6: Conclusion
<< 5: Over Where? The Search for Alternatives to the Western Front, June-November 1917 || The First World War Chronology
With the decision to concentrate American forces on the Western Front finalized, the
responsibility for most strategic planning shifted away from Washington. Finally, more
than seven months after the US declaration of war, the foundation of the American war
effort was complete: the AEF would be raised by conscription; it would be shipped as
rapidly as possible to Europe, receiving its training on both sides of the Atlantic; and
it would cooperate closely with the French and British in the West, but would remain an
independent force. The amalgamation issue would rear its head again in the winter of
1917-18, but the burden of parrying the Allied attempts to incorporate American soldiers
would fall on General Pershing, as would the decision to focus US efforts on the Lorraine
sector of the Western Front. Further issues relating to the coordination of the Entente
war effort would be debated among the members of the Supreme War Council. While Bliss, who
had been active in the General Staff's strategic planning as both the Chief of the War
College Division and the Chief of Staff, would serve as the American military
representative on the Council, the War College Division itself would play little part in
these considerations. Belatedly, the military planners in the General Staff had fulfilled
their war- planning role. The task of carrying through on those plans would belong to
General Pershing and his own staff at their Headquarters in France.(1)
After Major General Peyton C. March assumed the position of Chief of Staff in the
spring of 1918, the General Staff would finally gain recognition as the coordinating and
supervisory agent of the War Department -- the status which it had sought since the turn
of the century. Under March, the War College Division's role in strategic policy-making
would be made official and that branch of the General Staff would be renamed the War Plans
Division. Also during March's tenure, Wilson would begin close coordination with his
military planners, as described by historians Link and Chambers. Such a cohesive approach
to planning, however, had not existed during the formative period of America's
policy-making for the war, and this examination of that topic has demonstrated the
disparity between the approach and attitude of the military planners in the War College
Division and that of President Wilson.(2)
Military planning before the US declaration of war had found itself tethered by several
strong ropes. Within the War Department itself there existed no consensus on how best to
approach the task. The individual bureau chiefs vigilantly protected their personal power
from any hint of infringement, and in so doing often exercised their influence in Congress
to thwart the General Staff by reducing its number or limiting its authority. Legislative
opposition stemmed from other sources as well, including an honest fear that any
comprehensive policy-making would inevitably lead to a Prussian-like military system
within the United States. In addition, the organized militia-- the traditional American
second line of defense--had strong supporters in key positions in Congress. The General
Staff's criticisms of the National Guard would thus yield only a backlash of attacks on
the military planners themselves.
The military planners were by no means blameless. They did little to transcend the
myopic context of the Monroe Doctrine even as American foreign policy was reaching across
the oceans. Even if they had been more far-sighted, however, the strong public sentiment
for neutrality and the understandably popular desire to remain aloof from the slaughter in
Europe would have prevented any military planning which might have even remotely suggested
US involvement. In the context of American neutrality, any military planning at all was
seen by many as a prelude to an American role in the conflict, and therefore was to be
avoided.
Woodrow Wilson's view of the civilian-military relationship cannot be discounted,
especially since he was the President who "kept us out of war." The
constitutional distinction between the civilian Commander-in-Chief and the military
leaders which Wilson so greatly enforced must be praised. It was precisely the lack of
such a separation of powers which had led Germany to make several key errors in their war
effort, including the eventually fatal mistake of resuming unrestricted submarine warfare
in January 1917. A division of civilian and military authority, however, need not yield a
complete rift in military planning. A coordinated approach to policy-making can be pursued
in the context of civilian authority, but Wilson chose almost completely to ignore his
General Staff. He did not simply overrule their suggestions; instead, he seldom even
sought their advice.(3)
As winter passed into spring in 1917, it became more and more obvious that the US was
drifting into the war. Even Wilson began to consider the steps that might be necessary to
mobilize America's armed forces, but only those actions necessary to safeguard the
homeland from a possible attack. Definite restrictions remained in place. The President
tenaciously clung to the hope that Germany would not carry through on its U-boat threat
and that American involvement could be averted. Consequently, the military planning which
Wilson did sanction-- narrow though it was--was kept under tight wraps. Chief of Staff
Scott was reluctant to operate solely within these confines and, unknown to the President,
ordered the military planners in the War College Division to consider strategies which
wentsignificantly beyond those which Wilson desired and which included the possibility of
creating an expeditionary force.
