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ZINN OF THE U.S. ARMY AIR SERVICE The ef‹cient manner in which personnel was allocated by the Personnel Of‹cer, Captain F. W. Zinn, A. S. U. S. A. is deserving of note. Working without regard to hours, this Of‹cer, ably assisted by his Lieutenants and enlisted of‹ce personnel, did wonderful work for the Air Service, by the expeditious and careful manner in which he assigned and sent Pilots and Observers and ground of‹cers to unite where they would be most ‹tted by training to serve. —Gorrell’s History of the American Expeditionary Forces Air Service, 1917–1919 America had been resisting joining the ‹ghting in Europe since the start of the Great War. One chief reason is that it was pro‹ting from the war without the risks of being involved in the ‹ghting. As a neutral power, the United States sold munitions and weapons to any government that could pay for them. With the Royal Navy’s blockade of the North Sea, this limited sales to France, Britain, and Russia—and those sales were incredibly pro‹table for many American businesses. While the United States was of‹cially neutral in the early years of the con›ict, it saw no issues with pro‹ting from the bloodshed. The American perspective was easy to understand; the war was seen as a European affair. Its interests were not at risk, so direct intervention on either side of the con›ict was simply not in the interests of the country . Through 1917 the United States had everything to gain and nothing to lose by remaining on the sidelines of the con›ict. Germany was being squeezed by the Royal Navy’s blockade and unleashed a new weapon of terror on the high seas, the submarine or Uboat . Submarine warfare allowed Germany to strike not just at the Royal Navy but at the merchant ships carrying supplies to its enemies. Germany had tried to ‹ght the war using the international laws that governed the sea, giving fair warning to vessels before attacking them, al91 5 lowing crews to be removed before they were sunk, and so on, but Britain leveraged those rules against Germany. Using Q-ships, vessels disguised as neutral merchant ships that lured in U-boats and then sank them with hidden cannons, the Royal Navy struck back at the submarines . Germany’s response was vicious: unrestricted submarine warfare . Rather than give warnings, U-boats would attack ships and transports carrying war supplies for its opponents. An unfortunate by-product of this strategy was the sinking of the Lusitania, which resulted in the deaths of 128 American civilians. Many citizens pressed for the United States to enter the war, but President Woodrow Wilson managed, at least for the short term, to wait out the crisis. The president demanded that Germany return to the rules it had used before, abiding by international law. For a while Germany did, but as the war dragged on it was placed in the position of having to return to unrestricted warfare in order to survive. Even this declaration did not sway U.S. neutrality. German saboteurs conducted terrorist attacks on the U.S. munitions industry on an unprecedented level. The explosion at Black Tom in 1916 in New Jersey blew out windows in Manhattan and damaged the Statue of Liberty. A subsequent attack in Kingsland, New Jersey, days later wiped out a massive arms plant and rail facility. Still the United States did not loosen its grip on neutrality. What tipped the scales was what came to known as the Zimmerman Telegram. Germany had sent a message to Mexico promising ‹nancial and diplomatic support to the country if it would attack the United States and attempt to reclaim Texas and much of the Old West. Pancho Villa, a rebel leader in Mexico, had already crossed the border and raided several American towns, prompting the ill-fated Punitive Expedition led by General John Pershing. The thought that the American borders could potentially be crossed and the continental United States invaded was the proverbial ‹nal straw in holding back restraint. In April of 1917 the United States stumbled into a war that it was ill-prepared to ‹ght. The Wright Brothers ‹rst took to the air in 1903. By 1914 their creation had been turned into a clumsy vehicle for observing enemy troops and spotting for artillery. By 1917 the airplane had emerged as a bomber and pursuit ‹ghter, and its pilots...

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