Wars and ConflictsÌý permalink
America in World War 1?
This discussion has been closed.
-
Message 1.Ìý
Posted by QuakerPete (U14080784) on Wednesday, 16th December 2009
I think it's true to say that America played a major part in the Western European theatre during World War 2 to defeat Germany and its allies, originally with its huge amount of supplies and material, latterly with the number of troops.
But what about World War 1? Does the same apply here, too? They entered the war in 1917, I believe significant numbers of troops were available by 1918. Was America's entry just what was needed to tip the scales in the Allies favour or was it more fundamental than that?
What are people's opinions on this? -
Message 2
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
The answer is yes, although linked to the improvement in the fighting capacity of the British and French forces after four years of trench warfare and the impact of the British naval blockade on German warmaking capacity.
The crucial difference between the arrival of US forces in strength on the Western Front in 1918 and the opening of the Western Front after the D-Day invasion of 1944 was the collapse of Russia following the Bolshevik Revolution in November 1917 and its eventual exit from the war following the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in March 1918.
This enabled large numbers of troops to be transferred from the Eastern Front to the West to launch the so-called Kaiserschlact or Kaiser's Offensive that commenced on 21 March 1918 where the Reichswehr recovered almost all the gains it had made in its initial assault of 1914. For the rest of the war Germany was fighting on a single front (although German troops also assisted the Austrians in Italy).
This was not the case in 1944-5 where over twice the number of divisions were engaged on the 1000-mile Eastern Front compared to the West (and an offensive was co-ordinated to coincide with the Normandy breakout). Whilst US forces were still insufficient to stem the initial assault in 1918 once it had been stemmed they did prove critical in counter-attacking and ultimately breaking the German Army, particularly in the offensive along the Argonne in the late summer and autumn of 1918 although it is true that the US Expeditionary Force fought separately and not as part of an integrated command structure as it did in 1944-5 (and as the Anglo-French forces were doing by 1918).
On a statistical note it should be noted that the US suffered more casualties in WWI (mainly compressed into three months of intensive fighting) than it did in a decade of combat in Vietnam half a century later. It is also worth noting that contrary to the usual picture that is painted of WWI as a bloodbath compared to the greater consideration (at least on the Western allied side) for the lives of troops in WWII that in his magisterial work "Armageddon" Sir Max Hastings points out that combined Allied casualties were greater on the Western Front in 1944-5 (despite the fact that the Eastern Front was not only active but of greater consequence) than in the comparable period in WWI. -
Message 3
Posted by JB on a slippery slope to the thin end ofdabiscuit (U13805036) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
A fine analysis, Allan
US casualties on the Western Front were a product of Pershing's refusal to accept any advice from the British based on their own early experience. This seems to be a hardwired characteristic of the West Point graduates who the Chilcott Enquiry is now showing were equally inflexible and impervious in 2003. -
Message 4
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
QuakerPete,
But what about World War 1? Does the same apply here, too? They entered the war in 1917, I believe significant numbers of troops were available by 1918. Was America's entry just what was needed to tip the scales in the Allies favour or was it more fundamental than that?Ìý
Pretty much. However much the US may or may not have influenced the actual fighting in 1918, their real threat to Germany was that more, fresh divisions were on the way while Germany was quickly reaching its limit. -
Message 5
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
That may be true but US refusal to accept the lessons that had been learned the hard way was not confined to WWI. The Americans ignored the lessons that had been learned by the British in two years' desert fighting and almost as long in opposition to Rommel, particularly his tactic of a faked retreat resulting in the pursuing armour heading straight into anti-tank gun fire, and were consequently almost totally wiped out at the Kassarine Pass in February 1943.
The initial success of the Ardennes counter-offensive has often been attributed to American complacency and sloppiness (as well as a failure to heed intelligence). The US were also involved in battles that were almost equivalent to those fought in WWI, most notably the 4-month long Battle of Hurtgen Forest from September 1944-February 1945, the 'Verdun' of WWII in which US forces suffered half the casualties they incurred during WWI:
Whilst I'm reluctant, especially on these boards, to be drawn into a debate on a subject that more properly belongs to the realm of current affairs however I think you are being a little unfair to the products of the US Military Academy. I think the generals were overruled by their political masters who did not attend West Point. Once the situation became so bad that the initiative was handed back to the military and the Petraeus strategy was implemented and the position in Iraq was turned around and West Point's justifiable reputation (although some of its least distinguished alumni such as Grant and Bradley have often made the greatest subsequent mark) was redeemed.
