The United States Enters World War I | The Great War
Video Transcript

NARRATOR:  For nearly two-and-a-half years, the generals of the German High Command had tried everything they could to break out of the stalemate on the Western Front.  But by the beginning of 1917 they were becoming increasingly desperate.  The British blockade had pushed millions of Germans to the brink of starvation.

Meanwhile, American goods and armaments continued to flood into Britain and prop up the Allied war machine. 

There was a seemingly bottomless market for barrels of beef, tons of iron and steel, bushels of oats and wheat.

The Germans desperately wanted to sink ships transporting these supplies. But since their Navy was no match for the British on the high seas, their only solution was to attack from under the surface. 

Finally, on January 31st, Germany sent a message to President Wilson announcing a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare.  Any ships that now entered the war zone around Great Britain would be sunk.  

DAVID M. KENNEDY, Historian: It was a very risky decision. They knew this would mean sinking the ships of neutral nations, most obviously the United States.  And that this would probably provoke the Americans into an armed response.  So it was a calculated risk I think the Germans were taking. 

NARRATOR: When Wilson read the message he turned to his secretary and said, “The break that we have tried so hard to prevent now seems inevitable.”

On February 3rd, the president severed diplomatic relations with Germany.

On April 2nd, as rumors of a declaration of war swirled through Washington, more than a thousand pacifists descended on the Capitol wearing sashes and armbands that read “Keep Us Out of War.”  They were quickly driven off the steps by the police. At 8:32 p.m. Woodrow Wilson entered the floor of the House of Representatives.  He was greeted by a two minute standing ovation.  Speaking to a rapt chamber he announced that “the recent course of the Imperial German Government” was, “in fact nothing less than war against the Government and people of the United States.” 

A. SCOTT BERG, Writer: [It is] what I consider, the greatest foreign policy speech in American history, because embedded within this speech is a single sentence, which for the last hundred years has been the bedrock of all American foreign policy. And that sentence quite simply is this, “the world must be made safe for democracy.”  

NARRATOR: “Its peace must be planted upon the tested foundations of political liberty,” Wilson continued, “We have no selfish ends to serve. We desire no conquest, no dominion. We seek no indemnities for ourselves, no material compensation for the sacrifices we shall freely make. We are but one of the champions of the rights of mankind.”