The Zimmermann Telegram: a failure of American scholarship Part 1

 

The Zimmermann Telegram: a failure of American scholarship

Part 1

 

Introduction

  1. The Zimmermann Telegram was a telegram which in January 1917 was sent by the German Foreign Minister, Arthur Zimmermann, to the German ambassador in Mexico. As set out below the telegram offered German financial support for a Mexican attack on the United States of America, to regain its lost territories.  Also referred to is the possible involvement of the Japanese.

 

  1. This affair has been the subject of two books, Barbara Tuchman’s, The Zimmermann Telegram published in 1959 and Thomas Bogart’s The Zimmermann telegram: intelligence diplomacy and America’s Entry into World War I published in 2012. The central thesis put forward here, which in this first part focuses on Tuchman’s book, is that both these works are ideologically interventionist and that the writer’s political agendas blind them to obvious inconsistencies inherent in the affair. Of the two Tuchman is by far the most crass. In a work hailed at the time as ‘an obeiance to evidence’ by the New York Times she falsifies, by truncation, the telegram itself in order to support her analysis. This outright re-writing of history is but the worst of many distortions that typify a piece of propaganda that is almost Stalinist in its crudity but which is still today recommended reading and described as a ‘classic’.

 

  1. Bogart’s work is far less blatant and appears to be more of a work of history than a polemic.  However Bogart’s militarist, rather than liberal, interventionism position blinds him to the obvious inconsistencies inherent in the affair and particularly to the possibility that the telegram was not deciphered, in a triumph of illegal surveillance as is officially claimed, but was always intended to be publicised.

 

  1. Tuchman’s book, the accepted historical account from 1959 to 2012, is oblivious to the fact that it was impossible for the alliance, suggested by Zimmermann in his telegram, to be realised and so does not raise the question: why was the telegram sent? Despite widespread belief that the telegram was an invention of British propaganda, particularly by the highly influential Hearst press, Zimmermann publicly admitted sending the telegram, and this at a time when American intervention in World War I hung in the balance. This hugely significant facet of an affair, which can only be described as bizarre, Tuchman utterly fails to engage with. As Tuchman’s work is at such divergence with reality this essay commences with setting out the issues inherent in the affair and then embarks on a critique of Tuchman’s book.

 

The Telegram

 

  1. On 11 January 1917 the German Foreign Minister, Arthur Zimmermann, sent a telegram to the German ambassador in Mexico which stated:

 

https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/zimmermann/

 

Timeline

11 January 1917 Zimmermann telegram sent to German Embassy in Mexico

telegram handed to Pres of Mexico by German ambassador

I February 1917 Germany resumed unrestricted U boat attacks

3 February US breaks of diplomatic ties with Germany

publication of the telegram

arming of merchant ships H rep 64 cong2 sess 1/3/17 54 ;4593

3 & 29 March 1917 Zimmermann states publicly that telegram sent by him

9 March US Executive order arming merchant ships

2 April 1917 US Pres Woodrow Wilson seeks congressional support for declaration of war on Germany

6 April 1917 US declares war on Germany

 

 

Background – the German military situation

 

  1. By late 1916 the British blockade was throttling Germany and the poor were beginning to starve. On the Western front the Entente was getting the upper hand, British invention of the tank and Monash’s Australian troops’ tactics gaining ground in the trenches. To have any hope of a negotiated peace, let alone victory it was crucial for the Germans that the Americans were kept out of the conflict, which conversely the British were doing everything they could to achieve.

 

  1. The prime strategic consideration of keeping America from siding with Britain was directly at odds with the prime strategic objective of counter blockading Britain by means of the U-boat. The U-boat blockade, entailing attacks on American shipping and American civilian casualties, was highly controversial and a rich source of British propaganda against the Germans. When the Americans had threatened that this issue could bring them into the war, after the sinking of the Lusitania, Germany had limited its U-boat campaign. By late 1916 Germany’s ability to wage war was so reduced that unlimited attacks on shipping was seen by the German military as the only way to knock Britain out of the war and so prevent defeat.

 

 

 

Analysis

 

  1. The telegram begins with informing that Germany intends unrestricted submarine warfare as of 1 February 1917. It says Germany will endeavour to keep the US neutral but in the event that this is not successful it proposes a military alliance by which Germany will provide “generous financial support” on the basis that Mexico “is to reconquer their lost territory in Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona”, “settlement in detail” being left to Mexico.

 

  1. The question must be what financial support could the Germans have offered which would enabled Mexico to defeat America and take back these territories. To be able to do so Germany, with its armies bogged down in a stalemate on the Western Front and grinding away on the Eastern Front, blockaded, now chancing desperate moves to avoid defeat, would have to simultaneously provide “financial support” at least equivalent to that of America, the greatest economic power of the time. In addition it is at this time that Zimmerman and the German military were in the process of adopting Israel Helphand’s plan to fund the Russian Bolsheviks, ultimately to the tune of 50 million Gold Marks. The answer must be that there was not the slightest possibility that Germany could have offered financial support to the Mexicans in the magnitude required and that Zimmerman knew this at the time.

