The American Military - A Narrative History

by Brad D. Lookingbill

  On November 1, the guns of the First Army began shelling the Kriemhilde Position with high explosives and chlorine gases. With the 2nd and 89th Divisions in the lead, Liggett's troops pushed through the village of Landres-et-Saint-George and captured the heights of Barricourt on the first day. By nightfall, they advanced at least 5.5 miles. While III Corps broke through the right, I Corps absorbed greater losses on the left.

  As the casualties on all sides mounted, the center of the Kriemhilde Position collapsed. Soaring through the skies, Rickenbacker flew his plane over the battlefield and watched the “retreating Heinies” scramble over the roads in a rout. Over the next several days, the advancing columns of the First Army moved along the heights overlooking the Meuse River and placed the railroad from Sedan to Mézières under artillery fire.

  As American divisions crossed the Meuse, the German military began crumbling. The First Army pushed onward to Sedan, although I and V Corps commanders allowed French troops to occupy the historic city. At the same time, the Second Army pressed against Metz to achieve another breakthrough. With the Hindenburg Line unhinged, Pershing's generals steered their armies toward the Rhineland. Before Liggett and Bullard reached their final objectives, however, the armies of the Central Powers largely ceased firing.

  The relentless hammering from the Allied armies left the Central Powers thoroughly beaten. The collapse of Bulgaria, Turkey, and Austria-Hungary followed crucial Allied victories in Salonika, Syria, and Italy. With defeat imminent, German leaders faced civil unrest and naval mutiny. In early November, the Kaiser abdicated and fled to Holland. After sending a secret delegation to meet with Foch in the forest of Compiègne, the new German Republic agreed to the armistice. They promised to surrender most of their arsenal as well as their ships. Moreover, Allied forces prepared to occupy their territory as far as the Rhine River. Signed at 5:10 p.m. on November 10, the armistice suspended all fighting the next morning. At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the guns in Europe fell silent.

  The Americans achieved most of their objectives by Armistice Day, even though they paid a terrible price. From September 26 to November 11, they counted 26,277 dead as well as 95,000 wounded. They forced 43 German divisions to retreat over 30 miles through difficult terrain and fortified positions. In addition to capturing 468 guns, they inflicted over 120,000 casualties on the enemy. While making the U.S. a decisive power in the war, the Meuse-Argonne offensive represented one of the costliest operations in American military history.

  According to the terms of the armistice, the Allied governments convened a peace conference at Versailles on January 18, 1919. French Premier Georges Clemenceau insisted on dealing with the Germans harshly, while British Prime Minister David Lloyd George downplayed the Fourteen Points. Vittorio Orlando, the Italian prime minister, demanded the Austrian province of Dalmatia in the spoils of war. Wilson leaned forward with a covenant for the League of Nations, which pledged collective security to all members in Article X. Making concessions to his counterparts, he permitted a “war guilt” clause that assigned blame to Germany and required it to pay reparations to Allied governments. The German delegation protested but signed the Treaty of Versailles.

  With the Treaty of Versailles completed, Wilson returned to the U.S. that summer. In the Senate, the debate over ratification elicited “reservations” about mandates for collective security in the League covenant. On two occasions, the ratification vote fell short of the necessary two-thirds majority. Although the armistice kept the armed forces at bay, peace treaties among the belligerents were not ratified by the U.S. until October 18, 1921.

  To uphold the armistice, a number of U.S. soldiers remained in Europe. Under the command of Dickman, the Third Army marched eastward and occupied parts of Germany. Other divisions lingered in Belgium and France, where disciplinary infractions and training accidents multiplied. As weeks turned into months, everything that sustained morale seemed to disappear. By the beginning of 1919, the War Department had returned 800,000 “doughboys” to the U.S. Eager to receive their discharges, the rest boarded transport ships before the summer. At re-embarkation camps, medics inspected military personnel for venereal diseases in addition to other maladies. Spanish influenza followed many units home and killed more than 43,000 service members. While the hostilities ceased “over there,” the horrors of the Western Front seemed endless.

