Chapter 23 Objectives

1. European nations had by 1914 created an unusually precarious international system

that careened into war very quickly on the basis of what most historians agree was a
minor series of provocation.

2. The United States provided much military help to the allies during WW1. Within
weeks of joining the war, the United States had begun to alter the balance. A fleet of
American destroyers aided the British Navy in its assault on the U-Boats. Other Warships
escorted merchant vessels across the Atlantic Ocean.

3. Mobilizing an industrial economy for total war required an unprecedented degree of

government involvement in industry, agriculture, and other areas. It also required, many
believed, a strenuous effort to ensue the loyalty and commitment of the people.

4. The propaganda that was used during WW1 encouraged many to enlist in the army. It
gave a negative connotation to the Germans by calling them Huns. The discrimination of
Germany was at the heart of government efforts to portray the war to Americans.

5. World War 1 was the first conflict which airplanes played a significant role. The planes
themselves were relatively simple and not very maneuverable; but anti-aircraft
technology was not highly developed either, so their effectiveness was still considerable.
Planes began to be constructed to serve various functions: Bombers, Fighters, and
Reconnaissance aircraft.

6. Wilson proposed the Treaty of Versailles, which took its name from the palace outside
of Paris where the final negotiating sessions had taken place, to the senate on July 10,
1919.

7. Henry Cabot Lodge, who disliked Wilson, opposed the treaty. Wilson might have been
able to win approval if he had agreed to some relatively minor changes in the language of
the treaty. But the president refused to yield. The United States had a moral obligation, he
claimed, to respect the terms of the agreement precisely as the stood.

8. Between 1920 and 1921, the gross national product declined nearly 10 percent;
100,000 businesses went bankrupt; 453,000 farmers lost their land; nearly 5 million
Americans lost their jobs. In this uncompromising economic environment, leaders of
organized labor set out to consolidate the advances that they had made in the war, which
now seemed in danger of being lost.

9.To much of the white middle class at the time, the industrial warfare, the racial violence
and the other forms of dissent all appeared to be frightening omens of instability and
radicalism. This was in part because other evidence emerging at the same time seemed
likewise to suggest the existence of a radical menace. The Russian Revolution of
November 1917 made it clear that communism was no longer simply a theory but now an
important regime.