By Patrick Allitt, Emory University
When World War I began, President Woodrow Wilson was quite clear that, if possible, America should stay out of this terrible European conflict. He urged Americans to be neutral in thought and deed. Many Americans were ardent pacifists, too. Then how and when did America decide to take sides and favor the British?
WWI: Participating Countries
In the First World War, the grand alliance of Britain, France, Italy, and Russia was fighting against an alliance of Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Turkey, the Turkish Empire.
Germany was the dominant partner in the Central Powers, the enemy powers, from the British point of view. Germany also faced a decisive disadvantage, of a two-front war. It was fighting against an alliance of Britain and France on the western front and against the Russians on the eastern front.
Naval Dominance
In the Atlantic Ocean, Britain and France enjoyed naval supremacy over Germany.
Germany, Britain, and France all appealed to American manufacturers to send them goods to help their war effort, but captains of ships that were sailing toward Germany had their ships boarded by British sailors. When these sailors realized that the ship’s destination was Germany, they ordered the ship to be diverted into a British harbor; for the British government to buy their commodities and use in the British war effort.
But since the British were paying for the goods, the Americans were willing to put up with it. The geography of the northeast Atlantic and British naval dominance made it very difficult for the Germans to do anything about it.
This is a transcript from the video series A History of the United States, 2nd Edition. Watch it now, on Wondrium.
The Lusitania Disaster
In 1915, the wreck of the Lusitania sharpened pro-British and anti-German feeling in America. It was one of the greatest liners of its day. Therefore, when it sank just off the coast of Ireland, having nearly completed a transatlantic voyage from New York, with the death of 1,200 people on board, including 124 Americans, there was a great feeling of revulsion in the United States. How could the captain of this submarine commit such a barbarous act?
The submarine was itself a new terror weapon of the First World War. In the very earliest days of the First World War, German submarine captains would fire a warning shot across the bows of the ship, before sinking it with gunfire. The British merchant navy responded by arming its merchant ships. Of course, the Germans then retaliated by not surfacing and giving any notice.
It was regarded as a horrible violation of the traditions of war, but nevertheless it was extremely effective. This is why the captain of U-20, the German submarine, sank the Cunard liner Lusitania when he saw it.
Sinking of Lusitania: A Decisive Factor?
The Germans claimed that the Lusitania was carrying not only civilian passengers, but also munitions. The British government flatly denied it at the time, although subsequently it turned out to be true.
President Wilson decided to send a diplomatic note of protest to the German government criticizing this act. He phrased it with such an implicit threat that America would join the war on the British side, that the secretary of state, William Jennings Bryan, begged him not to send it.
America’s Trade Relationship with Britain
Britain was buying everything it possibly could from the United States because it had an enormous demand for food supplies, munitions, and industrial goods to help its war effort.
Eventually, though, Britain’s reserves of U.S. dollars were exhausted. The British government then asked American bankers whether they could borrow money from the American financiers. The bankers consulted the government whether it was appropriate for them to extend credits in effect to the British government.
They were very keen to make the loans, because they thought that the credit of the British government was good, and that they would get repaid at a good rate of interest. They believed, failure to make these loans would stop Britain from buying anything from America.
That meant that demand in America would fall off, and an economic recession would set in. There would be less employment. Besides, by now, by late 1915, early 1916, Wilson and most of his cabinet members were really pro-British.
Woodrow Wilson: Pro-British?
Wilson had been a professor of political science at Princeton. He’d written books full of admiration for the British political system, parliamentary democracy, and advocating various reforms in America comparable to the way in which the system ran in Britain, so he was latently an Anglophile, and many of his principal advisors were much more so. For example, the new secretary of state was Robert Lansing. The new treasury secretary was Robert McAdoo, and he was very pro-British.
Wilson’s personal advisor, Edward House, one of the most influential men in the administration, warned Wilson, “Germany’s success would ultimately mean trouble for us. We’ll have to abandon the path that you are blazing as a standard for future generations, with permanent peace as its goal and a new international ethical code as its guiding star and instead build up a military machine of vast proportions.”
In other words, they want to be neutral if they can, but they can’t be neutral if it actually means British defeat. In the long run, that’s going to cause trouble for America.
It was a very widespread belief from the 1880s through the 1920s, in the common destiny of the Anglo-Saxon peoples, with America and Britain clearly leading the way. This is the age of the Rhodes’s scholarships and the idea that these two people who’ve been racially selected by natural selection have far more in common than they have in antagonism.
Common Questions about What Made US Support Britain in WWI
In the First World War, the grand alliance of Britain, France, Italy, and Russia was fighting against an alliance of Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Turkey, the Turkish Empire.
Britain’s reserves of U.S. dollars were exhausted, because it was buying from America far more than it was selling. The British government then asked American bankers whether they could borrow money from the American financiers.
The U.S. government believed, failure to make these loans would stop Britain from buying anything from America. As a result, demand in America will fall off, and an economic recession will set in.