 

  1. On receipt of the telegram the Mexican president Carrenza set up a military commission to consider the offer. One wonders why he didn’t reject it out of hand as being plain crazy but we must be grateful to him as the Commission’s findings are a primary resource of the first order and a welcome expression of common sense in what is otherwise an illogical and incoherent landscape. It should be noted that Tuchman does not reference or cite in any way this core historical document. The Commission of course rejected the alliance on every ground. In regard to the offer of financial support it noted that the Germans had not even been able to provide the gold necessary for the establishment of a Mexican national bank.

 

  1. The next oddity stated in the telegram is that the above message was to be given to the Mexican president when the German ambassador in Mexico “is certain” that America is about to enter the war against Germany. This is an incredibly heavy responsibility to place on a person in what would not be thought of as being in a top level diplomatic post. So the German ambassador in Mexico was being asked to commit his country to a military alliance against the most powerful nation in the world, when he thought the time was right? This cannot be right and in fact was not what happened, the Telegram was merely passed on directly to the Mexican president on receipt.

 

  1. The telegram goes on to say to the German ambassador:

 

“add the suggestion that he [the Mexican President] should, on his own initiative, invite Japan to immediate adherence and at the same time mediate between Japan and ourselves”

 

  1. It is Tuchman’s core proposition that the real and substantial threat to America, inherent in the telegram, was the threat from Japan. When looked at closely this is completely illusory. If we take the first line of the above extract it is of course a logical impossibility that the Mexican president could do something on his own initiative, when this is being suggested to him by another. What is being asked is that the Mexican president engage in subterfuge, intended to conceal the fact that Germany is the instigator of this proposed alliance.

 

  1. In the context that Germany is about to recommence unrestricted U-boat warfare with the very likely result that America will forthwith declare war on Germany, it is not at all clear why this subterfuge is necessary. In regard to Zimmermann’s attitude in a somewhat similar situation, the sinking of the Lusitania  Boghardt relates the following exchange between Zimmermann and a journalist in which  Zimmermann “remarked cheerfully”:

 

“Now, this will have quite an effect! The hatred towards us can’t possibly increase, they will always hate us, but in this situation the only thing we can do is lash out at all sides, we have no room for any consideration whatsoever”.[1]

 

  1. Leaving aside the claim that these words are spoken “cheerfully”, if this is Zimmermann’s attitude at the time of the Lusitania, then why is he taking such care to keep secret Germany’s involvement in the purported alliance. These matters are not being shouted from the rooftops and the Japanese are being invited to immediately enter mediations with Germany, which is clearly the major party. It follows that there is no reason for this subterfuge.

 

  1. The issue of Japanese involvement raises an enormous problem for the proposition that the telegram was intended for the purpose it claimed and that is the problem of time. The telegram was sent on 11 January 1917. Zimmermann knew that Germany would recommence unrestricted U-boat attacks on 1 February 1917. He knew that as Germany had restricted its attacks on neutral and specifically American shipping because America had threatened to enter the war, that renewal of unrestricted attacks will probably bring America into the war. To prevent this, any attack on America by a third party such as Mexico, should be made before America declared war on Germany. America declared war on 6 April 1917. Realistically then there were about three months in which to launch the attack. If the Japanese have not yet been invited to join this alliance and nor had they previously been engaged in discussions, then there had been no planning or preparation by them and if they were only being invited subsequent to Mexican agreement then not enough time to do so.

 

  1. The part the Mexicans were called upon to play was to invade America with the intention of retaking of its lost provinces. On their own the only response that the Mexicans could realistically expect from America was for Mexico to go the way of the lost provinces and be wiped off the map. The only way that such a response could possibly be avoided would be for the Mexicans to receive military support on a massive scale, and this just to avoid total defeat, still more would be required to actually achieve the outcomes sought.

 

  1. To provide such military support Japan would have to do three things. It would have to raise a large army. As the Americans raised a force of approximately 2.8 million men for the war in Europe and as it could not be argued that the Americans would expend less effort defending their own soil, the force the Japanese would have to have raised would be of the same order. Japan would then have to be ready to transport this enormous military force across the Pacific and be able to supply it. At some point the Japanese would have to destroy the larger American Pacific Fleet. It would then have to be be able to maintain and supply this huge force on continental America and be able to repel counter attack by the American Atlantic Fleet and the British Navy.

 

  1. This run down does not even consider the difficulties in deploying and forward supplying these forces in an area with limited communications infrastructure. There are immense logistical and planning preparations that are absolutely necessary for any such plan to become a reality, we are talking many months if not years. By comparison America declared war on Germany on 6 April 1917 but it was not until 1918 that the Americans began landing substantial forces in Europe.

 

  1. Such an undertaking must be contrasted with Japan’s effort in World War II. Then, faced with the existential threat of the American oil embargo, the high point of the Japanese effort vis-a-vis ‘Continental’ America, was to junk some obsolete battleships in Pearl Harbour and provide the Americans with an excuse for going to war with Germany. It is true that the Japanese did manage to extend the scope of their atrocities beyond Korea and China for a while but after the battle of Midway in June 1942 the threat to America was so insubstantial that American forces were concentrated on Europe. Importantly this later period is the dawn of the power of the aircraft carrier and in this development Japan ranked second in the world, behind America. The period at issue is the era of the dreadnought and here the British Navy was pre-eminent.

