Transcripts For CSPAN3 US Naval Activities In Post-World War I Europe 1918-1921 20240713

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. My name is matt miller. I service the president and ceo here at the national War One Museum immemorial it is my pleasure to welcome you here to what i think its going to be an extraordinary couple of days to thing together and learn at the symposium. We are delighted to be house need networking with so many partners to create yet another, i think, exceptional opportunity for us. Whilst you are here, i hope that you take time to spend some time in the galleries. The special exhibition, piece 1919, certainly fits with this theme and he will enjoy that as well as our main galleries where we are preparing for the opening of a new exhibition this week on the vietnam war, 1945, 1975. That is not open until next weekend so its a teaser for you. But we invite those of you who are able to come back through the next several months 30 memorial day weekend of next year to come back and take in really quite exceptional exhibition that also provides the links and helps people understand the enduring impact of the, war of world war one and how it then contributed to the vietnam war. What strikes us is that there is a continual and growing interest in world war one and its enduring impact. I am really pleased to report that october is our largest october in the last 13 years, probably in the history of the organization of attendance at the museum, so october is the largest attendants in our history for the month of october so thats great, that were coming up to the centennial period still with our visitor ship growing, and it indicates, i think what a deep vein of interest that there continues to be around this founding catastrophe of the 20th century. Were also really pleased to report that last year we served in excess of 14 Million Students through a partnership that we have with scholastic supported by the bank of america and the u. S. Centennial commission. So, students right across the country were able to use our resources, and in fact good use our resources, something in excess of 14 million student and we look forward to the future as we come out of this commemorative period. We are anticipating inciting enhancements to our main galleries over the next number of years. We are also planning a special collecting initiative that focuses upon the stories of women minorities and Indigenous Peoples from places across the globe, from which people served in world war one. And we very much look forward to the opportunity to be able to tell those stories more completely here at the National World War One Museum and memorial. So, i join with laura and welcoming you, and looking forward to this exciting symposium. I also want to acknowledge the supporters that we have, the sponsors for the symposium. The event is made possible in part by the general support for the u. S. World war one Centennial Commission and the world war one historical association, the Charles Bacon fund held here at the museum memorial, donors bill and laura freak and many donors to the National World War One Museum and memorial. I want to express my appreciation to the speakers who have come, traveled here and prepared to present what i think is going to be striking conversations and content. Also, i want to express my appreciation to the Education Team and really to all of the staff here at the National World War One Museum and memorial for what they are doing and what they have done to create this event. Please join with me and thinking our sponsors and teams who have supported this symposium. And lastly, ladies gentleman, to laura vote our curator of education who provides our overall leadership. Please welcome her. Thank you and again, welcome, whether you are here on site or joining us on line, to your National World War One Museum immemorial which is located in kansas city, missouri, where it has been since 1926. It is because kansas city and came together and they wanted to create a memorial for those who live through and died from this war at this shape the foundation of the 20th 24 century. Is because of all of you who continue to support this mission that we are here today for an outstanding conversation about 1919 and about peace, and it is these partnerships and these relationships that we have not only around the world but also around our region. We are very lucky to be close to the United States army general commanded Staff College where our first speaker is joining us from. Doctor john kuehn is a professor of military history and strikingly, retired from the United States navy while still at the army war college. You have to be sure to give him a lot of love when it comes up here. Im not sure that he always feels it when he is over there. He retired from the u. S. Navy in 2004 at the rank of commander after 23 years serving as a flight officer flying a landing carrier based aircraft. He has authored agents of innovation, and military history of japans on the age of samurai to the 24 centurynapoleon of warfare, the operational part of the great campaigns, americas first general staff, a short history of the rise and fall of the general war of the navy, 1900 to 1950. He is also the coauthor, i wouldnt business specifically who was awarded the mankato prize for the society of military history in 2011. He is one of our most popular speakers on our Youtube Channel would you can get two from w. Dot the world dot or the war. Org. Each and they have offered him the chair of naval history really in the nation for this next year, so we were pleased we were able to catch him while he is still in town this year. We will look forward to seeing you back, hopefully again soon but we are really looking forward to seeing you on stage here again in about 30 seconds or less. So, ladies and gentlemen, this morning, dr. John d kuehn will address u. S. Naval activities in post world war one europe. Please join me in welcoming doctor john kuehn. Okay. All right. There is a soundtrack for us. Thank you so much, laura. Thank you matt. Thank you to the museum. I just found out i can cut off the signal i put in my own right there. Thank you all for coming and what i have for you i think is really a good sort of discussion of the battle of midway, right . Run venue. Okay, that will have to wait. , no i am here to talk about u. S. Naval operations. I am the token squared up at u. S. Army command general Staff College, a little fish in a big pond up there, at the only big guy up there said it is a challenge to teach up there and even so, my colleagues are out here to help spur me on and help me with the presentation. The first thing i want to do is to take a look at the span here. So, the topic is from the parents the black sea, and the first major displaying where i have here is i got into this research