THe US experience in all of its conflicts have tended to bear out Churchill's dictum that:
"the Americans can always be relied to do the right thing...after they have exhausted everry possible alternative." -
Message 6
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
However much the US may or may not have influenced the actual fighting in 1918, their real threat to Germany was that more, fresh divisions were on the way while Germany was quickly reaching its limit.Ìý
That's true, WC, and the arrival of the US divisions did improve the morale the war-weary veterans on the Western Front. However there was a lucky coincidence of US intervention in the war with Russian departure from it and thus overriding what could have been the disastrous and fatal consequences of the latter as was shown by the initial success of the Kaiserschlacht.
The role of the US in tipping the scales was certainly appreciated at the time with the Stars and Stripes being flown from the Victoria Tower of the Houses of Parliament on 6 April 1917, the date of the US declaration of war and with Woodrow Wilson receiving a hero's welcome in both London and Paris when he arrived for the Peace Conference in 1919.
What is remarkable is that the Germans kept back over a million troops in the East to retain control over their conquered territories (under the terms of Brest-Litovsk the Soviets had awarded Germany most of Byelorussia (White Russia) and the Ukraine. This led to the Allied intervention in 1919. Had the Germans been more concerned with winning a decisive victory in the West than hanging on to territorial gains (that proved illusory anyway once the war had been lostin the West) then even the arrival of US forces might not have proved capable of turning the tide. -
Message 7
Posted by JB on a slippery slope to the thin end ofdabiscuit (U13805036) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
2003 counts as History in my book Allan, and the testimony I was referring to was from the British staff officers who found their experience derived from Borneo, Cyprus, Aden, Northern Ireland, The Falklands, Gulf War, Bosnia and Sierra Leone was given short shrift at best.
The preference of the UK Armed forces when working with the Americans is always to fight alongside the USMC, who are a similar sized force to the British Military with similar equipment starvation and fighting qualities, and a reputation for respecting anyone who fights alongside them as an equal from the outset. -
Message 8
Posted by Mike Alexander (U1706714) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
Some historians take the view that the potential of the US was more significant than its actual fighting contribution in bringing WWI to a close. That's not to say the US didn't make important contributions to the final push, but there were vast numbers of doughboys (getting on for half a million, if memory serves) who never saw action at all.
The March Offensive was really Germany's last throw of the dice - they knew if they were going to win they would have to do so before the US turned up in numbers. Like so many offensives of WWI, it ran out of steam, partly because of problems keeping supply lines moving forward as fast as the front, partly because of poor morale and food shortages (due to the naval blockade), also lack of manpower (young teenage boys became a more common sight in the German ranks), and finally (I've seen it alleged) there was a breakdown in discipline as soldiers liberated the contents of captured French wine cellars. -
Message 9
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
The military problems in Iraq were not connected with the invasion which was well-planned and successfully executed but came about as a result of the insurgency that followed the overthrow of the Saddam regime in which poor post-war planning, on both sides of the Atlantic, played a significant role.
Only three of the military operations you list could be described as genuine insurgencies - Cyprus, Aden and Northern Ireland and the British Army's role in quelling them could be best described as "mixed". A long-running insurgency by the ethnic Greek community against the British during the 1950s was eventually resolved by a power-sharing agreement between the ethnic Greek and Turkish communities that resulted in independence being granted in 1960.
However inter-communal violence developed throughout the 1960s and early 1970s that resulted in a Turkish invasion in 1974 causing a partition of the island and the insertion of a Un force (with a substantial British contingent) that remains there to this day.
British forces staged a fighting retreat from Aden along the lines of Palestine twenty years before (another location where British forces, despite thirty years of occupation, were unable to resolve inter-communal strife) resulting in aden being absorbed into the Marxist state of South Yemen. Although the spectre of communism has been removed with the later unification of North and South Yemen, it still remains an unstable region.
