On the other hand, the U.S. Involvement also helped Britain to win the First World War. There are some sources found on the historylearningsite.co.uk show the Americans aided Britain and France with weapons like machine guns, steel helmets and etc. even though they were neutral at that time. This source is reliable as it is an official website that is designed for education. The source above tells us the British had more weapons as the Americans and the British were trading. As they were trading, the British owed the Americans some money, therefore if the British lost the War, America cannot get the money back, which is also a reason why the U.S. joined the army later on in the War. However this may not be as important as the Germans are already weakened by the blockades may have even lost the war without the Americans helping. But although the German citizens were tired of the War, the British also used up a lot of her soldiers and weapons, while powerful countries like America a produced more weapons, even the steel production alone in the U.S. is three times higher than Germany and Austria (historylearningsite.co.uk). Therefore the U.S. involving in the War while being neutral also played an important role in the WWI.
As the U.S. involving in the War plays an important part for the allies to win, it was also one of the reasons why the U.S. later joined the War. As America was known to have one of the best militaries in the world at that time, they played an important part in the First World War. There are statistics on spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk, a very reliable secondary source as it is used for education, stated the U.S. mobilized 4,355,000 number of soldiers in the First World War. Meaning the U.S. gave a lot of help to the allies. However, this may not be the most important reason for the allies to win as there are other countries like Serbia and Belgium that helped the allies in the First World War, mobilizing more than a 1,000,000 soldiers to fight. But this does not really show the Americans were not important because as the allies are weakened by the war of attrition and the Russians had quit the war. When the Americans join, it strengthens the allies power and therefore make them win the War easier.
The reasons above are reasons of the advantages of the allies. The problems the Central Powers face could also be a huge reason why they lost the War. One of the major mistakes the Germans made was to use the Schlieffen’s plan. The Schlieffen’s plan is basically a plan that puts 90% of the resources and soldiers to the West side to attack France, through Belgium, while leaving 10% of its military sources in the east, as Russians were not expected to mobilize quickly. The plan was planned to succeed in six weeks time, making a rapid victory. However, the plan was not successful as they took an unexpectedly long time to fight the Belgians while the Russians mobilized quicker than they thought. This is one of the major reasons why trench warfare started. As trench warfare started, they lost a lot of resources as they fight a trench war. According to a powerpoint made by , the Germans almost lost 500,000 soldiers in the Battle of the Somme alone, showing that a major battle like this already killed a lot of its men, showing the Germans had lost a humungous amount of men in this War. This is a reliable source because it is used by a lot of teachers for education. But building trenches can also be viewed as an advantage as from a primary source found on spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk, a reliable educational website, states that general Haig observed the German trenches and it tells us that the Germans have defences like “lines of deep trenches”, “bomb-proof shelters” and a lot more things that are more advanced than the English, even the general described it as having a “formidable character”. This infers the fact the German trenches were better than the allies trenches, therefore taking an advantage for the Germans to win. However, this does not show the Germans have a full advantage as the Germans were not as powerful as Britain at that time while the Blockades had cut out a lot of its resources, meaning the Germans will be weaker and may not be able to handle a long-lasting battle that required a huge amount of resources. Therefore the failure of the Schlieffen’s plan had caused trench warfare that made the Germans lose the WWI.
During trench warfares in WWI, there were some really important battles that made the allies lose the war. The Battle of the Somme would be a very good example. As mentioned above, the battle killed almost 500,000 soldiers. Because of the fact that they took a lot of damage, the Somme was also known as the “muddy grave of the German field army”. This quote was found from the , a reliable source of information as the information was written by military history experts. This quote works like a metaphor as it compares a “muddy grave” to the situation, meaning the death numbers were really high as it states it was the entire army’s grave. But, losing one battle may not be a very important reason for losing the entire war. Just like a tennis game, losing one point does not mean you lose the game, there are chances to catch up. But this really had a huge impact on the German army because it made them lose their hope to win the War, meaning it has a long-term effect on the soldiers and this will possibly make the Germans lose many battles.
These are all very important reasons for why the Allies won the war, each of these reasons do make a huge difference. From these reasons above, the Blockades were probably the most important reason of all because fighting a war of attrition like this do require a huge amount of resources. Not only the blockades starved the people back in the German home front, it also reduced the amount of resources that can be used in the trenches. Meaning the Blockades affected a wide range of areas. To conclude, out of all these reasons above, the most important reason of the allies winning the WWI was because of the British naval blockades.