 

  1. It is correct that an attack could have been launched after America entered the war, obviating the necessity of prior planning and mobilisation. The difficulty here is the advantage a surprise attack would have had, as isolationist America had a small standing army and some initial success might have been hoped for. Once America declared war it began mobilising its enormous forces, forces large enough to contend with anything that Japan could put in the field, without significantly detracting from the forces it committed to Europe, as it did in World War II.

 

  1. All this does not even take account of the fact that at this time the Japanese were a British ally and a contingent of their Navy was engaged in the Mediterranean, in action against the Austrian fleet.

 

  1. A possible interpretation is that the words ‘invite Japan to immediate adherence” conveys that the Japanese were already on board the alliance with Germany and was only awaiting Mexico’s agreement. The proposition of prior Japanese involvement raises a fundamental problem. There is not a single shred of evidence in any archive document, memoir or biography of what would had to have been an enormous amount of military planning and mobilisation on the part of the Japanese. The single most important factor which counts against there being any treaty between Germany and Japan, agreeing to a joint attack on the US, is the absence of any record which indicates that this existed. While it is highly improbable that all records of any such agreement have been lost, it is inconceivable that the Japanese could have engaged in the enormous planning and preparation that an attack on the US would have entailed and there not be a single document left which suggest this. And this after Japan’s unconditional surrender in World War II and American occupation.

 

  1. The possibility of prior Japanese involvement being discounted one must return to a literal interpretation of the telegram and conclude that at the time the telegram was sent there was no Japanese involvement in Zimmermann’s plan. This interpretation is supported by what is an almost fantastical facet of this affair. Prior to the telegram being sent Zimmermann did not consult or have sanction from the government, the Kaiser, or the military high command. Considering that he was apparently attempting to form a military alliance in time of war this is truly incredible.

 

  1. It is also important that during the recriminations by German politicians that followed exposure of the telegram, Zimmermann claimed he was merely acting in accordance with the Kaiser’s policy of forming alliances against the Entente. While policy was discussed there was never any mention of any agreement with Japan still less a treaty.

 

 

Conclusion

 

  1. It follows from the above that:

(a)       it was not possible for Germany to make good the offer of financial support of the magnitude required;

(b)       it is highly unlikely that the timing of the offer would be left to the German ambassador;

(c)        the suggestion that Mexico invite Japan to join in this attack on America, admits of two possibilities. First that prior to the telegram the Germans had come to an understanding with the Japanese but wanted Mexico to broach tripartite negotiations, for no obvious reason. It this was the case then to be an actual strategy, immense planning and mobilisation by the Japanese was required. In the absence of any record of such a huge undertaking this possibility can be discounted. Second if the Japanese were not already on board then there was simply not enough time to mount the invasion prior to American mobilisation and the prospects of success post American mobilisation were minimal.

 

  1. All the above indicates that it could never have been thought by Zimmerman that the telegram could have accomplished what it purported to.  The question then becomes “is this treason or is it stupidity”. Two things point to the former. If one discounts the idea that the telegram intended to put in train a Mexican invasion of America then the only point of the exercise was to threaten the possibility. At best this might have meant the commitment of some US forces to America’s Mexican border. It may have sowed distrust with Japan, which was engaged in an important theatre of the war.

 

  1. The official story is that the telegram was intercepted by British intelligence, illegally, as it was sent via the US ambassador, all German telegram services having being cut by the Entente powers. As such the interception and decoding is held up as an example of the virtue of illegal military action. The point is that you cannot threaten someone if they are not aware of the threat. Looked at this way the alleged interception was intended by Zimmerman, as the only way you can have a secret treaty that becomes public knowledge and hence a threat, is to have it revealed.

 

  1. This theory is reinforced by the fact that a widespread American reaction to the publication of the telegram was one of incredulity. The perfidious nature of British propaganda was well known and the conflict between reality and assumptions made in the telegram were ridiculed, importantly by the enormously influential Hearst press. Despite ‘plausible deniability’ Zimmermann publicly acknowledged responsibility for the telegram, twice. In doing this he must’ve been conscious that he was contributing to his nation’s military defeat, which the Entente had made clear would only be on unconditional surrender.

 

  1. On the other hand some folks do really dumb stuff, although such is not generally expected of Foreign Ministers of major powers. It is possible that Zimmerman thought that the Americans could be threatened because he mistakenly conflated isolationism with weakness, which ironically is the position both Tuchman and Boghart take. It is possible that Zimmermann’s gambit reflected the mindset apparently exemplified in the above comments he made on the sinking of the Lusitania but for myself there is a question mark over the accuracy of that quote as I find it very difficult to equate the words used with the claim that they were cheerfully spoken. It may have been that Zimmerman was certain unrestricted U-boat warfare would bring America into the war and thought it didn’t matter what he did. However the Telegram itself says that he will be doing all he can to keep America neutral, which is what one would think was the German Foreign Minister’s job description.

 

  1. It should be mentioned that in Woodrow Wilson’s speech to Congress seeking that America declare war on Germany, very little mention is made of the Zimmermann telegram and the great bulk of that speech focuses on Germany’s unrestricted submarine warfare. However it could be seen that the effect of the telegram was to attack American isolationism, particularly in Congress, by linking Germany with the spectre of war on American soil.

