What if Hindenburg and Ludendorff insisted on unrestricted U-Boat warfare in order to accept overall

[raharris1973]

What if Hindy and Ludy insisted and blackmailed the German Kaiser and Chancellor into accepting on unrestricted U-Boat warfare in order for them to accept overall German high command in August 1916?

With the German government firing Falkenhayn, and the OberOst commanders so popular and widely considered Germany’s only hope, could they not extort from the Kaiser and Chancellor approval of unrestricted submarine warfare policy without delay as both declared policy and tactical ROE?

Like in the German OTL decision of Jan 9, 1917, the ATL German decision of August 29, 1916, is motivated by senior leaders’ distaste of half-measures, a desire to free U-Boats to inflict maximum damage on the British, an estimate this can happen before the Americans can do anything effective in response. The public declaration that submarine warfare will be unrestricted is a feature, not a bug, because even though it is more diplomatically provocative and obnoxious, the intended effect of the announcement is to intimidate and deter neutral shippers, American, but especially Dutch and Scandinavian shippers, from getting underway with cargo for British ports.


Anticipating complications with the United States, and wanting to keep the USA occupied, the German Foreign Minister, at this time Gottlieb Von Jagow rather than Arthur Zimmerman, sends a telegram on September 6th, 1916, directing his Ambassador to Mexico to propose a German-Mexican alliance and promising to restore Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas to Mexico. This telegram gets intercepted and decoded by Britain’s Room 40, and its contents revealed to the Americans.

The new German unrestricted submarine warfare policy is put into official effect, and publicly announced to neutral governments, including the government of the United States, on September 12th, 1916.

This policy is the classic “October Surprise” for America’s 1916 election, highly inconvenient for Woodrow Wilson’s “He kept us out war” messaging theme, because Wilson can now stick with that, and ignore Germany’s provocations on the high seas and its repudiation of past pledges to Wilson, and what will become weekly sinkings of American ships, or he can respond by breaking relations, arming merchant ships, or the ultimate sanction, declaring war, all sacrificing, to one degree or another, his war-avoidance achievement.

His opponents can point to Wilson policy failure leading America to this situation. But, they can also appear to be “ambulance-chasing” in bad taste in a national emergency, during which Wilson may benefit from a rally around the flag effect in public opinion.

Meanwhile, when the ‘Jagow Telegram’ contents are disclosed in Mexico, the US is closer to the middle of its Pancho Villa expedition rather than its end, so there might be subtle differences in how the Mexicans receive or evaluate it. At a minimum, even if the US were to declare war on Germany over the combination of the unrestricted submarine warfare and the Jagow Telegram in October 1916 or November 1916, extraction of the Army and National Guard from Mexico may take a little longer at this time than it did in the February 1917 timeframe in OTL.

So what happens from here. How does the Wilson Administration respond from September 13, 1916 onward, to the German USW announcement? Ignore it? Break relations? Arm merchant ships? Call on Congress over the next seven or eight weeks, or a shorter period of time, to declare war? How does the US react to the additional news, days later, of the Jagow Telegram, and the German proposal of alliance with Mexico, and further scheming to incite Japan against the USA and Entente?

Zimmerman’s stupidity in admitting to the veracity of his eponymous telegram is often noted as an odd blunder. But based on my looking over Jagow’s Wikipedia description, I think it’s quite plausible, even probable, Jagow would have admitted authorship under similar questioning. Zimmerman was carrying out the policy Jagow started. As tone-deaf as Zimmerman’s admission was, he was probably trying to keep alive the prospect embodied in the note of the potential alliance as a contingent, hypothetical deterrent (when in fact Americans did not see it that way, but was a bold, secret plot, instead). Jagow easily could have done the same.

Who would win the 1916 election?

What would happen for the rest of World War One?

[Max Sinister]

Jagow is described by German WP as rather careful and somewhat pro-British. He might do better.

The memory of Lusitania is younger. What did the US public think about entering the war?

Also, there's the possibility that Wilson will be so shocked that he suffers his debilitating stroke even earlier.

