Should Britain have gone to war in 1914?

[RangerJoe]

Wilson also had a stroke.

[RangerJoe]

The Japanese were willing to send ground troops but the other Allies did not want them. The Chinese had laborers in France but no combat troops.

[Capt. Harlock]

"Of course, it is just possible that we may not have to go. England may leave France to her fate. We are sure that there is no binding treaty between them."

"And Belgium?"

"Yes, and Belgium, too."

Von Bork shook his head. "I don't see how that could be. There is a definite treaty there. She could never recover from such a humiliation."

"She would at least have peace for the moment."

"But her honour?"

"Tut, my dear sir, we live in a utilitarian age. Honour is a mediaeval conception. Besides England is not ready. It is an inconceivable thing, but even our special war tax of fifty million, which one would think made our purpose as clear as if we had advertised it on the front page of the Times, has not roused these people from their slumbers. Here and there one hears a question. It is my business to find an answer. Here and there also there is an irritation. It is my business to soothe it. But I can assure you that so far as the essentials go—the storage of munitions, the preparation for submarine attack, the arrangements for making high explosives—nothing is prepared. How, then, can England come in, especially when we have stirred her up such a devil's brew of Irish civil war, window-breaking Furies, and God knows what to keep her thoughts at home."

"She must think of her future."

"Ah, that is another matter. I fancy that in the future we have our own very definite plans about England, and that your information will be very vital to us. It is to-day or to-morrow with Mr. John Bull. If he prefers to-day we are perfectly ready. If it is to-morrow we shall be more ready still. I should think they would be wiser to fight with allies than without them, but that is their own affair."

--"His Last Bow", Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: philabos

I think the objections centered more on the League of Nations.
Giving power to an international body was too much for some, others pointed to Washington's warning of entangling foreign alliances.
Wilson never could muster the two thirds majority required for ratification.
Not the only time in US history.

warspite1

Were the League of Nations and the Treaty part of the same deal or separate?

[RangerJoe]

I think that they were separate.

[RangerJoe]

I was mistaken. I knew that it was part of the 14 points but:

Part I of the treaty, as per all the treaties signed during the Paris Peace Conference, was the Covenant of the League of Nations, which provided for the creation of the League, an organization for the arbitration of international disputes.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_Ve ... anizations

Why was the treaty not passed in the US? Many reasons for the public but this trumps all:

Defeating the League of Nations

Unfortunately for Wilson, he was met with stiff opposition. The Republican leader of the Senate, Henry Cabot Lodge, was very suspicious of Wilson and his treaty. Article X of the League of Nations required the United States to respect the territorial integrity of member states. Although there was no requirement compelling an American declaration of war, the United States might be bound to impose an economic embargo or to sever diplomatic relations. Lodge viewed the League as a supranational government that would limit the power of the American government from determining its own affairs. Others believed the League was the sort of entangling alliance the United States had avoided since George Washington's Farewell Address. Lodge sabotaged the League covenant by declaring the United States exempt from Article X. He attached reservations, or amendments, to the treaty to this effect. Wilson, bedridden from a debilitating stroke, was unable to accept these changes. He asked Senate Democrats to vote against the Treaty of Versailles unless the Lodge reservations were dropped. Neither side budged, and the treaty went down to defeat.

http://www.ushistory.org/us/45d.asp

[Bennett]

I have read many standard works on this topic. This book is a different angle on the Liberal party cabinet decision to go to war in August 1914 and is worth reading for consideration.

https://www.amazon.ca/Darkest-Days-Trut ... oks&sr=1-7

[warspite1]

ORIGINAL: Bennett

I have read many standard works on this topic. This book is a different angle on the Liberal party cabinet decision to go to war in August 1914 and is worth reading for consideration.

https://www.amazon.ca/Darkest-Days-Trut ... oks&sr=1-7

warspite1

Thanks for the link.