In Northern Ireland the British Army was sent in by the Labour Government in August 1969 to protect the minority Catholic population from rioting Protestant mobs whose fears had been aroused by the modest proposals for reform by the Northern Ireland Prime Minister, Terence O'Neill. The Army was welcomed by the Catholics as an impartial alternative to what was seen as the pro-Protestant security force of the RUC.
The military intervention was designed to create a window of opportunity in which political reform could be pursued. However, despite the optimistic promises made by Jim Callaghan, the Â鶹ԼÅÄ secretary (then the minister responsible for Northern Ireland), this window was allowed to be slammed shut as Stormont dragged its feet.
Within 18 months the British Army became to be seen as an oppressive force by the Catholics upholding the will of Stormont rather than Westminster and this mood was reinforced by the creation of the Provisional IRA (armed from within the Republic) in early 1971.
The British Army played a part in this by failing to take into account the sensitivities of the local population and acting alongside the RUC in rounding up detainees following the introduction of internment (by the Faulkner Government in Belfast not the Heath Government in Westminster) in August 1971.
It was to take a further military blunder in the form of the so-called 'Bloody Sunday' Affair in January 1972 when paratroopers, new to the Province, fired on demonstrators possibly or possibly not in response to IRA shots fired on them from eighbouring buildings before the westminster Government took a hand, and abolished Stormont the following April and instituted a crash programme of reform. However the damage had been done and, as in Palestine and Cyprus and later Iraq, an insurgency directed at British forces tipped over into inter-communal violence that remains latent today.
The one insurgency you missed out that is more relevant to Iraq was the Malayan Emergency of 1948-60. The post-war Labour Government had despatched troops to Malaya (then a British colony - at the same as it had decided to cut its lossess in Palestine) to quell an uprising by the minority ethnic Chinese population there. However this was not without its 'Petraeus moment'. After four years of fighting it was clear that the insurgency was nowhere near being defeated. The Colonial Secretary of the incoming Conservative Government, Oliver Lyttleton, sent out a former Eighth Army General, Gerald Templer, to reoprt in 1952. Templer formed the conclusion that the difficulty lay in the division between the military and civil power with neither effectively supporting the other.
Templer was given the job of uniting the two functions and, with the aid of more troops and a proper counter-insurgency strategy being put in place, a dramatic improvement was seen. Nevertheless it took 8 more years (as well as the granting of independence to Malaya in 1957) before the leaders of the insurgency gave up.
The situation in Borneo which followed the Malayan Emergency from the early to the mid-60s when Indonesian communists infiltrated along the common border shared by Malaya and Indonesia on that island aided and abetted by the Sukarno regime was only resolved when Sukarno was overthrown in a military coup by Generalsuharto and a violent purge was unleashed on the members of the Indonesian Communist Party at the beginning of 1966.
The British presence in Iraq post-2003 could also not be claimed as an overwhelming success either. The British were put in charge of the largely Shi'a dominated southern region around Basra when the insurgency was largely Sunni-based (who were of course the sect that had been displaced from power by the coalition invasion).
I remember watching the obviously MoD-inspired 'puff' pieces on TV showing British soldiers on patrol in Basra wearing only berets in contrast to their more heavily-kitted American counterparts to the north and great play was made with the experience that the British Army had garnered in Northern Ireland. I thought at the time that this was tempting Providence as none of the soldiers on the ground could have served in Northern Ireland at the height of the 2troubles" in the 1970s and that British occupation had turned sour there as pointed out above.
True to form, the emergence of Shi'a militias armed by Iran changed the situation on the ground and in 2007 the TV pictures were of crews attempting to escape from burning tanks to the accompaniement of jeering mobs. British forces were swiftly withdrawn to barracks and it was only the insertion of US forces alongside Iraqi security forces in the first test of the Malikhi government that reversed the situation.
Whilst it is possible to make legitimate criticisms of the US I do not think the British military, based on the history I have outlined above, can claim any kind of superiority. -
Message 10
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
Dear Mike
David Stevenson in his history of the First World War considers the US intervention to have been decisive. The economic importance of the US declaration of war should also be noted, the benefits of which were felt immediately. Although there was nothing like the Lend-Lease scheme of WWII the Allies had become increasingly reliant on the US as a supplier not only of armaments but also of food and raw materials (thus making the resumption of unrestricted U-boat warfare by Germany at the beginning of 1917 particularly significant).
