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The Great War
War and Society, 1914-1920
Study Guide Identifications
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14 points
Peace without Victory
League of Nations
Imperial Competition
American neutrality
Factors that led to US entering war
U-boats
Trench Warfare
Study Guide Questions
• Why did the US become involved in
WWI?
• What problems did the US encounter as
it sought to mobilize its people, and
economy for war?
• How were they overcome?
• What were Woodrow Wilson’s peace
proposals and how did they fare?
Origins of Conflict
• Since 1870s
– Competing imperial ambitions of the great
European powers
– Economic rivalries
– Military expansion
– Diplomatic maneuvering
– International tensions
• May 1914, an American diplomat reported,
“there is too much hatred, too much
jealousies, he predicted an awful
Cataclysm”
Entente & Central Powers
• Entente Powers
– Led by France, Russia, Britain
– Later Italy (1915) and the United States (1917)
• Central Powers
– Austro-Hungarian
– German
– Ottoman Empire
Inevitable War
• Began between Serbia and Austro-Hungary
– Serbian nationalist assassinated Archduke
Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne
• Austria declared war on Serbia in 1914
• World powers promised to come to each
other’s aid if attacked
– 2 hostile groups:
“Domino’s”
• Russia was obligated by a treaty to defend
Serbia if attacked by the Austria-Hungary
Empire
• Alliance System
– Alliances a factor in powers joining WWI
Imperial Rivalry
• Greater Factor’s in rise of WWI competition
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Economic rivalries
Military Expansion
Diplomatic maneuvering
International tensions
• Britain and Germany - struggle for
world supremacy
• Myth of the swift and decisive war
Unprecedented Warfare
• Victory Not Swift
• Two camps evenly matched
• New technologies and methods
of warfare
• Tanks
• trench warfare
– rat infested –disease
• airplanes
• barbed wire
Myth of Victorious War
• In the first 3 months of the war
– (August 1914) the original British army was
wiped out.
– The British press
• Impression of victory
– German press
• “All quiet on the western front.”
– 1917 the French military
• Mutinies
Devastation & Carnage
• 8.5 million soldiers died, with 17 million wounded
• total casualties military and civilian reached 37
million.
• Europe lost an entire generation of young men,
leaving behind an entire nation of young widows.
American “Neutrality”
• Woodrow Wilson - Europe’s war
• No threat to vital American interests
• Wilson effort to seek peace
• Normal trade relationships with both.
Roosevelt’s Pro-war Camp
• War was inevitable
• German Expansion
needed to be checked
• Majority agreed with
Wilson.
Factors of America’s entering
into War
1. Strong economic ties with Britain
• 800 million dollars a year in exports
• 170 million to Germany and Austria-Hungary
2. Shared culture and language
3. Economic Boom for the United states in providing
food, clothing and war supplies and equipment to
France and Britain
• American business and investors had a direct stake in
an Allied victory
Critical Perspectives
• Anti-Imperialist and Socialist:
Imperialist war
– advanced capitalist countries of Europe were
fighting over boundaries, colonies, spheres of
influence
• Alsace-Lorraine, The Balkans, Africa and the
middle east.
• Imperialist: Economic necessity
– 1914 recession in the U.S.
• business depressed, farm prices deflated,
employment serious,…
War Profits
• 1915 war orders for the allies stimulated
the economy
– by April 1917 more than 2 billion worth of
goods had been sold to the allies. Prosperity
depended on foreign markets
• 1897: 700 Million in exports
• by 1914 3 ½ billion in exports
– Even secretary of State, an anti-imperialist William
Jennings Bryan advocated the righteous conquest of
foreign markets.
%Interest in an Allied victory
• JP Morgan and Allies
– lent money at great amounts to make a
profit and tie American finance closely to the
interest of a British victory.
• (Was the prosperity classless, who
benefited?)
Factors Continued…
4. British Blockade on German Ports (attempt to
starve Germans into submission)
• America did not challenge its right to trade with Germany
• Violated American neutrality
• protested the blockade, created a recession in the US.
5. U-boat or submarine warfare
• Combat British control of the seas
• Flow of US goods to the allies.