 

  1. It appears then that the reason why the Telegram was sent and Zimmermann admitted to sending it, was possibly one of the following:

(a) Zimmermann was an incompetent fool who didn’t know what he was doing;

(b) Zimmermann expected the proposed alliance to be revealed and intended for it to operate as a threat rather than a reality. Quite how he thought this would advance German interests is unclear and we probably return to (a) above;

(c) Zimmermann was an incompetent fool who didn’t know what he was doing. He was manipulated by British intelligence into sending the Telegram and the interception story is a myth. This sounds pretty wacky but the cue bono, or ‘who benefits’ approach is often the right one. Certainly the British were the only ones who benefited from the Zimmermann telegram and that the interception was bogus was a widely held view at the time. There is some foundation. Boghart writes that the idea was not Zimmermann’s own[2] and that Zimmermann was a man who was easily manipulated by lobbyists[3]. Unfortunately it is a weakness of Boghart’s work that he does not drill deep enough and we do not learn who these lobbyists were. What cuts against this theory is Zimmermann’s public acceptance he sent the telegram as it is hard to see him as being that stupid.

(d) Zimmermann was a traitor. He was part of a British plot to undermine American isolationism and bring America into the war against Germany.  He sent the telegram knowing it would be revealed and antagonise America. He admitted responsibility for it so as to hasten American involvement in the war and the defeat of Germany.

 

 

 

 

Critique

There are two books which focus on the Zimmermann Telegram, Barbara W Tuchman’s 1959 work, The Zimmermann Telegram and Thomas Boghardt’s 2012 The Zimmermann Telegram: Intelligence, Diplomacy, and America’s entry into World War I.  Taking Tuchmans work first as referred to above it is highly praised.

 

Goodreads describes it as ‘a classic’. Amazon provides a review by the New York Times, which  says”

“A true, lucid thriller . . . a tremendous tale of hushed and unhushed uproars in the linked fields of war and diplomacy . . . Tuchman makes the most of it with a creative writer’s sense of drama and a scholar’s obeisance to the evidence.”

 

The National Archives site relates: The Zimmermann Telegram by Barbara Tuchman recounts that story in all of its exciting detail. It is an excellent historical account for high school students.

 

 

In my view Tuchman’s book is neither thriller or history. It is a mixture of polemic and gossip column that crosses the line to become actual falsification. On page 7 Tuchman sets out part of the telegram. Further down the page she dribbles out another bit, but that is all. What Tuchman deliberately cuts out of the Telegram, and this is 1958 there is no internet to look it up, is this:

add the suggestion that he [the Mexican President] should, on his own initiative, invite Japan to immediate adherence

And why, because the fact that the telegram requests that the Mexican’s “invite” the Japanese contradicts Tuchman central allegation, that the Japanese were “the third Partner” the title of a chapter in her book, and were involved from the beginning.

The mechanism

 

To shore this up theory Tuchman goes back to earlier times focusing on alleged Japanese involvement in Mexico. Of this period she says “there may have been a secret treaty; the archives do not say. But certainly Japan was making common cause with the Mexicans” 34 Tushman does not reference the latter sentence. Nor does she reference the following:

Page 7 “the United States was also exceedingly jumpy about Japan”

Page 9 “aiming straight for Mexico and Japan the two whose long hostility to the United States gave most promise of readiness to jump to the attack”

Page 41 “long predicted war”

“the whole of Europe was expecting war between Japan and America”,

It should be mentioned that Tuchman’s scholarliness doesn’t extend to footnotes, she has endnotes which are not reference in the text the reference being a italicised in the endnote. This makes it very difficult to check her sources but it does make it easy for her to slip in comments that have no foundation.T he index does not contain a reference to Japan

 

Where there are references these are almost exclusively in relation to broad issues such as discrimination against the Japanese in the US and contrary Japanese attitudes against the US. Some are taken from the New York Sun, which Tuchman later relates published a bogus article alleging that there was a photo of a Mexican/Japanese treaty 37. The Sun’s credentials can be gauged by the fact that it claimed the photograph had been taken by America’s ambassador to Mexico, when it was not. The standing of the Sun can be gauged by the fact that the Ambassador did not bother to refute it. In relation to this story Tushman says that it is “irrelevant” 37 whether or not there was a secret treaty. She says what was important was that people thought “there was a possibility of joint Japanese Mexican action” and also that the Germans made themselves “believe in it”. 38 However Tushman’s central thesis is not that the Americans and/or the Germans believed in the possibility of a treaty but that there was one in fact. It is an enormous leap to move from the jockeying of Pacific powers and cultural differences to Japan actually allying with Germany and Mexico with the intention of invading America. Reading Tuchman’s work one would be completely unaware that the Japanese were actually fighting with the Entente in the Mediterranean at the time.

 

This is Tuchman’s approach, ignore the complete lack of documentary evidence, make wildly extravagant statements with no foundation and cobble together undoubted frictions to arrive at the conclusion that Japan was “the third partner” and was about to invade America in 1917.

that there was a treaty with Japan and she titles an entire chapter the third Partner-Japan.

