opposed that bill. It was particularly unfortunate that such malicious falsehoods should fill the public press of the country at a time when every consideration for our country required that a spirit of fairness should be observed in the discussions of the momentous questions under consideration.

. . . The poor, sir, who are the ones called upon to rot in the trenches, have no organized power, have no press to voice their will upon this question of peace or war; but, oh, Mr. President, at some time they will be heard. I hope and I believe they will be heard in an orderly and a peaceful way. I think they may be heard from before long.

I think, sir, if we take this step, when the people today who are staggering under the burden of supporting families at the present prices of the necessaries of life find those prices multiplied, when they are raised 100 percent, or 200 percent, as they will be quickly, aye, sir, when beyond that those who pay taxes come to have their taxes doubled and again doubled to pay the interest on the nontaxable bonds held by [J. P.] Morgan and his combinations, which have been issued to meet this war, there will come an awakening; they will have their day and they will be heard.

It will be as certain and as inevitable as the return of the tides, and as resistless, too. . . . In his message of April 2, the President said: We have no quarrel with the German people—it was not upon their impulse that their government acted in entering this war; it was not with their previous knowledge or approval.

Again he says: We are, let me say again, sincere friends of the German people and shall desire nothing so much as the early re-establishment of intimate relations of mutual advantage between us. At least, the German people, then, are not outlaws. What is the thing the President asks us to do to these German people of whom he speaks so highly and whose sincere friends he declares us to be?

Here is what he declares we shall do in this war. We shall undertake, he says—The utmost practicable cooperation in council and action with the governments now at war with Germany, and as an incident to that, the extension to those governments of the most liberal financial credits in order that our resources may so far as possible, be added to theirs.“Practicable cooperation!” Practicable cooperation with England and her allies in starving to death the old men and women, the children, the sick and the maimed of Germany.

The thing we are asked to do is the thing I have stated. It is idle to talk of a war upon a government only.

We are leagued in this war, or it is the President’s proposition that we shall be so leagued, with the hereditary enemies of Germany. Any war with Germany, or any other country for that matter, would be bad enough, but there are not words strong enough to voice my protest against the proposed combination with the Entente Allies.

When we cooperate with those governments we endorse their methods; we endorse the violations of international law by Great Britain; we endorse the shameful methods of warfare against which we have again and again protested in this war; we endorse her purpose to wreak upon the German people the animosities which for years her people have been taught to cherish against Germany; finally, when the end comes, whatever it may be, we find ourselves in cooperation with our ally, Great Britain and if we cannot resist now the pressure she is exerting to carry us into the war, how can we hope to resist, then, the thousand fold greater pressure she will exert to bend us to her purposes and compel compliance with her demands?

We do not know what they are. We do not know what is in the minds of those who have made the compact, but we are to subscribe to it.

We are irrevocably, by our votes here, to marry ourselves to a non-divorceable proposition veiled from us now. Once enlisted, once in the copartnership, we will be carried through with the purposes, whatever they may be, of which we now know nothing.

Sir, if we are to enter upon this war in the manner the President demands, let us throw pretense to the winds, let us be honest, let us admit that this is a ruthless war against not only Germany’s Army and her Navy but against her civilian population as well, and frankly state that the purpose of Germany’s hereditary European enemies has become our purpose.

Again, the President says “we are about to accept the gage of battle with this natural foe of liberty and shall, if necessary, spend the whole force of the nation to check and nullify its pretensions and its power.” That much, at least, is clear; that program is definite. The whole force and power of this nation, if necessary, is to be used to bring victory to the Entente Allies, and to us as their ally in this war.

Remember, that not yet has the “whole force” of one of the warring nations been used. Countless millions are suffering from want and privation; countless other millions are dead and rotting on foreign battlefields; countless other millions are crippled and maimed, blinded, and dismembered; upon all and upon their children’s children for generations to come has been laid a burden of debt which must be worked out in poverty and suffering, but the “whole force” of no one of the warring nations has yet been expended; but our “whole force” shall be expended, so says the President.

We are pledged by the President, so far as he can pledge us, to make this fair, free, and happy land of ours the same shambles and bottomless pit of horror that we see in Europe today.

Just a word of comment more upon one of the points in the President’s address. He says that this is a war “for the things which we have always carried nearest to our hearts—for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own government.” In many places throughout the address is this exalted sentiment given expression.

It is a sentiment peculiarly calculated to appeal to American hearts and, when accompanied by acts consistent with it, is certain to receive our support; but in this same connection, and strangely enough, the President says that we have become convinced that the German government as it now exists—“Prussian autocracy” he calls it—can never again maintain friendly relations with us.

His expression is that “Prussian autocracy was not and could never be our friend,” and repeatedly throughout the address the suggestion is made that if the German people would overturn their government, it would probably be the way to peace. So true is this that the dispatches from London all hailed the message of the President as sounding the death knell of Germany’s government.

But the President proposes alliance with Great Britain, which, however liberty-loving its people, is a hereditary monarchy, with a hereditary ruler, with a hereditary House of Lords, with a hereditary landed system, with a limited and restricted suffrage for one class and a multiplied suffrage power for another, and with grinding industrial conditions for all the wage workers. The President has not suggested that we make our support of Great Britain conditional to her granting home rule to Ireland, or Egypt, or India.

We rejoice in the establishment of a democracy in Russia, but it will hardly be contended that if Russia was still an autocratic government, we would not be asked to enter this alliance with her just the same.

Italy and the lesser powers of Europe, Japan in the Orient; in fact, all the countries with whom we are to enter into alliance, except France and newly revolutionized Russia, are still of the old order—and it will be generally conceded that no one of them has done as much for its people in the solution of municipal problems and in securing social and industrial reforms as Germany.

Is it not a remarkable democracy which leagues itself with allies already far overmatching in strength the German nation and holds out to such beleaguered nation the hope of peace only at the price of giving up their government? I am not talking now of the merits or demerits of any government, but I am speaking of a profession of democracy that is linked in action with the most brutal and domineering use of autocratic power. Are the people of this country being so well-represented in this war movement that we need to go abroad to give other people control of their governments?

Will the President and the supporters of this war bill submit it to a vote of the people before the declaration of war goes into effect?

Until we are willing to do that, it becomes us to offer as an excuse for our entry into the war the unsupported claim that this war was forced upon the German people by their government “without their previous knowledge or approval.”Who has registered the knowledge or approval of the American people of the course this Congress is called upon to take in declaring war upon Germany?

Submit the question to the people, you who support it. You who support it dare not do it, for you know that by a vote of more than ten to one the American people as a body would register their declaration against it.

In the sense that this war is being forced upon our people without their knowing why and without their approval, and that wars are usually forced upon all peoples in the same way, there is some truth in the statement; but I venture to say that the response which the German people have made to the demands of this war shows that it has a degree of popular support which the war upon which we are entering has not and never will have among our people.

The espionage bills, the conscription bills, and other forcible military measures which we understand are being ground out of the war machine in this country is the complete proof that those responsible for this war fear that it has no popular support and that armies sufficient to satisfy the demand of the Entente Allies cannot be recruited by voluntary enlistments. . . . Now, I want to repeat: It was our absolutely right as a neutral to ship food to the people of Germany.

That is a position that we have fought for through all of our history. The correspondence of every secretary of state in the history of our government who has been called upon to deal with the rights of our neutral commerce as to foodstuffs is the position stated by Lord Salisbury. . . . In the first days of the war with Germany, Great Britain set aside, so far as her own conduct was concerned, all these rules of civilized naval warfare.

According to the Declaration of London, well as the rules of international law, there could have been no interference in trade between the United States and Holland or Scandinavia and other countries, except in the case of ships which could be proven to carry absolute contraband, like arms and ammunition, with ultimate German destination.

There could have been no interference with the importation into Germany of any goods on the free list, such as cotton, rubber, and hides. There could have properly been no interference with our export to Germany of anything on the conditional contraband list, like flour, grain, and provisions, unless it could be proven by England that such shipments were intended for the use of the German Army.

There could be no lawful interference with foodstuffs intended for the civilian population of Germany, and if those foodstuffs were shipped to other countries to be reshipped to Germany no question could be raised that they were not intended for the use of the civilian population.

It is well to recall at this point our rights as declared by the Declaration of London and as declared without the Declaration of London by settled principles of international law, for we have during the present war become so used to having Great Britain utterly disregard our rights on the high seas that we have really forgotten that we have any, as far as Great Britain and her allies are concerned.

Great Britain, by what she called her modifications of the Declaration of London, shifted goods from the free list to the conditional contraband and contraband lists, reversed the presumption of destination for civilian population, and abolished the principle that a blockade to exist at all must be effective.

It is not my purpose to go into detail into the violations of our neutrality by any of the belligerents. While Germany has again and again yielded to our protests, I do not recall a single instance in which a protest we have made to Great Britain has won for us the slightest consideration, except for a short time in the case of cotton.

I will not stop to dwell upon the multitude of minor violations of our neutral rights, such as seizing our mails, violations of the neutral flag, seizing and appropriating our goods without the least warrant or authority in law, and impressing, seizing, and taking possession of our vessels and putting them into her own service.

I have constituents, American citizens, who organized a company and invested large sums of money in the purchase of ships to engage in foreign carrying.

Several of their vessels plying between the United States and South America were captured almost in our own territorial waters, taken possession of by the British Government, practically confiscated, and put into her service or the service of her Admiralty. They are there today, and that company is helpless. When they appealed to our Department of State, they were advised that they might “file” their papers; and were given the further suggestion that they could hire an attorney and prosecute their case in the English Prize Court.

The company did hire an attorney and sent him to England, and he is there now, and has been there for almost a year, trying to get some redress, some relief, some adjustment of those rights.

But those are individual cases. There are many others. All these violations have come from Great Britain and her allies, and are in perfect harmony with Briton’s traditional policy as absolute master of the seas.

. . . The only reason why we have not suffered the sacrifice of just as many ships and just as many lives from the violation of our rights by the war zone and the submarine mines of Great Britain as we have through the unlawful acts of Germany in making her war zone in violation of our neutral rights is simply because we have submitted to Great Britain’s dictation.

If our ships had been sent into her forbidden high-sea war zone as they have into the proscribed area Germany marked out on the high seas as a war zone, we would have had the same loss of life and property in the one case as in the other; but because we avoided doing that, in the case of England, and acquiesced in her violation of law, we have not only a legal but a moral responsibility for the position in which Germany has been placed by our collusion and cooperation with Great Britain. By suspending the rule with respect to neutral rights in Great Britain’s case, we have been actively aiding her in starving the civil population of Germany.

We have helped to drive Germany into a corner, her back to the wall, to fight with what weapons she can lay her hands on to prevent the starving of her women and children, her old men and babes.

The flimsy claim which has sometimes been put forth that possibly the havoc in the North Sea was caused by German mines is too absurd for consideration. . . . I am talking now about principles. You cannot distinguish between the principles which allowed England to mine a large area of the Atlantic Ocean and the North Sea in order to shut in Germany, and the principle on which Germany by her submarines seeks to destroy all shipping which enters the war zone which she has laid out around the British Isles.

The English mines are intended to destroy without warning every ship that enters the war zone she has proscribed, killing or drowning every passenger that cannot find some means of escape. It is neither more nor less than that which Germany tries to do with her submarines in her war zone. We acquiesced in England’s action without protest. It is proposed that we now go to war with Germany for identically the same action upon her part.

. . . I say again that when two nations are at war any neutral nation, in order to preserve its character as a neutral nation, must exact the same conduct from both warring nations; both must equally obey the principles of international law. If a neutral nation fails in that, then its rights upon the high seas—to adopt the President’s phrase—are relative and not absolute. There can be no greater violation of our neutrality than the requirement that one of two belligerents shall adhere to the settled principles of law and that the other shall have the advantage of not doing so.

The respect that German naval authorities were required to pay to the rights of our people upon the high seas would depend upon the question whether we had exacted the same rights from German’s enemies. If we had not done so, we lost our character as a neutral nation and our people unfortunately had lost the protection that belongs to neutrals. Our responsibility was joint in the sense that we must exact the same conduct from both belligerents.

The failure to treat the belligerent nations of Europe alike, the failure to reject the unlawful “war zones” of both Germany and Great Britain is wholly accountable for our present dilemma.

We should not seek to hide our blunder behind the smoke of battle to inflame the mind of our people by half truths into the frenzy of war in order that they may never appreciate the real cause of it until it is too late. I do not believe that our national honor is served by such a course. The right way is the honorable way. Source: Congressional Record —Senate, April 4, 1917, 224–225. See Also: The Zimmerman Telegram: Bringing America Closer to War War Is ""a Blessing, Not a Curse"": The Case for Why We Must Fight The War and the Intellectuals: Randolph Bourne Vents His Animus Against War""I Didn't Raise My Boy to Be a Soldier"": Singing Against the War Making the World ""Safe for Democracy"": Woodrow Wilson Asks for War "

What effect did the Zimmerman note have on the United States' position in the war? a) It pushed the United States to join the war on the side of the Central Powers. b) It made the United States suspend its trade embargo with Germany c) It was another reason for the United States to join the war on the side of the Allies d) It helped the United States decide to halt trade with Mexico

What effect did the Zimmerman note have on the United States' position in the war? a) It pushed the United States to join the war on the side of the Central Powers. b) It made the United States suspend its trade embargo with Germany c) It was another reason for the United States to join the war on the side of the Allies d) It helped the United States decide to halt trade with Mexico

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Ask for details Follow Reportby Takemetoouterspace 03/23/2017Only registered members have access to verified answers Join now Answers The Brainliest Answer!Supererudite Ambitiousc) It was another reason for the United States to join the war on the side of the Allies hope i helped Comments (2) Report4.9 9 votes Thanks 40Thank you!yea np Log in to add a comment Rosie1004 Helping Hand I would also go with C) It was another reason for the United States to join the war on the side of the Allies.

:) ;) <3Comments Report4.2 5 votes Thanks 22The Brain Helper Not sure about the answer? See next answers Learn more with Brainly!Having trouble with your homework? Get free help!80% of questions are answered in under 10 minutes Answers come with explanations, so that you can learn Answer quality is ensured by our experts I want a free account!

n …How did the zimmerman note affect American public opinion about the war? The Zimmermann note helped turn U. S. public opinion against Germany during WWI & strengthened advocates of U. S. entry into war.

What was the XYZ affair and how did it affect American public opinion?

"Answers.com ® Wiki Answers ® Categories History, Politics & Society History History of the United States What was the XYZ affair and how did it affect American public opinion? Flag What was the XYZ affair and how did it affect American public opinion? Answered by The Wiki Answers ®Community Answers.com ® is making the world better one answer at a time.

The French officials, later identified by President Adams as merely ""X, Y, and Z,"" made three insulting demands. First, the American government must apologize publicly to France for remarks made by President Adams in a speech to Congress, Second, the United States must grant a loan to France.

Third, the American envoys must pay a bribe of $250,000 to the French Directory. When news of this insult reached America, many Americans demanded war. Rallying around the slogan ""Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute,"" Americans began war preparations. In 1798 the government created the Navy Department. Warships were built and harbors were fortified. The government also strengthened the army and recalled former President Washington to assume chief command.

Although was was not officially declared, a state of war actually existed. Within a few months American warships captured more than 80 vessels flying the French flag.3 people found this useful Was this answer useful? Yes Somewhat No Why was the XYZ Affair so insulting to Americans? it was because the people who became to be called XYZ did not say what their names were!!

!Blue 518,948 Contributions What did the XYZ affair lead the Americans to do? Following the XYZ Affair, there was a surge of nationalism from the Americans. This included calls of war - eventually contributing to the naval quasi-wars along the Atlantic …How did Americans respond to the XYZ Affair?

THE Americans ended up getting very angered with the French because of how the French so easily got in to America. This caused a War (The Civil War to be exact)Which slogan summarizes americans' response to the XYZ affair?

""Millions for defence, not one cent for tribute""What affect did the xyz affair have on us-french relations? Type Complete the table about the main types of chemical bonds your answer here... How did Americans react to the XYZ Affair?

Americans were outraged by the XYZ Affair in 1797. The French foreign minister had refused to receive the American ambassador unless he was paid a $ 250,000 bribe and Fran …Why were Americans angered by the XYZ affair with France?they were angered by them because the French wanted the Americans to do so much but the Americans refused.

The French put the xyz affair on them trying to make A deal The xyz affair caused American anger toward? Toward France. Redneckbabe 91 29 Contributions How did the XYZ Affair affect politics in the US? The nation was unified by anger at the French.

George Washington signed the Jay Treaty to prevent a war with Great Britain, but the Treaty limited France's ability to trade in …How did the XYZ Affair affect Adams presidency?

I don't really think it affected his term in office.. He just had to think quickly to not go to war with France. Don Dfoofnik 4,377,818 Contributions There are three kinds of answers: ones that are mostly right, ones that are mostly wrong, and those that once were right but now are wrong. How did the Iran hostage crisis affect American public opinion? The takeover of the US embassy in Tehran resulted in embarrassment for the administration of Jimmy Carter, which was already seen as weak in foreign policy. (The concurrent i

Answered In History of the United States Who led the American contingent in XYZ affair? President John Adams Cassandra Lifesnadir 1,684,469 Contributions With my Registered Nurse background, I most enjoy helping people understand normal anatomy and body functions.

Answered In Politics and Government Why do so many Americans hold somewhat volatile public opinions about foreign affairs? I think there might be varied opinions about this question, but, rather than volatile public opinions about foreign affairs, Americans in general have been accused of having w …Answered In Newspapers and Magazines How did yellow journalism affect American public opinion about Spain?

Journalists used newspapers as a means to make the Spanish look as awful as possible. The most famous example of yellow journalism is when the USS Maine sank in the harbor …Answered In History of France How did the xyz affair affect politics in the United states?

The nation was unified by the anger at the French Answered In American Revolution What was the rallying cry from americans on the XYZ affair? 'Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute' was the American rallying cry during the XYZ Affair. The affair occurred during the presidency of John Adams. "

I. Zimmermann note The Zimmermann Telegram (or Zimmermann Note) was an internal diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office in January, 1917 that proposed a military alliance between Germany and Mexico in the event of the United States entering World War I against Germany.

world war 1

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Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort Long-term causes -Nationalist tensions in Europe -Competition for colonies -Arms race and militarism -Formation of defense alliances Immediate Causes -Assassination of Franz Ferdinand (heir to the Austro-Hungarian Throne) -Austria-Hungary's retaliation against Serbia -Declarations of War between rival alliances -Germany's invasion of Belgium Immediate Effects of WWI -Destruction and immense loss of life -Revolution in Russia - Red Communists will win and ultimately lead to Cold War -Social change in the U. S. Allied victory over Central Powers -Treaty of Versailles -Formation of mandates (temporary colonies) -League of Nations Long-Term Effects -Break-up of empires ex: Ottoman Empire (they entered war late on losing side) -U. S. policy of isolationism - opposite of Teddy Roosevelt -U. S. emergence as global economic giant Rise of militant extremist parties in Europe ex: Nazi Party -Eruption of WWIIMilitarism the belief or desire of a government or people that a country should maintain a strong military capability and be prepared to use it aggressively to defend or promote national interests.

Francis Ferdinand 1863-1914, archduke of Austria: heir apparent to the thrones of Austria and Hungary whose assassination precipitated the outbreak of World War I (nephew of Francis Joseph I).

Western Front The Western Front was the name the Germans gave to a series of trenches that ran 700 kilometres from the Belgian coast to the Swiss border. Casualty a person killed or injured in a war or accident. Contraband goods that have been imported or exported illegally. U-boat a German submarine used in World War I or World War II. Lusitania a British luxury liner sunk by a German submarine in the North Atlantic on May 7, 1915: one of the events leading to U. S.entry into World War

What caused World War I, and why did the United States enter the war? The United States entered the war because of the Germans' decision to resume the policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, and the so-called ""Zimmerman telegram,"" intercepted by the British, in which Germany floated the idea of an alliance with Mexico How did nationalism and militarism both work to push Europe toward war? • Nationalism heightened tensions among ethnic groups, exacerbated territorial disputes, & increased economic competition.

