Sandra Knispel
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Communications Specialist 
President Woodrow Wilson wanted to keep the United States out of World War I.
When fighting erupted in Europe in 1914, Wilson pledged American neutrality, reflecting widespread public opposition to entering the conflict. For nearly three years, he pursued a diplomatic solution as tensions between the United States and Germany escalated.
But Germany’s decision to resume unrestricted submarine warfare in February 1917—attacking ships without warning in waters around Britain—made American neutrality increasingly difficult to maintain. On April 2, Wilson asked Congress to declare war. Four days later, on April 6, 1917, the United States formally entered World War I.
According to University of Rochester political scientist Hein Goemans, the answer lies in a desperate calculation by German leaders: They believed they could defeat Britain before American forces could arrive in Europe in sufficient numbers to change the war’s outcome.
“The US declaration of war, in essence, was a recognition of the fact that Germany had chosen to impose a very risky gamble on the US—risky for Germany, but the only way they thought they could obtain the victory they needed at home,” says Goemans, an associate professor of political science.
A specialist in international relations and conflict, Goemans is the author of War and Punishment: The Causes of War Termination and the First World War (Princeton University Press, 2000) and coauthor of Leaders and International Conflict (Cambridge University Press, 2011).
“The Germans were well aware that the US could not and would not accept unrestricted submarine warfare, but launched it anyway,” says Goemans. “The US declaration of war was thus already taken into account when the final decision for unrestricted submarine warfare was made in January 1917. Indeed, Hindenburg explicitly admitted the day before ‘We count upon war with America.’”
So why would the German leadership under Paul von Hindenburg take such a big risk?
“It was a gamble, which was very likely to hurt them in the long run,” explains Goemans. “They thought the gamble would open up a window of opportunity in which they could defeat the British. If they defeated the British, then they could prevent Americans from coming to the mainland, and they would have a victorious end to the war.”
Goemans argues that German leaders had observed how long it took British troops to prepare for a major offensive after arriving in France. They calculated that American forces would also need considerable time to cross the Atlantic, organize, and become effective on the battlefield.
Germany’s leaders believed unrestricted submarine warfare could force Britain out of the conflict before American military intervention tipped the balance.
But the gamble was driven by more than military calculations.
Germany’s ruling class, led by an alliance of aristocratic landowners and industrialists, was also fighting for its political survival amid growing social unrest.
“A victorious ending to the war was necessary for them because without victory, without spoils to divert those who had been loyal Germans—loyal to the old regime—they would face a revolution on the home front, and a revolution not unlike the one that the Russians had experienced,” explains Goemans.
Germany’s unrestricted submarine warfare was the principal reason the United States entered World War I. But another development helped turn American public opinion against Germany: the Zimmermann Telegram.
In January 1917, German foreign minister Arthur Zimmermann sent a secret diplomatic message proposing an alliance with Mexico if the United States entered the war. British intelligence intercepted and decoded the message.
Germany offered to support Mexico in recovering territory it had lost to the United States, including Texas, Arizona, and New Mexico. The telegram also suggested that Mexico seek Japan’s participation in the proposed alliance.
Goemans calls the proposal “ludicrous.”
He says he found no indication in official documents from the period that the US government regarded the proposed alliance as a serious military threat. Instead, the intercepted message became “a propaganda gift that could be used against the Germans more than it was a real factor in the decision making of the Americans [to go to war].”
When the telegram’s contents appeared in American newspapers, however, they intensified anti-German sentiment and strengthened public support for entering the war.
World War I began on July 28, 1914, when Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand a month earlier.
The United States declared war on Germany on April 6, 1917, after nearly three years of neutrality.
Woodrow Wilson, the 28th president of the United States, led the country into World War I during his second term.
Fighting largely ended on November 11, 1918, when an armistice took effect. The Treaty of Versailles was signed on June 28, 1919, formally establishing peace between Germany and the Allied powers.
The United States was formally at war with Germany for approximately 19 months before the November 1918 armistice. More than two million American soldiers served in Europe during the war.
For Goemans, World War I illustrates a fundamental question in international relations: Why do countries choose to fight when one side could theoretically avoid war by accepting the other’s demands?
Understanding why leaders initiate wars—and why they continue fighting despite devastating losses—is central to his research.
“I study war not because it’s cool, or because there are big explosions and big weapons, but because it’s truly horrific,” says Goemans.
The consequences of Germany’s 1917 gamble extended far beyond the battlefield. Although the war ended in 1918, the peace that followed proved fragile. Just two decades later, Europe was again engulfed in world war.