With Japan

55 In regard to Japan’s activity in WWI BT says that at the outset of war Japan “snapped up” German bases and interests in the north eastern Pacific  and that at “that point her active belligerency stopped.” This is incorrect, Japan fielded a naval contingent in the Mediterreanean as stated above.

In the time it took Japan to build three carriers, the U.S. Navy commissioned more than two dozen fleet and light fleet carriers, and numerous escort carriers.[164] By 1942 the United States was already three years into a shipbuilding program mandated by the Second Vinson Act, intended to make the navy larger than all the Axis navies combined, plus the British and French navies, which it was feared might fall into Axis hands.[165]

Ex post facto

What is important here is that in 1941 the America embargos gave Japanese militarists  the choice of abandoning its conquests in China and Korea or going to war to get oil supplies.

MEXICO

 

Tuchman also vastly overstates the threat Mexico was to America. Certainly Mexico harboured resentment over America’s annexation of her provinces but the realities meant there was little she could do about it. Tuchman is not so concerned about realities. On page 7 Tuchman relates that General Pershing’s concurrent campaign involved 12000 men. Boghardt says 4000. Tuchman says they were “deeply engaged”. What they were actually doing was running around in the bush trying and failing to find Pancho Villa. Of more moment than arguably minor inconsistency is the lack of context. America at this time was strongly constitutional and isolationist. As such the military was kept at a minimum. This did not prevent America from fielding 2.8 million men in WWI. Ignoring this Tuchman continually strives to give the impression that the Mexican situation was militarily significant for America and actually wrote that Mexico was “the soft underbelly of the United States”.42 This is crazy stuff. If this was argued today people would laugh at you but leaving the nuclear dimension aside the relative strengths of the two nations is probably pretty much the same for both periods. Arguably the relationship was even more one sided then, the US having recently annexed Texas et al and having such a casual attitude to Mexican sovereignty that it sent General Pershing’s forces charging over the border  in pursuit of Panco Villa.

 

No doubt for the small American military of the time it was but at this time what was significant for the military was not necessarily significant for the nation.

 

Obeisance is high praise indeed for a history that does not list among its sources the Report of the Mexican Military Commission which considered the German offer, one would have thought an important document. Instead of citing this central source and its commonsense conclusions, Tuchman writes as if it didn’t exist saying of the Mexican President Carranza, post publication of the Zimmermann Telegram,  that “ the hullabaloo had scared him off”.195 This is either incompetence or outright dishonesty.

Tuchman’s approach is exemplified in her statement that in relation to the reference in the Telegram to an alliance, “there is nothing in the archive but it could have

As set out above, while that it would be indeed remarkable that not one document, not one memoire is left in existance to evidence the purported treaty discussion, it is impossible that there is absolutely nothing to evidence the enormous work that would have been involved in the planning and preparation of such an enterprise as a Japanese invasion of America. Tuchman makes up for the deficiency with a pistache of rumour and speculation. Some of it is no doubt factual xenophobia, but this has little to do with Japanese intentions and has absolutely no relevance to the theme at issue, which was imminent invasion.

Tuchman’s lack of rigor is exemplified by her use of an incomplete version of the Telegram, which is found at page 7. Tuchman states that this version is incomplete, and adds a bit to it further down the page, obstensibly the latter part having been decoded later but Tuchman never provides the completed version. By this deviousness a number of issues raised above do not come up in Tuchman’s book as they are simply not part of the incomplete factual basis Tuchman utilises. It is easy to make obeisance to the evidence when you have manufactured it.

There are also factual inconsistencies both within the book and between other sources.

At one point she says that 4/5 of the American forces are either engaged

 

The only time Tuchman contradicts the current official version is in her discussion of the mode by which the telegram was said to be intercepted. At page 11 and thereafter she gives the impression that Germany was berefit of cable communications and that it was radio communications that room 40 received its information from:

nothing can stop an enemy from picking wireless messages out of the free air- and nothing did. In England, Room 40 was born.

The only explanation for this is that in the late 50’s the official version was still the cover story. Now, either because Official Secrets Act’s prohibitions no longer or apply, or because it suits the establishment to glorify the illegal interception of other governments communications, we have a new version.

 

 

Tuchman is firmly of the view that American conflict with German was inevitable, but by hastening matters  the “Zimmerman Telegram altered the course of history”. Although she packs on the lard in lauding Woodrow Wilson’s speech urging war she makes no comment on the fact that in that speech Wilson focused almost entirely on Uboat warfare. The Telegram gets a couple of lines. Of the Japanese there is no mention.

It is in the last lines of her book that Tuchamn reveals herself. She says:

 

200 But a pebble can kill a Goliath and this one killed the American illusion that we could go about our business happily separate from other nations. In world affairs it was a German minister’s minor plot. In the lives of the American people it was the end of innocence.

 

Leaving aside Tuchman’s sacrifice of coherence for rhetoric, where she says that this “minor plot” ”altered the course of history”. It becomes clear that Tuchman’s target is isolationism and that her book is not a history or a gossip column but interventionist ideological polemic.