These were paid for through by raising increasingly expensive loans from private bankers such as J.P. Morgan. Once America entered the war as a co-belligerent the terms and conditions of the loans were eased and facilitated by the US Treasury. The cost was deferred until after the end of the war when the US Government proved an unforgiving creditor.
A visit to Washington in 1923 by Stanley Baldwin, while still Chancellor of the Exchequer, in an attempt to reschedule Britain's war debts proved fruitless eliciting the laconic comment from the then US Vice-President (but soon-to-be President) Calvin Coolidege of:
"They hired the money, didn't they?"
However to the financially-exhausted and war-ravaged economies of Britain and France in 1917 the US becoming a full member of the Allied cause seemed. almost literally, like manna from heaven.
The Kaiserschlacht has often been compared to the Ardennes offensive of December 1944 as, in your words, "a last throw of the dice" by Germany. However I think the comparisons are overblown and misleading. The Ardennes offensive was certainly a last desperate gamble by an army in full retreat in both the West and the East (and the South, if you count Italy) whereas in March 1918 both sides were fairly evenly matched with Germany still in possession of most of the territory that it had held since the end of 1914 with the infusion of troops from the Eastern Front giving Germany a great advantage, alongside the new 'stormtrooper' tactics perfected by Ludendorff.
The Germans lacked the element of surprise that they possessed in 1944 but they realised they had a small window of opportunity to inflict a major defeat on the Allies before the Americans arrived in full force. Kaiserschlacht was a tactical success but a strategic failure. The initial successes caught the High Command by surprise almost as much as they did the Allies. There was a confusion as to the ultinmate objective as to whether there should be a dash for the Channel Ports or a repeat of the strategy of 1914 with an attempt to outflank and ultimately envelop the French Army. It is doubtful, however, whether either strategy could have succeeded.
The main difference between the Spring Offensive of 1918 and the initial assault of 1914 was that they faced experienced opponents rather than inexperienced ones who had gone through the fires of Verdun, the Somme and Passchendaele and who could therefore receive enormous hammer blows and then come back more strongly.
The British naval blockade also played its part in the failure of the Spring Offensive. After 3 1/2 years of war and the mismanagement of the war economy Germany was experiencing severe food shortages (that were eventually to lead to revolution in November) that were felt as much at the front as domestically. The German soldier's rations (especially compared to the generous provisions he received at the beginning of the war when the position vis-a-vis the Allies were probabbly reversed)was magre and of poor quality whilst the Allied trenches were well-stocked particularly with alcohol.
When the German soldiers took the British and French forward positions they were amazed at the quality and quantity of Allied stores. Discipline broke down as the troops resorted to looting. After consuming the large amounts of alcohol they found the troops were, literally, not in a fit state to progress any further forward for several days. This delay bought valuable time for the retreating Allies to regroup and mount defensive positions. -
Message 11
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
Re: Message 10.
Allan,
thank you very much for your interesting messages in this thread. As I thank also the other contributors for their thoughtful replies. Really a "gentlemen's" discussion as we here not that often see.
Learned a lot from the thread as for instance the "Hurtgen Forest" battle from which I had never heard till now. As the opinion about the one million Germans kept at the Eastern Brest-Litovsk border.
With esteem for all the contributors,
Paul. -
Message 12
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Thursday, 17th December 2009
Dear Paul
Thankyou for the compliments which I am sure are unmerited on my part. Hurtgen Forest is one of the neglected battles of WWII as it contradicts the image of the war as one of rapid movement on both sides. Even Sir Max Hastings gives it little space in his history of the Western Front in the last year of WWII, "Armageddon".
At Hurtgen the conditions of WWI were replicated in two armies locked in deadly combat, both refusing to yield an inch and fought in the most abominable of physical conditions. Although it displayed the finest qualities of the American soldier young recruits were thrown into what was essentially a charnel house. The average life expectancy of a GI on reaching the frontline was 10 days.
