The USA in the Great War
In this presentation, which was delivered 'live' to an online audience, Gordon Corrigan talks about the involvement of the USA in the First World War.
When war broke out in 1914 Woodrow Wilson, president of the United States of America declared neutrality. He could do little else: much of the population or its ancestors had left Europe to avoid the seemingly unending internecine warfare there. In 1916 Wilson was re-elected on a pledge to keep America out of the war (although he himself never said that). Nevertheless, almost from Day One the USA helped the British and French war effort in a way that far exceeded the obligations of a neutral, and the slack in American industrial capacity was vital to Britain.
When America did finally enter the war, goaded by a German policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, her army was tiny – only 70,000 strong – she had to create a national army, train it and equip it and get it to Europe. This talk describes how the USA prepared from the Western Front and what she achieved when she got there.
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