From: Everette (194cbteng@bellsouth.net)
Date: Sun Feb 05 2006 - 02:46:05 PST
February 3
1917 U.S. breaks diplomatic relations with Germany
On this day in 1917, President Woodrow Wilson speaks for two hours before a
historic session of Congress to announce that the United States is breaking
diplomatic relations with Germany.
Due to the reintroduction of the German navy's policy of unlimited submarine
warfare, announced two days earlier by Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann
Hollwegg, Wilson announced that his government had no choice but to cut all
diplomatic ties with Germany in order to uphold the honor and dignity of the
United States. Though he maintained that "We do not desire any hostile
conflict with the German government," Wilson nevertheless cautioned that war
would follow if Germany followed through on its threat to sink American
ships without warning.
In the wake of Wilson's speech, all German cruisers docked in the United
States were seized and the government formally demanded that all American
prisoners being held in Germany be released at once.
On the same day, a German U-boat sunk the American cargo ship Housatonic off
the Scilly Islands, just southwest of Britain. A British ship rescued the
ship's crew, but its entire cargo of grain was lost.
In Berlin that night, before learning of the president's speech, German
Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmermann told U.S. Ambassador James J. Gerard
that "Everything will be alright. America will do nothing, for President
Wilson is for peace and nothing else. Everything will go on as before." He
was proved wrong the following morning, as news arrived of the break in
relations between America and Germany, a decisive step towards U.S. entry
into the First World War.
Everette
Deo adiuvante
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