ABSTRACT
During the First World War, Americans wanted to use the war to reform their own society and the world. During the First World War, a host of federal agencies managed the nation’s material and manpower resources. These agencies employed a range of tactics, including patriotic appeals to conserve resources, loaning money to co-operative businesses, and seizing control of the railroads. Conclusions about the country’s mistakes during the First World War influenced how America reacted to the Second World War. The questions raised about just war and America’s world position in the 1950s and 1960s recalled the dilemmas Americans confronted during the First World War. In fighting the war, Pershing’s insistence on leading an independent American army in the field overshadowed how often the Americans cooperated and compromised with the British and the French. The country’s rejection of the Versailles Treaty and its refusal to join the League of Nations signaled to many observers an American retreat into isolationism.
