ARTICLE: Building for Victory. America in WW1
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I’ve previously written about the TV programme I made, War Factories. In that, we made the case that the Second World War was won in Allied factories, as they made the most of mass production techniques and harnessed industry better than the enemy. I wrote a free article about it, you can read it here:
However, what we have here is another classic example of the sequel trying to claim all the glory whilst ignoring all of the groundwork that was laid during the First World War, and today I’m going to prove it.
During the First World War, Germany could live with American neutrality. What was feckless in the extreme by 1917, however, was idiocy like the Zimmerman telegram (see link below for a bit about someone involved in exposing that) and unrestricted submarine warfare antagonising Washington. Because Germany were categorically buggered if America joined the war on the side of the Allies. As soon as she did, they were going to lose. The Central Powers were already weakened already by years of war, by spring 1917 everyone was. Whilst that status quo remained, there was hope for Germany, because they may use outlast the likes of Britain and France, who were just as exhausted. What Germany could not survive was the prospect of America’s arriving fresh to the party. Today, whilst working in legendary baked goods, Disneyland and Brad Pitt, I’m going to use the medium of shipbuilding to show you why…
One ship is launched, and before it settles in the water another keel is being laid at a shipyard in the United States towards the end of the First World War.
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