The Doughboys

Some young men signed up to fight in the first World War because of family military traditions and community expectations. Others were bored and saw no prospects around them at the moment. These men were asked to join a crusade and “make the world safe for democracy.” These new soldiers underwent lots of training to prepare them for this war. They learned to march, build trenches,  and fight other soldiers. The belief that their country came before self-protection was deeply ingrained through this training as well. Overall, the training provided them with the basics of “modern soldiering.”

The European allies wanted to take the US soldiers and break them up within the European armies. They wanted American soldiers to fight as part of their own armies. General Pershing opposed this, and wanted his men to fight as their own entity. If his men couldn’t stop the German assault, the war would end badly.

World War I veterans say that they didn’t know if they were going to be alive or dead the next day, so they adopted a “fatalistic attitude.” Of killing other men, one veteran said that you didn’t think about whether he was someone’s father or son; this was your job and it was what you were trained to do. Towards the end of the war, soldiers became conservative in their actions. If the war was going to end soon, why go “over the top” into No Man’s Land and risk being killed? No one wanted to be the soldier who was killed right before the war ended.

After the war ended, there was a sense of disillusionment among the soldiers. They questioned what their and their peers’ sacrifices had been for. One veteran just blatantly said that war is stupid. He felt that people should discuss problems reasonably, “give and take a little”, and come to an agreement.