Causes of World War I
Americans wanted to stay out of the war, but
would eventually be dragged into the war raging
in Europe
• To fully understand America’s role in the war,
you need to understand the causes of the war
• There are four long-term or MAIN causes of
World War I
– M- Militarism
– A- Alliances
– I- Imperialism
– N- Nationalism
•
Causes of World War I- Militarism
• M- Militarism is the development
of armed forces and a countries Armed Strength
1880 1914
use of the military as a tool for
• Germany
1.3m 5.0m
diplomacy
• France
0.73m 4.0m
• By 1890 an arms race had
• Russia
0.40m 1.2m
started between the strongest
European countries
– Germany had the largest army
– Britain had the largest Navy
– Other countries started
spending money to try to stay
in the race
Causes of World War I- Alliances
• A- Alliances By 1907, there were two major
defense alliances in Europe, which provided a
measure of international security for all countries
involved in an alliance
• Allied Powers
• Central Powers
(Major Powers)
(Major Powers)
− Germany
– France
− Austria- Hungary
– Britain
− Ottoman Empire
– Russia
– U.S (1917)
Causes of World War I- Imperialism
• I- Imperialism for centuries European nations
had been building empires and slowly extending
their economic and political control over various
peoples of the world
– Colonies supplied the European imperial
powers with raw materials and provided
markets for manufactured goods
– As Germany industrialized, it began competing
with France and Britain in the contest for
colonies
Causes of World War I- Imperialism
Causes of World War I
• N- Nationalism a devotion to the interests and
culture of one’s nation
– Often nationalism led to competitive and
antagonistic rivalries among nations
• Various ethnic groups resented domination by
others (colonies) and longed for their nation to be
independent
– Many ethnic groups looked to larger nations
for protection
– Russia regarded itself as the protector of
Europe’s Slavic people
An Assassination Leads to War
The Balkan Peninsula was known at the time as
“the powder keg of Europe” meaning there was so
much tension in the area, that something was
going to happen which would result in fighting
• The incident happened on June 28th 1914 when
Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian
throne, visited the capital of Bosnia, Sarajevo
– Bosnia was a Slavic country under the control
of Austria Hungary
– Bosnia also had a large number of nationalists
that lived there…
•
An Assassination Leads to War
• Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was visiting Bosnia
to try and gain support for the Austrian
government, which wasn’t liked very much and
was in a parade to “make friends”
– During the parade the Serbian nationalist, and
a member of the Black Hands, Gavrilo Princip
shot the Archduke and his wife
• Serbia was the neighboring country to
Bosnia and happened to be Slavic and
wanted Bosnia and Serbia to become one
• Serbia was also in an alliance with Russia
The Beautiful People
Gavrilo Princip
Archduke Franz
Ferdinand
An Assassination Leads to War
• The assassination touched off a diplomatic crisis
when Austria- Hungary declared war on Serbia
– Russia was then called in to back up Serbia
– In response, Germany was called in to back
up Austria- Hungary
– Germany then declared war on France because
they only had war plans to attack France before
they could attack Russia
– Then Germany invaded Belgium with a huge
show of force (A neutral country) and caused
Britain to declare war on Germany
World War I- A New Kind of War
• Both sides of the war had such huge
armies, that neither one could
successfully advance on each other
– The war soon entered into a
stalemate on the Western front and
both sides resorted to digging
trenches and using trench warfare to
protect themselves
• The scale of slaughter was horrific
during one battle there was 1.2 million
deaths and only seven miles of land
changed hands
The Trench System- Activity #1
Americans Question Neutrality
• In 1914 most Americans didn’t feel it necessary
to get involved with a conflict 3,000 miles across
the Atlantic
– It didn’t threaten American lives or property
• Most American’s supported the Allied Powers
– People felt closer to Britain because of
common ancestry, language, and similar
governments
– America had strong economic ties with the
Allies… trade with Britain and France alone
was double that of trade with Germany
Americans Question Neutrality
During the first two years
of the war, America’s trade
with the Allied powers
increased as the Allies
flooded American
manufactures with orders
for all sorts of war supplies
• The United States shipped
millions of dollars of war
supplies to the Allies, but
the requests kept coming
•
The War Hits Home
• Although most
Americans favored an
Allied victory, they didn’t
want to enter the fight
until two events
happened
– The sinking of
neutral, or private
ships
– The Zimmerman
Telegram
The War Hits Home
As fighting on land continued, Britain began using
it’s superior naval force to hurt Germany
• Britain blockaded the German coast to prevent
weapons and other military supplies from getting
through
– They soon extended it to include food which
caused famine to strike Germany in 1917 and
around 750,000 Germans starved to death
• Americans had been angry at Britain’s blockade
because it threatened freedom of the seas and
prevented American goods from getting to
Germany… but Germany’s response to the
blockade would soon anger the Americans
•
The War Hits Home
Germany responded to the British
blockade by using unrestricted
submarine warfare, or the sinking
of any ship within it’s waters
without warning
• One of the worst disasters
occurred on May 7th, 1915 when a
U-boat (Unterseeboot) sank the
British liner Lusitania
– Of the 1,198 people lost, 128 of
them were Americans which
upset America because they
were neutral
•
The 1916 Election
Democrats nominated Wilson again
and the Republicans nominated
Supreme Court Justice, Charles Evans
Huges
• Wilson used the slogan “He Kept Us
Out of War”
• Huges pledged to uphold America’s right
to freedom of the seas but promised not
to be too severe to Germany
• The election was very close and Huges
went to bed thinking he won, but in the
morning he woke up to defeat!
