A quiet commemoration
Richard Fulton
Make America great again has been the theme of President Trump’s election campaign and now his presidency. But what made America great to begin with?
A case can be made that, in terms of world power and influence, America became a great power as a result of World War I. Thursday was the 100th anniversary of America entering that war.
Kansas City and it’s WW I memorial is a center of the commemorations of the war, but there has been little made of this anniversary. While World War II anniversaries have seen significant attention, the so called “war to end all wars” has been virtually ignored by most people and by the American government establishment.
It was a horrible war begun in 1914 with France, Great Britain and Russia against Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire. It was a Europe of the old world run by aristocracies. But it also was the dawn of the modern world with advances in science and technology and restive populations eager to participate in deciding their own futures.
Static trench warfare with ancient military practices meant that the war was marked by unbelievable slaughter: nine million soldiers killed, twenty-one million wounded. By 1917 there was virtual stalemate.
Enter the United States to tip the balance. Over four million Americans were mobilized, 1.2 million fought, and 26,000 died in their first battle alone. But America emerged from the war the only major state without war damage and with it’s economy awakened.
The war created our modern world by killing the old world. France and Britain were spent, a generation of men gone. The empires of Russia, Austro-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire were disintegrated. The communist revolution transformed the Russian empire.
Out of the Austro-Hungarian empire came a bevy of new states based upon localized ethnicity that continue to fight each other to this day. The Middle East today reflects the dividing up of the Ottoman Empire by the French and British using arbitrary boundaries. Iraq, Iran, and modern, secular Turkey were created.
The French and British colonial empires survived, but weakened and destined to disintegrate after WW II.
Innovations in science and technology, especially of war, exploded. New were tanks, aircraft carriers, efficient machine guns, and the emergence of air power. Mobilization for war in America brought the first major migration from the South to the North to man the manufacturing centers of war production.
Europe and the rest of the world needed America’s production facilities since much of Europe’s were destroyed. America became an economic powerhouse in the world.
American leadership tried to produce a peaceful foundation for the future by championing the League of Nations. But Europe sled back into its old habits of conflicting national interests.
World War I left simmering the foundations of World War II. America pulled back from world political leadership into an “America first” posture. As a result we did not join the fight against fascism’s aggression until forced to by Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor.
We celebrate the “greatest generation” of WW II because they remained amongst us.
But no WW I veterans remain, the last died in 2011 at the age of 110. Commemorations of “the Great War” remain muted. President Trump ignores the ceremonies and instead meets with the Chinese head of state.
Yet we, and he, should remember that war because it thrusted America into the role of being the “Great” power in the world.
We must remember, however, that the reaction of America following WW I was an ardent “isolationism” based on the theme of “America first.”
And how did that work out?
Richard Fulton is an emeritus professor of political science.