  Leaving the Western Front behind them, veterans returned home with few benefits. Secretary Baker established the “Khaki University” to prepare some for peacetime through academic and vocational programs. Nevertheless, most Americans presumed that military service amounted to a civic duty and merited no special status.

  No American wore the uniform more proudly than Pershing, who remained one of the nation's most celebrated soldiers after the armistice. On September 1, 1919, he departed France and arrived in the U.S. after a week-long crossing of the Atlantic. In New York City, he led a victory parade on horseback from 110th Street to Washington Square. Enthusiastic crowds cast roses and laurels before him. With the authorization of Congress, Wilson promoted him to General of the Armies – the highest rank possible for an American officer.

  Conclusion

  The Great War in Europe pitted powerful nations against one another, but the grand finale came abruptly. Before the U.S. mobilized for war, the absence of decisive battles represented a strategic problem on the Western Front. The proliferation of armaments increased the bloodshed with each salient. The contested ground degenerated into trenches of desolation, which no one foresaw at the outset. America's entry during 1917 led Congress to create the Selective Service system, although few “doughboys” saw action until the next year. Naval convoys immediately safeguarded shipping across the Atlantic Ocean. Under Pershing's leadership, the AEF penetrated German lines at Saint-Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne. The Allied Powers eventually overcame the Central Powers through attrition and exhaustion – not with tactics. As a result of their enormous sacrifices, the French, British, and American troops paved the way for the armistice. Unfortunately, the peace conference in Versailles laid the groundwork for another war two decades later.

  Amid unprecedented carnage and unspeakable cruelties, survivors of the Great War incorrectly judged it “the war to end all wars.” The catchphrase originated in 1914 with British intellectual H. G. Wells, who was renowned for authoring science fiction, popular history, and political commentary. Likewise, the specter of German militarism inspired a 1916 novel, The Conquest of America, in which the American author Cleveland Langston Moffett imagined countermeasures to a “sneak attack.” Without a doubt, the most widely read prose and poetry of the era emerged from an outpouring of anti-war literature. Authors such as Erich Maria Remarque, Robert Graves, Ernest Hemingway, and John Dos Passos dwelt upon feelings of alienation, despair, and loss. Soon, motion pictures unveiled the horrors of the frontlines to civilian audiences in the U.S. and in Europe. In the wake of massive destruction, an endless war of memory overshadowed the lofty goals of the belligerents.

  The American military played a role in the massive destruction, which made the Allied Powers victorious. The U.S. suffered approximately 112,000 fatalities in the European theater, while France and Great Britain counted more than 2 million deaths between them. In other words, the French and British governments contributed much more in terms of lives, resources, and planning than the Wilson administration. At least 10 million people perished worldwide during four years of armed conflict, although American casualties in a matter of months skyrocketed to 320,710. Out of a U.S. population in excess of 100 million, service members numbered 4,743,800 in wartime – less than 5 percent of the nation's citizenry. Nearly two-thirds of them were conscripts, while the National Guard provided most of the rest. With an estimated 2 million American warriors crossing the Atlantic, the majority joined a “Grand Offensive.”

  As the discharged veterans rushed home to civilian life, the primary lesson of World War I seemed troubling to the America
n people. To be sure, the preservation of peace required the preparation of the military. After U.S. forces fought in Europe for the first time in history, however, Washington D.C. left them in a state of disorganization and disrepair. Owing to the inherent difficulties in mobilizing men and material, the fumbling and miscalculations reinforced lingering doubts about America's ability to succeed in coalition warfare. U.S. commanders stood among equals in the war effort, but they lacked sophistication in the conduct of combat operations. The poor posture of defense afterward weakened the nation, which repudiated the responsibilities of great power and withdrew into relative isolation. Even though the vastness of the oceans no longer promised security, Americans remained as unprepared as ever for the hostile fire of “total war.”