• Militarism led to new weapons technology & created an arms race. • These two factors increased rivalries among nations & aggravated tensions that already existed. Why did both sides embrace trench warfare as a strategy to win the war? trenches provided a protective defense Why did President Wilson fear the war would set Americans against one another?

President Woodrow Wilson feared that the war would turn Americans against each other, because most Americans were born in other countries, including countries in Europe. Many of these foreign-born Americans supported the country they originally were born at which caused many conflicts against many Americans whose countries were enemies.

What German actions led the United States to enter World War I? The U. S. entered World War I on April 6, 1917, after Germany's policy of unrestricted submarine warfare seriously threatened America's commercial shipping. The U. S. originally pursued a policy of non-intervention. Selective Service Act The Selective Service Act or Selective Draft Act (Pub.

L. 65-12, 40 Stat. 76, enacted May 18, 1917) authorized the federal government to raise a national army for the American entry into World War I through the compulsory enlistment of people. Bernard Baruch economic advisor to United States Presidents (1870-1965) Bernard M. Baruch: Quotes, WW1 & Biography.

In this lesson, learn about Bernard Baruch, who was a financial investor who served in several official and advisory roles from Woodrow Wilson's presidency through Harry Truman's. He was called the 'elder statesman' of his era. CPI A measure that examines the weighted average of prices of a basket of consumer goods and services, such as transportation, food and medical care.

The CPI is calculated by taking price changes for each item in the predetermined basket of goods and averaging them; the goods are weighted according to their importance. George Creel A young journalist, master of propaganda, and head of the Committee on Public Information.

Conscientious objector a person who for reasons of conscience objects to serving in the armed forces. Espionage Act The Espionage Act of 1917 is a United States federal law passed on June 15, 1917, shortly after the U. S. entry into World War I. It has been amended numerous times over the years. It was originally found in Title 50 of the U. S. Code (War) but is now found under Title 18, Crime.

The Espionage Act, passed in June 1917, provided penalties of 20 years imprisonment and fines up to $10,000 for those convicted of interfering with military recruitment. Great Migration The Great Migration was the movement of 6 million African Americans out of the rural Southern United States to the urban Northeast, Midwest, and West that occurred between 1910 and 1970.

How did the war affect Americans at home? It really had little effect unless you had a friend or family member in the military service.

Remember, back then we did not have the news coverage we do now. By the time a battle story was published, it may have been over for a week. Many people, if they did not have a radio or newspaper, did not even keep up with the events. There was little, if any, rationing.

No great war bond drives. The majority of Americans thought of it as just another European Conflict and none of our business. We were not the international saviors of the world until Roosevelt came along and started interfering in everyone else's affairs.

Of course if you worked in an armaments industry, your employment was boosted. Very little agriculture effect because we did not have the means to ship things back then. How did the United States ready its military, economy, and people for war? Selective Service Act is created, military buildup, women will take the work of the men fighting in the war.

How did the war provide new opportunities for women, African Americans, and Mexican Americans? They all replaced millions of men fighting in the from, it contributed to the economy and production of weapons need in the war. Convoy a group of ships or vehicles traveling together, typically accompanied by armed troops, warships, or other vehicles for protection.

Vladimir Lenin Russian founder of the Bolsheviks and leader of the Russian Revolution and first head of the USSR (1870-1924)John J. Pershing John Joseph (""Blackjack"") 1860-1948, U. S. general: commander ofthe American Expeditionary Forces in World War I. Fourteen Points Fourteen Points is a blueprint for world peace that was to be used for peace negotiations after World War I, elucidated in a January 8, 1918, speech on war aims and peace terms by U. S. President Woodrow Wilson.

Self-determination the process by which a country determines its own statehood and forms its own allegiances and government. ""Irreconcilables any of two or more ideas, facts, or statements that cannot be made compatible. League of Nations League of Nations definition.

An international organization established after World War I under the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles. The League, the forerunner of the United Nations, brought about much international cooperation on health, labor problems, refugee affairs, and the like.

Henry Cabot Lodge Henry Cabot, 1850-1924, U. S. public servant and author: senator1893-1924. Reparations the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged. Reservationists a person who makes or takes reservations, as at an airline office;reservation clerk. How did Americans affect the end of World War I and its peace settlements? Americans were fresh and propossed the Traty of Versailles. How did American involvement help the Allies win World War I? American troops helped the Allies win the war by playing a ""definite and distinct part"" in the war.

They did this by supporting British and French forces as well as operating in their own manner. Why did Wilson believe that a ""peace without victory"" would help avoid future wars? He believed that if the terms of the treaty weren't punitive, but encouraged self determination, future wars might be avoided.

He believed that if victors punished losers, there would be resentment in Europe and future wars could result. He considered his proposal a way to achieve peace without victory. How did the decisions at the Paris Peace Conference violate the Fourteen Points?

The decisions ignored the principle of self determination harshly punished the former central powers, and failed to include other ideas from the fourteen points such as freedom of the seas, free trade, the liberation of colonial empires and disarmament What reservations did Henry Cabot Lodge and his followers have about the peace treaty? Many people thought that the treaty could lead the us into a war without the consent of congress, which was unconstitutional.

They wanted the treaty revise to ensure that it would not contradict the power of congress to declare war Influenza a highly contagious viral infection of the respiratory passages causing fever, severe aching, and catarrh, and often occurring in epidemics.

Inflation a general increase in prices and fall in the purchasing value of money. Red Scare A Red Scare is the promotion of fear of a potential rise of communism or radical leftism, used by anti-leftist proponents. In the United States, the First Red Scare was about worker (socialist) revolution and political radicalism.

Palmer Raids The Palmer Raids were a series of raids by the United States Department of Justice intended to capture, arrest and deport radical leftists, especially anarchists, from the United States.

The raids and arrests occurred in November 1919 and January 1920 under the leadership of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer. Warren G. Hardin A political leader of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, who served as president from 1921 to 1923. As Republican party candidate in the campaign of 1920, he described his goal as a return to ""normalcy""after the ambitious foreign and domestic policies of the outgoing Democratic president, Woodrow Wilson; Harding strongly opposed the participation of the United States in the League of Nations.

As Harding's presidency went on, the corruption of some of the officials he appointed became increasingly evident; Harding died in office before the worst of the Harding scandals came to light.

Creditor nation DEFINITION of 'Creditor Nation' A nation with a cumulative balance of payment surplus. A creditor nation has positive net investment after recording all of the financial transactions completed between it and the rest of the world.

What political, economic, and social effects did World War I have on the United States? he Industry production in America boomed. Manufacturers had to keep production up to the pace needed to support the war. How did the economic situation after the war led to labor unrest?

After the war the economy slowed and inflation rose. The recession caused a competitive job market, just as soldiers were returning from the war and seeking jobs. People fought for their jobs and for their rights as workers How did the rise of communism in the Soviet Union contribute to the Red Scare? Lenin supported the spread of communism. He encouraged revolutions outside the soviet reunion. Many Americans feared there would be a revolution in the us Why did the United States become the leading economic power after World War I? America's industries expanded very fast making revenue for the government which made it the leading economic power. "

So, what did all this have to do with America and why did we enter World War One? Most Americans favored staying out of the conflict and President Wilson publicly and formally stated that the United States would follow a policy of neutrality. In three short years, however, the United States would find itself in the middle of what later became known as the first World War. As the war in Europe raged on America sympathies were clearly on the side of the allies. American propaganda posters urged citizens to buy war bonds and support the allies.

"Why did the United States enter World War One. The industrial era had many effects, not the least of which was plunging the world into world war. One must consider the relationship between eras and events as a student of history. The industrial era created a perceived need in America for raw materials and markets for goods.

The United States was not alone in this desire for expansion. All the industrial nations were in open competition to develop vast empires that would provide them with the fuel to run the factories of industrialism. This imperialist competition led to tension and the creation of vast armies. The willingness to use these armies was known as militarism.

In order to feel safe (there was a pretty fair degree of paranoia as you can imagine) nations began to sign secret treaties forming alliances and Europe was divided into an armed camp. Tension was high, the subjugation (taking over) of other nations led to feelings of nationalism that would eventually light the spark that would explode Europe into the flames of conflict.

The causes of World War One as discussed above can be summarized by the following acronym as a mnemonic device: A- Alliance: European nations signed secret treaties that created a system of alliances pitting nation versus nation. N - Nationalism: There were intense feelings of nationalism on the part of subjugated nationalities.

These feelings would eventually lead to rash acts. I - Imperialism: Competition to develop vast empires caused tension and conflict. M - Militarism: Nations built huge armies to defend themselves and help to gain these empires. It was a natural feeling for them to want to use these militaries.

A - Anarchy: There was no international organization to help them deal with their problems. L - Leadership: It was poor.

Just look at the system they set up...quite poor indeed. These were the conditions facing Europe as a crisis emerged in the Balkans. The Archduke of Austria Hungary, a traditional power, was touring the nation of Serbia. Meanwhile Bosnian nationalists desiring freedom from Serbia plotted to assassinate the Archduke. Gabriel Principe, a member of the Black Hand, the aforementioned Bosnian nationalist group, shot and killed Franz Ferdinand on June 28 th 1914.

Austria Hungary blamed the Serbian government for the assassination of the Archduke and issued an ultimatum (demands). The Serbians agreed to all but two of the demands, one of which was the placement of Austro Hungarian troops within Serbia. The Serbians appealed to Russia for support and Russia as the ""protector of the Slavs"" agreed to support Serbia.

Meanwhile the Austro Hungarians still wanting revenge and fearing Russia secured the support of their traditional ally, Germany. In a famous decision Germany issued what has become know as ""Carte Blanche,"" of blank check, to Austria Hungary.

This unqualified military support from Germany made Austria Hungary rather confident that Russia would not attack. At this point the Austro Hungarians declared war on Serbia. In response to the declaration of war Russia mobilized her military forces.

Perhaps it was a bit of saber rattling, perhaps not. Regardless Germany demanded Russia demobilize its army. When Russia refused Germany attacked Russia. The effect of the war on the Russian front were devastating.

The Russians were ill prepared for war and lost millions of men. In the end the Czars refusal to exit the war cost him his throne as the Bolsheviks (Communists) revolted in 1917 overthrowing Czar Nicholas II. When the Russians were attacked by Germany, France was obligated to declare war on Germany as a result of a treaty she had signed with Russia.

The Germans attacked France by marching through Belgium. The Belgians who did not give Germany permission to do this now were in a state of war with Germany as well. The most important byproduct of this was the fact that England had a treaty with Belgium! Now England was obligated to declare war on Germany as well.

Italy, which had a treaty with Germany switched sides so that she might gain territory from Austria Hungary (A gamble that more or less worked) and the Ottoman Empire entered the war on behalf to the Austro Hungarians (they wanted to gain territory from the Russians and gain control in the Balkan region).

Now most of Europe was engulfed in war. In the end the Triple Entente (England, France and Russia later to be joined by Italy, the United States and Japan) defeated the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria Hungary and the Ottoman Empire).

The conflict which was long and bloody was marked by trench warfare and the use of chemical weapons. It was fought mostly in French territory. At the conclusion of hostilities Germany was still in French territory but it was relatively clear that the combined industrial might of the Triple Entente would prevail.

In actuality the influence of the United States is questionable. Germany hoped to negotiate a favorable treaty but as we shall see this was not to be the case. The Treaty of Versailles was signed ending the war and blaming Germany for the entire conflict. This blame and the consequent punishment set the stage for years of resentment and another world war, something American President Woodrow Wilson had hoped to avoid.

So, what did all this have to do with America and why did we enter World War One? Most Americans favored staying out of the conflict and President Wilson publicly and formally stated that the United States would follow a policy of neutrality. In three short years, however, the United States would find itself in the middle of what later became known as the first World War. As the war in Europe raged on America sympathies were clearly on the side of the allies. American propaganda posters urged citizens to buy war bonds and support the allies.

The Kaiser and Germans were painted as the aggressors in the war. True or not Americans came to see Germany as vicious and blood thirsty. The poster below was used by the US Army in 1917 to recruit soldiers. Notice how the Germans are pictured? This is a clear example of anti German propaganda. When the war began England enforced a naval blockade of Germany in the hopes of cutting off supplies. Germany responded by unleashing the U Boats. U Boats were submarines capable of staying submerged for long periods of time.

They would sneak up upon their victims, often at night, an torpedo them. The Germans did not limit their attacks to military vessels. Any ship sailing in the war zone was considered an enemy. This became known as unrestricted submarine warfare. On May 7th 1915 the British cruise ship Lusitania was sunk off the coast of England. Over 1,198 passengers including 128 Americans were killed.

America was furious at the brutality and demanded a stop to this type of attack. In 1916, after the sinking of the passenger liner Sussex, Germany agreed to end unrestricted submarine warfare in the "" Sussex pledge.

""The Sussex pledge only put off the inevitable American entry into the war. America shared a cultural bond with England and France. Woodrow Wilson began to actively campaign for Americans to support the allies. Besides being culturally similar England and France were our trade partners.

From 1914 to 1916 trade with the Allies grew from 825 million dollars to 3.2 billion dollars. If the Allies were to lose the war our trade would be threatened. American increasingly saw Germany as the enemy. Germany was a dictatorship fighting against the great democracies of the world and America as a democratic nation felt an obligation to support them. As America became increasingly less neutral, the British government intercepted a message from the German ambassador Zimmerman to the Mexican government.

This message termed the "" Zimmerman Note "" asked Mexico to attack the United States if war broke out between the U. S. and Germany. Source: National Archives and Records Administration The note was turned over to American government a short time later and eventually published in the newspapers.

Americans were outraged. Then the Kaiser announced that Germany was going to re initiate the practice of unrestricted submarine warfare violating the Sussex Pledge. Wilson had campaigned for office promising to protect freedom of the seas and now it seemed he had little choice.

He had to ask Congress to declare war. Many Americans still wanted to stay out of ""Europe's war"" and there was much debate in Congress. Wilson closed his speech to Congress by saying "" it is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war... But the right is more precious then peace and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried in our hearts. ""

On April 6, 1917, by a vote of 82 to 6 in the Senate and 373 to 50 in the House of Representatives, the United States of America declared war on Germany. Wilson strongly believed that the American system would save the world, meaning:

1. American economic goods2. America's democratic political structure3. America's blend of morality and Christianity Wilson stated:"" When properly directed, there is no people in the world not fitted for self-government. "" Note the caveat, ""when properly directed."" Wilson saw the U. S. as the rightful and natural director.

He was determined to provide that direction in a framework where morality, democracy and economics were closely related. Wilson believed that other nations of the world had to look to the U. S. as an example , at the same time America was dependent on the rest of the world, mostly for economic markets.

The world market must act as the new frontier for the American system. Wilson was determined to direct the affairs of other nations so that they could eventually achieve self-government, as long as this government was based on the American model, and he was even more willing to intervene in other countries than Roosevel

t. For instance, he sent U. S. troops to Mexico to intervene in their civil war (1913-1917). When World War I broke out in Europe in 1914, Wilson tried to keep the U. S. neutral, but Germany repeatedly violated America's neutral status. When America finally entered the war in 1917 it was because, as Wilson stated,

1917 did the united states enter world war i. president wilson created the committee on public information in order to influence public opinion during world war i Comments Report

What year did the united states enter world war i? a. 1912 b. 1914 c. 1917 d. 1920 user: what organization did president wilson create in order to influence public opinion during world war i? a. the federal bureau of investigation b. the committee on public information c. the public works administration d. the central intelligence agency

High School History 5 points What year did the united states enter world war i? a. 1912 b. 1914 c. 1917 d. 1920 user: what organization did president wilson create in order to influence public opinion during world war i?

a. the federal bureau of investigation b. the committee on public information c. the public works administration d. the central intelligence agency Ask for details Follow Reportby Ashanculexro 06/30/2016Verified answer What is a Verified Answer? Log in to view the full answer. Unlock Verified Answers and get help from subject experts. Unlock verified answer Answers Sauroniasty44 Ambitious

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. To Wilson, the United States had not entered the war with the hope of gaining wealth or territory; instead, Americans entered the war to shape a new international climate and to ensure the well being and continued growth of democracy. Wilson’s campaign succeeded with the American public.

Peace Conferences

"Peace Conferences Share Tweet Post Next Outline Wilson’s Fourteen Points Seeking to rally Americans to the war effort in 1917, President Woodrow Wilson promised a “war to end all wars,” and pledged to “make the world safe for democracy.” Making the world safe for democracy seemed a noble and just pursuit to Americans who watched as Europeans and Russians struggled with increasingly limited freedoms and leaders who acted out of vengeance, creating economic turmoil.

President Wilson believed that the United States should serve as a moral compass to the rest of the world. He differentiated the United States’ goals in the war from the goals of the other warring powers

On the home front, Americans responded to Wilson’s idealistic aims and rallied behind him and the war effort. During the summer and fall of 1917, large numbers of U. S. troops arrived in Europe to support the Allied Powers. About two million Americans served overseas and about 75 percent of those saw combat action during the next 18 months.

America’s troops arrived as the peril in Europe increased. Russia, reeling from a revolution, established a separate peace with Germany in 1918 and pulled out of the war.

With Russia no longer a threat to the Central Powers, Germany began moving troops to the war’s western front for a major offensive move into Allied territory. Fresh American troops arrived in France just in time to be catapulted against the German advance and hold off the German armies.

American troops also played an important role in the last Allied assault that took place in France in the fall of 1918—one major objective of this offensive was to cut off the German railroad lines feeding the western front. The Meuse-Argonne offensive, which at the time was the largest battle in American history, lasted 47 days and engaged 1.2 million American troops.

Although more than 120,000 American troops were wounded or killed, this triumph paved the way for Allied victory. As the war drew toward its conclusion, many began to consider what would be the outcome. Recognizing the need for a plan, Wilson devised an outline for peace that would become known as his Fourteen Points.

On January 18, 1918, Wilson delivered his Fourteen Points Address to Congress to encourage the Allies to victory.

In it, he hoped to keep a reeling Russia in the war and to appeal to the Central Powers’ disenfranchised minority members.

The points, which represented Wilson’s lofty goals for the future of the world, included five general principles for a peace settlement: (1) “Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at” should replace secretive diplomacy; (2) a guaranteed freedom of the seas should exist during wartime and peace time; (3) nations should be able to trade freely without fear of retribution; (4) armaments should be drastically reduced; and (5) colonial claims should be adjusted to reflect the needs of native peoples.

Most of the additional points involved specific territorial adjustments: lost territory should be returned to Russia, Belgium should be a free and independent state, France should regain the Alsace-Lorraine, and Italian boarders should be adjusted along easily recognizable lines of nationality.

Under the Fourteen Points, oppressed minority groups such as the millions of Poles who lived under the rule of Germany and Austria-Hungary, would benefit from an era of self-determination. The final point called for the creation of a “general association of nations” that would work to guarantee political independence and sovereignty for all countries.

This general association, an early version of Wilson’s League of Nations, would provide international order in the post-war era. Although the reaction to the Fourteen Points was largely positive, some leaders of the Allied Powers, hoping for territorial gain, grumbled at Wilson’s idealistic aims.

Republicans at home who favored isolationism openly criticized Wilson’s world vision and mocked what they referred to as the “fourteen commandments.”Treaty of Versailles Nearly one year after President Woodrow Wilson addressed Congress and laid out his Fourteen Points, fighting in Europe had reached its end.

In the last weeks of the war, Wilson used the promise of his Fourteen Points to persuade the German people to overthrow Kaiser Wilhelm II and establish an armistice. Under the armistice, Germany had to withdraw behind the Rhine River and surrender its submarines and munitions.

To establish the conditions of surrender for the defeated Central Powers, members of the Allied Powers came together in Paris. Representatives of the Big Four powers—the United States, France, Britain and Italy—attended the conference. Fearing his Fourteen Points would not be well received by European leaders with their own agendas, Wilson attended the conference as the leader of the American delegation. Wilson’s aim was to create a world parliament to be known as the League of Nations, an agency that would ensure international stability.