Even though these military planners had finally broken the bonds of the Monroe
Doctrine, they found themselves hampered by the nation's previous inaction and failed to
create a reasonable plan for US involvement. The War College Division did, however,
successfully draft plans for raising a mass army. It concluded dearly that conscription
would be the only feasible means of raising a large American force, no matter what the
eventual shape of the nation's involvement. Here again, though, the gap between the
concerns of the military planners and those of the President is illustrated. In spite of
their repeated urgings of the General Staff and in spite of the growing likelihood of US
participation in the struggle, Wilson continued to look toward voluntarism to expand the
army. Not until he realized that selective service could thwart Theodore Roosevelt's plans
to raise a volunteer division for service overseas did he embrace the draft and jettison
his previous affinity for volunteers. This was one of the rare times that Wilson was fully
aware of the opinions of the General Staff. His concurrence would not result from their
persuasive arguments, however; instead, it would come only after he had realized the
political utility of conscription. Wilson was not so fully attuned to the War College
Division's recommendations concerning an immediate expeditionary force to France. The
military planners voiced their reservations passionately and argued that sending an
American army to Europe before it had been trained could not only threaten the nation's
independent war effort, but might also result in a mass butchering of raw soldiers. Wilson
was probably ignorant of these opinions when, on 2 May, he promised Joffre that the US
would raise and send a division as soon as one could be organized.
In retrospect, following the War College Division's advice to hold the bulk of American
soldiers within the country until they had completed their training would no doubt have
left the US lacking a land presence at the end of the war or, worse yet, might have
resulted in a victory for the Central Powers. Such hindsight analysis does not erase the
fact that Wilson had not thought to consult the General Staff and that Secretary of War
Baker proved a poor messenger for the War College Division's opinions.
Wilson's approach to strategic planning came dangerously close to folly when he
suggested that the US seek an alternative to the Western Front. Wilson seemed too easily
swayed by the strategic advise of amateurs or polemicists, such as Herbert H. Sargeant.
Indeed, the President appeared reluctant to accept even the most straight-forward
arguments which excluded the possibility of an attack through Russia. Secretary of War
Baker had to present the War College Division critique of these alternatives twice, and
even then it is less likely that the President was swayed by the strategic considerations
than it is that he was influenced by the fall of the Provincial Government in Russia and
by Baker's contention that a campaign along any front but the West would threaten Wilson's
role at the peace settlement.
It is often easy to find mistakes in failure. It is more difficult to criticize a
process which ends successfully, as did America's effort during the First World War. The
Allied victory, however, does not change the fact that American strategy was formulated in
a tardy, reckless and haphazard fashion, with Wilson making policies and commitments with
no consideration for the counsel of his military planners in the War College Division of
the General Staff. This is not to say that the advice of those planners was always sound,
or to claim that it should always have been adopted, or even to suggest that, at least on
the surface, American diplomatic goals and military policy failed to mesh. In fact, in
retrospect it appears that Wilson's decisions were often better suited to America's war
aims than was the advice of the War College Division. Nonetheless it must be recognized
that these decisions were not the result of a long and considered dialogue between the
President and these military planners. They were instead the outcome of unilateral
decision-making which, although successful in this instance, is a dangerous approach to
strategic planning.
1. See Allan R. Millet, "Over Where? The AEF and the American
Strategy for Victory, 1917-1918," in Against All Enemies: Interpretations of
American Military History from Colonial Times to the Present, eds. Kenneth J. Hagan
and William Roberts, Contributions in Military Studies 51 (New York: Greenwood Press,
1986): 235-56; American Battle Monuments Commission, American Armies and Battlefields
in Europe: A History, Guide and Reference Book (Washington: Government Printing
Office, 1938), 16; Trask, The United States in the Supreme War Council; On 3
September Pershing ordered from his own staff a study of strategical fronts for the
employment of the AEF. The examination was complete within the month: Lt. Col. Fox Conner,
Col. L. R. Eltinge and Maj. H.A. Drum, "A Strategical Study on the Employment of the
A.E.F. Against the Imperial German Government," 25 September 1917, Record Group 120
(American Expeditionary Forces), File 1003, Folder 681, Part 2, G-3, G.H.Q., A.E.F.,
National Archives; Pershing's headquarters were at No. 31 Rue Constantine, Paris, until 1
September 1917, when they were moved to Chaumont. Army War College Historical Section,
Genesis of the American First Army, 3.
2. Edward M. Coffman, The Hilt of the Sword: The Career of
Peyton C. March (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1966); Michael J. McCarthy,
"The US War Department General Staff in World War I," in The Encyclopedia of
World War I, ed. Anne Cipriano Venzon, Wars of the United States Series (New York:
Garland Publishing, forthcoming); Link and Chambers, "Woodrow Wilson as
Commander-in-Chief,"319-24.
3. Martin Kitchen, "Civil-Military Relations in Germany During
the First World War," in The Great War, 1914-18: Essays on the Military,
Political, and Social History of the First World War, ed. R.J.Q. Adams (College
Station: Texas A&M University Press), 39-68; Cooper, "World War I: European
Origins and American Intervention," 10-12.
<< 5: Over Where? The Search for Alternatives to the Western Front, June-November 1917 || The First World War Chronology