and getting the top ready, i found i but not far more than i could do which is sort of a habit with me, and i could have done a top to meet the timing requirements with questions on any of the various components of these Naval Operations. They are very wide ranging very complicated. They involve all the element of national power, not just naval power, so there is a lot of stuff. So, to solve that problem, im going to be very episodic, so were not going to cover all those operations. Im going to cut down and discussing who is working for who a lot. There is a lot of changing names and commands are taking place, and quite frankly, the line diagrams will implode so i will try to avoid too much of that. I will try to hit high spots here. So, that is my first disclaimer. The second one is that again, it is not going to go into an immense amount of detail, an immense amount of detail. Perhaps in questions we can get some of the detail. I think when you take a look at these three pictures, which we will show again, you kind of see the range here of operations, far, far north. That is a danger there on your left my right. That there is the adriatic ocean, an area i have familiarity with city. I cruiser 1980, five 1996, and so all the places that i am studying and looking at Naval Operations in the adriatic, kind of had to flashbacks there and that today is in modern day croatia, and over on the far side, it is by an english professor but it is a wonderful book, written very much for popular audience, americas black sea fleet. The fact that we even had a black sea fleet is still unknown to most americans. Well, the agenda of the major thing that is going on as a background all of this that is creating urgency and creating difficulties is this thing called demobilization. So i will talk a little bit about that demobilization, far, north i will probably use non american as well as american terminology. I will just call it the Northern Fleet, right . But that is really the name of the soviet slash russian fleet that is up there in the later years of the cold war. The atlantic going home that will be in the background. We have crude ships to bring troops and equipment people back to the United States. Naval forces are going to be tied up in that, as well as naval forces simply returning home, redeploying all these ships that had been deployed in 1917, bringing them all back home. There is going to be a fascinating facet of that which is, and ive been through, it every sailor that has been in the navy and on ships at sea has been through it this, we are getting ready to go home at the lastminute to say, you know what . Youre going out to stay a couple more weeks and so you stay a couple more weeks and theyre like actually, it will be a couple of more months and so that will happen to a lot of these ships trying to go home and then they get rerouted. Mediterranean, primarily we are going to be in the Eastern Mediterranean and that will be the adriatic. We will be in the adriatic. Again, episodic, there is operating through the mediterranean just as there is operation throughout the atlantic. The black sea, we will kind of close with the black sea. At last point is to kind of give you a feel of the front, because there is an easy stasis, the lecture is just going to sort of peter out, all right . Just as the piece sort of peters out so, the United States is very fortunate to pick an interesting guide what the command forces in europe. They will not come from the ship, the ultimatum land based asian, leveraging technology to do that command. Will form a very interesting modern staff and that is admiral william sims, a reformer, and he will be a contemporary contemporary of all these other guys im talking about. William estimate is the commander of u. S. Naval forces in europe on that date, so he will be the operational commander. He will eventually be released by a number of other admiral, but we are not going to plow through all of that and his scope as you can see from archangel, the north sea some of the ships are from the baltics, through the channel and into the black sea. Sims is one of these guys who is not yes sorry yes sir. He will be, like what you want me to do . Hey, your guys is not clear. I dont understand what you want. So he will actually push back on the Wilson Administration and on others and on the allies. That is another key feature for this entire sort of environment has taken place on november 11th and making going into the 1920s, well into the 1920s. The United States is not an allied power. It isnt associated power. This is particularly true of these Naval Operations and dont forget. The guy in the middle, we are going to portray ourselves as honest, but that is going to lead to a challenging set of circumstances for these naval officers trying to conduct these operations. Well, this is what sims says about demobilization. Now, to those of you who is i saw it might not be the, best it says it is believed that the terms demobilization is applying to this command, that is, the forcing european waters, is not clearly understood. In other, words hes basically saying like in the princess bride, i dont think you know what that word means. I dont think you understand what that word means. You need to come up with a clear definition of it because you keep telling us to demobilize but then you turn our ships around, you divert hour ships to the black sea in the adriatic. I dont think you really understand what we are talking about. And that is his comment on the topic of demobilization. By april 1990, the demobilization is proceeding smoothly. What a lot of people dont understand is how much infrastructure the u. S. Navy has ashore in europe at the end of world war one. There are tens of millions of dollars of properties and infrastructure and equipment that exist that either have to be loaded on ships, taken back to the United States of america or sold off. Some of it will be liquidated and sold off. Much of the real estate will just simply be sold back primarily to the government of france but when you read the correspondents going back and forth between the people on the scene, the naval Officers Holding the bag, when the balloon has popped in the war and, we are constantly like, hey we are telling the french this is how much it is were, and they offering us 10 of what it is worth. We have all this equipment and french said we have to take it, and it is sort of back and forth. What happens is most of this debt is forgiven eventually. The United States will forgive much of this debt by the time the Great Depression comes along, and then there is this entire people that can be done, i think, most closely at this whole effort to sort of liquid day all this naval infrastructure that exists. And there is another problem which is there is this mean to use naval infrastructure to assist in