alternatehistory.com

…The primary catalysts for US entry were as previously mentioned the German resumption of Unrestricted Submarine Warfare and the Zimmerman Telegram. The reason why the Germans did such stupid things, as most believe was Wilson’s fault. While that is partially true it does in fact ignore there were internal German reasons for doing what they did….

…To begin with the German leadership, most relevantly Hindenburg and Ludendorff, believed both that American entry to the war was nothing to be feared, and that American entry into the war was inevitable. For both of these reasons Wilson shares part of the blame.

For the former, the United States army was very small by European standards. Preparedness advocates had proposed to both double the standing Army and to provide a trained reserve that could rapidly expand it in times of war. Wilson had been an opponent of preparedness in 1915 and early 1916 before changing his tune and adopting a watered down form, that produced even more watered down bills in the summer of 1916, that were only just beginning to take effect in early 1917.

This meant that the German High Command could discount the United States Army as a factor, it was too small and unprepared to be a significant factor before late 1918 or even 1919 they believed. With their thoughts that the decisive campaigns would be in 1917 and 1918, the United States Army could thus be discounted. This estimate would be in error; however, it was the belief that the German High Command was operating under when it made the fatal decisions of late 1916 and early 1917. Had Wilson supported preparedness in 1915 the United States military would have been in the process of visibly expanding when the Germans made the fateful decisions and that may have made them reconsider if the United States could meaningfully intervene in 1917…

…Part of the reason that the Germans underestimated the United States was the contempt that Woodrow Wilson was held in. Wilson had downplayed actions by German saboteurs in the United States, such as the Black Tom explosion, and did not take a hardline against them. This was perceived as personal weakness by the German High Command. This was compounded by Wilson’s efforts to serve as a broker for a peace deal to end the World War, which led him to be seen as naïve and ineffectual. This contempt for Wilson spread into contempt for the United States in general and impacted German decision making in that way…

…While the Germans could arguably be justified in discounting the United States Army, they were in error in discounting the economic and industrial potential of the United States. They wanted to engage in Unrestricted Submarine Warfare to cut off supplies to the Entente but did not realize the nature of the economic relationship between the Entente and the United States. This is arguably due to set of ideological blinders particular to the Prussian military tradition that the German high command was thoroughly stepped in. This took the form of a focus on Operations and Tactics to an extant which overshadowed other military disciplines, such as strategy and logistics, something visible in both World War One and World War Two.

In a way this made sense, Prussia was a relatively small and poor country, its only way to defeat the much larger ones it had to face was to win quickly and decisively on the battlefield. This produced a flexible and responsive command structure that provided many victories and a doctrine that was the precursor to today’s mission-based tactics. It did however produce a neglect of logistics and to a lesser extent strategy. For 18th century Prussia this was manageable, logistic demands were less and strategy was not so divorced from operations as it would later become. For 19th century Prussia this emphasis had again worked out well when it was actually followed by the Prussians rather than used against them. Early 20th Century was something else entirely and faced an entirely different situation.

Thus, while German High Command thought that Unrestricted Submarine Warfare would be useful in constricting Entente supplies before the decisive campaigns, they did not realize that American Entry into the war would improve the Entente supply situation. The Entente had been steadily increasing their purchases of American goods and raw materials as American production ramped up. By the end of 1916 they were feeling a credit crunch and the Federal Reserve had warned against making any loans to the Entente that were not properly secured with collateral, which the Entente was running short of. If the situation did not change the Entente would have had to both cut back on their purchases and take more desperate measures to finance them. War with the United States gave them access to unlimited amounts of American credit free from the need for collateral and let them massively expand their purchases from the US…

…Furthermore, Unrestricted Submarine Warfare was not actually necessary to achieve their goals of constricting Entente Supplies. The increases in sinking that had been attributed to Unrestricted Submarine Warfare, were in fact due to announcements of that practice corresponding with a massive surge in U-Boats on commerce raiding patrols. In fact, well over 90% of ships sunk during the Unrestricted Submarine warfare period were sunk under Cruiser Rules. The limitation for German U-Boats was not finding enough targets to sink but running out of torpedoes.

The unnecessary provocation of Unrestricted Submarine Warfare, and such incidents as a U-Boat stinking ships while surrounded by American warships which could not legally engage, aroused anger in the American population. Had the Germans simply surged the number of U-Boats on commerce patrol, with some concessions to avoid American waters, would have almost accomplished the same results without angering the Americans nearly as much…

…That the Germans believed war with the United States was inevitable was again partially the fault of Woodrow Wilson. Wilson has personal sympathies with the United Kingdom and France, and his public speeches showed that. He was far more ready to condemn Germany than either Britain or France, and more willing to sweep what the Anglo-French did under the rug. He ignored his state department making a number of minor but Pro-Entente moves, like demanding copies of all diplomatic messages sent from US radio towers, when only the Germans were sending such messages from them.

Much of the American political establishment held similar views to Wilson, Francophile, and Anglophile they sympathized far more with the Entente. Many of them were quite outspoken in their professions of support in the Entente and a number were outright advocating for war with Germany as early as 1915.

What the Germans did not realize was how much opposition to the war there was. The lower socioeconomic rungs of society were particularly outspoken against the idea of a war. A general rule of thumb was that the more spelling and grammar errors a letter to the editor of a newspaper contained, the more likely it was to be an antiwar one. They were quite clear that it was they who would be expected to fight and die in the trenches and before the provocations of 1917 wanted no part of hit.

There was significant opposition to the war at higher income strata as well. Whether out of genuine belief or self interest quite a number of Americans opposed the idea of joining the war, including quite wealthy ones such as Henry Ford. Yet the Germans did not realize how much influence this group had in a country as democratic as the US. They saw the coastal elite being generally pro war and thought the coastal elite would drag the rest of the country after them, overinflating their influence over the country to match that of the less democratic states they were more used to dealing with…

…The Zimmerman note was a particular bit of foolishness that showed the ignorance and incompetence of the German Foreign office. The note offered Mexico a return of territories lost in the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo if it joined the Central powers, assuming the United States had previously joined the Entente and the Central Powers ultimately won the war, and financial support during the war.

The Mexicans were smart enough to have never even considered the note. They were in a civil war, and their army was in no shape to fight the United States. Furthermore they were well aware that Germany was in Europe, trapped behind the Royal Navy and had no real way to bring the war to the United States, thus any chance of the United States agreeing to significant loss of territory was a pipe dream. Thirdly Mexico did not want to acquire a huge amount of land filled with restive Anglos that would need pacific and invite another war with the Americans. Fourth Germany had not delivered gold Mexico had requested in 1916 to start a national bank, and their promises of money were thus suspect. Finally, such a war would be a diplomatic disaster as it would give support to opposing factions in the Civil War and would end its friendship with the South American ABC powers it relied on as a counterbalance to the US.

That the German foreign office did not realize this and sent the telegram, over a route known to be insecure and in an old code at that, was foolish. That the German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmerman publicly admitted it was genuine was arguably even worse. Denying it may have forced the British to reveal that they were spying on American diplomatic communications, and would continue to do so for another 25 years, and mitigated some of the blowback from the incident…



-Excerpt from Why did they do THAT!?! Historical Madness in Context: Volume III, Harper & Brothers, New York, 2015




Today's update heavily delayed, one week due to Isaias, two weeks probably due to Eversource getting some petty retaliation against the First Selectman here. Anyways I think I will finish off Part I next week