  Essential Questions

  1 How did the U.S. mobilize for World War I?

  2 What were the strengths of the AEF? What were the weaknesses?

  3 Why did World War I end without a decisive battle?

  Suggested Readings

  Chambers II, John Whiteclay. To Raise an Army: The Draft Comes to Modern America. New York: Free Press, 1987.

  Coffman, Edward M. The War to End All Wars: The American Military Experience in World War I. New York: Oxford University Press, 1968.

  Fussell, Paul. The Great War and Modern Memory. New York: Oxford University Press, 1975.

  Grotelueschen, Mark Ethan. The AEF Way of War: The American Army and Combat in World War I. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

  Harries, Meirion, and Susie Harries. The Last Days of Innocence: America at War, 1917–1918. New York: Random House, 1997.

  Jensen, Kimberly. Mobilizing Minerva: American Women in the First World War. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2008.

  Keegan, John. The First World War. New York: Knopf, 1999.

  Keene, Jennifer. Doughboys, the Great War, and the Remaking of America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001.

  Kennedy, David. Over Here: The First World War and American Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 1980.

  Kennett, Lee. The First Air War, 1914–1918. New York: Free Press, 1991.

  Koistinen, Paul A. C. Mobilizing for Modern War: The Political Economy of American Warfare, 1865–1919. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1997.

  Lengel, Edward G. To Conquer Hell: The Meuse-Argonne, 1918. New York: Henry Holt, 2008.

  Slotkin, Richard. Lost Battalions: The Great War and the Crisis of American Nationality. New York: Henry Holt, 2005.

  Smythe, Donald. Pershing: General of the Armies. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986.

  Storey, William Kelleher. The First World War: A Concise Global History. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2009.

  Trask, David F. The AEF and Coalition Warmaking, 1917–1918. Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1993.

  Trask, David F. Captains & Cabinets: Anglo-American Naval Relations, 1917–1918. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1972.

  11

  Out of the Trenches (1918–1941)

  Introduction

  On a cool Monday morning, the sun rose brilliantly over the Atlantic Ocean. Lieutenant Commander Godfrey de Courcelles Chevalier scanned the horizon through his goggles. He faced a northeast wind while navigating an Aeromarine 39-B plane over the Chesapeake Bay. Inside Cape Henry, he spotted the U.S.S. Langley off the Tail of the Shoe shoal.

  The pilot, who was known simply as Chevvy, intended to make October 26, 1922, a date to remember. Circling the Langley, he recalled the “precision landings” practiced in previous days at the Norfolk Naval Air Station. He reminisced about the tests and drills with Commander Kenneth Whiting, who chose “Boots and Saddles” – an old cavalry call to mount horses – for announcing “flight quarters” at sea. Although the U.S. Navy favored the first-class battleships, he admired what sailors called the “Covered Wagon” of the fleet. He glanced at the 5-inch, 51-caliber guns situated on either side of the vessel’s stern, where a white flag caught his attention. Without a landing signal officer for guidance, he neared the flight deck on his own.

  Chevvy's converted seaplane began losing altitude in the descent toward the flight deck. His main gear lacked brakes or tail wheels. The shock absorber for his tail skid consisted of nothing but rubber bungees. Lacking instruments on his panel, he stared at the starboard. His final checks included the strap on his leather helmet. He listened attentively to the roar of the engine while increasing the power. His approach flattened, as he struggled to keep his nose high.

  Upon hearing the sound of contact, Chevvy waited to exhale. The right wing of his plane dropped slightly, but he corrected in time for the hooks to catch the second wire. The pies and fiddle bridges that propped up the wire came crashing down and scattered in every direction. The axle hooks held after a short run, as did the tail hook. A high tail rise pressed the nose downward, which caused the propeller to nick the flight deck. To the delight of the crew, Chevvy accomplished the first arrested landing on a U.S. aircraft carrier.