the relief effort. Europe is starving at the end of world war one. And then there is this flu pandemic. So you need medicines for karen for food and so at the same time, they are just established naval infrastructure, and trying to use it to include medicine and relief. But it is a wicked problem. Go to our first geographic challenge. The decision to intervene, they deliberately chose george kent s total of his very famous book on americas decision to get involved in the baltic revolution. We generally know there are two areas where the americans helped, but this is just one of her you for you guys. When they signed the treaty of president off in moscow with trots ghislaine and their associates, the allied powers have been pushing warmer heroes to the latest courts and we have to ask archangel one of our stop. Of course the cant push for the black sea to get the straighter closed so there are millions and millions of dollars in warming editions that have paulo piled up. The fear of course the germans were captured munitions and use them against the allies and so the allies and the americans will intervene in the far east and in north russia, to secure this material. Very fairly narrow mission, guard. But what happens is politics. The french and the british, anti communists, is support the whites, the americans are saying we are neutral party saying we are not here to fight the communist, we are here to do this very narrow mission and then of course we get the belief thing going on that is taking place, so what we get is this sort of standard scenario which is mission creep, these missions will add up and they will require assets, resources at the same time the people are screaming back in washington in the computer officers in washington, d. C. , to try to bring everything home while just across the street at foggy bottom they are saying, no stay, stays, stay into this, this, and. This most of these naval officers are going to become naval diplomats. Naval diplomats. Naval diplomats. American support in the north, maybe 500 american troops to our chain goal and the navy will be involved in supporting these groups for sure. So this was back in the day when part of Navy Training was to sort of basically know how to land and serving additional infantry, so that is an additional force structure that the americans will have at hand. Well, there is archangel in the summer of 1919. I would like you to take a look at this map over here. Archangel here on the, river a major conduit through which relief, military operations, evacuations of people fleeing, both of mexico to take place. And again, a very difficult place to operate. Not a warm water environment, very shallow, very shallow, the ships dont do so well here and a big problem here is that the whites will actually kind of control this area for this time after the peace begins in 1918 and the americans, the british in the french will get involved. The americans will be asked to place themselves under british command and on the naval side they will refuse. They will say no, we are independent. We do not work for you. We will coordinate with you. We may cooperate with you on a case by case basis. That is the guidance that is given to this man, rear admiral newton macaulay, Standard Navy guy, goes to the naval academy, learns, but he has something most naval officers do not. He speaks russian. He is a raw file. He is a raw file in the mold of like i like tolstoy and there are things about azars regime that i admire, and russian culture in history. He is sort of the right guy in the right place at the right time. And again, the great naval historian who is really an expert on this period and who im channeling today, william sale, says the admirals orders were unrealistic and at times unpredictable and that is at times contradictory. That is sort of in line with everything that ive been saying. He also has a big heart. The admiral has a big heart and so when he gets up here, almost immediately he starts to exceed his authority one of the things hes told not to do is to bring russian refugees out of north russia. That is verboten. That is not within your mission set, admiral. So one of the things he does is to adopt six russian orphans and says, okay, well, i can bring the because they are my children. And he is not married yet. You will eventually marry a russian woman, surprise surprise. And that is the governess for these kids, areas with, kids one of his, aides if you will notice they have seven there, i dont know who the other child is. That is the admiral in command of u. S. Naval forces in these waters, officially reporting to admiral. Be sure to give me a wave ten minutes out so if i am kind of lagging here i can speak things up and get us to the end. He arrives in merman second october of 1918. He is ordered to evacuate the u. S. Ambassador to the united kingdom. The u. S. Asked olympia for a short time is going to serve as his flagship but when he gets there he says the ship is completely unusual, unsuitable ship for communications. It is outdated, she does not have what i need to do my operations, and she is deep draft and i cannot use her. She is very limited in where she can go. So the u. S. Ambassador loads up on the olympia to take the ambassador home via the uk. The olympia is going to be interesting. What were going to see is that the uss olympia is admiral george do is flagship in the middle, over 21 years earlier. Its going to sort of be our icon, it will be our where is walter sort of deal as we move all ran is operations. So, the United States is using obsolete cruisers to try to get the job done, all right . And she will end up in both the adriatic and the black sea so now you kind of chose why i chose this, because the olympia gets to be there. There she is in her wartime post looking very warship light instead of the white painted were used to for the olympia. Again, she still down in philadelphia, where she really needs some time to try to time a dry dock. Here is some summaries, heres something that happened without going into too much detail. One thing you will find is that the americans kind of use whatever is their, right . And so mccaul is flagship is actually going to be a converted dock, the uss yankton. It has a shallow draft and that is why he picks it. And my colleague is really an anti ballistic. Heat so he is sort of in sympathy with the british and the french and their schemes to get britain and france to sort of directly support the White Russians in their campaigns against the bush effects. His relations with the british are and this is sort of throughout we are going to see, i dont work for you. The british say hey, admiral mccully, put yourself under our senior naval officer he will go hey, i worked for president woodrow wilson. No. You can coordinate with me, but we are going to deal with each others