Wilson’s fear over the reception of his Fourteen Points proved to be well founded. Although Wilson was a popular figure, many European leaders felt his plans would interfere with their imperialistic ambitions. The English were mostly interested in the expansion of the British Empire, and the French wanted solid assurances that France would never be invaded by Germany again.

Millions in Europe rejected the idea that there could be peace without retribution against Germany—the cry of vengeance resounded throughout the Allied European nations, and they demanded that Germany pay for its actions.

Wilson, temporarily disheartened, left Paris without solidifying any specific agreement to help aid the Democratic Congressional campaign. During the Congressional election of 1918, Wilson faced a new battle on the home front. Republicans and Democrats had minimized open partisan politicking during the war. Wilson broke the bi-partisan truce to plea for a Democratic victory in the Congressional elections of 1918. Wilson’s move backfired when Republicans won majorities in both houses. Wilson, who had staked his prestige on a Democratic victory, returned to Europe as a less influential leader.

From January to May of 1919, the Allied Powers hammered out the treaty. To preserve his prized League of Nations, Wilson made sacrifices on many of the other 13 points. Although the Allied victors would not take control of the conquered areas outright, they would be allowed to oversee the territories under the guise of the League of Nations.

Under Wilson’s plans, the League of Nations was to consist of 42 Allied and neutral countries, with five permanent members: the U. S., France, Britain, Italy, and Japan. Wilson’s concessions led to the establishment of the League Covenant, a constitution for the League of Nations. Under the Covenant, the League’s chief goal was collective security among all nations. The Covenant required all League members to protect the “territorial integrity” and “political independence” of all other members.

Signed on June 28, 1919, the Treaty of Versailles outlined several provisions for peace. A “guilt-war” clause, clause 231, placed sole blame for the war on Germany and required Germany to pay reparations to the Allies, which totaled about $33 billion.

The treaty required Germany to accept military restrictions and a loss of territory and barred Germany from joining the League of Nations. The Treaty also granted national sovereignty to Poland, Czechoslovakia, Finland, and the Baltic States of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and Yugoslavia. Germany, which had capitulated based on assurances that it would be granted a peace based on the Fourteen Points, felt betrayed by a treaty that only included about four of Wilson’s original points.

The treaty, however, did little to advance Wilson’s quest to establish freedom of the seas, free trade between nations, and military disarmament. Always the optimist, Wilson believed that such oversights could be easily addressed through the powers of the League of Nations.

He believed that once convened, the League would have the authority to solve these problems through arbitration and negotiation. When Wilson went to Europe to fight for his Fourteen Points and negotiate the Treaty of Versailles, he was largely viewed as a worldwide hero.

Once the treaty was signed and he returned to America, he was greeted with a cold reception. American isolationists feared greater international entanglement through participation in the League of Nations. Anti-German critics believed the treaty did not go far enough to punish Germany, while many liberals found the treaty too harsh and heavy-handed toward the German people. With opposition in America, the treaty faced a difficult road toward ratification in the U. S. Senate.

Defeat of Treaty in U. S. President Woodrow Wilson felt optimistic about returning to America with the completed Treaty of Versailles. His return, however, was marked with a mixed reaction from the public and the Congress. Initially, Republican Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, who had ardently opposed the treaty, had little hope of defeating it in the Senate.

Instead, Lodge and other Republican Senators hoped to amend the treaty, so that they could take credit for the changes. These individuals were known as “reservationists,” since they were willing to accept the treaty with modifications.

If someone was opposed to the idea of the U. S. moving toward internationalism altogether, then they were called “irreconcilables.” Lodge’s delay tactics, which included reading the 264-page treaty aloud in a committee meeting, helped to muddy the once-favorable pubic opinion. Wilson was concerned that any modification to the Treaty by the Senate would encourage the Europeans allies to also make modifications, and he was afraid that too many amendments would lead to elimination of his League of Nations altogether.

To galvanize public support for the treaty, Wilson began a speechmaking tour in spite of the urging of his wife and physicians to stay home. Republican “irreconcilables” such as Hiram Johnson of California and William Borah of Idaho followed behind Wilson and made speeches against the treaty at every stop Wilson has been.

Although the Midwest reacted coldly to Wilson's pleas, he experienced tremendous support in the Rocky Mountain region and the Pacific Coast, two areas where he also had a solid political base. During a speaking stop in Colorado, Wilson collapsed from physical and nervous exhaustion. Taken by train back to Washington, Wilson had a stroke a few days later that paralyzed one side of his body.

Wilson recovered in the privacy of the White House for the next seven months. With Wilson removed from the political spotlight, Lodge took control of the treaty debate. Although Lodge was unable to amend the treaty outright, he mockingly created Fourteen formal reservations, known as the “Lodge Reservations,” to it—a reference to Wilson’s Fourteen Points—and attached the reservations to the treaty for all to review before they voted whether or not to pass it.

Lodge and other critics had particular disdain for Article X, which morally bound the United States to aid any League member who was victimized by external aggression.

Rather than morally bind the government to act, Congress wanted to reserve the power to declare war for itself. Wilson, who had little respect for Lodge, rejected the Fourteen Reservations outright. Although Wilson was willing to accept some compromises, he believed that Lodge’s reservations contradicted the pact’s spirit.

Wilson sent word to all Democrats to vote against the treaty, which now included Lodge’s reservations. In November of 1919, loyal Democrats, who had once strongly supported the treaty, voted against ratification. In March of 1920, strong public support of the treaty required the Senate to once again vote on the treaty.

Again, Wilson asked Democrats to vote down the treaty with Lodge’s reservations attached. For a second time, the Senate voted against ratification, thereby ending any chance for the treaty’s ratification in America and creating a deadlock in Washington.

Wilson believed that the Election of 1920 would serve as a “solemn referendum” on the Treaty of Versailles and the League of Nations and eliminate the political impasse the country faced. Since Wilson did not run for another term, Democrats nominated James M. Cox from Ohio, a strong supporter of the League.

Republicans, hoping to bring a sense of “normalcy” back to the country, nominated Warren G. Harding, a Senator from Ohio who remained intentionally ambiguous about the League. Although Democrats attempted to make the election a referendum on the League, the public had grown tired of high-browed idealism and turned to Harding’s message of normalcy. In the end, a Republican landslide elected Harding as President. Republican isolationists turned the election’s results into a mandate against the League of Nations. American participation in the League, Wilson’s long-held dream, would not be a reality. Because of the U. S.’s refusal to enter the League, it never had the power that Wilson had envisioned.

In July of 1921, Congress officially ended the war with the Central Powers by passing a joint resolution. Separate peace treaties with Germany, Austria, and Hungary were ratified on October 18, 1921. You just finished Peace Conferences. Nice work!Previous Outline Next Outline Tip: Use ← → keys to navigate!How to cite this note (MLA)Aboukhadijeh, Feross. ""Peace Conferences"" Study Notes.org. Study Notes, LLC., 17 Nov. 2012. Web. 08 Apr. 2018. <https://www.apstudynotes.org/us-history/topics/peace-conferences/>. "

Wilson decided to enter the war so that he could help design the peace settlement. Wilson viewed the war as an opportunity to destroy German militarism. ""The world must be made safe for democracy,"" he told a joint session of Congress. Only 6 Senators and 50 Representatives voted against the war declaration.

"Digital History Printable Version Zimmermann Note Digital History ID 3900Date:1917Annotation: In January 1917, Germany announced that it would resume unrestricted submarine warfare.

This announcement helped precipitate American entry into the conflict. Germany hoped to win the war within five months, and they were willing to risk antagonizing Wilson on the assumption that even if the United States declared war, it could not mobilize quickly enough to change the course of the conflict.

Then a fresh insult led Wilson to demand a declaration of war. In March 1917, newspapers published the Zimmerman Note, an intercepted telegram from the German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmerman to the German ambassador to Mexico. The telegram said that if Germany went to war with the United States, Germany promised to help Mexico recover the territory it had lost during the 1840s, including Texas, New Mexico, California, and Arizona.

The Zimmerman Note and German attacks on three U. S. ships in mid-March led Wilson to ask Congress for a declaration of war.

Document: The Zimmerman Note to the German Minister to Mexico Berlin, January 19, 1917On the first of February we intend to begin submarine warfare unrestricted.

In spite of this, it is our intention to endeavor to keep neutral the United States of America. If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico: That we shall make war together and together make peace. We shall give general financial support, and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona.

The details are left to you for settlement.... You are instructed to inform the President of Mexico of the above in the greatest confidence as soon as it is certain that there will be an outbreak of war with the United States and suggest that the President of Mexico, on his own initiative, should communicate with Japan suggesting adherence at once to this plan; at the same time, offer to mediate between Germany and Japan. Please call to the attention of the President of Mexico that the employment of ruthless submarine warfare now promises to compel England to make peace in a few months.

Zimmerman (Secretary of State)Source: National Archives and Records Administration: Record Group 59: General Records of the Department of State, 1756 - 1979Additional information not located on Digital History (opens in a new window): http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/zimmermann/Copyright 2016 Digital History "

The American press published news of the telegram on March 1. On April 6, 1917, the United States Congress formally declared war on Germany and its allies. Click here to read a 1921 commentary upon the consequences of the Zimmermann Telegram.

Primary Documents - Zimmermann Telegram, 19 January 1917

"Primary Documents - Zimmermann Telegram, 19 January 1917Between 1914 and the spring of 1917, the European nations engaged in a conflict that became known as World War I. Sponsored Links While armies moved across the face of Europe, the United States remained neutral. In 1916 Woodrow Wilson was elected President for a second term, largely because of the slogan ""He kept us out of war.

""Events in early 1917 would change that hope. In frustration over the effective British naval blockade, in February Germany broke its pledge to limit submarine warfare .

In response to the breaking of the Sussex pledge, the United States severed diplomatic relations with Germany. In January of 1917, British cryptographers deciphered a telegram from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann to the German Minister to Mexico, von Eckhardt, offering United States territory to Mexico in return for joining the German cause. Zimmermann himself dispelled initial suspicions regarding the telegram's authenticity by giving a speech in which he confirmed its existence.

This message helped draw the United States into the war and thus changed the course of history. The telegram had such an impact on American opinion that, according to David Kahn, author of The Codebreakers, ""No other single cryptanalysis has had such enormous consequences. ""It is his opinion that ""never before or since has so much turned upon the solution of a secret message.""

In an effort to protect their intelligence from detection and to capitalize on growing anti-German sentiment in the United States, the British waited until February 24 to present the telegram to Woodrow Wilson.

Click here to read the reaction of the Japanese government to news of the telegram. To the German Minister to Mexico Berlin, January 19, 1917On the first of February we intend to begin submarine warfare unrestricted.

In spite of this, it is our intention to endeavour to keep neutral the United States of America. If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico: That we shall make war together and together make peace. We shall give general financial support, and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona.

The details are left to you for settlement... You are instructed to inform the President of Mexico of the above in the greatest confidence as soon as it is certain that there will be an outbreak of war with the United States and suggest that the President of Mexico, on his own initiative, should communicate with Japan suggesting adherence at once to this plan; at the same time, offer to mediate between Germany and Japan. Please call to the attention of the President of Mexico that the employment of ruthless submarine warfare now promises to compel England to make peace in a few months.

Zimmermann (Secretary of State)Source: Source Records of the Great War, Vol. V, ed. Charles F. Horne, National Alumni 1923Sponsored Links Saturday, 22 August, 2009 Michael Duffy A Runner was a soldier who carried messages by hand.- Did you know? "

When RMS Lusitania left New York for Britain on 1 May 1915, German submarine warfare was intensifying in the Atlantic. Germany had declared the seas around the United Kingdom a war zone, and the German embassy in the United States had placed a newspaper advertisement warning people of the dangers of sailing on Lusitania.

RMS Lusitania

"From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedianavigation search For other ships with the same name, see List of ships named Lusitania.

Lusitania arriving in port History United Kingdom Name: Lusitania Owner: Cunard Line Operator: Cunard Line Port of registry: Liverpool Route: Liverpool to New York City Via Cherbourg, France and Cork, Ireland Ship Disaster :1915 English channel torpedoed by German U boat off the coast of Ireland Builder: John Brown & Co, Clydebank, Scotland Yard number: 367Laid down: 17 August 1904Launched: 7 June 1906 [1]Christened: Mary, Lady Inverclyde [2]Acquired: 26 August 1907Maiden voyage: 7 September 1907In service: 1907–1915Fate: Torpedoed by German U-boat U-20 on Friday 7 May 1915.

Wreck lies approximately 11 mi (18 km) off the Old Head of Kinsale Lighthouse in 300 ft (91 m) of water at 51°25′N 8°33′WCoordinates: 51°25′N 8°33′WStatus: Partially collapsed wreck General characteristics Type: Ocean liner Tonnage: 31,550 GRTDisplacement: 44,060 long tons (44,767.0 t)Length: 787 ft (239.9 m) [a]Beam: 87 ft (26.5 m)Height: 60 ft (18.3 m) to boat deck, 165 ft (50.3 m) to aerials Draught: 33.6 ft (10.2 m)Decks: 9 passenger decks Installed power: 25 Scotch boilers.

Four direct-acting Parsons steam turbines producing 76,000 hp (57 MW). Propulsion: Four triple blade propellers.

(Quadruple blade propellers installed in 1909). Speed: 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph) 28 knots (52 km/h; 32 mph) (top speed, single day's run in March 1914)Capacity: 552 first class, 460 second class, 1,186 third class. 2,198 total. 7,000 tons coal. Crew: 850Notes: First ship of Cunard's four funneledgrand trio, along with RMS Mauretania and RMS Aquitania RMS Lusitania was a British ocean liner that was in operation during the early 20th century.

The ship was a holder of the Blue Riband, and briefly the world's largest passenger ship until the completion of her sister ship Mauretania. The Cunard Line launched Lusitania in 1906, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic trade. She made a total of 202 trans-Atlantic crossings. [3]German shipping lines were aggressive competitors in the transatlantic trade, and Cunard responded by trying to outdo them in speed, capacity, and luxury.

Both Lusitania and Mauretania were fitted with revolutionary new turbine engines that enabled them to maintain a service speed of 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph). They were equipped with lifts, wireless telegraph, and electric light, and provided 50% more passenger space than any other ship; the first class decks were noted for their sumptuous furnishings. [4]The Royal Navy had blockaded Germany at the start of World War I.

On the afternoon of 7 May, a German U-boat torpedoed Lusitania, 11 mi (18 km) off the southern coast of Ireland and inside the declared war zone. A second, unexplained, internal explosion sent her to the seabed in 18 minutes, with the deaths of 1,198 passengers and crew. [5]Because the Germans sank, without warning, what was officially a non-military ship, many accused them of breaching the internationally recognised Cruiser Rules.

It was no longer possible for submarines to give warning due to the British introduction of Q-ships in 1915 with concealed deck guns. ( Lusitania had been fitted with 6-inch gun mounts in 1913, although she was unarmed at the time of her sinking.)

The Germans justified treating Lusitania as a naval vessel because she was carrying hundreds of tons of war munitions, therefore making her a legitimate military target, and argued that British merchant ships had violated the Cruiser Rules from the very beginning of the war. [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]The sinking caused a storm of protest in the United States because 128 American citizens were among the dead.

The sinking helped shift public opinion in the United States against Germany, and was a factor in the United States' declaration of war nearly two years later. After World War I, successive British governments maintained there were no munitions on board Lusitania and the Germans were not justified in treating the ship as a naval vessel.

In 1982, the head of the British Foreign Office's North America department admitted that there is a large amount of ammunition in the wreck, some of which is highly dangerous and poses a safety risk to salvage teams. [13] [14]Contents1 Development and construction1.1 Design1.2 Interiors1.3 Construction and trials1.4 Comparison with the Olympic class2 Career2.1 Hudson Fulton Celebration3 Outbreak of the First World War4 19155 Sinking6 Aftermath7 Commemoration7.1 100th Anniversary8 Conspiracy theories8.1 British Government deliberately putting Lusitania at risk8.2 Undeclared war munitions8.3 Alleged bombardment/destruction of the wreck9 Wreck9.1 Simon Lake's attempt to salvage in the 1930s9.2 Gregg Bemis' salvage efforts9.3 1984 British legal action10 Cultural significance11 See also12 References12.1 Notes12.2 Citations13 Bibliography13.1 Books13.2 Newspapers, journals and other media13.3 Online14 Further reading15 External links Development and construction Lusitania, shortly before her launch Lusitania and Mauretania were commissioned by Cunard, responding to increasing competition from rival transatlantic passenger companies, particularly the German Norddeutscher Lloyd (NDL) and Hamburg America Line (HAPAG).

They had larger, faster, more modern, more luxurious ships than Cunard and were better placed, starting from German ports, to capture the lucrative trade in emigrants leaving Europe for North America. In 1897 the NDL liner Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse captured the Blue Riband from Cunard's Campania, before the prize was taken in 1900 by the HAPAG ship Deutschland.

NDL soon wrested the prize back in 1903 with the new Kaiser Wilhelm II and Kronprinz Wilhelm. Cunard saw their passenger numbers affected as a result of the so-called "" Kaiser-class ocean liners "". [15]American millionaire businessman J. P. Morgan had decided to invest in transatlantic shipping by creating a new company, International Mercantile Marine (IMM), and, in 1901, purchased the British freight shipper Frederick Leyland & Co. and a controlling interest in the British passenger White Star Line and folded them into IMM. In 1902, IMM, NDL, and HAPAG entered into a ""Community of Interest"" to fix prices and divide among them the transatlantic trade.

The partners also acquired a 51% stake in the Dutch Holland America Line. IMM made offers to purchase Cunard which, along with the French CGT, were now their principal rivals. [ citation needed]Cunard chairman Lord Inverclyde thus approached the British government for assistance.

Faced with the impending collapse of the British liner fleet and the consequent loss of national prestige, as well as the reserve of shipping for war purposes which it represented, they agreed to help. By an agreement signed in June 1903, Cunard was given a loan of £2.6 million to finance two ships, repayable over 20 years at a favourable interest rate of 2.75%.

The ships would receive an annual operating subsidy of £75,000 each plus a mail contract worth £68,000. In return the ships would be built to Admiralty specifications so that they could be used as auxiliary cruisers in wartime.

[16]Design Lusitania unloading Christmas mail to a post office boat Cunard established a committee to decide upon the design for the new ships, of which James Bain, Cunard's Marine Superintendent was the chairman.

Other members included Rear Admiral H. J. Oram, who had been involved in designs for turbine powered ships for the navy, and Charles Parsons, whose company Parsons Marine was now producing revolutionary turbine engines. Parsons maintained that he could design engines capable of maintaining a speed of 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph), which would require 68,000 shaft horsepower (51,000 k W).

The largest turbine sets built thus far had been of 23,000 shp (17,000 k W) for the Dreadnought -class battleships, and 41,000 shp (31,000 k W) for Invincible -class battlecruisers, which meant the engines would be of a new, untested design.

Turbines offered the advantages of generating less vibration than the reciprocating engines and greater reliability in operation at high speeds, combined with lower fuel consumption. It was agreed that a trial would be made by fitting turbines to Carmania, which was already under construction.

The result was a ship 1.5 knots (2.8 km/h; 1.7 mph) faster than her conventionally powered sister Caronia with the expected improvements in passenger comfort and operating economy. [17]The ship was designed by Leonard Peskett [18] and built by John Brown and Company of Clydebank, Scotland. The ship's name was taken from Lusitania, an ancient Roman province on the west of Iberian Peninsula, the region that is now southern Portugal and Extremadura (Spain).

The name had also been used by a previous ship built in 1871 and wrecked in 1901, making the name available from Lloyds for Cunard's giant. [19] [20]Peskett had built a large model of the proposed ship in 1902 showing a three funnel design. A fourth funnel was implemented into the design in 1904 as it was necessary to vent the exhaust from additional boilers fitted after steam turbines had been settled on as the power plant.