 

One fact that Tuchman does usefully relate was that the Zimmermann Telegram, fraught as it was with the capacity of backfire, was not put in enciphered code 13. Tuchman’s obeisance to evidence doesn’t extend to clarifying this surprising omission.

 

 

It is Tuchman’s gossip column writers addiction to overstatement that mars any slight value her work might have. In writing of Adml Hall, director of British naval intelligence. she actually compares him to God. Recounting the purported cracking of the coded telegram says that Hall held in is hands, “what was that once a deadly peril and a possible miracle”. Hall more than anyone knew Japanese intention, after all the British Admiralty had built up the Japanese Navy in order to attack the Russians. Hall then knew there was no deadly peril.

 

An irritating feature of Tuchman’s writing is that she cannot mention the Russians without insulting them. In regard to the Russians provision to the British of copies of codes obtained from a sunken German ship, the Magdeburg, she says this exhibits “rare good sense” and “even rarer generosity to an ally”. P15 She continually and disparagingly refers to Czar Nicholas, as Nicky, his cousin the Kaiser’s term. Apart from providing German codes which assisted the British, the Russian had no part in the Zimmermann telegram, so why the hostility? Because Tuchman writes at the height of the cold war and her polemic is interventionist. Interestingly for Tuchman it is Russia which is the enemy

37/8 Speaking of the situation in 1911 BT “whether there was ever a secret Japanese treaty with Mexico… is unresolved but irrelevant.” This statement demonstrates that BT was not an historian. She then says “For the purposes of history, what actually happened is less determining of later events than what people think happened.” This commissar’s logic is wrong on a number of levels. First history tries to determine what actually happened because if you don’t know this there is no foundation. Second BT’s touching faith in the ability of the yellow press to speak for the people is misplaced. This form of journalism is not news but entertainment. Some read it as they enjoy the Shock! Horror! but in this period particularly they did not elect their representatives on this basis. Decisions involving the fate of the nation were not made by people running around with their hair on fire but by elected representatives who were generally thinking men. TB 149 Miles

44 blueprint pearl h

There is no reference to isolationism in the index

Thomas Boghardt’s 2012 The Zimmermann Telegram: Intelligence, Diplomacy, and America’s entry into World War I

BOGHART

147In regard to isolationist response B crit BT says of the  177 “pacifist senators” “”Thre was no lack of senior statesmen to thus rush in who were soon to wish they hadn’t” BT Serious mischaracterisation of what occurred

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Frcode breakers in the context of german radio transmission saying:

Nothing can stop

Although I cannot claim to have made an exhaustive study I have found no mention of any of the issues raised in this essay in any of the articles I have looked at on the internet. The only information which raises the possibility of conflict in the official history is the reference in the Wikipedia entry to the Mexican military commission which considered Germany’s offer. This Commission contradicted the viability of the offer made and in making no mention of the Japanese undercuts a crucial component, for if there is no Japanese involvement then the offer is a sham.

There are more detailed official versions of events on behalf of the British and American spy networks but needless to say there is absolutely no reference to these issues.

The British contribution simply crows about the purported interception

The American NSA account is published in its Cryptologic Quarterly This article begins with the statement that:

In 1917, as World War I dragged on in Europe, a neutralist President Wilson and a mostly apathetic public wanted little to do with the European conflict.

This is a complete misrepresentation and falsification of isolationism, such dishonesty being completely in accord with malignancy this agency typifies. There is no point considering the offerings of those who seek to rewrite history as any correlation between what is said and truth is purely accidental, and will probably be omitted in future editions. The one thing that is evident is the NSA’s interest in emphasising the utility in the illegal interception of diplomatic messages.

What all this glorifying of the codebreakers misses is the strang fact that the heroes in room 40 never decode a message to the Japanese which discusses the purported alliance.  And Japan is the key to this as Mexico on its own cannot credibly constitute a threat to America.

 

 

 

As Mr. Boghardt writes, “In other words, the director of naval intelligence had unilaterally made the decision to share a highly sensitive piece of information with a foreign power without proper authorization from his own government.”

The Washington Post wrote Mr. Boghardt’s work is a masterpiece of intelligence writing. By following the hard evidence rather than relying on historical assumptions, he provides an incisive case study on how intelligence can affect national affairs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The issue of time is equally important. For the Germans the best time for any attack was after they were certain the Americans would declare war on them but before any such declaration was made. This meant that if the Mexicans were not to embark on a suicide mission, massive Japanese reinforcement would have to arrive in Mexico within this timeframe. To have even the semblance of reality, planning for such deployment would have to have been commenced months if not years before. In contrast the alliance proposed in the Zimmermann telegram is inchoate. There is no detail as to what level of financial support the Germans were offering and there is a complete absence of any indication that the Japanese were ready, willing and able to land massive forces within 3 months. As set out in the timeline, the telegram was sent on 11 January 1917. The

 

This means we can only conclude that he was just plain stupid or that there are factors/involvements that we do not know about.

And there was no reason consistent with German interest for the telegram to be sent. Beyond that it appears to be a sham.

