Redbeard
Quibble on a couple of minor points.
a) They had huge potential. It's just that for most of the war this wasn't being used militarily and it was only just starting to come into place by the armistice.
b) Again the ~1.8M troops in France, a lot of whom were still in training I believe were actually less important than the other forces that would be following them in breaking German will and ability to continue.
Given the original conditions, which referred to nations actually military impact I would agree that a lot of people are over-estimating the US in WWI, probably failing to separate that from their much greater involvement in WWII. However if you actually considered potential as well as actual activity they would be substantially far more prominent.
Steve
Quibble on a couple of minor points.
a) They had huge potential. It's just that for most of the war this wasn't being used militarily and it was only just starting to come into place by the armistice.
b) Again the ~1.8M troops in France, a lot of whom were still in training I believe were actually less important than the other forces that would be following them in breaking German will and ability to continue.
Given the original conditions, which referred to nations actually military impact I would agree that a lot of people are over-estimating the US in WWI, probably failing to separate that from their much greater involvement in WWII. However if you actually considered potential as well as actual activity they would be substantially far more prominent.
Steve
By late WWII USA probably had something like 50% of the planet's war potential, but I think many have grosly overrated USA in WWI.
For most of the war they had no potenial at all, and when USA weighed in from summer of 1918, there was no chance of the Central powers winning any more, but the 1 million + US Army in France made odds so overwhelming for the Entente, that it made it practically possible to enforce the Versailles Treaty upon Germany (no matter of Wilson's sweet talk). I.e. had USA not taken part in WWI, Germnay would still have lost, but would have had a more fair armistice - i.e. less likelyhood of the nazis and WWII - but you can of course call that some kind of war potential
Regards
Steffen Redbeard