USA HISTORY

AMERICAN IMPERIALISM(1890 1919)

THE UNITED STATES IN WORLD WAR I

[SOURCES]
Which of the following reasons was a DIRECT CAUSE of the USA entering WWI?

(A) the Treaty of Versailles

(B) ** the Zimmerman telegraph

(C) the bombing of Pearl Harbor

(D) the assassination of Franz Ferdinand

EXPLANATIONS BELOW

Concept note-1: -The note revealed a plan to renew unrestricted submarine warfare and to form an alliance with Mexico and Japan if the United States declared war on Germany. The message was intercepted by the British and passed on to the United States; its publication caused outrage and contributed to the U.S. entry into World War I.

Concept note-2: -The telegram was considered perhaps Britain’s greatest intelligence coup of World War I and, coupled with American outrage over Germany’s resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare, was the tipping point persuading the U.S. to join the war.

Concept note-3: -On April 2, President Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany specifically citing Germany’s renewed submarine policy as “a war against mankind. It is a war against all nations.” He also spoke about German spying inside the U.S. and the treachery of the Zimmermann Telegram.

Concept note-4: -The Zimmermann Telegram (or Zimmermann Note or Zimmerman Cable) was a secret diplomatic communication issued from the German Foreign Office in January 1917 that proposed a military alliance between Germany and Mexico if the United States entered World War I against Germany.