Friday, September 23, 2016

Armistice: Wilson vs Pershing

In a country like the United States, where the Constitution states that the President is the commander in chief of the armed forces but that person is by definition a civilian, conflicts can arise between members of the military and the President. The disagreement between President Harry S. Truman and General Douglas Macarthur during the Korean War is probably the most famous. A less known dispute emerged between President Woodrow Wilson and General John J. Pershing, commander of the American Expeditionary Force in World War I, over the issue of whether to grant an armistice to Germany. Ultimately, the harsh terms of the armistice dictated by the Allies demonstrate the resolution of this conflict.
In October 1918, the Germans approached President Wilson to negotiate an armistice based on the latter's Fourteen Points. Three weeks later, at Senlis in northern France, General Pershing attended a meeting where the terms of the armistice were discussed. At that meeting, Pershing expressed the opinion that the terms of any armistice should render unable to fight again should the armistice fail. These terms included, among others, the vacation of occupied territory, including Alsace-Lorraine, Allied occupation of the Rhineland, the return of French and Belgian railroad equipment, and the surrender of all submarines to a neutral power. These terms were, according to historian Bullitt Lowry, less harsh than France's ideas and more harsh than those of the United Kingdom.[1]
Wilson, however, worried that terms dictated by the military would be overly harsh. Two days after the Senlis conference, Wilson sent a telegram to Pershing explicitly disagreeing with the latter's ideas, arguing that only the demand that Germany vacate occupied territory was reasonable, and even then, Germany would only have to surrender some of its weapons.[2] According to Lowry, of the several ways in which Pershing could have responded to the telegram, he chose an action that "would allow him to seek harsh terms but which would not leave him open to charges of direct disobedience … He suddenly opposed granting any armistice at all."[3]
To express this new viewpoint, Pershing sent a letter on October 30 to the Supreme War Council of the Allies. In 13 numbered points, Pershing argues against the armistice. For instance, after surveying the man- and firepower of the respective sides, he writes, "An armistice would revivify the low spirits of the German army and enable it to organize and resist later on and would deprive the Allies of the full measure of victory by failing to press their present advantage to its complete military end."[4] In addition, he makes it clear that only surrender is acceptable: "A cessation of hostilities short of capitulation postpones, if it does not render impossible, the imposition of satisfactory peace terms, because it would allow Germany to withdraw her army with its present strength, ready to resume hostilities if terms were not satisfactory to her."[5] He closes the letter by calling for "unconditional surrender."[6]
Two competing interpretations exist for Pershing's writing of the letter. For his part, Lowry argues that the letter was a feigned statement of positions designed to assure that the armistice that did emerge would contain terms as harsh as he had recommended at Senlis. "[T]he evidence," Lowry writes, "indicates that Pershing did not resist granting an armistice; he only resisted granting a lenient one."[7] He justifies this position on the basis of an absence of significant influence on Pershing to change his position between the Senlis conference and his receipt of Wilson's telegram.[8]
In contrast, Lowry's sometime colleague at the University of North Texas, Frank E. Vandiver, argues that there was a significant incident in the four days between Senlis and the telegram: specifically, according to Vandiver, Pershing spent those days sick with the flu, which caused him to be out of the loop. Moreover, Vandiver continues, because another telegram received by Pershing over this period, from Secretary of War Newton D. Baker, requested Pershing's continued input into the armistice process, resulting in a simple misunderstanding. Vandiver writes, "Pershing took this to mean that he could express his ideas to the Supreme War Council; Baker and Wilson meant it as a courteous invitation to private correspondence with them."[9]
Whether the letter was a deliberate tactic or a mistake, its influence on the final terms of the armistice are undeniable. For instance, in the clauses regarding the western front, the document reads, "Immediate evacuation of invaded countries: Belgium, France, Alsace-Lorraine, Luxemburg, so ordered as to be completed within fourteen days from the signature of the armistice.[10] In addition, clauses five and nine, respectively, require evacuation of the Rhineland and Allied military occupation thereof (albeit excluding Alsace-Lorraine). Finally, clause four demands the surrender of significant numbers of Germany's guns: 2,500 heavy guns, 2,500 field guns, and 25,000 machine guns.[11] -- a number greater than Pershing states in his first point that Germany has overall.[12]
In the end, Wilson, not Pershing, negotiated the armistice, but the terms were largely Pershing's. Thus did the roles of the president and military remain separate. As commander-in-chief and head of the cabinet, Wilson maintained the prerogative to make the final decisions about the terms of the armistice. However, because of his trust of the military to understand matters on the ground better than he, Wilson took Pershing's suggestions seriously, as a President should of his military leaders. In this manner, the distinct leadership roles of both men were honored.


[1] Bullitt Lowry, "Pershing and the Armistice," Journal of American History 55, no. 2 (Sept. 1968): 282-83
[2] Ibid, 283-84.
[3] Ibid, 285.
[4] John J. Pershing, Commander of the American Expeditionary Force, to the Allied Supreme War Council, October 28, 1918. United States Department of State Office of the Historian. Accessed September 7, 2016, https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1914-20v02/d124, point 6.
[5] Ibid, point 9.
[6] Ibid, point 13.
[7] Lowry, ibid, 287,
[8] Ibid, 285.
[9] Frank E Vandiver, "Commander-in-Chief-Commander Relationships: Wilson and Pershing," Rice University Studies 57, no. 1 (1971):
[10] "Allied Armistice Terms with Germany," firstworldwar.com, accessed September 7, 2016, http://www.firstworldwar.com/source/armisticeterms.htm, I.ii.
[11] Ibid, I.iv, v, ix.
[12] Pershing, ibid, point 1.

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