 

There is not the slightest doubt that Mexico could only court disaster by an attack on America. For there to have been any hope of success, massive military assistance would have had to have been organised and be ready for deployment within the short timeframe allowed. This would be an enormous undertaking and it is inconceivable that Japan could have done so and for there to be no record of it which has ever came to light, not even after its unconditional surrender in 1945 and occupation by the Americans. Conversely it would not have been possible for the Japanese to organise such a deployment between the time of any Mexican agreement and America’s declaration of war on Germany and the German High Command was exactly the sort of body which would know this. These considerations do not even address Japan’s willingness to commit national suicide in support of the Germans or American resistance to any such activities. If this is correct Zimmermann was asking the Mexicans to join an alliance that did not exist.

 

In struggling to find any advantage for Germany arising from the Zimmermann telegram one could possibly say that the best that could be hoped for was that America would divert some of its forces to internal security rather than deployment in Europe. However even this tenuous advantage evaporates when one considers that the primary strategic consideration was to keep America out of the war and therefore any such attempt to divert its forces should have been made after America’s decision to enter the war against Germany. The fact is that even after the purported revelation of these machinations the Americans deployed enough troops in Europe to ensure victory for the Entente.

 

 

 

 

There are two other facets to the telegram which have received little if any attention. First the telegram alludes to Japan as being part of this military alliance. While the Japanese had sent a warship to the area and were fishing around for a naval base in Mexico during this period there is simply no evidence of any agreement between Japan and Germany that can be aligned to the claim made by Zimmermann in the telegram. Japan at this time was in alliance with the British who had just provided the them with the finance and technology to build the fleet which had defeated the Russians in 1905. This means that Zimmermann was inviting the Mexicans to join a military alliance that did not exist.

 

Second the telegram directs the German ambassador in Mexico to make this offer of alliance when he is “certain” that the recommencing of unlimited U-boat action will bring the US into the war.

 

The Japanese Dimension

 

 

What is being proposed here is a military alliance against the US. It is to be suggested to the Mexican president that he, on his own initiative, should invite the Japanese to join the alliance and the same time to mediate between Japan and Germany. Importantly the invitation is to “immediate adherence”. Taking this one piece at a time how can the Mexican president invite the Japanese “on his own initiative” when this is being suggested to him by the Germans? This is either nonsensical or the Mexicans are being asked to a cover story for prior secret agreements between Germany and Japan, by appearing to be the initiator. The latter makes more sense as Germany is the major player here not Mexico and it would be any deal made between Germany and Japan that could possibly entice Japan to enter such an alliance. It should be noted that while the telegram refers to advantages for Mexico in the recovery of its lost provinces, there is no reference to any advantage to Japan. As emphasised above Japan is being invited to “immediate adherence”. Could it be thought that upon a Mexican invitation Japan in 1917 would immediately enter an alliance with Mexico against America, in which Mexico assisted by Germany and Japan would launch military attacks on the US. Still less with no explicit advantage for Japan being referred to. And immediacy is what is being called for as it is the intent of the alliance to prevent the US in engaging its forces in Europe, for the short period it will take for unrestricted U-boat attacks to bring Britain to its knees.  The alliance foreshadowed in the Zimmermann telegram cannot be anything other than a clear intimation to the Mexicans that the Germans had come to an arrangement with the Japanese and that Japan was poised to enter the alliance.

 

Strangely the Japanese role, which would have to be a major component of the alliance proposed by Zimmermann, appears to have received little attention at the time. Woodrow Wilson’s speech to Congress makes no mention of it. In view of the fact that Japan had declared war on Germany and as such was a member of the Entente one would have expected no little outrage in Britain and France but there appears to be a very odd silence at such apparent perfidity. Barbara Tuchman, in her 1959 work, the Zimmermann Telegram’, devotes chapter 4, ‘The Third Partner’ to this issue and makes some further reference to the Japanese at pages 105/6. Tuchman has been praised for writing popular history but it is difficult to determine whether she was writing history or a novel. She makes wild claims such as that “all of Europe was expecting a war between Japan and America “, without a single reference. I cannot claim an encyclopedic knowledge of this period but I do not recall anything which supports such hyperbole. It appears to be ex post facto reasoning but one must be wary of conflating Japan’s position in 1917 with its attack on the US in 1941. In 1917 Japan had a civilian government which looked to Britain as its major partner. It took over 10 years of military government, war in Korea and China and the promise of total collapse following on from America’s oil embargo for Japan to launch its suicidal attack on the US.

 

 

If we adopt the analysis set out above, that there was no prior Japanese involvement, the problem of time again arises. If military planning was to take place alongside the proposed mediation between the parties, there was simply not enough time to organise the forces required.

 

These considerations strongly suggest that the Zimmermann Telegram could not have achieved the objectives it sought. If the Telegram could not possibly achieve the objectives it sought then one must look for other reasons why was sent. Such reasons might include:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Zimmermann and the Bolsheviks

 

For the German High Command the issue of American involvement in WWI is closely related to the war with Russia. War on two fronts was anathema to the Germans and impossible if the Americans were to join forces in the West. As American entry into the war loomed with civilian losses and particularly the sinking of the Lusitania

close advisors to the German Kaiser argued that Germany should push a separate peace with the Tsar, while a faction, centered on Ludendorff in the General Staff and around Foreign Minister Zimmerman, pushed for a “war-to-the-death” with Russia.