as equals, most of the american admirals will be much senior to their british and french counterparts and that will really great on the british and french admiral. Eventually we get cruisers that get in, there these are protected and light cruisers, you can actually carry a battalion on one of these things and so they prove useful in kind of ferrying the troops around, but what the troops are mostly doing is guarding stuff. That is primarily what they are doing. They are landing somewhere or evacuating people. The prime mission for a vacuum to peoples american citizens, the u. S. Ambassador says. They will get it done but now the crews are in their, the des moines in the sacramento macaulay will sometimes name these ships as flagships but very confusing operations and again it gives you a sense that the ships will show up for duty and then they will turn right around and leave again, which is sort of a theme that is going to kind of go on because of that demobilization dynamic. Well, lets talk of the ships that are most useful because communications, Wireless Communications are still pretty much in their infancy. We are not talking but voice radio here, we are talking about wireless telegraphy. The transmitters tend to be very weak. The ships that will prove most useful are the ones that will be used to hunt submarines the north atlantic, the sub chasers, and the ship that the u. S. Navy hates, not the kind of ship a u. S. Naval officer needs to be on. But they are great because they are shallow draft vessels so in the northern theater they will be the most useful ships. They can go up the river and do the missions that are assigned for guarding things, bringing people out and stuff like that without getting too without getting stuck in the mud. Theyre easy to support. They are not High Maintenance like the olympia is. Theyre Propulsion Systems are fairly robust and so these will be the workhorses of the Northern Fleet in the Northern Waters and macaulay for use them as much as communications mechanisms as he will use them to do Standard Missions appearing people around doing landing parties and everything like this. You might think of these guys almost like a river patrol in vietnam before the make long explodes. So they are doing stuff like that, there is this tradition that in america was very under studied and these guys are actually a part of it. As for the singers, that is their attitude the sailors. The dual Landing Party near archangel and then they have to dig trenches and stand guard duty and kind of do infantry stuff so we have sailors in trenches. Sounds wonderful, doesnt it . We had no quarrel with them. We only knew that they were cold, that we were, cold we were a long way from home, that we did not care who won, meaning lights or reds, and all of our officers then felt the same way. So, what are we doing here . Where are cold and we want to go home we dont care who wins. That sounds familiar, doesnt it . All, right u. S. Naval operations in the baltics, a lot of foreshadowing of things today, the royal navy, the frenchman into the baltic. The goal here is to endeavor to assist only in carrying out the spirit of the terms of the so, what does that mean . It means wherever the germans are, but they are not supposed to be, whether it is in the baltic republics organic and poland or whether it is the german naval ports that are in the baltics that i need to secure german warships and you vote and german ships and stuff like that, that is what that means, all right . A lot of the operations are going to involve famine relief and this is going to be a theme over and over again. Whenever there are parts be u. S. Navys going to be there and it will serve as an enabling force to serve food in and often people out and the priority, american citizens. You would not think there were that Many American citizens in this political war but evidently there were. They go into the first time, the navy, does on the 26 of december 1918 and with a very, very vague mission. Eventually they end up almost coming to blows with the germans in some reports in the baltic republics, as they sail into these harbors, not sure whether the germans are going to open up on them or not because remember germany is sort of collapsing, in a state of resolution at this point, never mind the fact that the bush effects are trying to stir up a whole lot of revolution at the same time. There is the chester a example of a prewar scout cruiser designed by the prewar germany navy. In that in 20, two we have a baltic squatter in the baltics and the two principal missions are famine relief, flowing food and defeat all the starving people in eastern and Central Europe and provide presence. Well, what is president . Well, presence is, we are not sure what youre supposed to do but we want you there just in case we decide what youre supposed to do. That is present. And that is a mission for the ice his navy, youre on, station youre not sure what it is you want to do. Well, what we want you to do, but we feel really good when we put big and small navy ships on other peoples nations. That makes us feel wonderful. Uneasy peace in the patriotic, so we skipped the channel in the Mining Operations which by the way have never really ended. There was mine still floating around in the north sea and everything not completely gone. You will hear about a discovery of a mine or maybe a ship that is a mine. The key dynamic in the adriatic is in a world war one italy has made promises but the british and french in 1950 to enter the war and according to italy, one of those protocols is the reestablishment of the roman empire. Its not that simple . Yes it is they want to reestablish that presents down the adriatic in degrees from 2000 years before. There is not to be a yugoslavia, for the yugoslavia that exists is not going to it will just be over there on the other side of the mountains there and well have all that territory. It is beautiful territory in terms of ports, access, strategic control. I mean, if you control the west of the adriatic, you control the adriatic, of course, it already controls the east coast of the adriatic, so this would give italy complete control of the adriatic. Italy is filling the power vacuum created by the collapse of the oscar hungarian empire. She feels that she was promised all of those things belonging to the australian empire that had to do with that empires naval position, particularly at trieste which is still part of italy today but all the way, that major split all the way down those coasts on the adriatic and youre probably going man, the geography is beyond me, well hopefully ill give you some help with this in just a second. So, the american rule, same as we already talked about. Theyre not under the british and the french they are not under the italians. They are there to make sure that the