The original plan called for three propellers, but this was altered to four because it was felt the necessary power could not be transmitted through just three. Four turbines would drive four separate propellers, with additional reversing turbines to drive the two inboard shafts only.

To improve efficiency, the two inboard propellers rotated inwards, while those outboard rotated outwards. The outboard turbines operated at high pressure; the exhaust steam then passing to those inboard at relatively low pressure. The propellers were driven directly by the turbines, since sufficiently robust gearboxes had not yet been developed, and only became available in 1916.

Instead, the turbines had to be designed to run at a much lower speed than those normally accepted as being optimum. Thus, the efficiency of the turbines installed was less at low speeds than a conventional reciprocating (piston in cylinder) steam engine, but significantly better when the engines were run at high speed, as was usually the case for an express liner.

The ship was fitted with 23 double-ended, and two single-ended boilers (which fitted the forward space where the ship narrowed), operating at a maximum 195 psi and containing 192 individual furnaces. [21]Deck plans of Lusitania. Modifications were made both during, and after the ship's construction.

By 1915 the lifeboat arrangement had been changed to 11 fixed boats either side, plus collapsible boats stored under each lifeboat and on the poop deck. Work to refine the hull shape was conducted in the Admiralty experimental tank at Haslar, Gosport. As a result of experiments, the beam of the ship was increased by 10 feet (3.0 m) over that initially intended to improve stability.

The hull immediately in front of the rudder and the balanced rudder itself followed naval design practice to improve the vessel's turning response. The Admiralty contract required that all machinery be below the waterline, where it was considered to be better protected from gunfire, and the aft third of the ship below water was used to house the turbines, the steering motors and four 375-kilowatt (503 hp) steam driven turbo-generators.

The central half contained four boiler rooms, with the remaining space at the forward end of the ship being reserved for cargo and other storage.

Coal bunkers were placed along the length of the ship outboard of the boiler rooms, with a large transverse bunker immediately in front of that most forward (number 1) boiler room. Apart from convenience ready for use, the coal was considered to provide added protection for the central spaces against attack. At the very front were the chain lockers for the huge anchor chains and ballast tanks to adjust the ship's trim.

The hull space was divided into twelve watertight compartments, any two of which could be flooded without risk of the ship sinking, connected by 35 hydraulically operated watertight doors.

A critical flaw in the arrangement of the watertight compartments was that sliding doors to the coal bunkers needed to be open to provide a constant feed of coal whilst the ship was operating, and closing these in emergency conditions could be problematic. The ship had a double bottom with the space between divided into separate watertight cells. The ship's exceptional height was due to the six decks of passenger accommodation above the waterline, compared to the customary four decks in existing liners.

[22]High tensile steel was used for the ship's plating, as opposed to the more conventional mild steel. This allowed a reduction in plate thickness, reducing weight but still providing 26 per cent greater strength than otherwise.

Plates were held together by triple rows of rivets. The ship was heated and cooled throughout by a thermo-tank ventilation system, which used steam driven heat exchangers to warm air to a constant 65 °F (18.3 °C), while steam was injected into the airflow to maintain steady humidity.

Forty-nine separate units driven by electric fans provided seven complete changes of air per hour throughout the ship, through an interconnected system, so that individual units could be switched off for maintenance.

A separate system of exhaust fans removed air from galleys and bathrooms. As built, the ship conformed fully with Board of Trade safety regulations which required sixteen lifeboats with a capacity of approximately 1,000 people.

[23]At the time of her completion Lusitania was briefly the largest ship ever built, but was eclipsed in this respect by the slightly larger Mauretania which entered service shortly thereafter. She was 70 feet (21 m) longer, a full 2 knots (3.7 km/h; 2.3 mph) faster, and had a capacity of 10,000 gross tons over and above that of the most modern German liner, Kronprinzessin Cecilie.

Passenger accommodation was 50% larger than any of her competitors, providing for 552 saloon class, 460 cabin class and 1,186 in third class. Her crew comprised 69 on deck, 369 operating engines and boilers and 389 to attend to passengers. Both she and Mauretania had a wireless telegraph, electric lighting, electric lifts, sumptuous interiors and an early form of air-conditioning.

[24]Interiors Painting of Lusitania by Norman Wilkinson At the time of their introduction onto the North Atlantic, both Lusitania and Mauretania possessed among the most luxurious, spacious and comfortable interiors afloat. The Scottish architect James Miller was chosen to design Lusitania ' s interiors, while Harold Peto was chosen to design Mauretania. Miller chose to use plasterwork to create interiors whereas Peto made extensive use of wooden panelling, with the result that the overall impression given by Lusitania was brighter than Mauretania.

Lusitania ' s designs proved the more popular. The ship's passenger accommodation was spread across six decks; from the top deck down to the waterline they were Boat Deck (A Deck), the Promenade Deck (B Deck), the Shelter Deck (C Deck), the Upper Deck (D Deck), the Main Deck (E Deck) and the Lower Deck (F Deck), with each of the three passenger classes being allotted their own space on the ship.

As seen aboard all passenger liners of the era, first, second and third class passengers were strictly segregated from one another.

According to her original configuration in 1907, she was designed to carry 2,198 passengers and 827 crew members.

The Cunard Line prided itself with a record for passenger satisfaction. Lounge and music room Verandah cafe Lusitania ' s first class accommodation was in the centre section of the ship on the five uppermost decks, mostly concentrated between the first and fourth funnels. When fully booked, Lusitania could cater to 552 first class passengers. In common with all major liners of the period, Lusitania ' s first class interiors were decorated with a mélange of historical styles.

The first class dining saloon was the grandest of the ship's public rooms; arranged over two decks with an open circular well at its centre and crowned by an elaborate dome measuring 29 feet (8.8 m), decorated with frescos in the style of François Boucher, it was elegantly realised throughout in the neoclassical Louis XVI style.

The lower floor measuring 85 feet (26 m) could seat 323, with a further 147 on the 65-foot (20 m) upper floor. The walls were finished with white and gilt carved mahogany panels, with Corinthian decorated columns which were required to support the floor above.

The one concession to seaborne life was that furniture was bolted to the floor, meaning passengers could not rearrange their seating for their personal convenience. [25]Promotional material showing the First Class dining room Finished First Class dining room All other first class public rooms were situated on the boat deck and comprised a lounge, reading and writing room, smoking room and veranda café.

The last was an innovation on a Cunard liner and, in warm weather, one side of the café could be opened up to give the impression of sitting outdoors.

This would have been a rarely used feature given the often inclement weather of the North Atlantic. [26]The first class lounge was decorated in Georgian style with inlaid mahogany panels surrounding a jade green carpet with a yellow floral pattern, measuring overall 68 feet (21 m). It had a barrel vaulted skylight rising to 20 feet (6.1 m) with stained glass windows each representing one month of the year.1st class Smoking room1st class reading and writing room Each end of the lounge had a 14-foot (4.3 m) high green marble fireplace incorporating enamelled panels by Alexander Fisher.

The design was linked overall with decorative plasterwork. The library walls were decorated with carved pilasters and mouldings marking out panels of grey and cream silk brocade.

The carpet was rose, with Rose du Barry silk curtains and upholstery. The chairs and writing desks were mahogany, and the windows featured etched glass. The smoking room was Queen Anne style, with Italian walnut panelling and Italian red furnishings. The grand stairway linked all six decks of the passenger accommodation with wide hallways on each level and two lifts.

First class cabins ranged from one shared room through various ensuite arrangements in a choice of decorative styles culminating in the two regal suites which each had two bedrooms, dining room, parlour and bathroom. The port suite decoration was modelled on the Petit Trianon. [27]Lusitania ' s second class accommodation was confined to the stern, behind the aft mast, where quarters for 460 second class passengers were located.

The second class public rooms were situated on partitioned sections of boat and promenade decks housed in a separate section of the superstructure aft of the first class passenger quarters.

Design work was deputised to Robert Whyte, who was the architect employed by John Brown. Although smaller and plainer, the design of the dining room reflected that of first class, with just one floor of diners under a ceiling with a smaller dome and balcony.

Walls were panelled and carved with decorated pillars, all in white. As seen in first class, the dining room was situated lower down in the ship on the saloon deck. The smoking and ladies' rooms occupied the accommodation space of the second class promenade deck, with the lounge on the boat deck.

Cunard had not previously provided a separate lounge for second class; the 42-foot (13 m) room had mahogany tables, chairs and settees set on a rose carpet.

The smoking room was 52 feet (16 m) with mahogany panelling, white plasterwork ceiling and dome. One wall had a mosaic of a river scene in Brittany, while the sliding windows were blue tinted. Second class passengers were allotted shared, yet comfortable two and four berth cabins arranged on the shelter, upper and main decks.

[28]Noted as being the prime breadwinner for trans-Atlantic shipping lines, third class aboard Lusitania was praised for the improvement in travel conditions it provided to emigrant passengers, and Lusitania proved to be a quite popular ship for immigrants. [29] In the days before Lusitania and even still during the years in which Lusitania was in service, third class accommodation consisted of large open spaces where hundreds of people would share open berths and hastily constructed public spaces, often consisting of no more than a small portion of open deck space and a few tables constructed within their sleeping quarters.

In an attempt to break that mould, the Cunard Line began designing ships such as Lusitania with more comfortable third class accommodation.

As on all Cunard passenger liners, third class accommodation aboard Lusitania was located at the forward end of the ship on the shelter, upper, main and lower decks, and in comparison to other ships of the period, it was comfortable and spacious.

The 79-foot (24 m) dining room was at the bow of the ship on the saloon deck, finished in polished pine as were the other two third class public rooms, being the smoke room and ladies room on the shelter deck.

When Lusitania was fully booked in Third Class, the smoking and ladies room could easily be converted into overflow dining rooms for added convenience. Meals were eaten at long tables with swivel chairs and there were two sittings for meals. A piano was provided for passenger use. What greatly appealed to immigrants and lower class travelers was that instead of being confined to open berth dormitories, aboard Lusitania was a honeycomb of two, four, six and eight berth cabins allotted to Third Class passengers on the main and lower decks.

[30]The Bromsgrove Guild had designed and constructed most of the trim on Lusitania. [31] Waring and Gillow tendered for the contract to furnish the whole ship, but failing to obtain this still supplied a number of the furnishings.

Construction and trials Lusitania ' s launch, 7 June 1906Lusitania ' s keel was laid at John Brown on Clydebank as yard no. 367 on 16 June 1904, Lord Inverclyde hammering home the first rivet. Cunard nicknamed her 'the Scottish ship' in contrast to Mauretania whose contract went to Swan Hunter in England and who started building three months later.

Final details of the two ships were left to designers at the two yards so that the ships differed in details of hull design and finished structure. The ships may most readily be distinguished in photographs through the flat topped ventilators used on Lusitania, whereas those on Mauretania used a more conventional rounded top.

Mauretania was designed a little longer, wider, heavier and with an extra power stage fitted to the turbines. The shipyard at John Brown had to be reorganised because of her size so that she could be launched diagonally across the widest available part of the river Clyde where it met a tributary, the ordinary width of the river being only 610 feet (190 m) compared to the 786-foot (240 m) long ship.

The new slipway took up the space of two existing ones and was built on reinforcing piles driven deeply into the ground to ensure it could take the temporary concentrated weight of the whole ship as it slid into the water. In addition the company spent £8,000 to dredge the Clyde, £6,500 on new gas plant, £6,500 on a new electrical plant, £18,000 to extend the dock and £19,000 for a new crane capable of lifting 150 tons as well as £20,000 on additional machinery and equipment.

[32] Construction commenced at the bow working backwards, rather than the traditional approach of building both ends towards the middle. This was because designs for the stern and engine layout were not finalised when construction commenced. Railway tracks were laid alongside the ship and across deck plating to bring materials as required.

The hull, completed to the level of the main deck but not fitted with equipment weighed approximately 16,000 tons. [33]The ship's stockless bower anchors weighed 10 1⁄ 4 tons, attached to 125 ton, 330 fathom chains all manufactured by N. Hingley & Sons Ltd.

The steam capstans to raise them were constructed by Napier Brothers Ltd, of Glasgow. The turbines were 25 feet (7.6 m) long with 12 ft (3.7 m) diameter rotors, the large diameter necessary because of the relatively low speeds at which they operated. The rotors were constructed on site, while the casings and shafting was constructed in John Brown's Atlas works in Sheffield.

The machinery to drive the 56 ton rudder was constructed by Brown Brothers of Edinburgh. A main steering engine drove the rudder through worm gear and clutch operating on a toothed quadrant rack, with a reserve engine operating separately on the rack via a chain drive for emergency use. The 17 ft (5.2 m) three bladed propellers were fitted and then cased in wood to protect them during the launch.

[34]The ship was launched on 7 June 1906, eight weeks later than planned due to labour strikes and eight months after Lord Inverclyde's death. Princess Louise was invited to name the ship but could not attend, so the honour fell to Inverclyde's widow Mary. [35] [1] The launch was attended by 600 invited guests and thousands of spectators. [36] One thousand tons of drag chains were attached to the hull by temporary rings to slow it once it entered the water.

On launch the propellers were fitted, but on later launches propellers would be fitted in dry dock as they could be damaged by colliding with another object on launch.

[37] The wooden supporting structure was held back by cables so that once the ship entered the water it would slip forward out of its support. Six tugs were on hand to capture the hull and move it to the fitting out berth. [38]Testing of the ship's engines took place in June 1907 prior to full trials scheduled for July.

A preliminary cruise, or Builder's Trial, was arranged for 27 July with representatives of Cunard, the Admiralty, the Board of Trade, and John Brown aboard.

The ship achieved speeds of 25.6 knots (47.4 km/h; 29.5 mph) over a measured 1 mile (1.6 km) at Skelmorlie with turbines running at 194 revolutions per minute producing 76,000 shp. At high speeds the ship was found to suffer such vibration at the stern as to render the second class accommodation uninhabitable. VIP invited guests now came on board for a two-day shakedown cruise during which the ship was tested under continuous running at speeds of 15, 18 and 21 knots but not her maximum speed.

On 29 July the guests departed and three days of full trials commenced. The ship travelled four times between the Corsewall Light off Scotland to the Longship Light off Cornwall at 23 and 25 knots, between the Corsewall Light and the Isle of Man, and the Isle of Arran and Ailsa Craig.

Over 300 miles (480 km) an average speed of 25.4 knots was achieved, comfortably greater than the 24 knots required under the admiralty contract. The ship could stop in 4 minutes in 3/4 of a mile starting from 23 knots at 166 rpm and then applying full reverse.

She achieved a speed of 26 knots over a measured mile loaded to a draught of 33 feet (10 m), and managed 26.5 knots over a 60-mile (97 km) course drawing 31.5 feet (9.6 m). At 180 revolutions a turning test was conducted and the ship performed a complete circle of diameter 1000 yards in 50 seconds.

The rudder required 20 seconds to be turned hard to 35 degrees. [39] [40]The vibration was determined to be caused by interference between the wake of the outer propellers and inner and became worse when turning. At high speeds the vibration frequency resonated with the ship's stern making the matter worse. The solution was to add internal stiffening to the stern of the ship but this necessitated gutting the second class areas and then rebuilding them.

This required the addition of a number of pillars and arches to the decorative scheme. The ship was finally delivered to Cunard on 26 August although the problem of vibration was never entirely solved and further remedial work went on through her life.

[41]Comparison with the Olympic class The White Star Line 's Olympic -class vessels were almost 100 ft (30 m) longer and slightly wider than Lusitania and Mauretania.

This made the White Star vessels about 15,000 tons heavier than the Cunard vessels. Both Lusitania and Mauretania were launched and had been in service for several years before Olympic, Titanic and Britannic were ready for the North Atlantic run. Although significantly faster than the Olympic class would be, the speed of Cunard's vessels was not sufficient to allow the line to run a weekly two-ship transatlantic service from each side of the Atlantic.

A third ship was needed for a weekly service, and in response to White Star's announced plan to build the three Olympic -class ships, Cunard ordered a third ship: Aquitania.

Like Olympic, Cunard's Aquitania had a lower service speed, but was a larger and more luxurious vessel. Because of their increased size the Olympic -class liners could offer many more amenities than Lusitania and Mauretania. Both Olympic and Titanic offered swimming pools, Turkish baths, a gymnasium, a squash court, large reception rooms, À la Carte restaurants separate from the dining saloons, and many more staterooms with private bathroom facilities than their two Cunard rivals.

Heavy vibrations as a by-product of the four steam turbines on Lusitania and Mauretania would plague both ships throughout their careers.

When Lusitania sailed at top speed the resultant vibrations were so severe that Second and Third Class sections of the ship could become uninhabitable. [42] In contrast, the Olympic -class liners utilised four traditional reciprocating engines and only one turbine for the central propeller, which greatly reduced vibration.

Because of their greater tonnage and wider beam, the Olympic -class liners were also more stable at sea and less prone to rolling. Lusitania and Mauretania both featured straight prows in contrast to the angled prows of the Olympic liners.

Designed so that the ships could plunge through a wave rather than crest it, the unforeseen consequence was that the Cunard liners would pitch forward alarmingly, even in calm weather, allowing huge waves to splash the bow and forward part of the superstructure.

[43]Olympic arriving at port on maiden voyage June 1911, with Lusitania departing in the background The vessels of the Olympic class also differed from Lusitania and Mauretania in the way in which they were compartmented below the waterline.

The White Star vessels were divided by transverse watertight bulkheads. While Lusitania also had transverse bulkheads, it also had longitudinal bulkheads running along the ship on each side, between the boiler and engine rooms and the coal bunkers on the outside of the vessel. The British commission that had investigated the sinking of Titanic in 1912 heard testimony on the flooding of coal bunkers lying outside longitudinal bulkheads.

Being of considerable length, when flooded, these could increase the ship's list and ""make the lowering of the boats on the other side impracticable"" [44] — and this was precisely what later happened with Lusitania. The ship's stability was insufficient for the bulkhead arrangement used: flooding of only three coal bunkers on one side could result in negative metacentric height.

[45] On the other hand, Titanic was given ample stability and sank with only a few degrees list, the design being such that there was very little risk of unequal flooding and possible capsize.

[46]Lusitania did not carry enough lifeboats for all her passengers, officers and crew on board at the time of her maiden voyage (carrying four lifeboats fewer than Titanic would carry in 1912).

This was a common practice for large passenger ships at the time, since the belief was that in busy shipping lanes help would always be nearby and the few boats available would be adequate to ferry all aboard to rescue ships before a sinking. After the Titanic sank, Lusitania and Mauretania were equipped with an additional six clinker-built wooden boats under davits, making for a total of 22 boats rigged in davits.

The rest of their lifeboat accommodations were supplemented with 26 collapsible lifeboats, 18 stored directly beneath the regular lifeboats and eight on the after deck.

The collapsibles were built with hollow wooden bottoms and canvas sides, and needed assembly in the event they had to be used. [47]This contrasted with Olympic and Britannic which received a full complement of lifeboats all rigged under davits.

This difference would have been a major contributor to the high loss of life involved with Lusitania ' s sinking, since there was not sufficient time to assemble collapsible boats or life-rafts, had it not been for the fact that the ship's severe listing made it impossible for lifeboats on the port side of the vessel to be lowered, and the rapidity of the sinking did not allow the remaining lifeboats that could be directly lowered (as these were rigged under davits) to be filled and launched with passengers.

When Britannic, working as a hospital ship during World War I, sank in 1916 after hitting a mine in the Kea channel the already davited boats were swiftly lowered saving nearly all on board, but the ship took nearly three times as long to sink as Lusitania and thus the crew had more time to evacuate passengers.

Career Lusitania arriving in New York on her maiden voyage Lusitania, commanded by Commodore James Watt, moored at the Liverpool landing stage for her maiden voyage at 4:30 p.m. on Saturday 7 September 1907 as the onetime Blue Riband holder RMS Lucania vacated the pier.