To this day an argument rages as to whether, like the Somme, the battle should have been fought at all, as its primary purpose was not break through the enemy lines but prevent German forces being diverted to attack Montgomery's forces in the north or the US armies attacking in the south through the Belfort Gap.
There are several accounts of the battle available from both sides' point of view. Here is the broadest overview:
-
Message 13
Posted by Mike Alexander (U1706714) on Friday, 18th December 2009
Thanks Allan for an excellent expansion on the endgame of WWI. Regarding the terms of repayment for war loans, I'm sure I've read that France negotiated more favourable terms than Britain - I think Gerard deGroot mentions this in his book "Blighty".
-
Message 14
Posted by Tim of Acleah (U1736633) on Friday, 18th December 2009
Allan
"What is remarkable is that the Germans kept back over a million troops in the East to retain control over their conquered territories (under the terms of Brest-Litovsk the Soviets had awarded Germany"
I believe they sent their best troops westward and that most of these were poorer troops. Hoffmann in 'The War of Lost Opportunities' does not seem to consider this a significant factor in the German defeat. On the other hand he seems to consider that troops shipped from the eastern to the western front later on were 'passing on the poison which they had imbibed in the East from Bolshevik theories.' -
Message 15
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Friday, 18th December 2009
Possibly, but the number of German troops remaining within the territories which the Bolsheviks had ceded under the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk including Poland whose sovereignty was restored by the Treaty of Versailles caused the Allies to send out expeditionary forces in 1919, initially to deal with the Germans rather than the Bolsheviks, as Stevenson points out (although they were regarded as collaborationists who had almost cost the Allies victory). In the event it was the Bolsheviks with whom the Allied forces engaged although, ironically, the USSR could not have come into existence had the Allied victory in the West not nullified the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.
-
Message 16
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Friday, 18th December 2009
Possibly, but the number of German troops remaining within the territories which the Bolsheviks had ceded under the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk including Poland whose sovereignty was restored by the Treaty of Versailles caused the Allies to send out expeditionary forces in 1919, initially to deal with the Germans rather than the BolsheviksÌý Token expeditionary contingents were sent to take and hold strategic ports on Kola Peninsula (Murmansk and Arkhangelsk) and Far East, so that the Germans would not be able to use them for their war efforts.
-
Message 17
Posted by PaulRyckier (U1753522) on Saturday, 19th December 2009
Re: Message 12.
Allan,
thank you very much for the reply and the additional information.
Warm regards,
Paul. -
Message 18
Posted by Tim of Acleah (U1736633) on Sunday, 27th December 2009
Allan
you wrote "caused the Allies to send out expeditionary forces in 1919, initially to deal with the Germans rather than the Bolsheviks"
just out of interest could you provide your evidence for this.
regards
Tim -
Message 19
Posted by suvorovetz (U12273591) on Sunday, 27th December 2009
"caused the Allies to send out expeditionary forces in 1919, initially to deal with the Germans rather than the Bolsheviks"
just out of interest could you provide your evidence for thisÌý The evidence is in Wilson's refusal not only to use military force against Bolsheviks, but to confront them in any way at all. "Bridge-building to the Soviets began in 1918 under President Woodraw Wilson, before the Bolsheviks had physically gained control of more than a fraction of Russia. As a result of this trade, the Bolsheviks were able to consolidate their totalitarian regime. Edwin Gay, then a member of the US War Trade Board, later dean of the Harward Business School and long-time member of the Council on Foreign Relations, is the most likely originator of "bridge-building." (A. Sutton, National Suicide). As for the expeditionary forces, "Had the initial Allied landings at Arkhangel, argues historian Richard Ullman, "been carried out by two or three divisions - the number which [British envoy] Lockhart and the military attaches in Moscow had insisted was the bare minimum necessary for success - instead of the 1,200 troops who actually occupied the port at the end of July [1918], there is little doubt that they could have forced their way to Moscow and overthrown the Bolshevik regime." (H.W. Crocker III, Don't Tread on Me). Mind you that at that time Germany was still at war with Entente and at peace with the Bolsheviks under the very favorable for them Brest-Litovsk Treaty. -
Message 20
Posted by Allan D (U1791739) on Sunday, 27th December 2009
I defer to my old adversary, Suvorovetz' far greater knowledge in this area. I would, however, just like to quote from Margaret Macmillan's magisterial account of the Paris Peace Conference, "Peacemakers", with regard to Wilson's attitude to Russian intervention:
"The sixth of his [Wilson's] Fourteen Points called for the evacuation of Russian territory by foreign armies (he had the Japanese in mind in particular) so that the Russian people could work out the institutions that best suited them. When the Russians had sorted out who was governing them (he hoped that it would not be the Bolsheviks), the United States would extend recognition. This, Wilson liked to point out, was what the United States had done in the Mexican civil war.
