THE UNITED STATES JOINS WORLD WAR I It was the morning of May 28 1918 US Cantigny French aircraft flew overhead tanks inched toward the French village of Together they moved toward the German forces The US troops were entering their first major battle of World War I 1914 1918 The attack began with US artillery fire US soldiers waited in trenches Now they emerged and attacked The tanks could not cross the rubble into Cantigny But they fired from positions as close as they could manage Soldiers on foot moved past them into battle Ground troops and tanks worked together in training and in battle
PERSPECTIVES A YOUNG SOLDIER’S VIEW British soldier Jack Rutherford joined the army at age 16 In an interview Rutherford described the horrible conditions in the trenches of World War I The trenches in the winter were terrible There’s no one in this world who’ll ever know what the First World War soldier went through You got food but it was just a cup of tea and a bit of bread maybe the odd bit of stew I remember one night lying in the dugout and trying to see who could fill the matchbox first with lice They used bayonets machine guns and grenades Within an hour the United States had struck a major blow to the Germans The US presence in the war would soon shift the balance of power American troops would help end the conflict HOW IT ALL BEGAN World War I began in 1914 On one side were the Central Powers These nations included Austria-Hungary Germany and the Ottoman Empire The other side was made up of Allies They included the United Kingdom France Italy and Russia
Russia clashed with the Ottoman Empire and the other Central Powers on the Eastern front The other Allies fought on the Western Front At first US president Woodrow Wilson had no plans to join the war But Germany made it difficult for the United States to remain neutral The United Kingdom was a key US trading partner This fact was no secret to Germany It tried to interfere with that trade Germany attacked ships entering British waters Its submarines sank passenger ships from around the world Many Americans lost their lives in these SIMPLE YET EFFECTIVE Some types of war technology are complex But sometimes the simplest inventions can be effective This was the case with barbed wire Soldiers used this wire tipped with short spikes in two ways First it helped keep the enemy from entering their trenches Second the wire trapped anyone who made contact with it Soldiers laid the wire in front of their guns They would fire as the enemy struggled to break free from the wire
