‘America First’ cry went up in WWI aftermath
be forgotten.”
World War I was, as Trump would say, huge. It led to the downfall of four major dynastic empires, paved the way for the rise of communism and fascism and gave birth to nations such as Poland. It set the stage for the even greater conflagration two decades later.
Fighting began in 1914. After the United States, provoked by German submarine attacks on shipping, entered in 1917, about 2 million Americans in the armed services went to Europe. About 53,000 died in combat; a similar number died of disease and other causes. On the home front, the war sped the growth of the federal government, expanded opportunity for women and blacks and produced cultural artifacts such as Irving Berlin’s song Over There.
In combat, the Americans tipped the balance in favor of Britain and France against Germany and the other Central Powers.
About 1.2 million Americans fought, and more than 26,000 died, in the decisive Meuse-Argonne offensive in 1918, the larganniversary
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After the Armistice, President Woodrow Wilson advocated a peace program — “the Fourteen Points’’ — based on self-government by national groups, such as the Poles; a world organization (which became the League of Nations); arms reduction; and generous terms for the losers.
America’s allies frustrated some of Wilson’s plans, and the Senate rejected U.S. participation in the League of Nations. Americans retreated into isolationism — or attempted to. “It was like losing your virginity and then trying to regain it,” says Dan Carlin, host of the podcast Hardcore History. The 1930s saw the rise of the “America First” movement, whose cry Trump adopted in his presidential campaign.
He’s questioned the role and cost of NATO, complained about bad foreign trade deals and criticized American attempts at nation-building. “He might ask of World War I, ‘What was in it for us? Our idealistic leaders were taken to the cleaners by shrewd European politicians,’ ” says Brian Balogh, co-host of the publicradio program BackStory.
The war seems to have an image problem in the Trump camp. When then-senator Jeff Sessions nominated Trump for president at the Republican convention, he compared Washington political gridlock to “the trench warfare of World War I.”
Its successor, on the other hand, ushered in the era of “greatness” that Trump seeks to re-create. “President Trump would never skip a World War II commemoration,” surmises Chris Mauriello, who teaches history at Salem State University in Massachusetts.
President George H.W. Bush went to Pearl Harbor for the 50th anniversary of the beginning of World War II, and President Obama joined the Japanese prime minister there to mark the 75th anniversary. President Clinton attended ceremonies in Europe and Asia marking the end of the war. President Reagan gave a famous speech at Normandy on the 40th battle in U.S. invasion.
World War I’s centennial has been a big deal in Europe, but the president’s apparent disinterest is shared by many of his constituents. Some reasons:
was short. The United States entered only in the war’s fourth year and took an active combat role only six months before the Armistice (Nov. 11, 1918). The first troops did not arrive in France until June 1917, and not until July 4 did an American officer utter the famous pronouncement, “Lafayette, we are here!”
was static. Much of the war, aside from the beginning and the end, consisted of trench warfare along a front from Switzerland to the North Sea.
was a long time ago. Unlike World War II or the Korean or Vietnam Wars, World War I has no living veterans. The last American, Frank Buckles, died in 2011 at 110. “It was fought by people we never met,” says Libby O’Connell, a member of the centennial commission. “Not our grandparents, but our great-grandparents.” of the D-Day