![]() ![]() Wilson also hired publicist George Creel to head up the Committee on Public Information, the official administration propaganda outlet which churned out millions of pages of news print and sponsored hundreds of speakers in support of US participation in the conflict.įinally, the author uses the role of British naval intelligence in interception, decryption and disclosure of the Zimmerman to highlight the growth of powerful intelligence services engendered by total war and largely independent of responsible political control. In addition to sanctioning super‒patriotic leagues like the National Security League and the American Defense Society, the Post Office Department suppressed anti‒war and pacifist publications and the Attorney prosecuted and jailed anti‒war activists such as socialist labour leader Eugene Debs. ![]() Wilson knew this and took extraordinary measures to excite war fever and crush anti‒war sentiment. Despite the Zimmermann provocation US public opinion remained sharply divided on the subject of belligerency. ![]() In fact, however, the telegram only served to further polarize factions of American pacifists and interventionists. Like Wilson’s diplomatic confidant and emissary Colonel House, he favoured American entry into the Great War on the side of Great Britain and saw Zimmermann’s rash and ill‒informed gambit as decisive in this regard. Thus, these abortive German efforts to get Japan (a British ally) and Mexico (then in the throes of a civil war) to attack the United States had no chance of success.įor his part, US Secretary of State Robert Lansing effectively covered up the true provenance of the Zimmerman decryption. Unlikely as it seems, Zimmermann, an experienced diplomat, and his staff were woefully ignorant of political forces at work in America, Mexico and Japan. Zimmerman preferred to scapegoat German ambassador Henrich von Bernstorrf and the German embassy staff in Washington rather than admit to a rather obvious breakdown in cryptographic security. Moreover the Foreign Ministry failed to investigate carefully the circumstances surrounding disclosure of the telegram. Zimmerman’s action was typical of the dysfunctional German federation which lacked a central policy‒making body or individual. The disastrous decision to dispatch the telegram was taken by Foreign Secretary Zimmerman without reference to the German Chancellor, the Kaiser or the German general staff. Of equal importance are his brief, but revealing character sketches of the principal actors in the drama: German Foreign Secretary Arthur Zimmermann, British naval intelligence chief, William ‘Blinker’ Hall, Wilson confidant Colonel Edward House and US Secretary of State Robert Lansing among many other major and minor characters who played key roles in the drama. Boghardt expertly dissects the political and military situation surrounding the decryption and dissemination of the notorious Zimmermann Telegram which triggered (but was not the cause) of America’s entry into The Great War. In a well‒documented and closely argued text, the author draws on documents not available at the time Barbara Tuchman’s classic work was written in 1957 and takes a fresh look at the Zimmermann fiasco. By 1917, British Intelligence could decipher most German messages.US Naval Institute Press, 2012, $36.95, xii pages,ģ19pp, illustrations, bibliography, index. Room 40 also received a copy of the German diplomatic code, stolen from a German diplomat’s luggage in the Near East. In October of 1914, the Russian admiralty gave British Naval Intelligence (known as Room 40) a copy of the German naval codebook removed from a drowned German sailor’s body from the cruiser SMS Magdeburg. Britain began capturing large volumes of intelligence communications.īritish code breakers worked to decrypt communication codes. Soon after the war began, the British successfully tapped into overseas cable lines Germany borrowed from neutral countries to send communications. In 1914, with war imminent, the British had quickly dispatched a ship to cut Germany’s five trans-Atlantic cables and six underwater cables running between Britain and Germany. The secret to the British interception began years earlier. Months earlier, British intelligence had intercepted a secret message from German Foreign Minister Arthur Zimmermann to the Mexican government, inviting an alliance (along with Japan) that would recover the southwestern states Mexico lost to the U.S. On March 1, 1917, the American public learned about a German proposal to ally with Mexico if the United States entered the war.
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