Lusitania
• Significance of the sinking of the Lusitania
– Brought public opinion in line with government
action
– People supported a war they collectively did
not previously
Germany’s Escalation of
Aggression
• Beginning in 1918, Germany’s aggression
against the allies began to escalate
– United States entered into the war to reinforce
British lines
• Allied powers won
• Germany asked for an armistice to be
followed by peace negotiations based on
Wilson’s 14 points
Wilson’s 14 points
• “Peace without victory” campaign won him
re-election in 1916.
– Culminated 14 points policy
– Proposed a new world order
• All nations, weak and powerful, could participate as
equals in the world.
Paris Peace Conference
• Wilson led the American delegation of
the Paris Peace Conference
• 14 points
• Code of conduct that embraced free
trade, freedom of the seas, open
diplomacy, disarmaments, and resolution
of disputes through mediation
League of Nations
• function as an international parliament and
judiciary
• establish rules of international behavior
• resolve disputes between nations through
rational and peaceful means
• nine member executive council
• power to punish aggressor nations through
economic isolation and military retaliation
• Due to opposition, congress failed to ratify the treaty
The Big Three
• Conference controlled by
• Wilson
• David Lloyd George of Britain
• Georges Clemenceau of France
• France and Britain refused to include most
of the 14 points into the peace treaty. They
wanted to punish Germany.
Treaty of Versailles (1919)
• Awarded portions of Germany to Denmark,
Poland and Czechoslovakia
• disarmed Germany (all but 100,000)
• forced admission of responsibility for the
war
• reparations of 33 billion dollars
War on the Home Front
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CPI 1917 campaign
CPI 1918 Campaign
War Time Repression
IQ test
Liberty Bonds
Trading with the Enemy Act
Anti-German Campaign
Anti-radical Crusades
Flappers
Nativism & Xenophobia
Total War
• Scale of men needed, preparations
heavily taxed the United States in every
way.
• First conscription law passed to raise a
multi million man army
• Agricultural, transportation, industrial
and human resources all devoted to war
effort.
How to Organize War Time
Economy?
• Southern and Midwestern democrats
– feared centralization of government authority
• Northeastern progressives
– strong state to regulate the economy, boost
efficiency and achieve social harmony.
Organized industry
• Centralized federal agencies
– food administrations
• Private transportation shifted to public control
– Rail Roads
• unified system to move supplies and troops efficiently
• centralized management eliminated competition,
• permitted improvements in equipment,
– brought great profits to the owners
– higher prices to the general public.
War Industries Board
– Further empowered corporations
responsible for mobilizing supplies
• led by Bernard Baruch who aimed for businessgovernment integration
• promoted major business interests
• helped suspend anti-trust laws
• guaranteed huge corporate profits.
– (industrialists charged high prices for what
the federal government needed)
Organized Civilian labor
• New job opportunities
– half million African Americans
– half million southern whites
• migrated from tenant farms and share cropping to
industrial centers such as Chicago and Detroit.
– Hundreds of thousands of Mexican immigrants
(1910 revolution)
– 40,000 women
Black Migration
• industrial northern cities doubling and
tripling the black population there
• fearful and resentful whites began race
riots, In east St Louis, IL,
– a white mob murdered at least 39 people in
• July 1917.
Gains in Labor Unions
• Demand of labor
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Success of labor unions (1916-1920)
Membership doubled
Wages rose 137%
work week decreased to 48 hours.
• “Industrial democracy”
– War for democracy in Europe, why not at home.
The Draft
• Senator James Wadsworth of New York
suggested it to avert the danger of class
struggle and movements for social change
– “that these people should be divided by
class…we must let our young men know that
they owe some responsibility.”
Military Labor
• Selective Service Act passed 1917
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24 million men registered
3 million were drafted
2 million volunteered
18% were foreign born
10% African American
Socialist Challenge
• Despite Wilsons words of “the war to end
all wars” and “to make the world safe for
democracy” Americans did not rush to
enlist and congress voted for a draft.