piece is stable and people do not start killing each other so it really is like you and chapter six a Chapter Seven operations. Peacekeeping and in some cases piece enforcement and it is going to involve guns which is always a scary thing. It is an interesting for shadow of what happens in the 19 nineties with guys like me and you have the italians over here and they are of course doing it here. I think it is easier to probably look at these on a map all. Trieste at the top, great oscar hungarian port, Maria Vaughan traps husband sales out of their, state are in the middle few me is today react, at a few mia north is very highly desired uncontested piece of real estate the italians claim that it was given to them. We go down to a split in creation, and then if you look under the vr the bay is down there. Americans are actually given a zone that actually encompasses this split. And the major American Naval base, and im going to walk from the front, is actually here at core siren. Yes, history is funny. One of the jobs the american are going to get is and the goal here is to keep them out of the hands of the italians until they can be pop really turned over to the turn over, so they will occupy both these battleships American Standard so you will have american sailors on austrian battleships in the yugoslavian port try to keep him out of the hands of the italians. That is fun. The italians are going to get the ship but they dont want to take possession of them in the adriatic out to sea. They want to take possession of them in split so they can turn the guns on the yugoslavians and dictate what parts of yugoslavia are now italian, and so that is going to be a real problem. The guy in command is going to be this guy rear admiral philippe andrews. If you want to know how yugoslavians regard admiral andrews, he is a citizen of split. They make him an honourary citizen. Now, when you get these operations, they never made me an honourary citizen of anywhere so i am jealous im not nunnery citizen. Maybe i should write to the mayors most are and say you need to make an honourary citizen because i did the same thing admiral andrews did. So here, the goal of the americans is to be neutral. Quite quickly the americans are not neutral. Okay. , we know admiral andrews is. Okay. So, i will read it for those that dont want to squint. It is a curious and eliminating fact that every single army are naval officer who comes to this dalmatian coast gradually which really acquires the conviction that the italians have no just to claim to any part of it. The italians are actually trying to capture the adriatic coast. The Italian Government going, the italian armies not try to do any of this. These are independent italian citizens at the head of militia bodies and there is this famous italian rider leaving several thousand people from italy into the adriatic and what is today modern croatia, and he is occupying these cities and declaring that they belong to italy and the United States ands up in the middle between these semi governmental non governmental militias from italy that are at war with the croatians, the albanians, the slovenians, and all of the different parties that exist in yugoslavia. And right away, the yugoslavians go, you know what . Americans are our friends. They are our friends, they are going to protect us so if you ever thought, when we doing the bulk of the 1990s . America has along its own history of being friends to balkans nationalists in bosnia and herzegovina, croatia and those areas and that begins here with this guy. The americans would actually force the italians to back down on a number of occasions. We eventually will deploy over 2000 ships to the adriatic, again using a smaller ships, the sub chasers and the eagle books, sort of like its to camp on horseback because of the and reliability of wireless telegraphy and Wireless Communications. The olympian will get diverted so she is in england, right . Ready to go home, she lives the u. S. Ambassador, and you get to court orders to go to the adriatic and you will be a new flagship for admiral andrews and so she goes to the adriatic. The other thing is this, right . Ports. Starving people. Food. All right . So, that is going to be again another Major Mission is following that blame on relief from the American Relief agency headed by this bright young humanitarian herbert hoover, into the starving populations because remember a blockade is still in effect but the americans are sort of the neutral party here so even though we are supposed to be supporting the blockade that is still in place, even though austria hungry has signed a peace treaty, the blockade is still in place and of italians are still in forcing it so the United States will actually be breaking the blockade and get into these populations. Why would they use starvation as a tactics to try to expand their territory into the balkans . Well, theyre going to use it because they will be the ones to deliver the relief. They will be the ones, and so the yugoslavians will trade away sovereignty for food and that is another italian strategy. The first crisis occurs in november 18 and the United States actually forces the italians who are trying to take possession of this to sort of back off and allow the yugoslavian militias, frankly into the city to take possession of it and that there will be a second crisis in 1919 against a little green men that are coming down from the north underneath and italian nationalist. The yuma crisis actually sort of a loss. The little dream unoccupied the yuma. The navy decides we are not going to go to war, and they convinced the malicious not to attack the italians and pull back and eventually if you get declared an open city or a free city under italian dominance, and we will be well into the twenties before the yugoslavians really kind of get a feel of that. That is the compromise but it will be a big crisis that will take place as well in it will involve the u. S. Navy because the sport is in the navy district. By 1921, the United States feels the things are stable enough patriotic. The french and the british have total support from the americans so it is the americans, french and british often oh voting the italian high commissioner of the adriatic and the actual naval forces are abolished in 1921 but you will still see naval forces in the adriatic after that point helping flow food in and sometimes they will flow refugees out. Well, now we get to the east men and the black sea. Now, the decision is actually made by the chief of Naval Operations William Benson in concert with william sims to push this guy, admiral mark crystal, former commander of the battleship arizona, comes into konstantin opal, into istanbul. This is going to be interesting, crystal is going to go by plane, train or automobile, literally, plane train and automobile and