The first part is uncontroversial. The second part is simply impossible as the financial support would have to be equal to the economic might of the most powerful country in the world at the time. Beyond being impossible it is not enough, as besides money, men would be needed.

In regard to the third part the telegram requests that the Mexicans make the first move and contact Japan. In regard to inviting Japan to join the alliance there are three possibilities:

a          Germany invites Japan

b          Germany gets Mexico to invites Japan

c          Germany gets another party to invite Japan

 

The third option can be immediately discounted as after all these are secret negotiations and as the saying goes, three men can keep a secret as long as two of them are dead.

It is hard to see why second option is taken. As set out above, time was of the essence. As it transpired the Mexican Pres Carranza did not respond immediately but set up a military commission to consider the offer. One possible reason for the Mexicans making the invitation is that Zimmermann thought the Japanese, who after all were their enemies, would probably reject it and reveal it. The invitation being formally made by Mexico might have provided for deniability or at least introduced a measure of confusion. The difficulty with this analysis is that the Mexican’s had the telegram with Zimmermann’s name on it and besides Zimmermann did not deny sending the Telegram, in circumstances where there was plausible deniability. On this point I cannot think of any plausible reason why Zimmermann would delay the formation of the alliance, by having Mexico first consider and then pass on the invitation, when time was of the essence.

If we then look at the first option, while there could be some difficulty in passing a message between Germany and Japan, them being at war with each other, it could not be thought that this was beyond the German intelligence service. Of course this might not be as quick as sending a cable but then we get back into the entire improbability of any action being able be taken in time if we take the start point as around 11 January 1916.  If we take it that Germany could have invited Japan itself, but didn’t, we must ask why. Clearly Japan could either answer yes or no. In such delicate negotiations the norm is for feelers to proceed agreements. If this was the case and the invitation was based on a prior understanding surely the Germans would have directly invited Japan. As they did not one must assume either:

(a) that there had been no feelers or prior understanding;

(b) that Zimmerman knew or expected the Japanese would reject the invitation.

 

If it is the first option then Zimmermann was acting in a manner no other Foreign Minister would act.  He was taking an enormous risk in which it is difficult to see any advantage but which if revealed could be nothing other than highly prejudicial to his country.

In considering the second option again it must be remembered that Japanese agreement to any alliance with Germany would have been treachery of the highest order, a betrayal of their allies in time of war.

If it is the first option Zimmermann is really chancing his arm, but even if he is it still doesn’t explain asking the Mexicans to make the first move. If it is the second option then the offer to the Mexicans was a sham. This conclusion conforms with the difficulties Japan would have had even if it wanted to join the alliance. Japan had neither the resources to attack America nor the time to attack America before America mobilised. As there appears to be no reason for Zimmermann to have sought for the Mexicans to invite the Japanese I conclude that he did not directly approach the Japanese as he knew they would reject it.

Shem negotiations are not unknown in the diplomatic world, after all diplomacy is war by other means. There are various sorts of shams, for example this could have been set up. But it is hard to see why Germany would want to set Mexico up. Mexico was not a competitor and it seems Germany was a suitor, it having come late to the cannibal feast the rest of Europe was having of the World. At best it could sour relations between Mexico and America but it is hard to see how Germany could take advantage of this, it being the cause of the problem.

  1. The most common diplomatic sham is to pretend a certain action with the intention of achieving more limited gains. It seems to me that this is what was happening here, although difficulties remain. In this scenario the telegram was designed to be a threat and the intention was either to get America to deploy forces in this region and so decrease its ability to deploy troops in Europe. If there had been a direct approach to Japan which the Japanese would have in all likelihood turned it over to the English, it would have seemed like a desperate move. Sending the Telegram to the Mexicans suspicion might be created. By creating suspicion Zimmermann may have hoped to drive a wedge between Japan and the other allies. The Meditarraen was an important theatre of U boat operation and the loss of the Japanese fleet there as a result of diplomatic fallout would have been a positive for the Germans. Arguably the Telegram was also sent to Mexico to touch the nerve, this being seen to have more portent than merely raising the possibility with the Japanese. It must be accepted that this conclusion requires a means of revelation in the circumstance of the Mexican’s rejecting the offer and not forwarding it to Japan which is what happened. It also cuts directly across the official story, which is one of the triumph of the British hackers.  On the other hand such an interpretation explains Zimmermann’s taking of responsibility for the telegram when there was plausible denial. The difficulty is that with or without the Japanese threat, America’s resources and manpower were so great that it could meet any threat in this region and still deploy enough forces in Europe to defeat Germany, as it did WWII. However as discussed by Bogart, below, Zimmermann does appear to be both impetuous and incompetent, strange attributes for a Foreign Minister.

 

why did Zimmermann admit to sending the Telegram

 

I believe that honesty is the best policy. I also believe that any Foreign Minister that has this policy would be taken away by the men in white coats.

This issue underlines the question that the Zimmermann Telegram raises, as put by a Russian politician of the 1905 period, ‘is this stupidity or is it treason”. To attempt to understand the incomprehensible I will first look at the resources generally available and critique these.

 

 

 

[1] Zimmermann telegram: intelligence diplomacy and America’s entry into World War I p31

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