– The socialist party declared the war “a crime
against the people of the United States”
Socialist party Gains
• 1917 up to 20,000 farmers protested the
war, the draft and profiteering.
• It began to gain in strength rapidly.
– Politically in municipal elections of 1917
socialists made gains.
Segregation, Discrimination, IQ
• Scientific Racism continued
– Eugenics
• 1905 Pennsylvania
• 1970’s African American 500,000
• Native American 25,000
– Military
• 10% were African American
– Segregated and barred from combat
• Justified by IQ test
– Non-whites not as endowed mentally
» Half the troops-morons, with a mental capacity of 13
NAACP- Concessions
• Pressured military to allow African
Americans combat positions
• 369th infantry
• Croix de Guerre by French government
length and distinction of service
Who paid for the war?
• Government borrowed money and
raised taxes
– Corporations paid 1/3 in taxes
• Richest charged a 67% income tax, and a 25%
inheritance tax
• Liberty Bonds –
– government effort, patriotic duty to
purchase them – treasury bond campaign
– “Every Person who refuses to subscribe is a
friend of Germany”
Committee on Public
Information
• 1917 Wilson - CPI
– George Creel
• Goal “fight for the minds of men, for the
conquest of heir convictions”
• publicize and popularize the war
• unprecedented propaganda campaign
– “to make the world safe for democracy”
– Self-determination of Nations
Renewed Protest
• Demanding U.S. live up to its ideals at home
– Industrial democracy
– Women’s suffrage
– Deliverance of African Americans from second class
citizenship
– Ethnic groups – opportunity for success
Suppressing Dissent
• Espionage Act
– Heavy fines and 20 years in prison in
obstructing the war effort
• Sedition Act 1918
– based on state laws designed to
suppress labor radicals
• severe penalties for speaking or writing
against the draft, bond sales, or war
production or for criticizing government
personnel or policies
Political repression and Ultra
Patriotism
• Senator Hiram Johnson lamented
• “It is war. But good God,…when did it become war upon
the American people?”
• Eugene Debs
• “it is extremely dangerous to exercise the right of free
speech in a country fighting to make democracy safe in the
world”
1918 CPI campaign:
• State and Local authorities
– 184,000 investigating and enforcement agencies known
as Councils of Defense or Public Safety Committees
– Inflammatory advertisements called on patriots to call
on their neighbors and ethnics they suspected of
subverting the war effort
• Propagandists “100% American”
– Repudiate all ties to homeland, language and customs.
German Americans
• Aroused hostility spreading
lurid tails of German
atrocities
• Justice department arrested
thousands of German and
Austrian immigrants
suspected of subversive
activities
Anti-German Campaign
• German Americans objects of popular hatred
• German banned
• Music
• books burned
• teaching of German language
• German Americans risked being fired, losing
businesses and assault on the streets
• Some lynched - defended as an act of patriotism
• Began hiding ethnic identity and changed names
Immigration Restriction Act
• Escalated into Anti-immigrant campaign
• Immigration Restriction Act of 1917
– denied entry to US to adults who failed the
reading test
– Banned immigration of laborers from India,
Indochina, Afghanistan, Arabia and East Indies.
Repression
• Wilson’s administration relied on repression more
and more to achieve domestic unity
– Espionage, Sabotage and Sedition acts passed in 1917
and 1918
• Sweeping power to silence dissenters
• Prosecuted for writing or uttering any statement
that could be construed as profaning the flag,
constitution or military
Banning and Persecution of
Socialists
Repressed and banned socialist meetings in
the US
Businessmen used rhetoric to suppress labor
movements
Anti-radical Crusades
• Super charged patriotism
• Encouraged local governments and private
citizens to initiate anti-radical crusades
– Bisbee, AZ, Kidnapping 1,200 IWW members, New
Mexican Desert
– Butte, MN, chained a IWW organizer to a car, drove
through city streets, castrated
American Protective League
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The Return of Vigilantism
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Attorney General Thomas Gregory
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American Protective League
250,000 members spied on workers and
neighbors
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Domestic Spying and surveillance
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Opened mail, Tapped phones
Harassed those suspected of disloyalty
Federally supported and endorsed