u. S. Destroyer, into istanbul and his orders are going to be like everybody elses orders, to protect american interests. The United States never declared war on turkey so this is going to give bristol, as he soon figures out, a big advantage over the british and the french. The problem is the Ottoman Empire is collapsing so the locals are to sets, so, turkey is really at civil war. We have had all these horrible things happen in turkey with the collapse of the Ottoman Empire including the ongoing armenian genocide, so crystals getting really plum assignment here. There he is with his wife helen, she is a full partner in these diplomatic operations out of istanbul. Bristol will be much like sims. He you will see why that is in a second. I20 to give a background on it because my intent is already a biography of him. He is a fascinating guy. He will be in turkey as the high commissioner for the United States, a direct representative of the state Department Working for lansing and it worked for Charles Evans hughes and working for whoever the secretary of state after Charles Evans used so he will be working for the secretary of state as well as for whoever the Operation Commander of the u. S. Naval forces in his. His official title will be commander of u. S. Naval forces in the black sea and near east. Remember, back then they called the middle east and erased. From egypt a stumble to save a steal paul, to sam soon, i will show you some of these places in just a second. He will not go to the nineties after this job, he will go to china and do the same thing as a four star command, and if you ever want to kind of understand what is happening at the ground level, through pistols assignment that assignment, watch the sand battles which will give you an idea of what is going on in these european waters. It really well. Its very confusing. What are we doing here . Protecting american interests. What does that mean . Eventually bristol will end up here where i first ran into him 15 years ago when i started my research, so a very important honorable of the inner work here that almost nobody knows about. Collapsing empires, we talk about, this been isis in turkey talked about, this famine relief, them and is happening everywhere, folks. All of these collapsed empires from baghdad to bristol are hungry, all right . Refugee evacuations are a big deal, White Russians, wreaks armenians, they are in turkey and russia, they are in georgia. They are all over the place and feeding food in while bringing people out, there is going to be this thing called the smear crisis. We will talk about that, and of course the collapse the White Russian military effort in southern russia and ukraine is going to cause the americans to get involved with ships and sailors. Well. Here is the deal. Bristol is basically told, support american interests, so he shows up in istanbul, i will get you up to date here in a second and he gets there and there is not even a fleet there. We will take a look at the ramshackle fleet that he gets. And so we actually moves into the embassy and basically is the ambassador and commander at the same time. His guidance, is protect american interests, and bristol sees this as, protect the open guard. Now, America Naval officers might not have been as well, literally educated as their counterparts in a civilian world in the United States, but there was one thing they were very educated on and that was the open world which meant access to foreign markets to American Goods and allowing goods from these other nations to make their way out of the states and nations to the United States markets, all right . The way that he sees to do that is stability. The way to get stability, bristol very quickly sizes up the situation and says, the caliphate is going away, most often all out attack its going to be the future, and mark bristol is the basis for a frank, for a turkish american relationship that has endured until just a couple of years ago, of friendship. He is regarded and turkish textbooks as the american lafayette, bristol, is because the nationalist turks in auditors have such a high esteem for him. That will lead to some problems with some historians who will, say he is a turk lover and an armenian heater but we will get into that. So, support american interests. It is the open, door and the way to make the open door workers to support the nationalists and here are the missions. Are you talked about them but i want to use the modern terminology. Humanitarian affairs. Help refugees, primarily americans, dont evacuate anybody except american citizens. You and your skippers are not allowed to evacuate anybody but american citizens unless we tell you who you can evacuate, all right . The problem is communications, right . You know, how long did it take to get Something Back to washington and then back to bristol understandable. Days and sometimes weeks, all right . The other thing that bristol is going to do, a lot of these are near, is not combatant evacuation officers, some are in these places around the black sea, is mere, and pull people out under the threat of being killed and attacked. Again, primarily americans but as usual theyre going to take more than americans. The other big mission i have already talked about. Communications enhanced, just getting the word around to his guys because of unreliable wireless telegraphy but remember, the entire communications infrastructure, such as it was in this part of the world, and it wasnt that great, is collapsed and has not been rebuilt. Here is the map. Lets go to it again . Show you the high places . Izmir here, serena, istanbul, so the black sea is open now, sevstopol, and other cities, and these are some of the major places that the u. S. Ship to go into an indepth operations. Timeline, 30 october is when turkey capitulates to the allied powers were not just to the United States which is not at war, nine november, the u. S. Scorpion isnt into u. S. Yacht inheriting costs and to know paul. Somehow, we get sailors in content noble and two days before the armistice, they raise the American Flag and reestablish the american presence in istanbul and it becomes officially a ship on the register of the United States navy. It is a converted yacht, okay . Late january bristol arrives, on will be on this story dryer and by march it is already deep into humanitarian assistance, opt for ar a relief over into but to me and samsun as well as trying to pull american citizens out if they want to come out because of the collapse in these four territories of his almost russia as russia is breaking apart and the lights are starting to collapse in the face of bush what kind of fences. By april 1990, eight permanently assigned fleet, now theyre battleships and cruisers there temporarily assigned like the olympia or the arizona, but the prominent fleet, the assembled, which