At the time Lusitania was the largest ocean liner in service and would continue to be until the introduction of Mauretania in November that year. During her eight-year service, she made a total of 202 crossings on the Cunard Line's Liverpool-New York Route. A crowd of 200,000 people gathered to see her departure at 9:00 p.m. for Queenstown (renamed Cobh in 1920), where she was to take on more passengers.

She anchored again at Roche's Point, off Queenstown, at 9:20 a.m. the following morning, where she was shortly joined by Lucania, which she had passed in the night, and 120 passengers were brought out to the ship by tender bringing her total of passengers to 2,320.

At 12:10 p.m. on Sunday Lusitania was again under way and passing the Daunt Rock Lightship. In the first 24 hours she achieved 561 miles (903 km), with further daily totals of 575, 570, 593 and 493 miles (793 km) before arriving at Sandy Hook at 9:05 a.m. Friday 13 September, taking in total 5 days and 54 minutes, 30 minutes outside the record time held by Kaiser Wilhelm II of the North German Lloyd line.

Fog had delayed the ship on two days, and her engines were not yet run in. In New York hundreds of thousands of people gathered on the bank of the Hudson River from Battery Park to pier 56.

All New York's police had been called out to control the crowd. From the start of the day, 100 horse drawn cabs had been queuing, ready to take away passengers.

During the week's stay the ship was made available for guided tours. At 3 p.m. on Saturday 21 September, the ship departed on the return journey, arriving Queenstown 4 a.m. 27 September and Liverpool 12 hours later. The return journey was 5 days 4 hours and 19 minutes, again delayed by fog. [48]On her second voyage in better weather, Lusitania arrived at Sandy Hook on 11 October 1907 in the Blue Riband record time of 4 days, 19 hours and 53 minutes.

She had to wait for the tide to enter harbour where news had preceded her and she was met by a fleet of small craft, whistles blaring. Lusitania averaged 23.99 knots (44.43 km/h) westbound and 23.61 knots (43.73 km/h) eastbound. In December 1907, Mauretania entered service and took the record for the fastest eastbound crossing.

Lusitania made her fastest westbound crossing in 1909 after her propellers were changed, averaging 25.85 knots (47.87 km/h). She briefly recovered the record in July of that year, but Mauretania recaptured the Blue Riband the same month, retaining it until 1929, when it was taken by SS Bremen.

[49]Lusitania at the end of the first leg of her maiden voyage, New York City, September 1907. (The photo was taken with a panoramic camera.

)Hudson Fulton Celebrationstereo picture of Wright Flyer, Lusitania (Europe-bound), and the Statue of Liberty, during Hudson Fulton Celebration. Lusitania and other ships participated in the Hudson-Fulton Celebration in New York City from the end of September to early October 1909.

The celebration also was a display of the different modes of transportation then in existence, Lusitania representing the newest advancement in steamship technology. A newer mode of travel was the aeroplane. Wilbur Wright had brought a Flyer to Governors Island and proceeded to make demonstration flights before millions of New Yorkers who had never seen an aircraft.

Some of Wright's trips were directly over Lusitania; several photographs of Lusitania from that week still exist.

[50] [51] [52]Outbreak of the First World War When Lusitania was built, her construction and operating expenses were subsidised by the British government, with the proviso that she could be converted to an armed merchant cruiser (AMC) if need be.

A secret compartment was designed in for the purpose of carrying arms and ammunition. [53] When war was declared she was requisitioned by the British Admiralty as an armed merchant cruiser, and she was put on the official list of AMCs.

Lusitania remained on the official AMC list and was listed as an auxiliary cruiser in the 1914 edition of Jane's All the World's Fighting Ships, along with Mauretania. [8] [54] [55] [56]The Declaration of Paris codified the rules for naval engagements involving civilian vessels. The so-called Cruiser Rules required that the crew and passengers of civilian ships be safeguarded in the event that the ship is to be confiscated or sunk.

These rules also placed some onus on the ship itself, in that the merchant ship had to be flying its own flag, and not pretending to be of a different nationality. Also, it had to stop when confronted and allow itself to be boarded and searched, and it was not allowed to be armed or to take any hostile or evasive actions.

[57] When war was declared, British merchant ships were given orders to ram submarines that surfaced to issue the warnings required by the Cruiser Rules.

[8] [9] [10] [11] [58]At the outbreak of hostilities, fears for the safety of Lusitania and other great liners ran high. During the ship's first east-bound crossing after the war started, she was painted in a grey colour scheme in an attempt to mask her identity and make her more difficult to detect visually. Germany's declared exclusion zone of February 1915. Ships within this area were liable to search and attack.

Many of the large liners were laid up in 1914–1915, in part due to falling demand for passenger travel across the Atlantic, and in part to protect them from damage due to mines or other dangers. Among the most recognisable of these liners, some were eventually used as troop transports, while others became hospital ships.

Lusitania remained in commercial service; although bookings aboard her were by no means strong during that autumn and winter, demand was strong enough to keep her in civilian service. Economising measures were taken. One of these was the shutting down of her No. 4 boiler room to conserve coal and crew costs; this reduced her maximum speed from over 25 knots (46 km/h; 29 mph) to 21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph).

With apparent dangers evaporating, the ship's disguised paint scheme was also dropped and she was returned to civilian colours. Her name was picked out in gilt, her funnels were repainted in their traditional Cunard livery, and her superstructure was painted white again.

One alteration was the addition of a bronze/gold coloured band around the base of the superstructure just above the black paint. [59]1915Captain Daniel Dow, Lusitania ' s penultimate captain Captain William Thomas Turner 1915. The official warning issued by the Imperial German Embassy about travelling on Lusitania By early 1915 a new threat began to materialise: submarines. At first they were used by the Germans only to attack naval vessels, something they achieved only occasionally but sometimes with spectacular success.

Then the U-boats began to attack merchant vessels at times, although almost always in accordance with the old Cruiser Rules. Desperate to gain an advantage on the Atlantic, the German government decided to step up their submarine campaign, as a result of the British declaring the North Sea a war zone in November 1914. On 4 February 1915, Germany declared the seas around the British Isles a war zone: from 18 February Allied ships in the area would be sunk without warning.

This was not wholly unrestricted submarine warfare as efforts would be taken to avoid sinking neutral ships. [b]Lusitania was scheduled to arrive in Liverpool on 6 March 1915. The Admiralty issued her specific instructions on how to avoid submarines. Admiral Henry Oliver ordered HMS Louis and HMS Laverock to escort Lusitania, and took the further precaution of sending the Q-ship HMS Lyons to patrol Liverpool Bay.

[c] The destroyer commander attempted to discover the whereabouts of Lusitania by telephoning Cunard, who refused to give out any information and referred him to the Admiralty. At sea, the ships contacted Lusitania by radio but did not have the codes used to communicate with merchant ships.

Captain Dow of Lusitania refused to give his own position except in code, and since he was, in any case, some distance from the positions they gave, continued to Liverpool unescorted. [60] [61] [62]In response to this new submarine threat, some alterations were made to the ship's protocols.

She was ordered not to fly any flags in the war zone, which was a contravention of the Cruiser Rules. Some messages were sent to the ship's commander to help him decide how to best protect his ship against the new threat, and it also seems that her funnels were most likely painted dark grey to help make her less visible to enemy submarines.

Clearly, there was no hope of disguising her identity, as her profile was so well known, and no attempt was made to paint out the ship's name at the prow.

[d]Captain Dow, apparently suffering from stress from operating his ship in the war zone, and after a significant "" false flag "" controversy, left the ship; Cunard later explained that he was ""tired and really ill"". [e] He was replaced by Captain William Thomas Turner, who had previously commanded Lusitania, Mauretania, and Aquitania in the years before the war.

[ citation needed]On 17 April 1915, Lusitania left Liverpool on her 201st transatlantic voyage, arriving in New York on 24 April. A group of German-Americans, hoping to avoid controversy if Lusitania was attacked by a U-boat, discussed their concerns with a representative of the German Embassy.

The embassy decided to warn passengers before her next crossing not to sail aboard Lusitania. The Imperial German Embassy placed a warning advertisement in 50 American newspapers, including those in New York: Notice!

Travellers intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that a state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to the British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, or any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and that travellers sailing in the war zone on the ships of Great Britain or her allies do so at their own risk.

Imperial German Embassy Washington, D. C., 22 April 1915. This warning was printed adjacent to an advertisement for Lusitania ' s return voyage.

The warning led to agitation in the press and worried some of the ship's passengers and crew. [63] Lusitania departed Pier 54 in New York, on 1 May 1915 at 12:20 p.m. [64] [65] A few hours after the vessel's departure, the Saturday evening edition of The Washington Times published two articles on its front page, both referring to those warnings. [66]Sinking Main article: Sinking of the RMS Lusitania On 7 May 1915 Lusitania was nearing the end of her 202nd crossing, bound for Liverpool from New York, and was scheduled to dock at the Prince's Landing Stage later that afternoon.

Aboard her were 1,266 passengers and a crew of 696, which combined totaled to 1,962 people. [67] She was running parallel to the south coast of Ireland, and was roughly 11 miles off the Old Head of Kinsale when the liner crossed in front of U-20 at 14:10.

Due to the liner's great speed, some believe the intersection of the German U-boat and the liner to be coincidence, as U-20 could hardly have caught the fast vessel otherwise. There are discrepancies concerning the speed of Lusitania, as it had been reported travelling not near its full speed. Walther Schwieger, the commanding officer of the U-boat, gave the order to fire one torpedo, which struck Lusitania on the starboard bow, just beneath the wheelhouse.

Moments later, a second explosion erupted from within Lusitania ' s hull where the torpedo had struck, and the ship began to founder much more rapidly, with a prominent list to starboard. [68] [f]Almost immediately, the crew scrambled to launch the lifeboats but the conditions of the sinking made their usage extremely difficult, and in some cases impossible due to the ship's severe list.

In all, only six out of 48 lifeboats were launched successfully, with several more overturning and breaking apart. Eighteen minutes after the torpedo struck, the bow struck the seabed while the stern was still above the surface, and finally the ship slid beneath the waves. Of the 1,962 passengers and crew aboard Lusitania at the time of the sinking, 1,198 lost their lives.

As in the sinking of Titanic, most of the casualties were from drowning or hypothermia. In the hours after the sinking, acts of heroism amongst both the survivors of the sinking and the Irish rescuers who had heard word of Lusitania ' s distress signals brought the survivor count to 764, three of whom later died from injuries sustained during the sinking.

A British cruiser HMS Juno, which had heard of the sinking only a short time after Lusitania was struck, left her anchorage in Cork Harbour to render assistance. Just south of Roche's Point at the mouth of the harbour only an hour from the site of the sinking she turned and returned to her mooring as a result, it is believed, on orders issued from Admiralty House in Cobh (HQ Haulbowline naval base), then known as Queenstown.

By the following morning, news of the disaster had spread around the world. While most of those lost in the sinking were British or Canadians, the loss of 128 Americans in the disaster, including writer and publisher Elbert Hubbard, theatrical producer Charles Frohman, multi-millionaire businessman Alfred Vanderbilt, and the president of Newport News Shipbuilding, Albert L. Hopkins, outraged many in the United States. [69]Aftermath The sinking caused an international outcry, especially in Britain and across the British Empire, as well as in the United States, since 128 out of 139 U. S. citizens aboard the ship lost their lives.

[70] On 8 May, Dr Bernhard Dernburg, a German spokesman and a former German Colonial Secretary, published a statement in which he said that because Lusitania ""carried contraband of war"" and also because she ""was classed as an auxiliary cruiser,"" Germany had a right to destroy her regardless of any passengers aboard.

Dernburg claimed warnings given by the German Embassy before the sailing plus the 18 February note declaring the existence of ""war zones"" relieved Germany of any responsibility for the deaths of American citizens aboard. He referred to the ammunition and military goods declared on Lusitania ' s manifest and said that ""vessels of that kind"" could be seized and destroyed under the Hague rules.

[g] [71]Lusitania was indeed officially listed as an auxiliary war ship, [72] and her cargo had included an estimated 4,200,000 rounds of rifle cartridges, 1,250 empty shell cases, and 18 cases of non-explosive fuses, which was openly listed as such in her cargo manifest.

[73] [74] The day after the sinking, The New York Times published full details of the ship's military cargo. [75] Assistant Manager of the Cunard Line, Herman Winter, denied the charge that she carried munitions, but admitted that she was carrying small-arms ammunition, and that she had been carrying such ammunition for years.

[73] The fact that Lusitania had been carrying shells and cartridges was not made known to the British public at the time.

[76]In the 27-page additional manifest, delivered to U. S. customs 4–5 days after Lusitania sailed from New York, and in the Bethlehem Steels papers, it is stated that the ""empty shells"" were in fact 1,248 boxes of filled 3"" shell, 4 shells to the box, totaling 103,000 pounds or 50 tonnes. [77]President Woodrow Wilson refused to immediately declare war. [78] During the weeks after the sinking, the issue was hotly debated within the U. S. government, and correspondence was exchanged between the U. S. and German governments.

German Foreign Minister Von Jagow continued to argue that Lusitania was a legitimate military target, as she was listed as an armed merchant cruiser, she was using neutral flags and she had been ordered to ram submarines – in blatant contravention of the Cruiser Rules.

[79] [80] [81]Von Jagow further argued that Lusitania had on previous voyages carried munitions and Allied troops. [82] Wilson continued to insist the German government apologise for the sinking, compensate U. S. victims, and promise to avoid any similar occurrence in the future.

[83] The British were disappointed with Wilson over his failure to pursue more drastic actions. Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan advised President Wilson that ""ships carrying contraband should be prohibited from carrying passengers ... [I]t would be like putting women and children in front of an army.""

[84] Bryan later resigned because he felt the Wilson administration was being biased in ignoring British contraventions of international law, and that Wilson was leading the U. S. into the war. [85]A German decision on 9 September 1915 stated that attacks were only allowed on ships that were definitely British, while neutral ships were to be treated under the Prize Law rules, and no attacks on passenger liners were to be permitted at all.

[85] [86] A fabricated story was circulated that in some regions of Germany, schoolchildren were given a holiday to celebrate the sinking of Lusitania. This claim was so effective that James W. Gerard, the U. S. ambassador to Germany, recounted it in his memoir of his time in Germany, Face to Face with Kaiserism (1918), though without substantiating its validity.

[87]Almost two years later, in January 1917 the German Government announced it would again conduct full unrestricted submarine warfare. This together with the Zimmermann Telegram pushed U. S. public opinion over the tipping point, and on 6 April 1917 the United States Congress followed President Wilson's request to declare war on Germany.

[88]In 2014 a release of papers revealed that in 1982 the British government warned divers of the presence of explosives on board: Successive British governments have always maintained that there was no munitions on board the Lusitania (and that the Germans were therefore in the wrong to claim to the contrary as an excuse for sinking the ship) ...

The facts are that there is a large amount of ammunition in the wreck, some of which is highly dangerous.

The Treasury have decided that they must inform the salvage company of this fact in the interests of the safety of all concerned. [89] [90]Commemoration100th Anniversary7 May 2015 was the 100th anniversary of the sinking of Lusitania.

To commemorate the occasion, Cunard's MS Queen Victoria undertook a voyage to Cork, Ireland. [91]On 3 May, a flotilla set sail from the Isle of Man to mark the anniversary. Seven Manx fishermen in The Wanderer had rescued 150 people from the sinking ship. Two of the bravery medals awarded to the crew members are held at the Leece Museum in Peel.

[92]Conspiracy theories There are a number of conspiracy theories relating to the last days of Lusitania. British Government deliberately putting Lusitania at risk There has long been a theory, expressed by historian and former British naval intelligence officer Patrick Beesly and authors Colin Simpson and Donald E. Schmidt among others, that Lusitania was deliberately placed in danger by the British authorities, so as to entice a U-boat attack and thereby drag the US into the war on the side of Britain.

[93] [94] A week before the sinking of Lusitania, Winston Churchill wrote to Walter Runciman, the President of the Board of Trade, stating that it is ""most important to attract neutral shipping to our shores, in the hope especially of embroiling the United States with Germany.""

[95] [94]Beesly concludes: ""unless and until fresh information comes to light, I am reluctantly driven to the conclusion that there was a conspiracy deliberately to put Lusitania at risk in the hope that even an abortive attack on her would bring the United States into the war.

Such a conspiracy could not have been put into effect without Winston Churchill 's express permission and approval."" [93]At the post-sinking inquiry Captain Turner refused to answer certain questions on the grounds of war-time secrecy imperatives. The British government continues to keep secret certain documents relating to the final days of the voyage, including certain of the signals passed between the Admiralty and Lusitania.

The records that are available are often missing critical pages, and lingering questions include the following: [96] [97] [98] [99]Were the British authorities aware (thanks to the secret decryption activities of Room 40) that a German submarine was in the path of Lusitania, but failed to divert the ship to a safer route?

Did they also fail to provide a destroyer escort, although destroyers were available in a nearby port? Was the ship ordered to reduce speed in the war zone, for reasons that have been kept secret ever since?

How did such a big ship sink so quickly from a single torpedo strike? Undeclared war munitions Lusitania was officially carrying among her cargo 750 tons of rifle/machine-gun ammunition, 1250 cases of shrapnel artillery shells with the explosive burster charges loaded but no fuses or propellant charges, and the artillery fuses for those shells stored separately.

[100] [7] [58] [73] [101] [102] [77] Beesly has stated that the cargo also included 46 tons of aluminium powder, which was used in the manufacture of explosives and which was being shipped to the Woolwich Arsenal, [103] [97] while Erik Larson has stated that the cargo included 50 barrels and 94 cases of aluminium powder, as well as 50 cases of bronze powder. [77] Author Steven Danver states that Lusitania was also secretly carrying a large quantity of nitrocellulose (gun cotton), although this was not listed on the cargo manifest either.

[104]Furthermore, there was a large consignment of fur, sent from Dupont de Nemours, an explosives manufacturer, and 90 tons of butter and lard destined for the Royal Navy Weapons Testing Establishment in Essex.

Although it was May, this lard and butter was not refrigerated; it was insured by the special government rate but the insurance was never claimed.

[105] In September 2008, bullets of a type known to be used by the British military were recovered from the wreck by diver Eoin Mc Garry. They were found in an area of the ship not previously known to have been carrying cargo. [106]Alleged bombardment/destruction of the wreck It has been alleged that the wreck was bombed by the Royal Navy.

A Dublin -based technical diver, Des Quigley, who dived on the wreck in the 1990s, reported that the wreck is ""like Swiss cheese"" and the seabed around her ""is littered with unexploded hedgehog mines "". [107]In February 2009, the Discovery Channel television series Treasure Quest aired an episode titled ""Lusitania Revealed"", in which Gregg Bemis, a retired venture capitalist who owns the rights to the wreck, and a team of shipwreck experts explore the wreck via a remote control unmanned submersible.

At one point in the documentary an unexploded depth charge was found in the wreckage. [108] [109]Professor William Kingston of Trinity College, Dublin claimed that ""There's no doubt at all about it that the Royal Navy and the British government have taken very considerable steps over the years to try to prevent whatever can be found out about the Lusitania "".

[107]Wreck The wreck of Lusitania lies on its starboard side at an approximately 30-degree angle in roughly 300 feet (91 m) of water, 11 miles (18 km) south of the lighthouse at Kinsale.

The wreck is badly collapsed onto her starboard side, due to the force with which she struck the bottom coupled with the forces of winter tides and corrosion in the decades since the sinking.

The keel has an ""unusual curvature"" which may be related to a lack of strength from the loss of its superstructure. The beam is reduced with the funnels missing presumably to deterioration. [110]The bow is the most prominent portion of the wreck with the stern damaged by depth charges. Three of the four propellers were removed by Oceaneering International in 1982. Expeditions to Lusitania have shown that the ship has deteriorated much faster than Titanic has, being in a depth of 305 feet (93 m) of water.

When contrasted with her contemporary, Titanic (resting at a depth of 12,000 feet (3,700 m)), Lusitania appears in a much more deteriorated state due to the presence of fishing nets lying on the wreckage, the blasting of the wreck with depth charges and multiple salvage operations.

