Transcript Chapter 9 America in World War I

Chapter 9:
America in World War I
Wilson and Latin America
• Mexico was going
through revolution
• “Pancho” Villa killed
some Americans in an
attempt to provoke
Americans
• Troops in Mexico,
Nicaragua, Haiti, & the
Dominican RepublicDollar Diplomacy
• This use of force only
led to hatred of
Americans then and
now
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The Great War Begins
• The Assassination of
Austrian archduke
triggered World War I
• Innovations that changed
warfare in WWI –
machine guns, land
mines, long-range
artillery, & high-velocity
rifles
• Trench warfare gave WWI
its lasting character
The United States & Neutrality
• Most high American
Officials were proBritish
• After Lusitania Wilson
sent notes to Germany
to stop such actions and
pay reparations
• Election of 1916
Wilson’s promise to
keep the U.S. out of the
war.
• The Revenue Act of
1916
• Zimmermann Telegram
The U.S. Goes to War
• The Congressional
resolution for war
passed overwhelmingly
• Liberty Loan Act
• The Food
Administration – taught
Americans to plant
victory gardens & use
leftovers wisely
War Industries Board
was the most Important agency
Bernard Baruch
U.S. War Propaganda
• Wilson put George
Creel a Denver
newspaperman in
charge of this
Committee on Public
Information
• They made films, i.e.
The Beast of Berlin
• “Four-Minute” men
speeches to buy liberty
bonds, conserve food,
fuel, etc.
Espionage & Sedition Acts of 1917-1918
• Under these acts
criticism of the
government leaders or
war policies became a
crime
• Socialist leader Eugene
Debs went to jail for ten
years
• Schenck v. United States
Eugene Debs
America at War
• The U.S. Military would
grow to 3.7 million
• 2 million American
troops would cross the
Atlantic & 1.4 would see
combat
• The U.S. military effort
in France helped turn
back several German
offensives
The Communist Revolution in Russia
• Russia had suffered 6.6
million casualties
• The Czarist government
had little control in 1917
• The White Russians tried
to gain power but the
Bolsheviks signed a
treaty with Germany
• Bolsheviks were lead by
Vladimir Lenin and
eventually won
Vladimir Lenin
Midterm Elections back in the U.S.
• President Wilson begins
to get in trouble
• Working to end the war
Wilson lost touch of the
political events
• Wilson pushed the
public to election a
Democratic Congress
• But instead Democrats
lost control of both
houses of Congress
Wilson’s Fourteen Points
• 1-5 called for open
diplomacy
• 6-12 dealt with selfdetermination for
various nationalities
• 13 called for Poland to
have access to the sea
• 14 called for the League
of Nations
Europe Before World War I
Europe After World War I
Treaty of Versailles and Reparations
• The Germans objected
to the Treaty of
Versailles because they
had to pay reparations
for the entire war
• But in the end they
signed the treaty b/c if
they didn’t the French
threatened to invade
Germany
The League of Nations and the Treaty
of Versailles in the U.S.
• Sen. Lodge was the
leader against the
treaty
• Wilson went on a
nation wide tour to get
support for the treaty
• Wilson suffered a stoke
that paralyzed his left
side
• Treaty not ratified until
1921 by Harding
Henry Cabot Lodge
The Spanish Flu 1918-1919
• Servicemen brought
home the disease
• It killed 675,000 in the
U.S. & 22 million
worldwide
• No plague, war, famine
in world history killed so
many people in such
short time
• Doctors never
understood why it
began or why it ended.
The Red Scare in America 1919-1920
• People in the U.S. saw
labor strikes as the
work of Communists
• There were also letter
bombs in 1919 that
Americans saw as work
of the “Reds”
• But people began to see
the bombs as they were
actions of ‘lunatic
fringe”
The End of Progressivism
• Roosevelt and Taft gone
and with Wilson
paralyzed
• The Republican party
came back very
conservatively after the
Bull Moose Party split
• The 1920s were going
to be a conservative
and isolationist era for
America