is on that part of the seacoast in east amble that is next to the foreign, order if you ever been to foreign order, that is the fleet. Really ought, to monitors. Monitors. Yes, monitors im fascinated. Someone should do a monograph on these things. Monitors, like monitor in the mary mac . Yes. All right, and again, bristol is probably using these ships in the local area and to run errands across, etc. May 1919 is the summer in a crisis and we have to go back to the italians, right . So, the italians want to reestablish the roman empire. And the roman empire owned asia. What is asia . If you are roman historian well, asia is so alicia and goal asia and the roman asian empire whose major cities were episodes per game and and izmir, so the italians have landed in turkey and so the crisis is to get those guys out and the guys that really want them out are the greeks. The creeks are saying no, not the alexandra not the empire but the alexander mediterranean empire and the italians and wreaks almost go to war with each other, and who is in the middle . The u. S. , as usual and are they doing their . Making sure that u. S. Is look at shot and killed. Making sure italians agrees to not should each other, like what can depression a french do that . And usually they will do that but you have to work for us on our orders do all these other missions stops that we think the to be done in turkey including opposing the nationalists under and so that is that crisis. We are kind of going towards the end, so i want to open it up for questions here. Eventually bristol and his guys what open up all of these for relief efforts and support them all into the 1920s, they are still doing these operations, although they are not officially the black sea fleet anymore, many will be evacuated between 1920 from the collapsing white situation of those guys in the south of russia as the bush of its kind of do it. Just the last thing, was trying to do all these missions are moving parts in everything, it is really hard to train your sailors with classical ambitions when you are constantly going to and from ports and on watch, on general borders, you dont get to do your training matrix and they come up with some innovative ways eventually they will have an entire destroyer squadron, five to six destroyers. Here is a great picture to capture the great sea fleet. Notice the russian coal packs, that kind of says it all. White russians collapse and the civil war in turkey. Also, note the dog, we are so loud have dog mascots the navy then. I want to close with this great statement by the first chairman of the joint chiefs of staff who served the black sea fleet, william leahy. Reality is ugly, decrepit, dirty city with all centric lori gone probably beyond recall, but seeing a fantasy in the evening in the distance as transform by the color to a strange and real beauty. No sailor ever saw the sea in the evening distance without the desire to return it sometime, 1921. Boarding party, Landing Party, naval employees tree, murmask, your questions please. You applause know coming here and, again i would invite you to come down to the microphone if you are able, and our first question will come on the other side. He talked about Naval Operations. Did they have naval airports . You said there were flights that were sent in to get one of the commanders in. , yes that was just a reference to an old movie with john candy, planes, trains, and automobiles. I dont know that he ever gets on an airplane for that transit. He is certainly on automobiles, trains and ships. That was a metaphorical thing. So naval ideation. Again, the presence of Naval Aviation at the end of world war one is substantial and remember we dont have any Aircraft Carriers yet, it likely is not in theater yet, i dont know if he has a air wing yeah, hes been converted into an Aircraft Carrier so most of the kurdish sea planes, it would not surprise me that there might be used a few of those airplanes, but in the research i did, a middle east bars and spare and to secondary source for the most part, the black sea fleet and williams hills book victory without piece i did not see much discussion in these operations of the use of naval aircraft. The question is fascinating. Anyone know who the force director Naval Aviation is in the United States navy after 9 11 . Mark bristol. So, it wouldnt surprise me if bristol did that. Now, bristol is not the first director of imperial aeronautics. That does not get chosen until 1921. That would be his friend a fellow battleship admiral. Bristol is going to be in charge of Naval Aviation where does not have a home, so hes essentially a coordinator who is going to coordinate the actions of the bureau of navigation, the bureau of ordinance, the bureau of construction and repair and the bureau of engineering with respect to Naval Aviation development and trade and everything. A guy who is in the navy on the grand floor is mark bristol. Mark bristol is exceptionally interesting guy and it wouldnt surprise me that he left his aircraft in some way during those nine years as an example. Paul question. Paul i at the time of the first world war, Great Britain was considered to be the power of the ocean if you will. What was the relationship with the United States consider to be a second cousin if you will to the british fleet and would take orders from the brits . Paul how clear where the americans naval orders . It seems to be terms as the United States is in the middle. It seems like a lot of what was going on here but i interpret is an ad hoc situation with the u. S. Navy. Okay, the question is as i understand it what is the relationship between the u. S. Navy and particularly the british navies and up if not the british government. You answered part of the question ad hoc. Sims is an anglophile so it is more than willing to cooperate more than any of his native officers with the british. When it comes to these operations actor of the arms it senses like no these guys knew neither independence because there have a diplomatic vision visions and there is a game in play. They will actually support these guys even if they subordinated themself somehow sue the goals of the british team and works well with the british admirals. He had nothing but good things to say about sims. But they had nothing but bad things to say about mark bristol. Mark bristol is an intelligent and stupid and they dont know why the United States aside im here. One of the biggest mistakes you can make about somebody that you got to work with or you view as an adversary which may lead the british admirals view as the convenient temporary influence but the real problem for the royal navy in Great Britain is the u. S. Navy. Ill get back to that i just a second to answer your question. Sims support these guys and bristol is particularly hated and loath by the british