"Sir Julian Byng, the Canadian Corps commander from 1915 to 1917, groomed Currie as his replacement. When Byng was promoted to army command after his Canadians had successfully stormed Vimy Ridge in April 1917, Currie was appointed in June to head the Canadian Corps. The first and only Canadian soldier to occupy the post, Currie proved an excellent corps commander. His willingness to demand more guns or preparation time prior to major assaults saved Allied lives and enhanced the prospects for success. Under Currie’s leadership, the Canadians cemented their reputation as an elite assault formation, with an unbroken string of major victories in 1917-1918 that included Hill 70, Passchendaele, Amiens, Arras, and the Canal du Nord. He is widely considered to have been among the finest generals of the war."

There's forgetting, and then there's not knowing.

LL&P

I watched a documentary on one small village in France’s devotion to caring for the graves of the American soldiers that died to win the villagers their freedom. It brought me to tears to see the care and honor that they show our fallen even after all these many years! It was humbling to realize we do not honor our own heroes as well as they do ours!

But my point was that most Americans thought we fought the war to prevent Germany from taking over Europe and threatening with autocracy and aggressive war the vaguely liberal democratic order that had been worked out in the Atlantic area over the previous century. Ending colonialism, and Eastern empires, and the use of area bombing on cities, was not on the minds of anyone outside of Washington or New York.

Given why they thought their sons had died in France, most Americans definitely noticed that twenty years later we and our Great War allies were faced with the threat of Germany taking over Europe and threatening, etc., AGAIN.

All in response to Chris' comment that, world history be damned, US history reckons the first war as being a bit of a dud, glamor and glory wise.

I would point out that this idea of personal interpretation is a recent reinterpretation by the US Supreme Court, and that the Court's interpretation is under nearly constant sniping from members of Congress who apparently have both too much time AND money AND American Pie :) on their hands.

Customs and regulations regarding the US flag were originally practical in nature. The flag was used to identify US Government property or manpower at a distance. The Post Office. A warship. A formation of soldiers. An airship or airplane. Flying it on civilian property or civilians was a form of misinformation. The US military had the prerogative of misidentifying US property under some circumstances (like flying a false flag on a warship) but this was considered bad form by civilians. If your house is not the Post Office, please don't fly the US flag...it might confuse people.

This was this basically the situation in 1942, when my father learned his flag etiquette during what was probably a VERY slow day at Stanton Military Academy. This why my family never, ever, flew the flag on our property, even on the 4th of July! We draped red white and blue bunting instead, because that would not violate military courtesy. My father also had problems with presidential salutes because the President, while commander in chief, was not in uniform. I'm not sure how solid my father's ground was on this point of military etiquette, but I guess he felt it payed to be cautious.

"How can you feel good remembering a patriotic American boy shipping off to France to fight the Hun, knowing his final sacrifice had zero effect in history?"

Actually World War I changed history in a lot of profound ways. Some of which would not have happened if the Central Powers and not the allies had won the war. To name just a few:

1) The German, Russian, Austro-Hungarian, and Turkish empires all collapsed and disappeared. It was the start of the end of colonialism too.

2) The horrors of trench warfare, the widespread use of chemical weapons and poison gas, the development of tanks and machine guns, of bombing people from the air using airplanes, etc.

3) All led directly to the update of the Geneva convention. First adopted in 1864, and then revised in 1929 and again in 1949. Something which would not have happened if the Allies had not been the winners. All our ideas of innocent civilian populations, of striking only purely military targets, of minimizing collateral damage to the greatest extent possible, of the very notion of how to conduct warfare, stems from the Allied victory and the attempt to adopt at least some moral standards in regard to warfare.

4) America became creditor to the world, especially to the devastated European nations, and therefore the leading industrial power for the next century. Again something not likely if Germany had won.

It wasn't just thousands of soldiers who died...roughly 675,000 US civilians died of the 1918 flu pandemic. The event was so swift and traumatic that it was largely suppressed from collective memory. My grandmother told my mother of seeing pine box coffins stacked up on the sidewalks of NY city.

General Pershing's approach to war was basically a revamp of US Civil War operational doctrine. Pershing's doctrine fell apart during the Argonne Offensive and so did Pershing - who handed direct control of the battle to General Hunter Liggett, who willing to learn from the British and French.

The most important contributions the United States made to Allied Cause in WWI were loans, manufacturing and shipping. The latter two were financed by the former. WWI created an economic boom in the United States that lasted into the 1920's. Cultural reference: Oliver "Daddy" Warbucks of Little Orphan Annie fame made his money during WW1.

Since we are only allowed one reference, I nominate the excellent PBS documentary:

https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/great-war/

http://www.phosphorart.com/wp-content/uploads/piecannon.jpg

the only canon for most politicians is winning elections. the only cannon in star trek shoots photon torpedoes.

JL

In short, did we WIN the Great War? It seemed so on Armistice Day, but by September 1939 it was clear that the now 'First' World War had failed to 'end all wars', and had really just been the first active phase of a new European Thirty Years War. How can you feel good remembering a patriotic American boy shipping off to France to fight the Hun, knowing his final sacrifice had zero effect in history?

Second, did WE win the Great War? As most people know who know the war at all, the American Army was inserted into the Western Front like a widget. We joined the British and French in a muddy killing machine that had been going on for over three years. The Americans operated separately, refusing to be treated as replacements who could be sent piecemeal to shore up depleted French and British units. But we still followed the plans of French General Foch, the Allied commander. He said fight at Meuse-Argonne, we fought at Meuse-Argonne. So did America 'win the war' the way the Union did in the Civil War, or the American Army did in Europe and the Pacific in WW II (apologies to the Red Army at this point)? Not really - most historians I've read agree that the American contribution was good but not great, due to lack of numbers and equipment. 1919 is when D-Day would have been anticipated: a vastly larger fresh American Army had every intention of marching on Berlin itself that year. That never happened, and on Armistice Day, America was (in military, not moral, diplomatic, or financial terms) just a junior partner in the so-called victory.

And so we don't remember the battles, the heroes, or the lost veterans of that Great War, at least not in the way we do with our two really 'good wars', the Civil War and WW II. They didn't really win, and to the degree that they won in an immediate sense, they won by helping the big boys close the match.

As to your final point: Trump has broken so many norms that one wonders whether the Republican party has been taken over by nihilists. Apart from tax cuts for the rich, is there anything left of GOP ideology?

Seriously, Paramount and CBS have preserved more of Star Trek's legacy than Trump has of GOP dogma. In ST world, the fans are in revolt, demanding a re-merger of the franchise. When will Republicans revolt? Will they ever?

Who's more loyal to their cannon, Republicans or Trekkies? At this moment, the convention-goers have it all over the nihilists.

https://www.speedguide.net/forums/showthread.php?8612-poem&p=94677