United States diplomats also took an active role in ending the Moroccan Crisis in 1912. That crisis began with a 1911 revolt in Morocco. The French sent in an army ostensibly to end the Revolt. However, their actual intent was to add Morocco to their empire. Germany objected and sent a gunboat to the port of Agadir, and later two cruisers. Their pretext was to protect German business interests.
Fearing the establishment of a German treaty port on the Atlantic, which could threaten Gibralter, Great Britain sent two pre-Dreadnought battleships. The British Prime Minister in a speech at a private gathering threatened war.
The United States ambassador offered to negotiate an equitable settlement. The Treaty of Fez acknowledged the French protectorate of Morocco, which ended that country’s independence. In return, Germany gained the southern portion of French Congo. With that addition to the German colony of Kamerun, Germany gained a port on the Congo River. The United States gained additional diplomatic recognition for participating in a settlement which prevented a war between Germany, France, and Great Britain.
The reprieve in Mexico was temporary. Madero was an inexperienced politician who had never held office. However, his election as president in October 1911, raised high expectations for positive change. Madero fervently held to his position that Mexico needed real democracy, which included a free press, and the right of labor to organize and strike. The press enjoyed their new found freedom, and almost immediately Madero became the target for their criticism.
Naively, Madero ordered rebel leaders who helped him to power to demobilize and return to civilian life. These were men of action, and when promised reforms were not immediately apparent, one by one they rose in revolt. Within months, Mexico was in the throes of civil war.
The Madero presidency was unraveling. In February 1913, Madero dispatched General Victoriano Huerta to combat revolutionaries fighting within Mexico City. In a time known as the Ten Tragic days, Huerta sided with the rebels and imprisoned Madero and the Vice President in the Presidential Palace.
The United States Ambassador Henry Lane Wilson brokered the Pact of the Embassy. This agreement formalized the alliance of General Huerta and General Felix Diaz, the nephew of the former president. With the backing of the United States, Huerta became the provisional President. Madero and his vice president resigned and agreed to go into exile. However, on their way to exile, they were murdered by the guards. Hoping for stability, virtually all the nations with embassies in Mexico City immediately recognized Huerta’s government.
Chapter 21
The Election of 1912
Roosevelt declined to run for a third term. Instead, he handpicked his Secretary of War William Howard Taft to be his successor. With the progressives in the ascendancy of the Republican Party, they engineered the nomination of the Senator from Wisconsin Robert LaFollette to be Vice President.
The Democrats endured a very contentious convention. On the forty-sixth ballot, with the support of William Jennings Bryan, they nominated the Governor of New Jersey Woodrow Wilson for President. Then they nominated Thomas Marshall from New York as the candidate for Vice President.
The Socialists again nominated Eugene Debs
Teddy Roosevelt campaigned hard for the Taft – LaFollette ticket. With his characteristic high-energy campaign style. He used his Bully Pulpit to excoriate Wilson’s run for President as the fourth campaign of William Jennings Bryan. An assassination attempt on Roosevelt by a Wilson supporter, John Shrank, on October 14, soured public opinion on Wilson. The bullet struck Roosevelt in the chest. However, Roosevelt’s steel eyeglass case deflected the bullet into a fifty-page folded copy of his speech. Characteristically, Roosevelt gave his speech before seeking minor medical attention.
Police arrested the would-be assassin. Shrank was tried and convicted of attempted murder of the President of the United States, and sentenced to hang. Roosevelt, in one of his last acts as President, commuted the sentence to life in prison.
LaFollette also campaigned hard, particularly in big cities and areas populated by union members. Combined, they stumped for Taft in every State.
Taft chose the traditional style of a candidate for President and campaigned from his front porch. Crowds of voters gathered three or four times per week to hear him speak. He promised a continuation of Roosevelt’s policies.
Wilson campaigned on the slogan A New Freedom. His policy focused on individualism instead of big government. Like Taft, he mostly campaigned from his home. William Jennings Bryan stumped the country for Wilson. Often, his rallies competed with those of Roosevelt and LaFollette.
The vote tallies on November 5 provided the Taft – LaFollette ticket 50.7 percent of the vote. Wilson received 41.7 percent, and Eugene Debs received six percent. Minor candidates accounted for the balance of the votes.
The Electoral College provided four-hundred and sixty votes for Taft and LaFollette, and one-hundred and twenty-seven for Wilson and Marshall. The Wilson – Marshall ticket only won the eleven Solid South states. Wilson received 100,000 fewer votes than William Jennings Bryan received in 1908.
1912 would be the last election when the total number of electoral votes increased with the population. The Apportionship Act of 1911 capped the number of members of the House of Representatives to 473, based on the 1910 Census, and provided for the addition of one seat each for the new states of New Mexico and Arizona. Following future di-centennial census reports, the House would be re-apportioned within the 475 maximum number of members. Each state would have at least one seat in the House of Representatives. If states joined the Union in between the di-centennial census, the House would temporarily add one seat per state until the next census.