admirals and they do not like him and they really do not like him. If youre looking for some of the sources of at a mall city that existed in 1920, there was a real factor to the conference and the london abel conference and you dont have to look too far in this scenario to find it. One of the biggest mistakes you can make about the adversaries is that he is stupid an intelligent. Bristol turns out to be immensely intelligent and far more intelligent than anybody had thought. Still, makes bristol look like the second commander of christ because it is viewed so closely. Bristol understands the economic instruments very well and will outmaneuver his counterparts and the dealings with the turks and will come out with a much better situation with the british and the french visavis and will service well. Running short on our cohen a time but we are going to take what is a very quick question from this side and is as quick as he says then the gentleman in the green jacket we will get to it. How rapidly can you answer . I dont think this could but in any way throughout the entire war fdr was the assistant secretary of the navy and can fighting that was the secretary and roosevelt had a great deal with creating mind barrage and in 1919, we went to europe to help the demobilization. Can you tell me and reforms the amount of Decision Making an impact roosevelt had upon what we just discussed . Roosevelt prose velvet is second only to justice chief daniels. There needs to be look at that, my own experience looking at roosevelts activity with chief daniels and William S Benson and roosevelt is daniels as man in respect to the conference that there will be another top here about the naval battle of versailles thats been in this presentation and perhaps will find out a little bit more about fdr than. The short answer is i know its important, in terms of these operations i dont see much as the agent of words. Feels like part of that answer was watch our Youtube Channel later and if you can see that lecture and it could be answered and 260 characters are less and gentleman in the green jacket go for it. Real quick. The americans are trying to have food aid in, the british are trying to run a blockade on germany and austria and hungary. Who is the food aid going to . Well, the food aid put this is a very political situation and maybe some of the other talks will get at it. Remember, the key guy there is hoover. There are times where all of these guys with andrews, bristol, sims are actually working for hoover. Hes probably the guy that understands the scope of the problem better than anything else. Hes a workaholic, he writes the never anyone work to save so many people from starving to death. Whoever should have gotten the nobel peace prize, duty . But this is all subject to local policy. I would say the american role in all of this is to try to write as much of that local politics out of the equation and what the americans will tend to do is they will tend to get the food to the National Components and surprising fact. We are still pushing family relief to the russians inside of the soviet union until 1924. We finally quit doing it because the communist government found it so difficult to work with in terms of pushing food. We are trying to get food to people who already identified as an existential threat to the United States. Does that answer your question . There are more questions what we are just about to head into a break. So feel free to ask those questions to doctor kuehn. Also, a couple of quick remind us before you head out, of, first the book stores not yet opens who do not make a beeline there, but do you make the beeline at lunch break because there will be a book signing. You could, however, make that beeline to the table of books that are known accession are duplicates from our collection, so many of you have already taken a quick look. We have added some more to it. Please feel free, that is a gift from our museum to those of you who love this period of study. Please feel free to help yourself to those. Also, if you want to find out more about i know at least three people in this room have gone to see assemble, we can talk more about our battlefield tours. I think you had also at least one goat who was a mascot and you could find that on our Digital Online archive. While you are filling up and waiting in line for coffee, dont forget your lids and i will see you back here promptly at ten. We will start right then. Have a great break. applause ladies and gentlemen welcome back to the world War One Museum at our symposium and the 1919 peace question mark. Were pleased that you are here and pleased to welcome our next speaker dr. At the Utah University where she had a modern european and Kansas City Missouri and they were in journalism and history from the university of missouri and a ph. D. In rockers. Including 2017s and mary filler and shock driver and gender in the great more and 2017s world war one short history. That is a spectacular book and get asked questions if theres a short book thats for teaching along that line as an interrupted point. If you havent seen proctors a short history on world war one its a nice entry point right there. She was very busy and 2017. She is presently working on a study of humanitarian aid in europe from 1914 to 1924 which will be hearing about more in just three seconds. Ladies and gentlemen will you please help me welcome dr. Tammy proxy or. applause its working . Okay. Good. All right, we are good. Thank you to laura for that nice introduction and to camille for all the work she did organizing the kong congress and its my hometown so its always wonderful to be here. Id also like to thank doctor keen for setting up my talking nicely and mentioning famine relief to will be talking about that a little bit today. I picked a provocative title, the myth of isolation and i did so partly because when i teach undergraduates about the first world war, i usually start a class by asking what do you know, what do you know about the war. I suspect if i threw this out to you youd probably know and get some of the things that they know. Trenches, poison gas, aerial warfare and dogfights. When i asked about the United States they go with zero wilson and isolation. That encapsulates the story of what graduates know about the first world war. What id like to argue today is that rather then the idea that the United States completely turned its back on europe, in 1919, that its a more complicated story an american engage with corrupt in terms of cultural imagination and were popping a little bit here. Using public funds and money, the United States intervened in europe to provide food, clothing, fuel, disease prevention and other important resources and in more than a dozen states in europe from 1919 to 1924 and i will go a little longer the 1924. They took major og