[stevep]

   Its likely to bring the US into the war earlier which could be costly for the US as their likely to send more forces into combat and against stronger German forces but for the rest of the alliance an improvement.  That could strengthen or weaken US desires to maintain a more international relationship or retreat into isolationism after the war.  It might change its relations with Russia, possibly especially if Wilson loses the 1916 election to Hughes.  - That might also speed up the arrival of US forces in Europe as OTL Wilson refused to allow any preparation for war, including planning for recruiting and mobilization - until the actual declaration of war.

  It will also of course bring forward the crisis in shipping and a lot would depend on what the allies do in reaction.  Does it prompt an earlier introduction of convoying or other actions, in which case the crisis is largely resolved earlier or still drag their feet in which case losses are heavier and the impact that results in.

  One other thing that comes to mind is if the ending of the war say 3-4 months earlier due to a German defeat on the western front what might that mean for fighting elsewhere?  Britain had already taken Jerusalem and much of Palestine but the final break-through's in Syria and Mesopotamia as it was called then were fairly late in the war.  Possibly it means a rump Ottoman state maintains control of more areas. 

[raharris1973]

Jul 3, 2024 0:35:26 GMT Max Sinister said:

Jagow is described by German WP as rather careful and somewhat pro-British. He might do better.

The memory of Lusitania is younger. What did the US public think about entering the war?

Also, there's the possibility that Wilson will be so shocked that he suffers his debilitating stroke even earlier.

That would be a wildcard.  Although the February announcement by Germany, coming two weeks, embarrassingly, after his "Peace without Victory" speech, did not cause it, and could have.

[raharris1973]

So, Wilson has two courses of action open to him if confronted with this situation:

He can stick with his "kept us out of war" campaign theme, and attempt to dampen outrage at German provocations and U-Boat sinkings, emphasize his domestic achievements, and continue to let himself be seen working towards peace, even stubbornly, and to a fault.

That should keep his supporters on his left flank happier with him than OTL, especially whenever pro-Entente voices and newspapers criticize him for failing to deter or punish German submarine atrocities at sea. It will cost him some supporters on the center and right who feel national honor and interest is being offended and not protected. Perhaps the Irish American and German American voters will give him a little bit less hard of a time than OTL for some of his pro-Entente actions if he remains a peace-talker while under hawkish criticism.

How will the Hughes campaign react to the resumed German submarine provocations, both as an opportunity to criticize Wilson for failing to prevent them, and in terms of proposed solutions, specific, or only implied, to deal with security on the seas and matters of war, peace, and preparedness, going forward?

The Republicans might be wise to keep their critiques general, say it is time for a change, just repeat that bad things happened at sea on Wilson's watch, and be very non-specific about and even vague about implied national security policies for a future Republican Presidency, to allow both pro-war and anti-war voters to believe Hughes would go with their preferences.

If Hughes and the GOP as a whole double-down on criticizing Wilson as a wimp and leave the unmistakable implication that he should have declared war and they would have and will do so in office, then they could well fall into a trap of their own making and lose the election by being seen as over-eager war mongers, even if a majority of the public is angered by German actions.

Under these circumstances, I suppose if Wilson wins reelection, he is *capable* of doing a rhetorical and policy reversal post-election and saying he has run out of patience and asking for a DoW on Germany after his reelection, but his political path of least resistance is to continue on the peace-making track through the spring and summer of 1917 at least.

And if the Republican candidate wins on a vague national security platform, they are flexible to do what they want, saying they are driven by external events and necessities. They as a Party would lean more than 50-50 into entering the war pretty soon, I think. Like it did for Wilson, I think the February revolution in Russia against the Tsar would reduce the number of Americans who find entering the war absolutely unacceptable and would add some credibility to people who have been arguing that the war in Europe is between autocracy and democracy. This would not make the war positively popular or generate volunteers but could enable Congressional votes in favor of a DoW if/when Hughes requests it.

[Max Sinister]

I can imagine he wants to be everybody's darling. But he may well end up as everybody's fool.