TR Administration 1913-1917 reaction to the European War

raharris1973

What would it have been?

Would the administration have been perceived or treated differently by the Entente, the Central Powers, or domestically by interventionists and anti-interventionists?
 

President Farrakhan

This is Teddy f'n Roosevelt we're talking about here. He'd race towards WW1, crush Germany before Lenin can do anything, boom, 20th Century saved.

Teddy Roosevelt is OTL Ameriwank
 
Sabot Cat

Sabot Cat

Banned
President Farrakhan said:
This is Teddy f'n Roosevelt we're talking about here. He'd race towards WW1, crush Germany before Lenin can do anything, boom, 20th Century saved.

Teddy Roosevelt is OTL Ameriwank
Click to expand...

With what pretext? Congress has to make the Declaration of War, and they'd have to be sold on it, along with the public, and those you'll likely need to draft...
 

Japhy

Banned
President Farrakhan said:
This is Teddy f'n Roosevelt we're talking about here. He'd race towards WW1, crush Germany before Lenin can do anything, boom, 20th Century saved.

Teddy Roosevelt is OTL Ameriwank
Click to expand...

Because Roosevelt angled to bring the United States into the European Alliance system during every crisis that occurred during his IOTL presidency.

I'm no fan of Roosevelt-worship in General but how on earth do you suggest he do this?
 

RCAF Brat

The US enters WWI two years early, following the torpedoing of the RMS Lusitania. TR wanted the US to ally with the Entente powers in 1914, but only something like the abortive 1915 USW campaign will give him the leverage he needs to push a DoW through Congress.

The US Army will need about 12 months to both recruit enough soldiers (the peacetime US Army was even more anemic that it's British counterpart) and to ship them across the Atlantic. So this means that the first time the US Army engages the Germans will either be alongside the British at the Somme or alongside the French at Verdun. Expect American casualties from WWI to be far, far higher than OTL. OTOH WWI might not last much past the spring of 1917 due to the disparity in force along the Western Front.

Knock-on effects might include a Red Germany (the communists might be more successful with greater German disillusionment) and the survival of the Romanov dynasty in Russia.
 

raharris1973

The US enters WWI two years early, following the torpedoing of the RMS Lusitania. TR wanted the US to ally with the Entente powers in 1914, but only something like the abortive 1915 USW campaign will give him the leverage he needs to push a DoW through Congress.
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Begs a few questions -

Does TR's personality have a deterrent effect on German decisions to do USW, or do they just regard him as a blowhard?

Is Lusitania, a one-off affair, enough to bring congress and public opinion along with TR, especially if TR has been vocally pro-Entente up till then, providing anti-interventionists in public and congress with warning and a reason to organize?

If somehow early US entry into the war is achieved, does the US start off without conscription, like Britain. How large a volunteer force could be raised, and would conscription become necessary before it's over?
 

Mikestone8

RCAF Brat said:
The US enters WWI two years early, following the torpedoing of the RMS Lusitania.
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More likely two months earlier.

The Germans didn't start torpedoing US ships until Feb 1917, so that's the earliest any war resolution would get through Congress.
 

eliphas8

He'd probably get America involved in a long grinding war of attrition that gives America it's first million dead men in a war.
 

David T

To quote an old soc.history.what-if post of mine:

***

A lot of people think that TR would have gotten the US into the War
earlier but I am a bit skeptical about that. As Henry Pringle, biographer
of both TR and Taft, once noted: "In 1886, Theodore Roosevelt had hoped
for war with Mexico. In 1896, he considered the possibility of sanguinary
combat against William Jennings Bryan and his fellow Populists. In 1898,
he agitated for war with Spain. In 1911, he volunteered to fight against
Mexico. In October, 1914, he said that the United States should uphold
the neutrality of Belgium. It will be noted, however, that not one of all
these belligerent expressions was voiced between September, 1901 and
March, 1909. It was one thing to urge that some other president involve
the nation in blood. It was a far different thing to face the
responsibility himself." *The Life and Times of William Howard Taft*, p.
296. TR himself wrote--admittedly before the *Lusitania* sinking--"I ask
those individuals who think of me as a firebrand to remember that during
the seven and a half years I was President not a shot was fired at any
soldier of a hostile nation by any American soldier or sailor, and there
was not so much as a threat of war. Even when the state of Panama threw
off the alien yoke of Colombia and when this nation, acting as was its
manifest duty, by recognizing Panama as an independent state stood for the
right of the governed to govern themselves on the Isthmus, as well as for
justice and humanity, there was not a shot fired by any of our people at
any Colombian. The blood recently shed at Vera Cruz, like the unpunished
wrongs recently committed on our people in Mexico, had no parallel during
my administration..."
http://books.google.com/books?id=_VMyAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA134