The trouble was that the Allies had already intervened. In the spring of 1918 British troops had landed at the northern ports of Archangel and Murmansk and the Japanese had seized Vladivostok on the Pacific and spread westwards into Siberia to keep the Germans from getting their hands on Russian raw materials such as grain and oil, as well as on Russian ports and railways. To keep an eye on the Japanese (and perhaps the British) and to protect a legion of Czechs from Russian prisoner-of-war camps who had got themselves stuck in Siberia, the Americans had reluctantly landed their own troops. The British then prevailed on the Canadians to supply a force to balance the Americans and Japanese...When, at the end of the war, Britain not only decided to keep its troops in place but to offer support to anti-Bolshevik White Russians, it was already quite clear that an intervention that had started out against the Germans had slipped into something quite different." -
Message 21
Posted by Mikestone8 (U13249270) on Friday, 15th January 2010
However to the financially-exhausted and war-ravaged economies of Britain and France in 1917 the US becoming a full member of the Allied cause seemed. almost literally, like manna from heaven.Ìý
Martin Horn "Britain, France enasd the Financing of the First World War" covers this in some detail.
He concludes that Britain could still, in theory, have financed her own war effort even without US intervention, but would not have been able to bankroll her allies as well. if this is so, then by the end of 1917 Britain would have been fighting alone a la 1940, but with the difference that this time she would already have been exhausted by three years of slaughter on the Western Front, and probably demoralised by the realisation that this effort had been in vain. At best we'd have been looking at a very bad peace treaty. -
Message 22
Posted by Tim of Acleah (U1736633) on Wednesday, 20th January 2010
The question then is. If this is so obvious why did Germany take the actions that ensured the US entry into the war rather than just waiting for the collapse of France and Italy?
-
Message 23
Posted by LongWeekend (U3023428) on Wednesday, 20th January 2010
I think the Germans at the end of 1917 had a clearer view of the economic realities than some subsequent historians.
The Allies had access to US industrial resources and US credit (the loan terms did get better the USA entered the war, but the US exposure to Allied debt was such it would have had to go on supporting them whatever. Britain was underwriting its fellow comabtants as it was.) On that basis, the German leadership assessed the the Allies could keep going longer than they could.
Their only window of opportunity was to use unrestricted submarine warfare to force Britain out of the war through starvation and bring on a negotiated peace. They recognised this would bring the USA into the war, but assessed that the US could not intervene in significant military terms for at least a year, as it had no mobilised field army and would need to create one.
In the event, the German gamble nearly came off. There was a U-Boat crisis for Britain in 1917 (I see recent research suggests there may have been actual starvation in some industrial cities), narrowly averted by improved ASW and the introduction of convoys, and the US Army did not enter battle in force until well into 1918. -
Message 24
Posted by Mikestone8 (U13249270) on Thursday, 21st January 2010
The question then is. If this is so obvious why did Germany take the actions that ensured the US entry into the war rather than just waiting for the collapse of France and Italy?
Ìý
Because the crucial decisions were taken in December 1916. At that point, the Germans were vaguely aware of Britain's economic difficulties but could not assess their precise severity, ie whether they would manifest themsleves in time to do Germany any good.
For Germany appeared to be racing against the clock. 1916 had been an "annus horribilis" which she had barely survived, and 1917 seemed almost certain to be worse. The British Army would be back, larger than in 1916 and far more seasoned. Kitchener's green recruits had been through the mill in 1916 and (those who had survived) would be fasr more experienced in the new year, and also reinforced by the next batch of conscripts.