•
The Election of 1916
The United States Declares War
After winning reelection, Wilson tried
to mediate a peace in Europe
– Germany responds by returning to
unrestricted submarine warfare,
which enraged Americans
– People pushed even more for
Wilson to take Action, he decided
to wait for “overt actions”
• The “overt actions” came in the form
of the Zimmerman Note and more
sinking of AMERICAN merchant
vessels!
•
•
The United States Declares War
The Zimmerman Note was a telegram
from the Germany foreign minister
(Zimmerman) to the German ambassador
in Mexico that was intercepted by the
British
– Germany proposed an alliance between
them and Mexico
– Germany promised that if war broke out
within the U.S. Germany would support
Mexico
– Germany would support Mexico in
recovering, “lost territory in Texas, New
Mexico, and Arizona”
The United States Declares War
The next “overt action” was the sinking of four
unarmed American merchant ships, which
resulted in the loss of 36 lives
• On April 2, 1917 Woodrow Wilson delivered his
war resolution, and asked Congress for a
declaration of war
•
– On April 6th, 1917 Congress approved the resolution
and America entered into the war on the side of the
Allies
– Only one person in the House of Representatives
voted not to go to war, and that was Janette Rankin of
Montana, the first women elected to Congress
America Mobilizes
The United States was not
prepared for war in 1917
– Only 200,000 men in
service and many officers
had combat experience
• Congress passed the
Selective Service Act in May
1917
– Required men to register
with the government so
they could be randomly
selected for military service
•
America Mobilizes
The Selective Service Act was
successful
- By 1918 24 million men had
signed up
- Roughly 3 million were called up
of which 2 million fought in the
war, and 3/4ths saw combat
• So who signed up?
- Most hadn’t attended or
graduated high school
- One in five was foreign born
•
America Mobilizes
About 400,000 African American
served in the armed forces and more
than half of them served in France
• African Americans served in
segregated units and were excluded
from the Navy and the Marines
– Most were assigned to noncombat
duties (cook, mechanics etc..)
– One exception was the369th
Infantry Regiment who saw more
continuous duty on the front lines
than any other regiment
•
America Mobilizes
•
Training for drafted soldiers took
eight months partly in the U.S. and
partly in Europe
– They put in17 hour days training
in things like target practice,
bayonet drills, kitchen duty and
cleaning the grounds
– However many weapons were in
short supply, they often drilled
with fake weapons
• Rocks instead of hand grenades,
wooden polls instead of rifles
America Mobilizes
Women were not allowed to enlist
but the army reluctantly accepted
women in the Army Corps of Nurses
– Didn’t get any sort of rank, pay,
or benefits
• 13,000 women accepted
noncombat positions in the Navy
and Marines
– They served as nurses,
secretaries, and telephone
operators
– They got full military rank
•
Fighting “Over There”
• One of the main contributions that the
U.S. made to the war effort was the
supply of fresh and enthusiastic young
men
– American infantrymen were
nicknamed “doughboys” due to the
white belts they wore which they
cleaned with pipe clay or “dough”
– The experience of war was new and
exciting to them, many didn’t travel
far from home, and also shocking at
the same time
Fighting “Over There”
The battlefield of war saw many new
weapons that had never been used
before
– Machine Gun, Tank, Airplane, Poison
Gas, Grenades, Large Artillery
• The new weapons and tactics of World
War I led to horrific injuries, diseases
and hazards
– Lice, Rats, polluted water that caused
things like dysentery, and trench foot
– Shell shock, and burns from poison
gas were also very common
•
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• The U.S. was affected a lot by the war even though
