How World War I Impacted America and the Impact of the Influenza Outbreak of 1918 - Essay Example

Discussions Discuss World War I and How This War Impacted America. Did it Change the World Forever? World War One, often dubbed “the Great War”, is generally considered a Europe-centered global conflict that involved several theatres of military operations. According to Strachan (1998), the fighting on land had been largely confined to Europe, the Middle East, and some parts of Africa, along with isolated episodes in central Asia and the Far East. Having become as the “third Balkan war”, the conflict developed into a major war in Europe, with inter-continental implications (Strachan, 1998, p.2). The latter stemmed from Europe’s global dominance – whether understood in terms of economic leadership or an imperial spread – and were manifested in a major shift in the “center of gravity of world politics and economics across the Atlantic to the United States” (Herring, 2008, p.2). The American involvement in the war is considered the result of several important factors, as follows – first and foremost, here should be mentioned the distinctive pro-American British policy and American elite’s pro-British sympathies, which became a reality after the “Great Rapprochement” between Britain and the US in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Buchanan, 1999, pp.193-5). Second, the widespread American dislike of militaristic Germany was “strengthened by the British propaganda”; while Americans generally sympathized with France, believing they owed it a debt (Buchanan, 1999, p.196). The immediate motive behind America’s entry into the war was the sinking of the Lusitania on May 7, 1915 (Buchanan, 1999). However, financial and commercial interests certainly stuck out – by the time of American entry into the war, US banks extended over 2 billion dollars to the Allies (Buchanan, 1999). Consequently, despite the relatively modest contribution to victory on the western front – during the hardest fighting of the war in 1918, the American Expeditionary Force captured 43 300 prisoners and some 1 400 guns – the US received recognition of their power, mainly due to their economic might, as well as the prestige and popularity of Woodrow Wilson (Strachan, 1998). Thus, the final stage of the World War One witnessed the “official” admission of the US status of a great power – to the degree that Wilson was confident enough to pronounce his famous fourteen-point vision of the post-Great War world (Schmidt, 2005). References Buchanan, Patrick J. (1999). A Republic, Not an Empire, Washington, DC: Regnery Publishing, Inc. Herring, George C. (2008). From Colony to Superpower: US Foreign Relations since 1776, New York: Oxford University Press, Inc. Strachan, Hew. (1998). Introduction. In H. Strachan (Ed.), The Oxford Illustrated History of the First World War. Oxford: Oxford University Press Discuss the Impact of the Influenza Outbreak of 1918. Could it Happen Again? The so-called “Spanish” influenza pandemic of 1918-1919 is believed to have affected nearly one third of the world’s population – about 500 million people – with over 50 million deaths worldwide (Taubenberger and Morens, 2006). According to Taubenberger and Morens (2006), many questions concerning its origins, epidemiologic features and “the basis of its pathogenicity remain unanswered” (p.15). As for the beginning of the pandemic in the US, Barry (2005) points out that several soldiers, who have been transferred from Haskell County, Kansas, to Camp Funston between 28 February and 2 March, appeared the initial influenza carriers; the camp hospital, according to Barry (2005), “first began receiving soldiers with influenza on March 4, which timing actually fitted the incubation period of the disease (p.169). On the other hand, far too many – or as Barry writes, “a river of soldiers” – moved between Camp Funston and other army bases, most notably in France (2005, p.169); however, two weeks after the first case in Funston, other cases appeared at Camp Forrest and Greenleaf in Georgia (Barry, 2005). In total, two-thirds of the largest army camps experienced the influenza symptoms, along with thirty of the fifty largest cities in the country, most of which adjacent to military facilities (Barry, 2005). While before and after 1918 most influenza pandemics originated in Asia, it was not the case of 1918 pandemic; it spread almost simultaneously across North America, Europe, and Asia in three distinct waves during a twelve-month period (Taubenberger and Morens, 2006). The first outbreaks of influenza in Europe were observed in Brest where American troops disembarked in early April, 1918; the disease struck Paris in late April, and reached Italy (Barry, 2005). After the first cases in the British army occurred in mid-April, the disease exploded (Barry, 2005). Apart from the exceptional severity of the pandemic, its impact was not limited to the period between 1918 and 1919; according to the scientists, almost all cases of influenza worldwide have been caused by descendants of the 1918 virus (Taubenberger and Morens, 2006). On the other hand, since the 1918 pandemic affected all belligerent countries in the Great War, it could be thought to have contributed to the end of the war. The pandemic also appeared a great impetus to the medicine insofar as influenza dominated the agenda of all medical and public organizations in the US. Given the globalization nowadays, it’s easy to presume that such pandemics could occur once again, although different in degree and consequences. References Barry, John M. (2005). The Great Influenza: The Story of the Deadliest Pandemic in History. London: Penguin Books Ltd Taubenberger, Jeffery K. and David M. Morens. (January 2006). 1918 Influenza: the Mother of All Pandemics. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 12 (1) Retrieved from http://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/12/1/pdfs/05-0979.pdf Discuss the Reasons Why the Stock Market Collapsed in 1929. The causes of the Stock Market Crash in 1929 could be sought in the very nature of the economic system – there were a number of crises across the industrial countries, which followed periods of relative growth and prosperity. Among the specific reasons should be mentioned the overvalued stock prices due to “ongoing bull market” – throughout the 1920s, there had been an upward spiral in stock prices and overspeculation – as against the slowdown in the textile, coal and farming industries (Lange, 2007, pp.20-21). The decline in the construction industry, along with other signs such as the reduced consumption of various commodities, signaled that the supply exceeded the demand – in fact one of the major drives behind the 1929 collapse (Lange, 2007). In a nutshell, a combination of factors, like the war-time overproduction, overspeculation, increase in stock prices, improvements in manufacturing, increase in loans, and a number of government policies, etc. contributed to the market’s sudden downturn (Lange, 2007; Beaudreau, 2005). The market crash of 1929, in turn, triggered, or, to be precise, joined other factors in triggering the Great Depression – “a decade-long period of economic downturn that affected virtually every resident of the United States” (Lange, 2007, p.21). References Beaudreau, Bernard C. (2005). How the Republicans Caused the Stock Market Crash of 1929: GPT’s, Failed Transitions, and Commercial Policy. Lincoln, NE: iUniverse Lange, B. (2007). The Stock Market Crash of 1929: The End of Prosperity. New York: Chelsea House Discuss the Impact of Seabiscuit on America. Having become the epitome of success – the story was often described as “amazing” (McEvoy, 2003) – the legend of Seabiscuit actually was believed to denote the recovery of America after the shock of the Great Depression. Just as the horse recovered from the injury – since many predicted it will not allow the horse to race again – against all expectations (Hillenbrand, 2001), it came to inspire Americans that their country would recover from the economic woes of the depression. References Hillenbrand, L. (2001). Seabiscuit: An American Legend. Toronto: Random House, Inc. McEvoy, J. (Ed). (2003). The Seabiscuit Story: From the Pages of the Nation’s Most Prominent Racing Magazine. Lexington, KY: Blood-Horse Publications Read More