Russia had by now got over her crippling shortages, and her army was far better equipped. Unlike 1914 and 1915, she was now holding her own, and was likely to get stronger still with time. She was of course "on the brink of revolution" but that had been true since the war started, yet it still hadn't happened, and even if it did there was no guarantee that it would come in time to save Germany. At Verdun, France appeared to have survived everything the German Army could throw at it. If present trends continued, there seemed no way Germany could hope to survive 1917.
Enter the German Navy. They produced an impressive set of stats, showing that they could starve Britain into surrender by August 1917. Their calculations were doubtful at best, but the desperate German government was in no mood to look a gift horse in the mouth. And in fairness, others believed much the same. In April 1917, Lord Jellicoe told Admiral Sims that on present trends Britain would have to surrender in November. His estimate differed from the German one by only three months.
Thus as far as the Germans (and indeed most others) could see, the war was going to end in 1917. If the u-boat campaign succeeded, Germany would win in 1917. If it failed, she would lose in 1917. This was why the Germans discounted the effects of US intervention. They assumed
(correctly) that significant American forces could not reach Europe till well into 1918, and (incorrectly) that this meant it would not matter as by then the war would be over - one way or the other.
This also provides the rationale for the otherwise crazy Zimmermann note. If 1917 was the year of decision, it made sense to keep such troops as the US had tied up through that year in a Second Mexican War. Whatever happened to Mexico afterwards could not harm Germany.
In fact, they got it wrong on every point. First, and in large part due to US assistance, the u-boat war did not knock Britain out. Second, events in Spring and Summer would show that it had been unecessary. In Russia the long awaited revolution finally came, and her military effectiveness steadily rotted away. In France the damage done in 1916 finally "surfaced" in the May 1917 mutinies. That just left Britain, who would have been financially on the ropes but for new American loans.
Germany brought diaster on herself because she did not know her own strength. By provoking the US into war, she snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. -
Message 25
Posted by Mikestone8 (U13249270) on Thursday, 21st January 2010
The Allies had access to US industrial resources and US credit (the loan terms did get better the USA entered the war, but the US exposure to Allied debt was such it would have had to go on supporting them whatever. Ìý
You often hear that stated, but in fact it's a bit of an urban legend.
As of Jan 1917, all US loans to the Allies had been secured, on (mostly British) property and securities in the United States or Canada, which would be out of Germany's reach even if she won. So American bondholders would not lose their money, regardless of the war's outcome. Obviously, sales of munitions etc would end, but they must in any case end with the war, which could not go on for ever. As far as the "merchants of death" were concerned, an Allied victory would be just as sad an event as a German one.
However, by the end of 1916, all the available collateral was tied up, and any future loans would have to be unsecured. But when the House of Morgan attempted to raise one in November, the Federal Reserve Board, with President Wilson's approval, issued a sharp warning to American citizens about the unwisdom of subscribing to such loans. This caused a nasty run on sterling, stabilised only with difficulty. Not until May 1917, after the US declaration of war, were any unsecured loans made.
President Wilson, IOW, was well aware of the danger that America might become financially "tied" to the Allies, and had no intention of allowing it to happen.
Could I recomment Patrick J Devlin's "Too Proud to Fight - Woodrow Wilson's Neutrality" for a good account of this?
About this Board
The History message boards are now closed. They remain visible as a matter of record but the opportunity to add new comments or open new threads is no longer available. Thank you all for your valued contributions over many years.
or Ìýto take part in a discussion.
The message board is currently closed for posting.
The message board is closed for posting.
This messageboard is .
Find out more about this board's
Search this Board
Â鶹ԼÅÄ iD
Â鶹ԼÅÄ navigation
Â鶹ԼÅÄ links
Â鶹ԼÅÄ Â© 2014 The Â鶹ԼÅÄ is not responsible for the content of external sites. Read more.
This page is best viewed in an up-to-date web browser with style sheets (CSS) enabled. While you will be able to view the content of this page in your current browser, you will not be able to get the full visual experience. Please consider upgrading your browser software or enabling style sheets (CSS) if you are able to do so.