The number of Senators did not change. According to the Constitution, each state elected two Senators. With the current total of fifty-six states, the total number of 112 Senators would not change except for the addition of more states.
Taft’s Inauguration took place on March 4, 1913. The day before the inauguration, 8,000 women marched in the first Woman’s Suffrage Parade. LaFollette, a strong supporter of woman's suffrage proudly stood on the reviewing stand as his wife Belle Case LaFollette marched at the head of the parade alongside a leading Women’s Suffragette and parade organizer Inez Milholland. Both women rode on white horses.
Following the Inauguration ceremonies, Theodore Roosevelt left Washington and returned to his Long Island estate, Sagamore Hills. Within months, the morose former President, frustrated being out of the limelight, needed to separate himself from politics. At his wife, Edith’s suggestion, Roosevelt, and Edith were on their way for a year-long hunting trip to Africa.
Chapter 22
President Taft began his administration during an atmosphere of crisis in Europe. The fear of war over the Moroccan Crisis strengthened the Entente between England and France.
Italy declared war on the Ottoman Empire when the Ottomans refused to cede Lybia to the Italians. The Italian Army invaded, and the Italian Navy defeated the small Ottoman squadron stationed in Benghazi. Italy took control of the coast. However, the Ottoman / Arab tribes in the interior defeated all attempts by the Italians to complete their conquest. With the war stalemated, a brutal guerrilla war followed. The Ottomans agreed to a peace treaty ceding Lybia to Italy when the Balkan Countries attacked Turkish territory in the Balkan Peninsula.
The Ottoman Empire before the First Balkan War
The First Balkan War occurred when the countries including Greece, Bulgaria, Serbia, and Montenegro took advantage of the Italian – Ottoman War to attack the remnants of the Ottoman Empire located on the Balkan Peninsula. The allies conquered most of the Ottoman territory and pushed the Turks back to the outskirts of Constantinople. A peace brokered by Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy ended the war, with the allies annexing the territory they occupied and creating Albania as an independent country.
Within months the former allies squabbled over their territorial gains. Bulgaria declared war on her prior allies. After
initial successes, the Bulgarian’s suffered defeats. The Ottoman Empire declared war on Bulgaria and re-gained its territory in Thrace. Romania invaded from the north and took the disputed province of Dobruja. Surrounded by enemies, Bulgaria sued for peace, losing much of the territory gained in the First Balkan War.
The European powers also formed conflicting alliances. Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy formed the Triple Alliance. The United Kingdom, France, and Russia formed the Triple Entente. All the nations expanded their armies and naval forces.
Triple Alliance versus Triple Entente
The Balkan Crisis of 1875, resulted in the Independence of Serbia. During their War of Independence from the Ottoman Empire, Serbia briefly conquered Bosnia. The Congress in Berlin returned the province to the Ottoman Empire but placed it under the protection of Austria-Hungary. Serbia protested as the population consisted predominately of Serbian Orthodox Christians.
In 1908, Austria-Hungary formally annexed Bosnia – Herzegovina, territories they occupied since 1877. Serbia protested, and sought the aid of Russia. However, Russia still recovering from defeat in the Russo-Japanese War, and the Revolution of 1905 was not ready for war.
Tensions grew between Austria-Hungary and Serbia due to Serbia’s intelligence services covert aid to Bosnian Serb revolutionaries. In retaliation, Austria cut off Serbian exports through its territory. The export ban delayed the shipment of Serbian goods, damaging Serbia’s economy. Landlocked Serbia needed to ship her exports through less desirable ports of call. The primed fuse for war just needed a spark.
That spark occurred on June 24, 1914, when a Bosnian Serb nationalist Gavrial Princip’s attempted assassination the Austrian Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the heir to the Austrian throne. The Archduke was on an inspection tour of military preparedness and visited the governor in Sarajevo.
The conspirators stationed six members of Black Hand a terrorist group, backed by Serbia, along with the published route of travel of the Royal Motorcade. One conspirator threw a grenade, which injured occupants of the fourth car. The Archduke ordered his car to go to the hospital. His driver took a wrong turn and stalled the engine while backing up. That gave Princip the opportunity to fire three shots. The first hit the Archduke in the shoulder, the second hit him in the chest, the other hit Sophie in the abdomen. The Archduke, severely wounded held his wife in his arms as she died, crying out for her not to leave him. The car rushed the severely wounded Archduke to the hospital for treatment, where he stayed for two weeks. Then the government transferred him to Vienna for a 2-month convalescence.
Princip and his five co-conspirators all attempted suicide by swallowing cyanide. However, the pills were defective. Following intensive interrogation sessions, the conspirators implicated Serbian intelligence in the plot. The conspirators were tried, convicted, and all but Princip executed. Princip, being only nineteen, was ineligible for the death penalty. The court sentenced him to twenty-five years in prison.
The Serbian Government surprised by the assassination attempt offered its sincere condolences. Investigations done by Austrian and Serbian investigators concluded that no direct evidence existed indicating involvement by the Serbian government, and to the contrary, most of the evidence exonerated the Serbian government. However, the evidence indicated that Serbian intelligence officials actively supported Black Hand.