As a result, the wreck is unstable and may at some point completely collapse. [110]Simon Lake's attempt to salvage in the 1930s Between 1931 and 1935 an American syndicate comprising Simon Lake, one of the chief inventors of the modern submarine, and a US Navy officer, Captain H. H. Railey, negotiated a contract with the British Admiralty and other British authorities to partially salvage Lusitania.

[111] The means of salvage was unique in that a 200-foot (61 m) steel tube, five feet in diameter, which enclosed stairs, and a dive chamber at the bottom would be floated out over the Lusitania wreck and then sunk upright, with the dive chamber resting on the main deck of Lusitania. Divers would then take the stairs down to the dive chamber and then go out of the chamber to the deck of Lusitania. Lake's primary business goals were to salvage the purser's safe and any items of historical value.

[112] It was not to be though, and in Simon Lake's own words, ""... but my hands were too full""—i.e. Lake's company was having financial difficulties at the time—and the contract with British authorities expired 31 December 1935 without any salvage work being done, even though his unique salvage tunnel had been built and tested.

[113]Gregg Bemis' salvage efforts In 1967 the wreck of Lusitania was sold by the Liverpool & London War Risks Insurance Association to former US Navy diver John Light for £1,000.

Gregg Bemis became a co-owner of the wreck in 1968, and by 1982 had bought out his partners to become sole owner. He subsequently went to court in Britain in 1986, the US in 1995 and Ireland in 1996 to ensure that his ownership was legally in force.

[114] [115]None of the jurisdictions involved objected to his ownership of the vessel but in 1995 the Irish Government declared it a heritage site under the National Monuments Act, which prohibited him from in any way interfering with her or her contents.

After a protracted legal wrangle, the Supreme Court in Dublin overturned the Arts and Heritage Ministry's previous refusal to issue Bemis with a five-year exploration license in 2007, ruling that the then minister for Arts and Heritage had misconstrued the law when he refused Bemis's 2001 application. Bemis planned to dive and recover and analyse whatever artefacts and evidence could help piece together the story of what happened to the ship.

He said that any items found would be given to museums following analysis. Any fine art recovered, such as the paintings by Rubens, Rembrandt and Monet among other artists believed to have been in the possession of Sir Hugh Lane, who was believed to be carrying them in lead tubes, would remain in the ownership of the Irish Government.

[107]In late July 2008 Gregg Bemis was granted an ""imaging"" licence by the Department of the Environment, which allowed him to photograph and film the entire wreck, and was to allow him to produce the first high-resolution pictures of her.

Bemis planned to use the data gathered to assess how fast the wreck was deteriorating and to plan a strategy for a forensic examination of the ship, which he estimated would cost $5m. Florida-based Odyssey Marine Exploration (OME) were contracted by Bemis to conduct the survey. The Department of the Environment's Underwater Archaeology Unit was to join the survey team to ensure that research would be carried out in a non-invasive manner, and a film crew from the Discovery Channel was also to be on hand.

[116]A dive team from Cork Sub Aqua Club, diving under licence, discovered 15,000 rounds of the .303 (7.7×56mm R) calibre rifle ammunition transported on Lusitania in boxes in the bow section of the ship. The find was photographed but left in situ under the terms of the licence. [117] In December 2008, Gregg Bemis's dive team estimated a further four million rounds of .303 ammunition were on the ship at the time of its sinking.

Mr. Bemis announced plans to commission further dives in 2009 for a full-scale forensic examination of the wreck. [118] A salvage dive in July 2016 recovered, then lost, a telegraph machine from the ship. This caused controversy, because the dive was unsupervised by anyone with archaeological expertise and because the telegraph was thought to have clues to the ship's sinking.

[119] [120]The joint American-German TV production, Sinking of the Lusitania: Terror at Sea premiered on the Discovery Channel on 13 May 2007, and on BBC One in the UK on 27 May 2007. [ citation needed]1984 British legal action In 1982 various items were recovered from the wreck and brought ashore in the United Kingdom from the cargo of Lusitania.

Complex litigation ensued, with all parties settling their differences apart from the salvors and the British Government, who asserted "" droits of admiralty "" over the recovered items.

The judge eventually ruled in The Lusitania, [1986] QB 384, [1986] 1 All ER 1011, that the Crown has no rights over wrecks outside British territorial waters, even if the recovered items are subsequently brought into the United Kingdom. [h] The case remains the leading authority on this point of law today. [121]Cultural significance Many works of art, media and entertainment were inspired by the sinking of the vessel.

These are discussed in Sinking of the RMS Lusitania. See also Avis Dolphin, a survivor Charles T. Jeffery, a survivor List by death toll of ships sunk by submarines The Carpet from Bagdad (1915), a film, of which a reel was recovered from the wreck in 1982Patrick Beesly, an author and historian References Notes^ The ship's overall length is often misquoted at either 785 or 790 feet.

[1]^ Germany's second submarine campaign against the Allies during the First World War was unrestricted in scope, as was submarine warfare during the Second World War.^ Referred to in Lusitania, by Preston (2002a), and Lusitania: An Illustrated Biography by Layton (2010).^ New photographic evidence presented in Lusitania: An Illustrated Biography.

Layton (2010)^ Testimony of A. A. Booth at the Mersey Inquiry.^ From Beesly (1982), pp. 84–85: U-20 log entry transcript.

Log first published in L'illustration in 1920^ From NY Times & 9 May 1915, p. 4; ""Justification of the sinking of the liner Lusitania by German submarines as a man of war was advanced today by Dr Bernhard Dernburg, former German Colonial Secretary and regarded as the Kaiser's official mouthpiece in the United States.

Dernburg gave out a statement at the Hollenden Hotel following his arrival in Cleveland to address the City Club at noon on Germany's attitude in the present war. ""^ Section 518 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1894 had originally applied to wrecks found or taken possession of within UK territorial limits, but section 72 of the Merchant Shipping Act 1906 extended that provision to wrecks later brought into those limits; the court held that as there was no duty on the salvors to bring the wreck into UK waters, the Crown had no rights to wreck, or under the ancient Royal Prerogative relating to ""wreck of the sea throughout the realm, whales and great sturgeons taken in the sea or elsewhere within the realm"" (Statute of 17 Edw II, c. 11).

Citations^ a b c Atlantic Liners.^ thepeerage.com.^ The Lusitania Resource. ""The Lusitania Resource: Lusitania Passengers & Crew, Facts & History"". Rmslusitania.info. Retrieved 3 June 2016.^ ( Ballard & Archbold 2005, p. 45)^ ( Ballard & Archbold 2005, p. 57)^ Douglas Carl Peifer (June 1, 2016).

Choosing War: Presidential Decisions in the Maine, Lusitania, and Panay Incidents. Oxford University Press. p. 269. The Lusitania, therefore, carried over 4 million rounds of small-arms ammunition (.303 calibre), almost 5,000 shrapnel shell casings, and 3,240 brass percussion fuses.^ a b King, Greg; Wilson, Penny (24 February 2015).

Lusitania: Triumph, Tragedy, and the End of the Edwardian Age. St. Martin's Press. p. 5. More lethal cargo loaded into the forward holds between the bow and bridge included 4,2 million rounds of Remington .303 rifle ammunition consigned to the British Royal Arsenal at Woolwich; 1,248 cases of shrapnel-filled artillery shells from the Bethlehem Steel Corporation, each case containing four 3-inch shells for a total of some fifty tons; eighteen cases of percussion fuses; and forty-six tons of volatile aluminium powder used to manufacture explosives.^ a b c Davidson 1997, p. 89.^ a b Butler 2003, p. 215.^ a b Carlisle 2009, p. 73.^ a b Tucker & Roberts 2005, p. 1146.^ Simpson & 13 October 1972, p. 60.^ Lusitania divers warned of danger from war munitions in 1982, papers reveal, The Guardian, 1 May 2014.^ Government papers released in 2014 confirmed the ship was carrying war material, facebook.com; accessed 23 February 2017.^ Ramsay 2001, pp.

6-10.^ Ramsay 2001, pp. 12–17.^ Ramsay 2001, pp. 19–21.^ Venzon & Miles 1995, p. 357.^ Maritime Quest; entry Lusitania 1871 retrieved 1 October 2015^ New York Times, 27 June 1901: ""LUSITANIA WRECKED OFF NEWFOUNDLAND COAST; Passengers Numbering More than 350 Escape in Lifeboats"", Wrecksite.eu; retrieved 1 October 2015.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, p. 5.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp.

5–8.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 22–24.^ Ramsay 2001, p. 25.^ Ballard & Dunmore 1995, p. 45.^ Maxtone-Graham 1978, p. 33.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 18–20.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 20–21.^ Keeling 2013.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 21–22.^ Watt.^ Fox 2004, p. 403.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 10–11,14.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 12–13.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, p. 13.^ Ramsay 2001, pp. 22–23.^ Layton, J. Kent (2015). Lusitania An Illustrated Biography.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp.

25–27.^ Ramsay 2001, pp. 23–24.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 27–28.^ Archibald, Rick & Ballard, Robert. The Lost Ships of Robert Ballard, Thunder Bay Press: 2005; p. 46.^ Archibald, Rick & Ballard, Robert.

""The Lost Ships of Robert Ballard,"" Thunder Bay Press: 2005; pp. 51-52.^ Titanic Inquiry.^ Layton 2010, p. 55.^ Hackett & Bedford 1996, p. 171.^ Simpson 1972, p. 159.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp.

29–31.^ Peeke, Jones & Walsh-Johnson 2002, pp. 32–34.^ Full text of ""The Hudson-Fulton celebration, 1909, the fourth annual report of the Hudson-Fulton celebration commission to the Legislature of the state of New York.

Transmitted to the Legislature, May twentieth, nineteen ten"".^ Sep 28th, 3:00 PM - 4:30 PM The First Aerial Canoe: Wilbur Wright and the Hudson-Fulton Flights, by John Sanford, Core Scholar Libraries, Wright State University^ The Half Moon passing the great steamship Lusitania, Hudson-Fulton Celebration, New York, U. S. A.

The J. Paul Getty Museum, at^ Denson 2006, p. 135.^ Watson 2006, p. 9.^ Craughwell & Kiester 2010, p. 133.^ NY Times & 9 May 1915.^ ICRC & 22 April 1930.^ a b Simpson 1972, p. 60.^ Layton 2010.^ Beesly 1982, p. 95.^ Preston 2002a, pp. 76-77.^ Preston 2002b, pp. 91-92.^ Larson, Erik (2015). Dead Wake.^ Simpson & 13 October 1972, p. 69.^ Butler 2003, p. 213.^ ""Articles referring to the German embassy warnings"". The Washington Times. 1 May 1915. p. Front page.^ ""Lusitania people resource"". Merseyside Maritime Museum.

National Museums Liverpool.^ Preston 2002b, pp. 216–217.^ Kemp, Bill (3 May 2015). ""PFOP: Lusitania sinking claimed life of famed local Elbert Hubbard"".

The Pantagraph. Retrieved 18 April 2016.^ Jones 2001, p. 78.^ Halsey 1919, p. 255.^ Watson 2006.^ a b c NY Times & 10 May 1915.^ Doswald-Beck & 31 December 1995, p. 124.^ Ciment & Russell 2007, p. 379.^ Rea & Wright 1997, p. 196.^ a b c Larson, Erik (2015).

Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania. Transworld – via Google Books.^ Jones 2001, p. 73.^ Tucker & Roberts 2005, p. 1413.^ Brune 2003, p. 265.^ Sondhaus 2011, p. 276.^ Brune 2003, p. 365.^ Zieger 1972, pp. 24-25.^ Paterson et al 2009, p. 73.^ a b Brune 2003, p. 366.^ Gardiner, Gray & Budzbon 1985, p. 137.^ Quinn 2001, pp.

54–55.^ Protasio 2011, pp. 200-201.^ The Guardian & 1 May 2014.^ ""Lusitania divers warned of danger from war munitions in 1982, papers reveal"", The Guardian, 1 May 2014.^ Cunard Line.^ ""RMS Lusitania: Manx flotilla marks centenary of sinking"".

BBC News. Retrieved 4 May 2015.^ a b Beesly 1982, p. 90.^ a b Schmidt 2005, p. 71.^ Denson 2006.^ Beesly 1982, Chapter 7.^ a b Steiger & Steiger 2006.^ Doenecke 2011.^ Preston 2002a, p. 384.^ Douglas Carl Peifer (June 1, 2016).

Choosing War: Presidential Decisions in the Maine, Lusitania, and Panay Incidents. Oxford University Press.

p. 269. The Lusitania, therefore, carried over 4 million rounds of small-arms ammunition (.303 caliber), almost 5,000 shrapnel shell casings, and 3,240 brass percussion fuses.^ Gittelman & Gittelman 2013, p. 199.^ Hoehling 1996, p. 27.^ Beesly 1982.^ Danver 2010, p. 114.^ Lusitania.net.^ Archaeology.org.^ a b c Sides & Goodwin Sides 2009.^ Treasure Quest.^ Discovery.com.^ a b Bishop 2003.^ Evening Post & 15 January 1932.^ Popular Mechanics & February 1932.^ Corey 1938, p. 295.^ Rogers & March–April 2005.^ Sharrock & 2 April 2007.^ Shortall & 20 July 2008.^ Goodwin Sides & 22 November 2008.^ Greenhill & 20 December 2008.^ http://www.independent.ie/breaking-news/irish-news/lusitania-telegraph-machine-lost-during-unsupervised-dive-35494223.html^ http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/republic-of-ireland/lusitania-telegraph-machine-lost-during-unsupervised-dive-35494227.html^ Palmer & Mc Kendrick 1998, p. 379.

Bibliography Books Ballard, Robert D.; Dunmore, Spencer (1995). Exploring the Lusitania: Probing the Mysteries of the Sinking that Changed History. New York, NY: Warner Books. p. 45. ISBN 978-0-4465-1851-2. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Beesly, Patrick (1982). Room 40: British Naval Intelligence, 1914–1918. London: Hamish Hamilton. ISBN 0-19281468-0. Bishop, Leigh (2003). ""Return to Lusitania "". Advanced Diver Magazine (13url= http://www.advanceddivermagazine.com/articles/lusitania/lusitania.html ). Brune, Lester H. (2003). Chronological History of U. S. Foreign Relations: 1607-1932 (2nd ed.). New York: Routledge.

p. 365. ISBN 978-0-4159-3915-7. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Butler, Daniel Allen (2003). The Age of Cunard: A Transatlantic History; 1839–2003. Pro Star Publications. ISBN 978-1-57785-348-0. Ciment, James D.; Russell, Thadeus, eds. (2007). The Home Front Encyclopedia: United States, Britain, and Canada in World Wars I and II. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. p. 379. ISBN 978-1-5760-7849-5. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Carlisle, Rodney P. (2009). World War I. Infobase Publishing. p. 73. ISBN 978-1-4381-0889-6. Corey, Herbert (1938). Submarine – The Autobiography of Simon Lake (PDF). London: D. Appleton-Century Company. p. 295. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Craughwell, Thomas J.; Kiester, Edwin, Jr (2010). The Buck Stops Here: The 28 Toughest Presidential Decisions and How They Changed History. Fair Winds.

p. 133. ISBN 978-1-61673-848-8. Danver, Steven L. (2010). Popular Controversies in World History: Investigating History's Intriguing Questions. ABC-CLIO. p. 114. ISBN 978-1-59884-078-0. Davidson, Eugene (1997). The Making of Adolf Hitler: The Birth and Rise of Nazism. University of Missouri Press. p. 89. ISBN 978-0-8262-1117-0. Denson, John V. (2006). A Century of War: Lincoln, Wilson, and Roosevelt.

Ludwig von Mises Institute. p. 135. ISBN 978-1-61016-508-2. Doenecke, Justus D. (2011). Nothing Less Than War: A New History of America's Entry Into World War I. University Press of Kentucky. ISBN 978-0-8131-3002-6. Fox, Stephen (2004). The Ocean Railway: Isambard Kingdom Brunel, Samuel Cunard and the Revolutionary World of the Great Atlantic Steamships. London: Harper Collins. ISBN 978-0-0073-7386-4. Gardiner, Robert; Gray, Randal; Budzbon, Przemysław (1985).

Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships, 1906–1921. Conway. p. 137. ISBN 978-0-85177-245-5. Gittelman, Steven H.; Gittelman, Emily (2013). Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt: The Unlikely Hero of the Lusitania. Hamilton Books. p. 199. ISBN 978-0-7618-5507-1. Hackett, C.; Bedford, J. G. (1996). The sinking of S. S. Titanic: Investigated by Modern Techniques. Royal Institution of Naval Architects. p. 171. Halsey, Francis Whiting (1919). The Literary Digest History of the World War. Funk & Wagnalls. p. 255. Hoehling, A. A. (1996). Last Voyage of the Lusitania. Rowman & Littlefield.

p. 27. ISBN 978-1-56833-078-5. Jones, Howard (2001). Crucible of Power: A History of U. S. Foreign Relations Since 1897. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 73. ISBN 978-0-8420-2918-6. Layton, J. Kent (2010). Lusitania: An Illustrated Biography. Stroud, Gloucestershire: Amberley. ISBN 978-1-84868-834-6. Larson, Erik (2015). Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania. Maxtone-Graham, John (1978). The Only Way to Cross. New York: Macmillan. ISBN 978-0-0258-2350-1. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Mersey, Bigham, 1st Viscount, John (1915). Report of a formal investigation into the circumstances attending the foundering on 7th May, 1915, of the British S. S. 'Lusitania', of Liverpool, being torpedoed off the Old Head of Kinsale, Ireland.

Command papers. Cd.8022 (Session 1914-16, Vol. XXVII, p. 451). London: HMSO. Mersey, Bigham, 1st Viscount, John (1915).

Proceedings in camera on 15th and 18th June, 1915, at the formal investigation into the circumstances attending the foundering, on 7 May, 1915, of the 'Lusitania', after being torpedoed off the Old Head of Kinsale, Ireland. Command papers. Cd.381 (Session 1919, Vol. XXV, p. 469). London, UK: HMSO. Osborne, Richard; Spong, Harry & Grover, Tom (2007).

Armed Merchant Cruisers 1878–1945. Windsor, UK: World Warship Society. ISBN 0-9543310-8-7. Palmer, N. E.; Mc Kendrick, Ewan (1998). Interests in goods. LLP. p. 379. ISBN 978-1-85978-177-7. Paterson, Thomas; Clifford, J. Garry; Maddock, Shane J.; Kisatsky, Deborah; Hagan, Kenneth J. (2009). American Foreign Relations: A History, Volume 2: Since 1895. Cengage Learning. p. 73. ISBN 978-0-547-22569-2.

Peeke, Mitch; Jones, Steven & Walsh-Johnson, Kevin (2002). The Lusitania story. Barnsley, Yorkshire, UK: Leo Cooper. ISBN 978-0-85052-902-9. Preston, Diana (2002a). Lusitania: An Epic Tragedy. Waterville: Thorndike Press. ISBN 0-80271375-0. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Preston, Diana (2002b). Wilful Murder: the Sinking of the Lusitania. London: Transworld Publishers Limited. ISBN 0-55299886-9. Protasio, John (2011). The Day the World Was Shocked: The Lusitania Disaster and Its Influence on the Course of World War I. Havertown, PA: Casemate.

pp. 200–201. ISBN 978-1-9351-4945-3. Quinn, Patrick J. (2001). The Conning of America: The Great War and American Popular Literature. Rodopi. pp. 54–55. ISBN 978-90-420-1475-6. Ramsay, David (2001). Lusitania: Saga and Myth. London: Chatham Publishing.

ISBN 978-1-86176-170-5. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Rea, Tony; Wright, John (1997). International Relations 1914–1995. Oxford University Press. p. 196. ISBN 978-0-19-917167-5. Schmidt, Donald E. (2005). The Folly of War: American Foreign Policy, 1898–2005. Algora Publishing. p. 71. ISBN 978-0-87586-383-2. Sides, Hampton; Goodwin Sides, Anne (January 2009).

