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WWI: The War to End All Wars and Empires

WWI: The War to End All Wars and Empires. Q: How did WWI usher in a new era of American imperialism?. I. Waking the Giant. A. Neutrality and “Neutrality” Reasons for Staying out of the War: 1914-1917. 1) no national interests 2) isolationism 3) ethnic loyalties to both sides

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WWI: The War to End All Wars and Empires

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  1. WWI: The War to End All Wars and Empires Q: How did WWI usher in a new era of American imperialism?

  2. I. Waking the Giant A. Neutrality and “Neutrality” • Reasons for Staying out of the War: 1914-1917. • 1) no national interests • 2) isolationism • 3) ethnic loyalties to both sides • 4) financial benefits: supply both sides • 5) military unready • 6) victory either side garrison state surrounded reactionary imperialism

  3. Full neutrality not possible 1) Ethnic groups in USA took sides lobby 2) Wilson & advisers held pro-Allied views: Germany threat to civilization 3) USA-England trade (arms, loans) grew; USA-German trade dropped; Germany saw US trade w/ England as un-neutral

  4. 4) Wilsonianism • USA peaceful world • World of free trade, capitalism, democracy, open diplomacy, fewer arms, & no empires • US destiny = save world • Idealism + interest: Ideals benefited USA • Wilson willing to force ideas on others • Only joining war would give US seat at peace table (war for reform not destruction G)

  5. B. Violating “Neutral Rights” • England: seize US cargo for Germany (property) • Germany blockades England via submarines (lives) • Wilson: G comply w/ strict interpretation int’l law; look other way for E

  6. Lusitania (1915): 1198 lives (128 Americans); contraband (ammo) on ship • Sec’y State W.J. Bryan: ban Am belligerent ships WW rejects WJB resigns “traitor” • 1916: Sussex Pledge (end unrestricted)

  7. C. Final Straws • Feb. 1917: G calculated risk full sub war • March 1, 1917: Newspapers report Zimmerman Telegraph (acquired by B)

  8. … 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. … • You will inform the President [of Mexico] of the above most secretly as soon as the outbreak of war with the United States 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 unrestricted employment of our submarines now offers the prospect of compelling England to make peace within a few months.

  9. II. Explanations of War A. Clash of Empires • V.I. Lenin: imperialism highest form of capitalism conflict for markets + resources to survive • US “Open Door” policy applies whole world: US economy requires access G presents larger threat (esp. post-Russian Rev.) back Allies • Allies sent troops to Russia to back Whites vs. Reds (start of “Cold” War)

  10. B. Wilsonian Idealism: Anti-Imperial Empire • "The nation should adopt the doctrine of President Monroe as the doctrine of the world: that no nation should seek to extend its polity over any other nation or people, but that every people should be left free to determine its own polity, its own ways of development, unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, the little along with the great and the powerful."         President Wilson, 1917

  11. War is Peace • Request for Declaration of War • “The world must be made safe for democracy. Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty.” • Peace and liberty through war and regime change • “…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.” • Forcible spread of freedom security

  12. Legacy • “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.” JFK, Inaugural • “There is only one force of history that can break the reign of hatred and resentment and expose the pretensions of tyrants and reward the hopes of the decent and tolerant. And that is the force of human freedom. We are led, by events and common sense, to one conclusion: The survival of liberty in our land increasingly depends on the success of liberty in other lands. The best hope for peace in our world is the expansion of freedom in all the world.” • “The rulers of outlaw regimes can know that we still believe as Abraham Lincoln did: ‘Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves; and, under the rule of a just God, cannot long retain it.’” • GWB, 2nd Inaugural

  13. C. Terrorism • Act of terror military reaction “blowback” • Serbian Black Hand, 28 June 1914 • Al Qaeda, 11 September 2001 • Bin Laden: despises US-backed Saudi monarchy; why else 17/19 Saudis?

  14. III. Consequences of WWI A. Twenty-year Armistice • Versailles fundamentally flawed: revenge over reconciliation (G down, R out) Hitler + WWII • J + I receive too little no racial equality provision, not enough land • WW fails use leverage: no promise pre-US troops; econ coercion gone w/need rebuild B. Self-Determination • New countries unstable: i.e. Iraq, Yugoslavia, Poland • League “Mandates” • Buffer against USSR

  15. C. Imperial America • W. Wilson centralizes power in D.C. and Pres.: WPB, CPI, taxation, diplomacy • Selective Service Act (1917) permanent standing army / militarization • 4.8 million served; most draftees in early 20s, white, single, US-born, poorly educated • US losses = 53,000 combat dead (+ 62,000 dead from disease); 200,000 wounded

  16. Peace Advocates: pacifists, socialists (anti-imperialism), labor unions (rich man’s war), some blacks + women (democracy at home?) • TR, “The Hun within Our Gates” (1917): • “Every disloyal native-born American should be disfranchised and interned. It is time to strike our enemies at home heavily and quickly. Every copperhead in this country is an enemy to the Government, to the people, to the army and to the flag, and should be treated as such.”

  17. “…to those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty, my message is this: Your tactics only aid terrorists for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve. They give ammunition to America's enemies and pause to America's friends.” • Attorney General John Ashcroft, 7 December 2001, speaking to Senate Judiciary Committee

  18. IV. Post-War Isolationism? A. Forces for Isolation • Lost Generation • Senate opposition, Republican decade • Flu (600,000 then :: 1.4 million today; 30 million worldwide; flu > battle deaths) • Post-war Depression B. Forces for Intervention • Red Scare / Bolshevism • Japan: Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere • American foreign investments • Rise militarism Germany, Italy, USSR

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