The United States Entered World War I History Essay Example

📌Category: History, History of the United States, War, World War I
📌Words: 994
📌Pages: 4
📌Published: 03 April 2022

These past few weeks we’ve been reading Give me liberty: an American history by Eric foner. This book is based on past historical events that happened in America. America had many entrances to wars and in my second essay I will be talking aboutAmerica’s entrance to the war. 

America's entry into warfare was the part of this chapter that piqued my curiosity the most. When I was in high school, I was always taught that the US joined the war instantly after the Lusitania was attacked and sunk by a German U-2 submarine. I've forever believed that the United States was simply pursuing a reason to join the war and that when one arose, they leaped at the chance to participate in World War I. The road to war, it turned out, was far more complex than this. President Wilson, disobedient to popular view, made numerous attempts to bring the war to a friendly ending but was often rejected by the Germans. In front of a large group of people, President Wilson declared to Congress that The American people had no legitimate reason to fight Germany, according to Congress; but, America was already preparing for war at the moment. Even though the majority of Congress decided to go to war, a few legislators did not. Senator La Follette argued that the war vote should have been conducted more democratically. A two-to-one majority of Americans opposed going to war. Many of them had no idea what was going on, and the editorials they did have were insufficiently informative. The vote for war was brought up in front of Congress when other pro-war legislators opposed la Follette's proposal for a referendum.

The United States was pulled into World War I by a near-unanimous vote. Any doubts of traitors or sympathizers with the Germans at home were swiftly investigated. Individuals from Germany who were living in the United States were regarded with distrust. United States government might utilize the postal service to watch individuals for anti-American actions under the Espionage Act and the Sedition Act. This distrust extended to labor unions as well. For speaking out against the war effort, members of the labor movement were imprisoned. All "unpatriotic" behavior was made illegal in every state across the country. This effectively outlawed all parts of German culture in America. German was no longer taught in schools. People of German ancestry went to great lengths to conceal their origin. In an odd sequence of events, hamburgers became known as "liberty burgers.". World Conflict I, like any other war, wreaked havoc on the economy. Millions of soldiers, equipment, weapons, and other items had to be built and shipped across the Atlantic as quickly as possible, across submarine-infested waters.

The United States economy turned the war into business to combat this strain. All the resources, production and manufacturing facilities, and the labor force began creating weapons and the necessary resources for war. All of these factors together became known as Total War, where everything is mobilized for the express purpose of the war. At the time, many laws were being passed as war measures. The U.S. started rallying its troops and training the 1.3 million recruits they had conscripted. President Wilson still sought a peaceful end to this already gruesome war. Wilson and the Inquiry drafted the Fourteen Points. These Fourteen Points introduced some radical changes that would affect both the Allies and the Central Powers. The Fourteen Points included maps that redrew the boundaries of several European nations. Wilson presented this before Congress while Lenin conquered surrounding countries as he led the bolsheviks. Lenin preached self-determination, and he was putting it into practice. Meanwhile, Germany secured its eastern front by allying with the Bolsheviks, which pitted the Russians against the Allies.

After securing their flanks, Germany prepared to mount their final offensive into Europe. The German economy was exhausted, and any continued war effort would be impossible with the resources they had available. On March 21, 1918, the German commanders launched what they knew to be their last effort, where the chances of success or failure were unknown. The Germans were exhausted, with no new troops to refresh the old ones. The United States' entrance to the war marked a vital turn for the Allies, as they had fresh troops and an economy that was fully mobilized to provide every need for the war effort. General Pershing, an American general, called for his European counterparts to begin moving forward and criticized them for staying on the defensive for so long. Pershing mobilized his troops to commit massed assaults on German fortified positions. He believed that he could overwhelm German defenses thanks to his numbers and his perceived understanding of the war based on his Civil War teachings. The Germans, however, were also mounting offensives along French lines. After the Germans broke through French defenses, they called upon General Pershing for help. He deployed an enormous amount of troops to defend Paris and drive back the Germans. The Germans, aware of the advancing American troops, lay in wait with 5 German divisions, minefields, rolling artillery, poison gas, and interlocked machine gun turrets. 

The Americans, armed only with their rifles, assaulted their positions. The Americans won that battle, but on that day, nearly one-half of the American troops that assaulted that position died, totaling 4,600 casualties. On September 12, 1918, General Pershing got another chance to try out his mass assault tactics against St. Mihiel Salient. German troops have been in the works of abandoning that position when the Americans attacked.

In conclusion, the skirmish ended in a resounding victory for the Americans, and their victory emboldened the Americans to continue fighting with the same tactic. General Pershing got his wish granted when he was given the task of removing the Germans from Argonne Forest and the German-held position for four years. Half a million German troops awaited the one million troops that General Pershing dedicated to the attack. True to his nature, General Pershing began his mass assault of the German defenses, incurring losses, but they broke through the first German defense lines in one day and a half.  After that, the fight turned into a slow but deadly crawl. 26,277 American troops gave their lives in this meaningful struggle. Finally, General Pershing overcame the Germans stationed in the Argonne Forest on November 10, 1918, and Germany announced their acceptance of the Fourteen Points as an armistice on November 11, 1918, bringing the Great War to a close.

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