it wasn’t fought at home
– The production of consumer goods had to be
stopped to produce war goods
– In order for this to happen, private businesses
and the federal government had to team up
– To do this the power of the federal government
was greatly expanded
• Congress gave President Wilson direct control over
the economy, including the power to fix prices and
to regulate war- related industries
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• The main organization that regulated
the economy was the War Industries
Board (1917)
– Encouraged companies to use
mass-production to increase
efficiency
– Eliminate waste by standardizing
products
– Set Production quotas and
allocated raw materials
– Under the WIB industrial
production increased by about 20%
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• There were other federal agencies to regulate the
economy during the war
– The Railroad Administration controlled the
railroad
– Fuel Administration monitored coal supplies
and rationed gasoline and heating oil
• Many people also adopted “gasless Sundays”
and “lightless night” to conserve fuel
• In March of 1918 daylight-savings time was
introduced in order to take advantage of the
longer days of light
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• Wages in most industries rose during the war
years especially for those in war related industries
• However, household incomes were undercut due
to rising prices of goods and food
• Stockholders and large corporations saw huge
profits
– Wasn’t passed on to the workers, instead they
increase their workers hours and output and as
a result Union membership boomed and
expanded
– During the war months, there were more than
6,000 strikes!
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• To deal with disputes between
workers and owners, Wilson created
the National War Labor Board in
1918
– Workers who refused to obey the
boards decisions could loose their
draft exemptions
– “Work or Fight” the board told
them
– Did work to improve war time
working conditions, fought for an 8
hour work day promoted safety
inspections
The Power Goes to … Wilson
• To help produce and conserve food, Wilson set up
the Food Administration under Herbert Hoover
– Instead of rationing Hoover called on people to
follow the “gospel of the clean plate”
• One day a week you went, “meatless”
another was “sweetless”
• Two days a week were “wheatless” and two
other were “porkless”
• Homeowners planted “Victory Gardens”
– As a result, American food shipments to the
Allies tripled
Selling the War
• Now that the government had control over the
economy, they had to raise money for the war
and get public support for it
• The U.S. spent roughly $35.5 billion on the war
effort
– Raised about one-third of this through taxes
• Income tax, War Profits tax, Higher tax on
tobacco, liquor, and luxury goods
– They raised the rest of the money by selling
war bonds
• Bought for the purpose of financing military
operations during war time, accrued interest
War Bonds- Activity #2
Selling the War
• To popularize the war, the government set up the
nation’s first propaganda agency, the
Committee on Public Information
– Propaganda is biased communication
designed to influence people’s thoughts and
actions
– The head of the CPI was George Creel a former
muckracker
• He turned every type of mass media into
propaganda
• “Four-Minute Men” who spoke about
everything relating to war… the draft, bonds
War Affects the Home Front
War Affects the Home Front
• Oh! Its a Lovely War
Oh! Oh! Oh! it's a lovely war,
Who wouldn't be a soldier eh?
Oh! It's a shame to take the pay.
As soon as 'reveille' has gone
We feel just as heavy as lead,
But we never get up till the
sergeant brings
Our breakfast up to bed.
Oh! Oh! Oh! it's a lovely war,
What do we want with eggs and ham
When we've got plum and apple jam?
Form fours! Right turn!
How shall we spend the money we earn?