The Austrian Government did not need or want proof. With the heir to the throne languishing in the hospital at death’s door, and the Grand Dutchess murdered, Austria thirsted for revenge. Backed by Kaiser Whilehm II’s guarantee of support, the Austrian government issued a ten-point ultimatum demanding Serbia surrender much of its sovereignty to Austria within 48 hours. Serbia agreed to eight of the demands and offered the others to arbitration. On July 28, the Austrians declared war on Serbia. Soon, the splendid war of punishment of Serbia escalated into a world war.
In response to Austria-Hungary's declaration of war on Serbia, Russia Declared war on Austria-Hungary. Two days later the German Empire demanded that Russia stop mobilization, and declared war on Russia when the Russians ignored the demand. France then declared war on Germany and Austria-Hungary.
Great Britain undertook diplomatic action to bring the Powers together in a conference. The Crown felt that as mobilization took several weeks, a negotiated settlement was possible. The Entente agreement with France and Russia only included a declaration of war if Germany attacked first. Since both nations independently declared war on Germany, the Entente did not apply. Great Britain did not have such an agreement with Serbia but did have mutual defense agreements with Belgium, Luxembourg, and Holland.
The Taft Administration declared the neutrality of the United States and cooperated with Great Britain’s attempts to secure a negotiated settlement. The general view, endorsed by Vice President LaFollette, regarded the war as a European issue. The 3,000 mile wide the Atlantic Ocean served as an effective barrier. The powerful United States Navy served as a deterrent within that barrier.
Taft ordered the navy to speed the development of the South Dakota Class of six Super Dreadnoughts. The battleships design characteristics included an overall length of 684 feet, a beam of 106 feet, and a displacement of 43,000 tons. These were the largest warships to date built for the United States Navy. Armaments consisted of four, triple turrets of sixteen-inch guns, two mounted forward and two aft in the superfiring position. Secondary armaments included sixteen, six-inch guns in twin turrets, four turrets per side. The Navy chose shipyards in New York, Mare Island, Newport, Norfolk, and Fore River to construct the battleships simultaneously. The Navy estimated completion time as twenty-four months. The New York shipyard contracts included the USS South Dakota and the USS Indiana. Other battleships in the class included: USS Montana, USS Massachusetts, USS Iowa, and USS North Carolina.
Mexico’s unrest distracted Taft from the European War. In The Tampico Affair. Taft’s initial cordial relations with President Huerta soured when Taft refused to sell Huerta weapons. Mexican authorities arrested nine United States Navy sailors, from the gunboat USS Dolfin who tried to purchase gasoline while on leave. When Mexico refused demands for their release, The battleships USS Florida and USS Utah, plus a transport ship with 500 Marines took the port city Veracruz and held it for six months.
On July 14, President Huerta abdicated and fled into exile. Mexico descended into civil war, which spilled over the United States border from bandits, notably by Pancho Villa. Taft sent the United States Army on punitive raids, to hunt down the bandits. The raids soon escalated until the United States Army occupied the bordering Mexican states Sonora and Chihuahua; as most of the bandit raids originated from there. United States Spanish speaking civilian administrators arrived to assist the local Mexican authorities to set up municipal governments, schools, and local police departments.
Within months, with the US Army providing stability, the Mexican citizens felt secure enough to view them as protectors instead of occupiers. The Mexicans began to provide valuable information about the bandit band members and locations. One by one the bandit bands were captured or killed.
Chapter 23
THE GREAT WAR
The Western Front
On August 3, 1914, Germany launched a massive attack on France, moving its armies through Belgium and Luxenberg. Germany initially asked for safe passage but invaded in force when the Belgians refused. Great Britain exercised its mutual defense pacts with Belgium and declared war on Germany following Germany’s refusal to withdraw. The Belgians fought hard, delaying the German advance for two weeks. The remnants of the Belgian army retreated towards Antwerp, hoping for rescue by the Royal Navy.
The Germans paused for reinforcements, then seizing the time it would take for the British to mobilize and move troops into France, pushed hard for Paris. Germany is following the Von Schlieffen Plan to knock the French out of the war before the six-million man Russian Army can mobilize.
Calais, France
August 20, 1914
Robert followed his father and grandfather into the British Army. His family, landed squires in Nottingham, had a rich history of military service. The walls at Pomeroy Manor displayed the uniformed paintings of his ancestors. Robert graduated from the Royal Military College at Sandhurst in 1898, which specialized in training young gentlemen cadets in the infantry and cavalry. His first taste of combat was in the Second Boer War in South Africa. He landed in South Africa in January 1900 with Lord Roberts army. He distinguished himself at the Battle of the Tulega Heights, receiving his promotion from Ensign to Lieutenant. Following the war, his unit transferred to India, where he received his Captaincy. In 1912, he returned to England as an instructor at The Royal Military College. On August 4, 1914, he volunteered for the BEF and received a promotion to Major.
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