What caused the United States' entrance into the Great War (WWI) in Europe?

Question

What was our Army's role? What were Wilson's plans for peace and how did they help and hinder the peace process? What were the long-term effects that this war had on American society?

Answer 1

1) The US entered WW1 due to Germany's un restricted submarine warfare in the Atlantic that was sinking ships with war materiel for Britain and France.  America had been funding the Entente's war with loans and armaments since the beginning and since the French and British were losing and the Russians were on their way out, we stepped in to protect our investments.

GB and France had their entire war effort paid for by American aid, their guns were from America, their ammunition American, you name it.  Who would pay that back if they lost to Germany?  The Lusitania and submarines in themselves were excuses.

2) The US army's role was decisive.  American troops saved the day at the Marne during the German offensive of 1918 when the Germans were poised to take Paris.  The Americans then play the vital fighting role in the attack on critical point in the S-shaped curve front near the Argonnes.  Without our million men there was no British/French army to defeat Germany at that point.

3) Wilson's plan for peace was based on his 14 points.  Points that Gb-France had no intention of following or implementing themselves.  The Germans accepted a status quo peace with America in exchange for accepting Wilsons points.  Since the French-GB had no way of defeating Germany alone, they reluctantly agreed to Wilson's terms.

At the peace conference though, the Germans were forced into reperations and concessions it had not agreed to in principle before.  No German would sign the treaty until the Weimar people did.  This was the "stab in the back" theory Hitler and many other Germans used as their rational for war later.

If applied evenly, Wilson's points would have made sense, but since they were not, it only allowed further conflicts to erupt once Germany ironically tried to incorporate Germans abroad into the German Reich.

4) The war had the effect on American society that Americans would be reluctant to go abroad again to fight a war involving Europeans.  Of course, their government and the elite financiers had other ideas...

Answer 2

There didn't seem to be any affect of the Americans during the time of the World War mostly for the Russian troops. It was all because they were close to defeat,but we soon came into the fight and saved our allies. I am pretty sure some of the n***s made it over seas and attacked some of the coasts like Florida and some of our islands off of Floridas coast.But luckily they were wiped out and I think some were taken as P.O.W's.

Answer 3

Read Pages 373-387, of this online Google book, "Triumphant Plutocracy," by Richard F.

Pettigrew. He argues that we went to war in 1917 to save our big banks from bankruptcy. Their corruption and incompetence was apparently the same as it is today, with the housing loan crisis.

http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&id=J...

How the first cases of influenza, that caused the worldwide pandemic of 1918-19, were diagnosed at Ft. Riley, Kansas, in March, 1918. US soldiers carried the flu to Europe.

http://www.americanheritage.com/articles...

Answer 4

The immediate cause was Germany's policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, and the sinking of the Lusitania.

Answer 5

1. Sinking of Lusitania

2. Zimmerman Note (German Secretary of State sent Mexico a telegram encouraging an attack on the US in exchange for southwest US territories. Intercepted by British, who told the US)

3. Alliances with Britain and France.

Answer 6

Each one of these could be the subject of several books and leave you with more questions than answers.  This aging warrior will attempt to give you a Reader's Digest Condensed Version.

The American Banks had advanced the Allied Nations huge sums of money to buy arms and supplies in the United States.  The British Naval Blockade severely restricted trade with Germany, so most of our trade was with the Allied Powers.  This also led Germany to adopt a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, which further antagonized the United States.  

The military collapse of Russia tilted the balance of power against the Allies.  A German victory would almost certainly have left them bankrupt and caused them to fault of their war loans.  The economic consequence to the United States and the American people -- Depression and Massive Unemployment -- was not acceptable.

With the collapse of Russia, Germany was able to throw the full weight of her army against the West.  It was the timely arrival of the AEF that swung the balance of power back in favor of the Allies and awarded them victory.  Had our intervention not taken place or even been delayed, Germany almost certainly would have won.  We were the difference between winning and losing.

Wilso's Fourteen Points, in my view, contained numerous flaws.  They could, however, have formed the basis of a just and hence more durable peace, had they not been scuttled by the duplicity and intrigues of our principal allies, England and France.  This last, helped assure the rise of Hitler, led directly to World War II and the Cold War and did much -- for better or worse -- to put the United States in the position of leadeship it holds today.

It's a push me/pull you universe.