  Figure 11.1 Aeromarine 39-B airplane, 19 October 1922. Photo NH 93178, U.S. Navy Historical Center, Department of the Navy

  No one at the time knew that Chevvy would die weeks later from a plane crash, even though aviators in the carrier detail, as one put it, were “here one day and gone or killed the next.” Whereas some veterans of the Great War dismissed them as “a crazy bunch of people,” a new generation incorporated striking innovations into the armed forces of the U.S. Their ingenious solutions to the problems of warfare enhanced not only technology and tactics but also military doctrines, organization, and planning. Officers and enlisted personnel made impressive strides during a period of minimal funding and public antipathy.

  Throughout the interwar period, the American military jockeyed to gain advantages in a world of constant change. In the absence of European menaces to the western hemisphere, national interest in supporting a mighty Navy or Army waned. The U.S. did not join the League of Nations established by the Versailles Treaty, thus rejecting a chance to participate in a collective security system. Nevertheless, the nation exerted influence overseas through trade and treaties. Congress supported several arms reduction agreements with foreign governments, while President Warren G. Harding pledged a “return to normalcy.” To many Americans in the coming years, the best bet for peace was nonalignment with other Great Powers.

  Americans knew that their nation represented one of the world's strongest, but they became disillusioned with what armed conflict meant. Because few citizens felt threatened by enemies abroad, neither Democrats nor Republicans supported a large military in peacetime. Rapid demobilization and federal retrenchment left U.S. forces in a state of unpreparedness. Empires remained intact during the 1920s and 1930s, while intellectuals rallied to the noble cause of pacifism. However, visionary officers in the War and Navy Departments imagined the outbreak of future wars in Europe and Asia. Despite the nadir of the Great Depression, Americans in uniform found ways to refine their missions for a second, even greater, world war.

  Soft Power

  In the years following the Great War, the U.S. appeared aloof from international affairs. Dismayed with overseas adventures, Americans rejected the entanglements of European alliances while calling for disarmament by the Great Powers. Though indifferent to the League of Nations, officials in Washington D.C. touted the comity of “soft” power rather than the coercion of “hard” power. As the armed forces returned home, the Army and the Navy retained only the personnel and the equipment required for peacetime contingencies.

  Passed by Congress on June 4, 1920, the National Defense Act redesigned the “Army of the United States” for peacetime. Colonel John McAuley Palmer, an advisor to the Senate's Military Affairs Committee and the author of An Army of the People (1916), shaped key provisions of the law. Most members of Congress, however, rejected his recommendation for universal military training. The final version replaced an expansible force with a pluralistic system of voluntary service that d
emanded varying degrees of readiness. Organized into three components, the Army contained a regular force, a civilian-based National Guard, and an Organized Reserve.

  In addition to protecting overseas territories and providing border security, the regular force assumed primary responsibility for training the other components of the Army. The National Defense Act permitted some 17,000 officers and 280,000 enlisted men on active duty, although the absence of nascent threats in subsequent years kept manpower well below the authorized levels. Two years later, Congress made budget cuts that reduced the numbers to 12,000 officers and 125,000 enlisted men. Nevertheless, the plan for mobilization promised to raise more than 2 million soldiers if warranted. While most soldiers served in combat arms, policymakers regularized personnel in the Financial Department as well as for the Air and Chemical Warfare Services. Nine geographic corps of approximately equal strength assumed command and administrative responsibilities for military operations. Each included a regular division in addition to two National Guard and three Organized Reserve divisions. Henceforth, the division rather than the regiment provided the basic unit for organizing the Army.

  With high regard for the National Guard, Palmer insisted that “great armies of citizen soldiers” mastered the skills for industrialized warfare. The National Defense Act envisioned a National Guard of 436,000 members, but its actual strength during the 1920s stabilized near 180,000. While responsible for curbing civil disturbances, the part-time units mirrored the Swiss model for an effective force on reserve status. The War Department supplied training officers, financial incentives, and surplus materials to the states. Complying with federal mandates, Guardsmen engaged in 48 drills at their armories along with 15 days of field training each year. By the numbers, the National Guard constituted the largest component for mobilizing and expanding the Army.