""Lusitania Rising"". Men's Vogue. Archived from the original on 31 May 2009. Simpson, Colin (1972). Lusitania. Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-00-3793-4. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Sondhaus, Lawrence (2011). World War One: The Global Revolution. Cambridge University Press. p. 276. ISBN 978-0-521-51648-8. Steiger, Brad; Steiger, Sherry Hansen (2006). Conspiracies and Secret Societies: The Complete Dossier.

OMNIGRAPHICS. ISBN 978-0-7808-0921-5. Tucker, Spencer; Roberts, Priscilla Mary (2005). World War One. ABC-CLIO. p. 1146. ISBN 978-1-85109-879-8. Venzon, Anne Cipriano; Miles, Paul L. (1995). The United States in the First World War: An Encyclopedia. Garland Pub. p. 357. ISBN 978-0-8153-3353-1. Watson, Bruce (2006). Atlantic convoys and Nazi raiders.

Greenwood. p. 9. ISBN 978-0-275-98827-2. Watt, Quintin (ed.). An Illustrated History. [ dead link]Zieger, Robert H. (1972). America's Great War. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 24–25. ISBN 978-0-8476-9645-1. Newspapers, journals and other media Goodwin Sides, Anne (22 November 2008). New Clues in Lusitania's Sinking. National Public Radio. Greenhill, Sam (20 December 2008). ""Secret of the Lusitania: Arms find challenges Allied claims it was solely a passenger ship"".

Daily Mail. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Mullally, Erin (January–February 2009). "" Lusitania ' s Secret Cargo"". Archaeology: A publication of the Archaeological Institute of America. Archaeological Institute of America. 62 (1). Rogers, Paul (March–April 2005). ""How Deep Is His Love"". Stanford Magazine. Stanford Alumni Association. Sharrock, David (2 April 2007). ""Millionaire diver wins right to explore wreck of the Lusitania"".

The Times. Simpson, Colin (13 October 1972). ""Lusitania"". Life Magazine. p. 68. Retrieved 17 March 2015. Shortall, Eithne (20 July 2008). ""Riddle of Lusitania sinking may finally be solved"". The Times. [ needs update]""The Lusitania – A Salvage Project"". Evening Post. Wellington, New Zealand. 15 January 1932.

Retrieved 21 May 2013. ""Lusitania divers warned of danger from war munitions in 1982, papers reveal"". The Guardian. 1 May 2014. ""Lusitania Treasure to be Raised"". Popular Mechanics. Hearst Magazines. 57 (2): 177. February 1932. Retrieved 17 March 2015. ""Sinking justified, says Dr. Dernburg"" (PDF). New York Times. 9 May 1915. Retrieved 17 March 2015. ""Lusitania was unarmed"" (PDF). New York Times. 10 May 1915. Online""A Deadly Cargo and the Falsifed Manifests"". Lusitania Online: The Home Port of RMS Lusitania.

Retrieved 18 March 2015. ""Terror at Sea – Sinking of the Lusitania"". Discovery Channel. Archived from the original on 24 March 2009. Retrieved 7 May 2009. ""175 Anniversary cruise - Lusitania Remembered with Martin Bell - 7 nights, May 2015"".

Cunard Line. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Doswald-Beck, Louise (31 December 1995). ""San Remo Manual on International Law Applicable to Armed Conflict at Sea"". International Committee of the Red Cross. Retrieved 18 March 2015. ""Treaty for the Limitation and Reduction of Naval Armaments, (Part IV, Art. 22,"" (PDF). International Committee of the Red Cross. 22 April 1930. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Keeling, Drew (2013). ""Mass Migration as a Travel Business"". www.business-of-migration.com. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Layton, J. Kent. ""Lusitania Home"". Atlantic Liners. Retrieved 18 March 2015. Lundy, Darryl (17 March 2015). ""The Peerage"". Ngaio, Wellington, New Zealand. Retrieved 18 March 2015. ""Testimony of Edward Wilding, Recalled"".

British Wreck Commissioner's Inquiry. 7 June 1912. Archived from the original on 5 February 2008. Retrieved 23 June 2017. ""Treasure Quest – Lusitania Revealed"". Tv.yahoo.com. Archived from the original on 18 May 2009. Retrieved 19 May 2009. Further reading Bailey, Thomas A. (October 1935). ""The Sinking of the Lusitania"". The American Historical Review. Oxford University Press. 41 (1): 54–73. doi: 10.2307/1839355. JSTOR 1839355. Bailey, Thomas A. (September 1936). ""German Documents Relating to the Lusitania"". The Journal of Modern History. The University of Chicago Press. 8 (3): 320–337. doi: 10.1086/468453. JSTOR 1881539. Bailey, Thomas A.; Ryan, Paul B. (1975). The Lusitania Disaster: An Episode in Modern Warfare and Diplomacy. Free Press. ISBN 978-0029012406. Bernier, Michelle (2010). Did these Stories Really Happen?. Create Space Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN 9781450585361. Burns, Greg (2012). Commemoration of Death: The Medals of the Lusitania Murders. Create Space Independent Publishing Platform. ISBN 9781479115730. Burns, Greg. ""www.lusitaniamedal.com"". Retrieved 19 March 2015. Doubleday, F. N. (January 1908). ""A Trip on the Two Largest Ships"". The World's Work: A History of Our Time. XV: 9803–9810. Retrieved 10 July 2009. Droste, C. L.; Tantum, W. H., eds. (1972). The Lusitania Case. Riverside, Connecticut: Patrick Stephens Ltd. ISBN 978-0-85059-097-5. Larson, Erik (2015). Dead Wake: The Last Crossing of the Lusitania. New York: Crown Publishing. ISBN 978-0-307-40886-0. Layton, J. Kent (June 2013). The Edwardian Superliners: a Trio of Trios. Amberley publishing. ISBN 978-1445614380. Ljungström, Henrik. ""The Great Ocean Liners: Lusitania"". Retrieved 19 March 2015. Molony, Senan (2004). Lusitania, an Irish Tragedy. Mercier. ISBN 978-1-8563-5452-3. O'Sullivan, Patrick (2000). The Lusitania: Unravelling the Mysteries. New York: Sheridan House. Sauder, Eric (1 October 2009). RMS Lusitania: The Ship and Her Record. London: The History Press. ISBN 978-0-7524-5203-6. Sauder, Eric; Marschall, Ken (1991). RMS Lusitania: Triumph of the Edwardian Age. Redondo Beach, CA: Trans-Atlantic Designs. ISBN 978-0-9633946-0-6. ""Lusitania Timeline"". The Lusitania Resource. Retrieved 19 March 2015. ""Lusitania Specification"". The Lusitania Resource. Retrieved 19 March 2015. External links This article's use of external links may not follow Wikipedia's policies or guidelines. Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links, and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references. (August 2015) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Wikimedia Commons has media related to Lusitania (ship, 1907). Wikisource has the text of the 1921 Collier's Encyclopedia article Lusitania. Lest We Forget: The Lusitania – from Encyclopedia Titanica RMS Lusitania, Public Broadcasting Service (PBS)Lusitania pictures: Construction, engine, and interior photos; disaster and wreck illustrations' – Big Bad Battleships.com The Home Port of RMS Lusitania – Lusitania.net Lusitania on Chris' Cunard Page RMSLusitania.info – passenger and crew lists, biographies, and deck plans of the Lusitania People of the Lusitania - biographies of crew and passengers on the final voyage Lusitania: life, loss, legacy - a major new exhibition at Merseyside Maritime Museum in Liverpool to mark the centenary year of the sinking RMS Lusitania on the wrecksite CWGC record of Lt. Robert Matthews ( Lusitania Passenger), reference only Lusitania: Theodore Roosevelt Blames Woodrow Wilson Shapell Manuscript Foundation Professor Joseph Marichal ( Lusitania Passenger KIA WWI), reference only British Wreck Commissioner's Inquiry Maritimequest RMS Lusitania Photo Gallery Photo of one of the Lusitania ' s salvaged propellers at Merseyside Maritime Museum in Liverpool Lusitania sinking with photos from UK National Archives and BBC videos"" Lusitania, British Cunard liner "". Encyclopedia Americana. 1920. Photographs of Q. S. T. S. Lusitania The album contains 59 photographs of exterior and interior views of the Cunard Steamship Company ship, R. M. S. Lusitania. Photographs in the album are by Bedford Lemere & Co., architectural photographers to His Majesty the King. Historical footage of the Lusitania, europeanfilmgateway.eu People of the Lusitania Crew and passengers on board the Lusitania""Mr. Charles Emelius Lauriat, Jr"". Lusitania Resource. IWM Interview with survivor Jane Lewis IWM Interview with survivor Alice Drury The Lusitania in rough seas, painting by Antonio Jacobsen Records Preceded by Deutschland Holder of the Blue Riband (Westbound) 1907–1909 Succeeded by Mauretania Preceded by Kaiser Wilhelm IIAtlantic Eastbound Record 1907v t e Ocean liners with four funnels SS Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse (1897) SS Deutschland (1900) SS Kronprinz Wilhelm (1901) SS Kaiser Wilhelm II (1902) RMS Lusitania (1906) RMS Mauretania (1906) SS Kronprinzessin Cecilie (1906) SS France (1910) RMS Olympic (1910) RMS Titanic (1911)RMS Aquitania (1913) HMHS Britannic (1914) RMS Arundel Castle (1921) RMS Windsor Castle (1922)v t e Timeline of the world's largest passenger ships Syracusia (240 BC) Thalamegos (200 BC) Caravel ships (1400s) SS Royal William (1831) SS Great Western (1837) SS British Queen (1839) SS President (1840) SS Great Britain (1845) HMS Himalaya (1854) RMS Atrato (1854) SS Great Eastern (1858) RMS Celtic (1901) RMS Baltic (1903) RMS Empress of Scotland (1906) RMS Lusitania (1907) RMS Mauretania (1907) RMS Olympic (1911)RMS Titanic (1912) SS Imperator (1913) SS Leviathan (1913) RMS Majestic (1914) SS Normandie (1935) RMS Queen Mary (1936)RMS Queen Elizabeth (1940) MS Sovereign of the Seas (1987) MS Sun Princess (1995) MS Carnival Sunshine (1996)MS Grand Princess (1997) MS Voyager of the Seas (1999) MS Explorer of the Seas (2000) MS Navigator of the Seas (2002)RMS Queen Mary 2 (2004) MS Freedom of the Seas / MS Liberty of the Seas / MS Independence of the Seas (2006) MS Oasis of the Seas (2009) MS Allure of the Seas (2010) MS Harmony of the Seas (2016) MS Symphony of the Seas (2018)v t e Ships of the Cunard Linev t e Shipwrecks and maritime incidents in May 1915Authority control GND: 4131863-8 SNAC: w6z36p4w Categories: Conflicts in 1915 Clyde-built ships RMS Lusitania Ships of Scotland Ships sunk by German submarines in World War I World War I shipwrecks in the Atlantic Ocean Blue Riband holders Passenger ships of the United Kingdom Four funnel liners 1906 ships Shipwrecks of Ireland Maritime incidents in Ireland Maritime incidents in 1915 Conspiracy theories "

With the Germans it was probably more of an anti-War sentiment than a pro-German bias. Public opinion gradually shifted toward the Allies as a result of British propaganda, German policies in occupied Belgium, and incidents such as the xsinking of the RMS Lusitania. Even so the vast majority of Americans, especially the progressives, opposed American entry into the War.

World War I: American Public Opinion

World War I: American Public Opinion Figure 1.-- The American public was decidely against entering World War I and President Wilsom was relected because of it (1916).

Only incredibly misguided German policies managed to change this. After the Germans renewed unconditional submarine warfare and President Wilson asked for a declaration of war, the once anti-war American people fervently embraced the War effort.

There was very little descent or misgivings from a people who a year earlier reelected President Wilson who ran on the slogan 'He kept us out of war.' Americans around the country, including the strongly-pacifist Midwest, pitched in to support the war effort.

There were all kinds of patriotic displays. President Wilson upon the outbreak of World War I declared the United states neutral (1914). His policy of neutrality was enormously popular with the American people. The German invasion of neutral Belgium amd midstreatment of Belgian civilians from the onset saw Germany as the major aggressor and a lawless nation.

This was an entirely new assessment. Before the War, Germany was an admired mation. Not only had america not had any diplomatic differences with Germany (unlike Britain), but the Germans had become the largest etnic group in America.

And the sinking of Lusitani cemented the new American assessment if Germany. The American assessment of Germany, however, did not mean that Aericans wanted to go to war with Germany. Peace and neutrality probably was the deciding factor in his reelection (1916). It was especially popular with German and Irish Americans.

The Irish were strong Democratic supporters. The Germans were a major constituency in the Midwest which often determined the outcome of American elections.

They also made any Administration efforts to strengthen the military difficult. The United States pursued a more friendly relationship with Great Britain and France than with Germany or Austria-Hungary, but Wilson’s administration maintained a strictly neutral stance. The President made diplomatic initiatives aimed at ending the War that suggested generous terms to the Germans.

The Kaiser and his Government, were, however basically dimissive and internt on a military victory. In the end it was incredably misguided German policy that brought America into the War. Many Ameicans began having second thoughts about the War, even before it ended (November 1918). The principal reasons were the casualties the AEF experienced in France. American war losses were small by European standards. But this was only because America entered the War several yearsafter the other combatants and the AEF was only committed for about 6 months of battle.

During those 6 months, however, American casualties were as high as experienced by other combatant countries, especially because the AEF was engaged in largely pitched offensive operations.

Neutrality (1914-17)President Wilson upon the outbreak of World War I declared the United States neutral (1914). The United States pursued a more friendly relationship with Great Britain and France than with Germany or Austria-Hungary, largely because of the U-boats. The Wilson Administration, however, maintained a strictly neutral stance. His policy of neutrality was enormously popular with the American people. It was a continuation of the isolationist policy set by President Washington at the very inception of the Republic.

And with war raging in Europe and reports of enormous casualties appearung in the press. The vast number of Americans were convinced that this was the right policy.

American neurtrality, however, did not mean that it had a neutral impact on the war. The British Royal Navy maintained command of the seas. This meant that Britain and France could trade in America. The Allies could buy raw materils, food, and industrial products in America.

The Germans could not. There were no legl restiction, but they had no way of shipping purchases back to Germany. And because Wall Street was not neutral, the Allies could access American credit markets and the Germans could not.

This was due to the very extensive financial ties between America and Britain. And the American elite that dominated the banks were strongly pro-Britih. As a result as the war progressed, while Americans continued to want to stay out of the War, important elements in the German Government, as victory seemed to slipping away, began demanding a firmer stance against America hose neutrality they saw as actually supporting the allies.

Public Opinion (1914-17)The one strongly held opinion in America with the outbreak of the War was that America should hold to its long term isolationist traditions.

There were efforts to aid the starving Belgians and to negotiate a peaceful end of the conflict, but there was no interest in entering the War. German-Americans were not the only group opposed to entering the War. Here sympathy with Germany was combined with strongly held pacifist sentiment.

Irish Amnericans with anti-British sentiments were also opposed to entering the War. German Americans were, however, the largest and most influential group. There was some support for Britain. The most outspoken propent was former President, Theodore Roosevelt.

There was some sympathy with the Germans among the large German ethnic community, but the overwealming desire on the part of Americans was to stay out of the war. This does not mean that Americans were neutral concrning who launched the war or on the conduct of the war.

From the very beginning, most Americans saw the Germans who invaded neurtral Belgium as the aggressor nation. Most Americans as a result of the German invasion of neutral Belgium amd midstreatment of Belgian civilians from the onset saw Germany as the major aggressor and a lawless nation.

The American assessment of Germany only deteriorated as the War coninued. The reports of German attrocities in Belgium began to change the generally positive view that most Americans held of the Germans. This was an entirely new assessment. Before the War, Germany was an admired mation. Not only had America not had any diplomatic differences with Germany (unlike Britain), but the Germans had become the largest etnic group in America. These reports were inflated by British propaganda, but were not entirely false. And then there was a steady drip of war reports that steadily darkened the American view of Germany, including U-boat attacks on shipping, RMS Luisitania, the introduction of poison gas, and Zephlin bombing of cities.

The German sinking of Lusitani and the rerrible loss of life cemented the new American assessment of Germany. The American assessment of Germany, however, did not mean that Ameicans wanted to go to war with Germany.

Dspite the public repulsion to German actions, most Americans wanted no part of the War. President Wilson's Reelection (1916)President Wilson's narrow reelection victory was largely due to the fact that he kept America out of the War (1916). Peace and neutrality almost certainly was the deciding factor. Wilson'selection in 1914 had been a fluke, the result of former-president Roosevely spliting the Republican vote. Wilson in 1916, however, managed to win against a united Republican Party. Wilson's victory did not men that Americans were moderating their view of the Germans.

There was growwing anti-German sentiment, only there was no esire to fight the Germans. . Neutrality was especially popular with German and Irish Americans. The Irish were strong Democratic supporters. The Germans were a major constituency in the Midwest which often determined the outcome of American elections.

With the Germans it was probably more of an anti-War sentiment than a pro-German bias. Public opinion gradually shifted toward the Allies as a result of British propaganda, German policies in occupied Belgium, and incidents such as the sinking of the RMS Lusitania.

Even so the vast majority of Americans, especially the progressives, opposed American entry into the War. They also made any Administration efforts to strengthen the military difficult. America Declares War (April 1917)The President made diplomatic initiatives aimed at ending the War that suggested generous terms to the Germans. The Kaiser and his Government were, however, basically dimissive and intent on a military victory.

In the end it was incredably misguided German policy that brought America into the War. The Germans believed that America was not all that important and that they could win the War before America could mobilize and send an army to France. The German Navy even assured the Reichstag that the U-boats would even prevent an American Army from crossing the Atlantic.

The Kaiser's decesion to resume unrestricted submarine warfare (February 1917). And if that was not bad enough, the Zimmermann Telegram enfuriated the public. This finally decided the issue. The German actions unleashed a flood of anti-German sentiment and nationalist fervor.

It galvanized public opinion which came to support entering the War. The United States declared War (April 6, 1917). Despite what had been strong anti-War sentiment, both the Senate and House overwhelmingly voted to declare war. American Participation (1917-18)The American public fervently embraced the War once it was declared.

There was very little descent or misgivings. Americans around the country, including the Midwest, pitched in to support the war effort. There were all kinds of patriotic displays. There was an an explosion of patriotic fervor not seen in America since the Civil war.

Large numbers of young men enlisted. Many cities came close to fulfilling their quota within a few months, well before selective Service went There were parades with veterans of foreign wars, high school cadets, Boy Scouts, Red Cross girls, Boy Scouts, Rotary Club and other organization members.

There were Liberty Bonds drives and and other fundraising efforts such as the Catholic War Fund and the YMCA War Fund. Congress moved to supress even the limited opposition. There was a deplorable outburst of anti-German violence.

President Wilson was concerned about public support for the war because the pacifist feeling had been so pronounced. Shortly after the declaration of War, he created Wilson created the Committee on Public Information (CPI) (April 13). The new agency was assigned with with the twin tasks of promoting the War domestically while publicizing American war aims overseas.

Muckraking journalist George Creel was put in charge of the CPI. He recruited staff from business, media, academia, and the art world. After the War (1918- )Many Ameicans began having second thoughts about the War, even before it ended (November 1918). The principal reasons were the casualties the AEF experienced in France. American war losses were small by European standards.

But this was only because America entered the War several yearsafter the other combatants and the AEF was only committed for about 6 months of battle. During those 6 months, however, American casualties were as high as experienced by other combatant countries, especially because the AEF was engaged in largely pitched offensive operations.

By the time the AEF was back home, most Americans had concluded that the War had been a mistake. This was the prevailing attitude during the inter-War era (1920s and 30s). And it generated aiowerful anti-War movement that opposed American efforts to confront Germany after Hitler's rise to power (1933).

This would lead to President Roosevelt's struggle with the isolationists, ironically perhaps the most critical battle of World War II.