Oh! Oh! Oh! it's a lovely war
War Affects the Home Front
News Paper Headlines:
“Germans crucify Canadian
officer”
• “Belgian Child’s Hands Cut
off by Germans”
• “French Doctors Infect
German Wells with Plague
Germs”
• “German prisoners blinded by
Allied captors
•
Selling the War
• The CPI also handed out 25 million copies of “How
the War Came to America”
– Book that included Wilson’s war message and
other propaganda about the war
– Witten in several different languages
• With the help of the Boy Scouts the CPI
distributed 75 million pamphlets, booklets, and
leaflets
• The campaign was effective but it also inflamed
hatred and violations of civil liberties of certain
ethnic groups and opponents of the war
Attacks on Civil Liberties
• Main targets were Americans who had emigrated
from Germany or Austria, or who were decedents
of these nationalities
– Many Americans with German last names lost
their jobs
– Orchestras refused to play the music of Mozart,
Bach, and Beethoven
– Towns with German names changed them
– Libraries pulled books by German authors off
the shelves
– Hamburger  “Salisbury Steak”, Sauerkraut 
“Liberty Cabbage”, Dachshunds – “Liberty Pups”
Attacks on Civil Liberties
• In June of 1917 and May of 1918
Congress passed the Espionage
and Seditions Acts
– A person could be fined up to
$10,000.00 and sentenced to 20
years in jail for interfering with
the war effort or for saying
anything disloyal, profane, or
abusive about the government
or war effort
– Led to over 2,000 prosecutions
which over half resulted in
convictions
Attacks on Civil Liberties
• All types of people could be convicted under the
Espionage and Sedition Acts
– Newspapers & Magazines that opposed the war
lost their mailing privileges
– The House of Representatives refused to seat
Victor Berger, because of his socialist antiwar
views
– Columbia University fired a distinguished
professor because he opposed the war
– Eugene v. Debs was handed a 10 year prison
sentence for speaking out against the war and
the draft
The War Encourages Social Change
• The greatest effect of the war on African
Americans’ lives was that it accelerated the Great
Migration
– The large scale movement of hundreds of
thousands of Southern blacks to cities in the
North
– Sought to escape racial discrimination in the
South and were also seeking better job
opportunities
• Due to the outbreak of the War, and the
decrease in European immigrants Northern
manufacturers needed workers for their
booming factories
The War Encourages Social Change
• In the fall of 1918 the United States
suffered from a terrible flu epidemic which
affected about ¼ of the U.S. population
– The result of the flue on the economy
was devastating factories and mines
shut down, business hours were cut in
half
– In the army more than ¼ caught the
flu
– It’s estimated that it killed about
500,000 Americans before is
disappeared in 1919, believed to have
killed 30 million worldwide
The War Comes to an End
• On November 11th, 1918 World War I came to end
– 11th day, of the 11th month on the 11th hour
– Called Armistice Day or today it’s known as
Veterans Day
• January 18th, 1919 a conference was called to
establish peace terms held at the Palace of Versailles
• Delegates representing 32 countries met at the
conference
– Dominated mostly by Britain, France, the U.S.,
Italy
– Russia was not represented, nor were the Central
Powers
Wilson’s Plan for Peace
• Wilson had drawn up a series of
proposals called the 14 Points
– Outlined a plan for achieving a just
and lasting peace
• The first five set general goals for a
peaceful world  MAIN
– End to secret treaties
– Freedom of the seas
– Reduced national armies and navies
Wilson’s Plan for Peace
• 6th –13th Self-determination
– Groups that claimed distinct ethnic identities
were to form their own nation-states or decide
for themselves to what nations they would
belong
– Specific suggestions for changing boarders and
creating new nations
• 14th Point was a League of Nations
– A general association of nations that would
protect the great and small states alike and
would peacefully negotiate solutions to world
conflicts
The Allies Reject Wilson’s Plan
• The European leaders wanted a
much more strict treaty
– Clemenceau had lived through
two German invasions and wanted
to prevent another
– George had just been reelected on
the slogan, “Make Germany Pay”
•
Instead, the “Big Four”- Wilson,
Clemenceau, George, and Orlandohad to work out the treaty based on
what all of them wanted
The Treaty of Versailles: Major Provisions
League of Nations
• International peace
organization
Territorial Losses
• Germany returns
Alsace-Lorraine to
France
• Membership to include
32 Allied countries and • French boarder
neutral nations
extended to the west
bank of the Rhine River
• Germany and Russia
excluded
• Germany surrenders all
of its overseas colonies
The Treaty of Versailles: Major Provisions
Military Restrictions
• Limits the size of the
German army
• Germany prohibited
from importing or
manufacturing war
material
• Germany forbidden to
build or buy submarines
or have an air force
War Guilt
• Sole responsibility for
the war placed on
Germany’s shoulders
• Germany forced to pay
the Allies $33 billion in
reparations over 30 years
Wilson Faces Opposition
• Wilson had to concede on most of his 14 points in
order to get the League of Nations into the treaty
which caused him to loose a lot of support at
home
– People accused him of selling out to
imperialism
– A lot of people felt the league of nations
threatened the U.S. policy of isolationism
• Take away Congress’s right to declare war
• United States would be obligated to enter
European conflicts
• When World War I ended,
many Americans looked
forward to a return of
“normalcy.”
• In Europe there was
destruction and massive
loss of life and severely
damaged social and
political systems.
• Because the Treaty only
resolved a few issues,
another war was around
the corner