American History X

In the summer of 1914, when World War One broke out, the United States wanted to be neutral and isolated. America's policy of insisting neutral rights while also trying to advocate peace resulted in tensions with both Berlin and London. We didn't want to get involved because we viewed this war as a European conflict.In three short years, however, the United States would find itself in the middle of what later became known as World War One.

When the war began England enforced a naval blockade of Germany in the hopes of cutting off supplies. Germany responded by unleashing the U Boats. U Boats were submarines that were capable of staying submerged for long periods of time. They would sneak up upon their victims, often at night, and torpedo them. The Germans didn't limit their attacks to military ships. Any ship sailing in the war zone was considered an enemy to Germany (Doc #5). This became known as unrestricted submarine warfare. On May 7th, 1915, the British cruise ship (Lusitania) was sunk off the coast of England. Over 1,198 passengers including 128 Americans were killed. America was furious at the brutality and demanded a stop to this type of attack. In 1916, after the sinking of the passenger liner Sussex, Germany agreed to end unrestricted submarine warfare in the "Sussex pledge."

The Sussex pledge only put off the inevitable--American entry into the war. America shared a cultural bond with England and France. Woodrow Wilson began to actively campaign for Americans to support the allies. Besides being culturally similar, England and France were our trade partners. From 1914 to 1916 trade with the Allies grew from 800 million dollars to 3 billion dollars (Doc #2). If the Allies were to lose the war our trade would be threatened. American increasingly saw Germany as the enemy. Germany was a dictatorship fighting against the great democracies of the world and America as a democratic nation felt an obligation to support them.

As America became increasingly less neutral, the British government intercepted a message from the German ambassador Zimmerman to the Mexican government. This message called the "Zimmerman Note" asked Mexico to attack the United States if war broke out between the U.S. and Germany (Doc #4). In return, the telegram stated that Germany and Japan would help Mexico regain the territories that it lost to the United States (Texas, New Mexico and Arizona).The note was turned over