CIH -- WW INavigate the CIH World Wat I Section: [Return to Main United States World War I home front page] [Return to Main American World War I mobilization page] [Return to Main United States World War I page] [ About Us] [ Aftermath ] [ Alliances ] [ Animals ] [ Armistace ] [ Biographies ] [ Causes ] [ Campaigns ] [ Casualties ] [ Children ] [ Countries ] [ Declaration of war ] [ Deciding factors ] ------- [ Diplomacy ] [ Economics ] ------- [ Geo-political crisis ] [ Home front ] [ Intelligence] [ Military forces ] [ Neutrality ] [ Pacifism ] [ People ] [ Peace treaties ] [ Propaganda ] [ POWs ] [ Russian Revolution ] [ Terrorism ] [ Trench warfare ] ------ [ Technology ] [ Weaponry ] [ Bibliographies ] [ Contributions ] [ FAQs ] [ Images ] [ Links ] [ Registration ] [ Tools ] [Return to Main World War I page] [Return to Main war essay page] [Return to CIH Home page]Created: 12:09 AM 6/29/2011 Last updated: 4:47 PM 1/9/2016

ite The world must be made safe for democracy, U. S. President Woodrow Wilson proclaims on this day in 1917, as he appears before Congress to ask for a declaration of war against Germany. Under Wilson, the former Princeton University president and governor of New Jersey who was voted into the White House in 1912, the United States had proclaimed its neutrality from the beginning of World War I in the summer of 1914.

Woodrow Wilson asks U.S. Congress for declaration of war

World War I1917Woodrow Wilson asks U. S. Congress for declaration of war Share this:facebook twitter google+Print C

Even after the German sinking of the British passenger ship Lusitania in May 1915, which killed 1,201 people, including 128 Americans, caused a public outrage in the U. S. and prompted Wilson to send a strongly worded warning to Germany, the president was re-elected in 1916 on a platform of strict neutrality.

Late that same year, Wilson even attempted to broker a peace between the Allies and the Central Powers, which was looked at favorably by Germany but eventually rejected by both France and Great Britain. The first months of 1917, however, brought new offenses by Germany against American interests at sea, namely the resumption of the German navy’s policy of unrestricted submarine warfare on February 1 and the sinking of the American cargo ship Housatonic two days later.

An angry Wilson broke off diplomatic relations with Germany that same day. Meanwhile, British intelligence had decoded and informed the U. S. government of a secret message sent by the German foreign secretary, Arthur Zimmermann, to the German ambassador to Mexico. The so-called Zimmermann Telegram proposed a Mexican-German alliance in the case of war between the United States and Germany and promised Mexico financial and territorial rewards for its support.

Wilson authorized the State Department to publish the text of the telegram; it appeared in America’s newspapers on March 1, provoking a great storm of anti-German sentiment among the U. S. population.

With German submarine warfare continuing unabated, the final straw came on April 1, 1917, when the armed U. S. steamer Aztec was torpedoed near Brest and 28 of its crew members drowned. The next day, Wilson stepped before Congress to deliver his historic war message, making clear exactly how high he considered the stakes of the war to be.

It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the balance.

Despite the risks, Wilson felt the U. S. could not stand by any longer; in the face of continued German aggression, the nation had the moral obligation to step forward and fight for the principles upon which it had been founded.

We shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts, Wilson famously intoned, for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations, for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.

In this speech, Wilson displayed the idealism and moral fervor that characterized his view of the rightful role of the U. S. in the world—a supremely self-righteous outlook that would earn him acclaim from many and criticism and derision from others during his lifetime and after his death (especially after his pet project at war’s end, the League of Nations, proved a failure).

It was also an outlook that would, for better or worse, determine the direction of U. S. foreign policy for decades to come, up to and including the present day. On April 4, the U. S. Senate voted in favor of war by 82 votes to 6; two days later, the House of Representatives delivered their own yes vote by 373 votes to 50, formally announcing the entrance of the United States into the First World War.

1The United States enter the War - The First World War - 1917. What year did the United States join World War IOn April 6, 1917, the U. S. joined its allies--Britain, France, and Russia--to... When did the United States join WWI? Germany's resumption of submarine warfare in the spring of 1917 was the final... What was the year the United States joined World War One? The U. S. entered World War one on April 6th 1917. What made the United States join the WWll? The United States got involved in WW2 because the United States got attacked in... See All Questions

What were the last two states to join the United States and what year did they join?

Anonymous What were the last two states to join the United States and what year did they join? Topics: Sports › United States, Culture, Politics Answer Alaska was the 49th state in the US and became a state on October 18, 1867.

Hawaii was the 50th state, joining on Aug 21, 1959.0 7 years ago Do you know the answer? Login or Sign Up to answer this question.00:00 00:00Autoplay: On | Off Related United States Questions What year did the united states join world war

ade The Sussex Pledge was a promise made in 1916 during World War I by Germany to the United States, Germany had instituted a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, allowing armed merchant ships, but not passenger ships

Events that drew the U.S into World War 1

Events that drew the U. S into World War 1Timeline created by ccollins17In History Aug 2, 1914Declaration of Neutrality Proclamation of Neutrality was a formal announcement issued by President George Washington in May 1793, declaring the nation neutral in the conflict between France and Great Britain. It threatened legal proceedings against any American providing assistance to any country at war. May 2, 1915The Lusitania RMS Lusitania was a British ocean liner, holder of the Blue Riband and briefly the world's biggest ship.

She was launched by the Cunard Line in 1906, at a time of fierce competition for the North Atlantic trade. May 2, 1916Sussex Pledge M

Feb 2, 1917Sussex pledge Ended Germany became convinced they could defeat the Allied Forces by instituting unrestricted submarine warfare before the United States could enter the war. The Sussex pledge was therefore rescinded in January 1917, thereby initiating the decisive stage of the so-called First Battle of the Atlantic.

Mar 2, 1917Zimmermann Note Zimmermann Note was a 1917 diplomatic proposal from the German Empire for Mexico to join an alliance with Germany in the event of the United States entering World War I against Germany.

The proposal was intercepted and decoded by British intelligence. Mar 2, 1917American ships targeted U. S. Merchant Ships, Sailing Vessels, and Fishing Craft Lost from all Causes during World War I. Apr 2, 1917Declaration of War The 'Great War', which began on 28 July 1914 with Austria-Hungary's declaration of war with Serbia

Initially, a German sub blew up a ship, the Lusitania, with 128 Americans on board, but it was not enough to drive Wilson to war. Wilson ended up declaring war when a the telegram was intercepted-from Germany to Mexico-with the Germans trying to persuade the Mexicans to declare war on America.

What drew the united states into the World War?

"Arts & Humanities History What drew the united states into the World War? After following a policy of neutrslity for nearly three years, why did President Woodrow Wilson ask congress to declare war against Germany in April, 1917?

Follow 7 answers Answers Relevance Rating Newest Oldest Best Answer: A German U-Boat destroyed the Lusitania a British cruise ship they killed out of the 139 US citizens on board 128 died (although it is thought that the cruise liner was carrying munitions) they also sunk 7 US merchant ships trying to reach the UK that on top of the Zimmerman Telegram which was intercepted in the US it was being sent to the German ambassador to Mexico it stated that if the US were to become involved in the war that Germany would supply Mexico with supplies that it needed to go to war with the US it also promised that Germany would allow Mexico to have the territories back that it lost in the Mexican-American war.

Source (s):http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/zimmermann_telegram http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWIDavis M · 9 years ago0 1 Comment There were many factors, specifically the unrestricted U-Boat warfare being used by the Germans on allied ships, mainly British. There was a lot of anti-German sentiment at the time, especially due to the sinking of the Lusitania, which was a British ship that was sunk by German U-Boats, but had over a hundred Americans on board.

Another biggie was the Zimmerman note, which was a telegram sent to Mexico by Germany, which, when intercepted and decoded by the U. S. A., turned out to be a proposal for an alliance with Mexico, promising to help Mexico regain land that it lost to the U. S. A. way back during the Spanish-American war.

That's pretty much it, hope I helped.___ · 9 years ago0 0 Comment America Joins The War America was a reluctant to participate in World War 1, infact in august 1914 when the war broke out in Europe; President Woodrow Wilson issued a declaration of neutrality. Preferring to remain isolated from the war, America tried to broker peace between the allies and the axis, the war was in Europe; America did not need to get involved.

On May 7th 1915, German U-boats, patrolling in the Atlantic Ocean, fired torpedos at the British passenger ship Lucitania sinking her in 20 minutes. Onboard were 128 Americans. Woodrow Wilson, demanded that Germany stop attacking passenger ships, and declared that America was too proud to fight. Wilson also tried to mediate a compromise settlement but failed. Wilson also repeatedly warned that America would not tolerate unrestricted submarine warfare, as it was in violation to American ideas of human rights.

Wilson was under great pressure from former president Theodore Roosevelt, who denounced German ""piracy"" and Wilson's cowardice. In January 1917, Germany announced it would destroy all ships heading to Britain. Although Wilson broke off diplomatic ties with Germany, he still hoped to avert war by arming merchant vessels as a deterrent.

Nevertheless, Germany began sinking American ships immediately. In February 1917, British intelligence gave the United States government a decoded telegram from Germany's foreign minister, Arthur Zimmerman that had been intercepted en route to his ambassador to Mexico.

The Zimmerman Telegram authorized the ambassador to offer Mexico the portions of the Southwest it had lost to the United States in the 1840s if it joined the Central Powers.

However, because Wilson had run for re-election in 1916 on a very popular promise to keep the United States out of the European war, he had to handle the telegram very carefully. Wilson did not publicize it at first, only releasing the message to the press in March after weeks of German attacks on American ships had turned public sentiment toward joining the Allies.

On 2 April 1917, Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war and four days later all but six senators and fifty representatives voted for a war resolution. The Selective Service Act that was passed the following month, along with an extraordinary number of volunteers, built up the army from less than 250,000 to four million over the course of the conflict. General John Pershing was appointed head of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) and led the first troops to France On April 6th 1917, America declared war on Germany Source (s):http://hubpages.com/hub/World_War_1_Amer... DC · 9 years ago0 0 Comment

This was called the Zimmerman telegram.maya2008 · 9 years ago1 1 Comment Germans bombed the Lusitania.

Sean · 9 years ago1 0 Comment RMS Lusitania and other attacks of U. S. ships by German U-boats, Zimmerman Telegram... Coma Gray · 9 years ago0 0 Commenthe asked congress to go to war because they were allied with france and UK and so when russia left the germans started turning the tables the us came in to help there allies if they hadnt good relationships with the allies would have been therejohn w · 9 years ago0 1 Comment Maybe you would like to learn more about one of these?

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Wilson saw the Great War as an opportunity for the USA to... President Wilson viewed America's entry into World War I as an opportunity for the United States to shape a new international order based on the ideals of democracy.

APUSH - WWI Review

"34 terms alex1818APUSH - WWI Review Learn Flashcards Write Spell Test Match Gravity Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Like this study set?

Create a free account to save it. Create a free account Maybe later Sort When did Wilson break off diplomatic relations with Germany? On May 7, 1915, when a German submarine sank the British ocean liner Lusitania with 1,198 people aboard (over 100 americans). When Germany announced on January 31, 1917 a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, the United States cut diplomatic ties with Germany.

Janurary 31, 1917Zimmermann Note The Zimmermann Note was a diplomatic proposal from Germany to Mexico to make war against the USA. It was intercepted by the British and supported war against Germany. Why was Wilson's position weakened at the Paris peace Conference? President Wilson's position at the Paris Peace Conference was weakened by Republican Party victories in the 1918 midterm elections and his failure to appoint a leading Senate Republican to the conference delegation.

How did Wilson convince Americans to enter the war? President Woodrow Wilson persuaded the American people to enter World War I by pledging to make the war ""a war to end all wars"" and to make the world safe for democracy.

What did American women receive for supporting the war? As a result of their work supporting the war effort, women finally received the right to vote. Which groups suffered the most from the violation of Civil Liberties? Germans and Antiwar Americans Communist party people During World War I, civil liberties in America were denied to many, especially those suspected of disloyalty.

Know Wilson's 14 points This was a speech Wilson gave to Congress on Jan. 8,1918 to keep America confident, inspire the Allies to keep fighting.

These are the first 5 points: a proposal to abolish secret treaties, a freedom of the seas, a removal of economic barriers, a reduction of armament burdens, and an adjustent of colonial claims. President Wilson's Fourteen Points included, arms limitation, self-determination, freedom of the seas, and a permanent international organization. What was CPI's major problem? Creel (head of CPI) oversold ideals of Wilson & led the world to expect too much when Wilson couldn't deliver what Creel said, disillusionment was disastrous What administrator directed which agency?

George Creel - Committee of Public Herbert Hoover - Food Administration Bernard Baruch - War Industries Board William Taft - National War Labor Board When the US entered the war it was militarily unprepared During WWI civil liberties in the U. S. were During World War I, civil liberties in America were denied to many, especially those suspected of disloyalty.

Wilson's goal at Versailles was, and he sought establishment of international authority whose principal purpose was to preserve peace (League of Nations)Most war time agencies depended on to prepare for war Most wartime mobilization agencies relied on voluntary compliance to prepare the economy for war.

Name 2 major battles U. S. fought in The First Battle of TANNENBERG (1914) and The Battle of the SOMME (1916) Were Two Major Battles in WW1In the U. S., the most controversial aspect of the Treaty of Versailles was Article X, it was not harsh enough Who led our forces in Europe? General John ""Black Jack"" Pershing US Army General Pershing led US Ground Forces in France in WW One.

The WWI military draft generally worked fairly and effectively to provide military manpower. Senate opponents of the Treaty of Versailles argued that Senate opponents of the League of Nations as proposed in the Treaty of Versailles argued that it robbed Congress of its war-declaring powers.

Who supported Wilson in Congress? Democrats; even though a majority of congress was republican. The senate might have accepted the Treaty of Versailles if Wilson had The Senate likely would have accepted American participation in the League of Nations had Wilson been willing to compromise with League opponents in Congress.

Reasons for the start of the Great War M- Militarism A- Assasination N- Nationalism I- Imperialism A- Alliances Wilson's October appeal in 1918 publicly tells the people to vote democrat and ends up upsetting the republicans and loosing house seats to them4 minute men were associated with what agency CPI The four-minute men speakers would present self-prepared speeches written with CPI supplied topics and talking points tailored to present a local voice.

Mostly for to sign up for Military. How did Wilson try to obtain popular support for Treaty of Versailles? --------------? Woodrow Wilson's ""solemn referendum"" in 1920 concerned his attempt to use the presidential election as a public vote on the Treaty of Versailles.

On the issue of Americans traveling on belligerent ships, Wilson Wilson banned Am travel on belligerent ships banning caused by Lusitania sinking When the Great War broke out in 1914, Wilson remained neutral, didn't get involved continued trade w/ Europe gave loans to GB & France Which individual was responsible for wheatless days?

Food Administration; Hoover used to allow more food to be sent overseas Wilson established the War Industries Board in order to coordinate industrial production ensure factories produced enough mil supplies What was 1 blunder Wilson made in trying to secure the Versailles Treaty? Wilson blundered when choosing American peace delegation by failing to include any Republicans in the delegation.

When Wilson had chosen the American Peace Commissioners to go to Paris, he had snubbed both the Republican party and the Senate.

Yet the Republicans held the majority in the Senate. And before any treaty became law, the Senate had to approve it by a two-thirds majority.1 geographic change to Europe caused by Versailles Treaty it broke up the German and Austro-Hungarian empires and created a number of new sovereign states out of them.

Examples include Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. What was the Sedition Act? The Sedition Act said that any person who criticized the government or the President could be thrown in jail. What was the War Guilt Clause? The ""war guilt"" clause was Germany being blamed for everything and had to accept full responsibility for war.

List 2 specific sacrifices Americans made during the war the American Federation of Labor (AFL) gave workers the right to organize, or create unions if they promised no strikes and an 8 hour day.

President Wilson asked for people to voluntarily agree for certain days of the week called ""meatless and wheatless days"" where people wouldn't eat meat one day of the weak and another day they wouldn't eat wheat, and things like that so they could save food for those fighting the war. People actually listened and did it too. World War I was the first time women worked in factories in large numbers. The Sedition Act came about, which said that it was illegal to speak against the war. The Great Migration happened, which was when many blacks started going North. Advertisement Upgrade to remove ads Features Quizlet Live Quizlet Learn Diagrams Flashcards Mobile Help Sign up Help Center Honor Code Community Guidelines Students Teachers About Company Press Jobs Privacy Terms Follow us Language© 2018 Quizlet Inc. "

ns. In September 1915, Germany, hoping to avoid U. S. entry into the war, ended unrestricted submarine warfare, forbidding its U-boats from attacking neutral ships.

On This Day

U. S. Entry Into World War IIn February 1915, just over six months after the outbreak of World War I, Germany announced that it was implementing a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare to enforce a naval blockade of Britain (which was a response to a British naval blockade of Germany).

It declared the area around the British Isles a war zone and warned that it would strike any merchant ship attempting to enter the area. German leadership hoped that cutting off shipments of food, supplies and munitions from the U. S. and other neutral countries would cripple Britain’s war effort. However, the policy presented the risk of provoking the U. S. into entering the war. In May 1915, a German U-boat torpedoed the British liner Lusitania, a passenger ship that was likely transporting munitions.

Nearly 1,200 passengers, including 128 Americans, were killed, outraging the American public. President Wilson wrote three notes to German leaders calling for an end to attacks on Americans citize

In March 1916, however, a Germany U-boat torpedoed the French passenger ferry Sussex, which was carrying some Americans. Wilson issued an ultimatum threatening to sever diplomatic relations if Germany continued attacking civilian ships. On May 4, Germany issued the “ Sussex pledge ,” in which it promised that it would not attack passenger ships and that it would only attack merchant ships if there were definitely weapons aboard.

Germany’s policy remained in place until January 1917, when German military leaders introduced a plan for a naval offensive that they believed could win the war for Germany before the U. S. could enter the war.

On Jan. 31, Germany Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg, who opposed the plan over fears that it would draw the U. S. into the war, announced that unrestricted submarine warfare would be re-instituted the following day.

Hollweg’s announcement prompted Wilson to end diplomatic relations with Germany three days later. In an address before a joint session of Congress, he declared that the he did “not desire any hostile conflict with the Imperial German Government,” though he did pledge to “use any means that may be necessary for the protection of our seamen.” Wilson and Congress slowly moved toward declaring war over the next two months.

Their decisions were also influenced by a telegram sent by German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmerman to Germany’s Mexican ambassador that was intercepted by the British and given to Wilson on Feb. 24.

The Zimmerman Telegram said that, in exchange for Mexico’s support during the war, Germany would help it reclaim land lost to the U. S. in the Mexican-American War. On April 2, 1917, Wilson issues his “War Message to Congress,” calling for U. S. entry into the war.

He declared, “It is a war against all nations. American ships have been sunk, American lives taken, in ways which it has stirred us very deeply to learn of, but the ships and people of other neutral and friendly nations have been sunk and overwhelmed in the waters in the same way.

There has been no discrimination. The challenge is to all mankind.” Congress declared war on Germany four days later.

Historical Context: World War IWorld War I Events Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand Christmas Truce Armistice Day Treaty of Versailles World War I, originally known as “The Great War,” began in the spring of 1914 and raged through Europe until November 1918. The war cost 9 million lives and billions of dollars in damages. World War I demonstrated the magnitude and destructive power of modern warfare.

PBS’ “The Great War” and the BBC’s “World War One” describe the battles and events of the war and provide commentary from noted historians. The U. S. Army Center of Military History gives detailed accounts of the U. S. Army’s action during the war, along with a prologue explaining the war prior to U. S. involvement. First World War.com provides a battle-by-battle history of the war . Most Recent Beyond The Headlines On This Day: Ford Model T Unveiled On This Day: Richard Nixon Delivers “Checkers Speech”On This Day: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson Die Click For More Beyond the Headlines