Answer:
John J. Pershing led all American forces during World War I. He stressed staff work and offensive operations and fought successfully to keep all U.S. forces under his control. Although success during the St. Mihiel operation appeared to validate Pershing’s aggressive tactics, the bloody and controversial Meuse-Argonne campaign muddied his operational legacy.
Explanation:
Pershing as a full general, faced numerous problems trying to bring the AEF to France, the most pressing of which entailed amalgamation. The Allies, dubious of U.S. military preparedness, sought to amalgamate American soldiers and units into existing French and English units. Pershing steadfastly opposed this notion. He did allow early-arriving regular units to serve under Allied leadership, but only at the division or higher level and mainly as a form of battlefield familiarization. These early arriving American units served with distinction during the dark days of the German Spring 1918 offensive. As the Germans gained ground, Pershing agreed to American divisions helping in the defense, stating that, “the American people will hold it as a high honor to take part in the present battle.”
Even after these concessions, Pershing continued to agitate for a U.S.-commanded sector of the front and the full concentration of U.S. manpower under U.S. control. Pershing benefitted from the full political backing of Wilson and the Secretary of War, Newton D. Baker (1871-1937). The general enjoyed a free hand to manage and run his command in France. Pershing did, however, demur somewhat to political necessity; an early advocate of African American soldiers serving in combat, he letf realizing, the political imbroglio this would cause the Wilson administration so in need of Southern legislative support. Two African American divisions formed and fought during World War I. Pershing did little to help the 92nd Division succeed and turned the provisional 93rd Division over to the French Army, where it fought successfully. Landing on France in June 1917, Pershing immediately resumed work for his staff, untangling the congested French rail and road networks needed to bring the AEF ashore and supply them with war materials. He then built training camps for the raw American units arriving in France during the autumn of 1917. These camps institutionalized best practices by veteran French and English units, particularly the minutiae of trench warfare. Some American divisions rotated back and forth to Allied sectors of the front in order to gain battlefield familiarization and acquire the knowledge needed to serve as future trainers. At the same time, these camps also taught specialized skills associated with “modern” warfare machine gun use, artillery adjustment, gas attack defense, and the use of armored formations.
Having witnessed how poor staff work could lead to disaster during the Mexican campaign, Pershing ordered his staff to create a Staff School, modeled after the Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, to train fresh officers on the intricacies of staff work at the division and corps level. One of Pershing’s most innovative trends entailed the integration of multiple “arms” within the AEF: artillery, aircraft, and armor. While the U.S. Army had little training in these branches prior to 1917, Pershing helped to incorporate their application into both the planning and execution of the AEF. Much of this was designed to create dynamism within the planning of the American forces. Many American planners believed that the Entente powers had lost their offensive spirit after three years of war and that aggressive leadership that leveraged all the elements brought to bear by the U.S. Army would create opportunities for localized, but rapid, breakthroughs. With this in mind, AEF staff officers planned first- and second-day objectives for upcoming operations far forward of the line of departure, believing that brisk and bold action would allow American units to escape the grinding attrition of trench warfare.
At the war’s conclusion, Pershing found himself in political hot water, for perhaps the only time during the war, when he advocated against an Armistice with Germany and instead believed that the Allies should attack into Germany and occupy it completely. He would later retract his statements, avoiding a reprimand from Wilson, but many, including President Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945), would later claim that such an action might have prevented the rise of Germany and World War II.