Obviously, TR is not going to say America is "too proud to fight." But I
don't think he will ask for an immediate declaration of war, either--which
I doubt he could get through Congress even after the Lusitania sinking.
He will probably put much more emphasis on "preparedness" than Wilson did
(Wilson was a late and only a partial convert to that cause), in the hope
that building up an American military stronger than that of of OTL in
1914-17--and readier to get to Europe within a reasonable time--will
dissuade the Germans from resorting to unrestricted submarine warfare.
 

zoomar

There is every reason to believe that TR would have wanted to involve the US in WW1 earlier, but as others have said it takes two to tango. Unlike Wilson, he would have probably used the Bully Pulpit to argue for US assistance to Britain and France, and it's remotely possible this might have affected US public opinion and a few votes in the Senate, but probably not. After the Lusitania incident, I think there is a good chance he would have involved US naval forces in the anti-submarine campaign with or without Congressional approval as commander in chief, and dared the Germans to sink a US ship.
 

raharris1973

The Germans didn't start torpedoing US ships until Feb 1917, so that's the earliest any war resolution would get through Congress.
Click to expand...
He will probably put much more emphasis on "preparedness" than Wilson did
(Wilson was a late and only a partial convert to that cause), in the hope
that building up an American military stronger than that of of OTL in
1914-17--and readier to get to Europe within a reasonable time--will
dissuade the Germans from resorting to unrestricted submarine warfare.
Click to expand...

This again raises the question of how Germany will react to TR's policies. Will Germany simply never do unrestricted submarine warfare for fear of TR bringing the US into the war with an increasingly prepared army and navy? Could this ironically lead to the US staying out and Germany winning as a result, or TR being one to mediate what's effectively a "white peace" or a "peace without victory"?

Or, might Germany never cease USW or start it earlier if it feels that TR is already doing nearly everything in its power to aid the Entente, or feels like the US is just waiting till it builds up to attack?

How much "preparedness" would Congress allow and how controversial would it be?

What's TR going to think about British blockade practices and the "blacklist" of American firms or any Irish troubles that start during the war? Those items all brought a degree of tension between Britain and the Wilson administration in OTL.

Also, how's this for a wildcard: TR uses the outbreak of war for unilateral American advantage, purchasing Germany's vulnerable Pacific territories for a discount price to establish a continuous string of American territory between the Philippines and Hawaii? The historical model would be the Louisiana Purchase. If TR and Bethman were ready for a deal like this shortly after the outbreak of war, I wonder if Congress would go along with funding it and how the Entente would react.

Out of curiosity, what had Mexico done in 1886 or 1911 to tick off TR as indicated in the quote?

In 1886, Theodore Roosevelt had hoped
for war with Mexico. ..... In 1911, he volunteered to fight against
Mexico.
Click to expand...
 

Timmy811

I don't think TR is going to accept the British blockade. He may be an anglophile, but he's not going to just meekly protest over interference in American commerce on such a large scale.
 

Mikestone8

Timmy811 said:
I don't think TR is going to accept the British blockade. He may be an anglophile, but he's not going to just meekly protest over interference in American commerce on such a large scale.
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He certainly talked about putting American mails onto a battleship instead of a merchantman, to prevent GB from intercepting it.
 

sloreck

Given TR's OTL involvement with the preparedness movement, I'd expect the USA to begin ramping up its military within 6 months of the start of the war, once it became obvious that this was not going to be the "short war" everyone expected. Expanding the army, getting adequate weapons (rifles, machine guns, better artillery) will still take ~18 months so the earliest you could see a significant US force in Europe would be August 1916. Naval assistance of course could be much sooner.

OTL the USA did provide a great deal of assistance to the Entente "short of war". Large amounts of war related materials from actual munitions to key chemicals and raw materials to food and clothing went to the Entente via loans from US banking houses. While some "stuff" was sold to Germany it was limited and of course Germany had no way to get much of anything from USA to Germany (in spite of the merchant U-Boat "Deutschland"). Also Germany was basically unable to secure loans from the US banking system, which was a crippling problem.

While TR would push preparedness, expansion etc of US military, there would not be a US involvement directly without some very specific action on the part of the Central Powers that would bring the USA in. With TR as president it would (hopefully) be obvious to the German leadership that something like USW that sinks US ships or kills Americans will not result in diplomatic notes (as with Wilson) but rather a declaration of war. You might also see convoys of US (only) ships escorted by the USN, and of course an attack on such a convoy would lead to war. This sort of thing is very much in line with US historical "freedom of navigation" policy.
 

raharris1973

...it occurred to me that serious early investments in preparedness of US forces are going to hurt the Entente a bit by raising the price of many supplies and raw materials.
 
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