The Zimmermann Telegram

. . . In world affairs it was a German Minister's minor plot. In the lives of the American people it was the end of innocence" (p. 200).This "minor plot" turned out to be a major incident in American foreign relations, one of the incidents which helped turn public opinion to enter the Great War. I have read several of Tuchman's books, and generally enjoy them. (The opening paragraph of her "The Guns of August" is one of the most beautifully written paragraphs I have read, and I would often read it to my students.) Part of what attracts me to Tuchman is her writing style. Despite the fact that some of her writing can be a tad bit turgid, much of it is really engaging. (Both examples can be found in "The Zimmerman Telegram.") But, because it is Tuchman writing, I easily forgive her, recalling the pleasures she brings through her work.This is a book I wish I had read 40 years ago when I first started teaching. I regret that now that I am no longer teaching, I will not be able to draw from this material in an attempt to engage young minds, which often requires a bag of tricks and some entertainment.This book could have been condensed into a scholarly article or a monograph, but Tuchman managed to draw it out into 200 pages of generally engaging reading. I have no problem with that, because of the insights she brings to the topic.I recommend this book and hope that others readers will find it as informative and engaging as I have.

I bought this book based on my interest in the history of World War One and my opinion of other books by Barbara Tuchman. I'm not disappointed. It is well written, humorous, and very interesting. Tuchman manages to make history fascinating, entertaining, and funny. This time period (a few months before the U.S. entered WWI) became a comedy of errors and would have been hilarious if it hadn't been a world war. The posing and intrigues of Kaiser Wilhelm and others are comic in the extreme, but end up being tragic as well. If ever there was a preventable war, this was it. The Zimmerman telegram itself was used masterfully by the British (who seem to have been the only ones in the entire conflict who knew what they were doing) to draw the U.S. into the war in time to prevent a British defeat. President Wilson was so determined to keep the U.S. neutral and stop the war, by insisting that everyone involved follow his peace plan—and his only—that he arguably missed an opportunity to shorten the war and save thousands of lives. His rigidity and inability to see beyond his own nose make him a comic figure equal to Kaiser Wilhelm. Add to this the machinations of "Willy" (Kaiser Bill) to involve Mexico and Japan in an intrigue to make the U.S. government believe that Mexico and Japan were about to invade the United States, and the involvement of such nearly unbelievable figures as Pancho Villa and others who were jockeying to take over the Mexican government, and you have a comic tragedy on the level of the Mel Brooks movie "The Professionals," which made a musical comedy of WWII, with wildly funny songs like 'Springtime For Hitler.' THE ZIMMERMAN TELEGRAM begs to be made into a historical comedy all its own. And yet it is history. It actually happened.

"The Zimmerman Telegram" (1958) is another excellently written history by the author of the Pulitzer Prize winning "The Guns Of August" (1962). Writing with the same style and skill, Tuchman provides an important look at the crucial events that dragged the United States, kicking and screaming, into the First World War, even against the strong pacifism of the majority of Americans and the anti-war convictions of her president, Woodrow Wilson. "The Zimmerman Telegram" captures the flavor and atmosphere of a world facing its own worst fears. While many historians attempt to present the sinking of the Lusitania in 1915 as the precipitate cause of U.S. entry, Tuchman correctly shows that only a specific and direct threat against the U.S. "forcing the nation to believe that Germany had hostile intentions toward America" would have turned the nation from anti- to pro-war. That threat came in the form of a telegram from Arthur Zimmerman, the German Foreign Secretary, sent to the German ambassador in Mexico suggesting a conspiracy to provoke an attack by Mexico on the United States, with the help of Japan. The goal was to involve the U.S. in a local war and prevent them from becoming involved in the European conflict. The "bait" for Mexico was the recovery of Texas and parts of New Mexico and Arizona taken by the United States in 1848. In her own inimitable style, Tuchman provides a strong understanding of the deep levels of conspiracy that had been going on in American-Mexican relations for years prior to the start of the war in 1914 and which continued even after U.S. entry into the war. She also shows the difficulties involved in revealing knowledge of the threat without jeopardizing cryptographer's ability to continue intercepting and decoding German secret messages. If read together, "The Guns of August" and "The Zimmerman Telegram" present a strong foundation for understanding history during the first half of the 20th Century. I highly recommend this short, but compelling work as supplemental reading for any student of United States history.

A book about the little known code breaking by the British in World War one.Unlike every other history I have read , the characterisation of the individual "statesmen" and agents is excellent .This books makes you want to read history ......for pleasure!The revelations about the nervous ticks fumbling , sometimes incompetent , sometimes competent politicians is very refreshing .No one dimensional individuals here ............everybody has their personal prejudices , self doubts and paranoias !Another excellent book from the author of the excellent "A distant Mirror" .

This book recounts one of the exploits of Room 40. In 1917 the Germans were planning to unleash a U Boat campaign in the Atlantic to sink all suspect shipping at sight. This would probably bring the USA into the war so, to keep the Americans occupied on their side of the Atlantic, they offered to help Mexico to recover the states, California for example, that they had lost to the USA in the past. Room 40 decoded the secret message from Germany to their representative in Washington, Herr Zimmerman. This resulted in America joining the Allies. A real thriller!

America was finally tipped into declaring war against Germany in 1917 following the release of the Zimmermann Telegram, a message from the Germans proposing an anti-American alliance to Mexico which would see Mexico take back Texas, New Mexico and Arizona. Barbara Tuchman's lively account of the affair was first published in 1958 and it is a tribute to the popularity of the book that it was turned into an audio book just this year.The book is based on an impressive grasp of the detailed evidence. At times the description of what people were thinking, where they were sitting and how they felt clearly goes beyond what the evidence directly proves, making the account read more like a careful dramatisation than a dry academic recitation.And drama aplenty there is: ingenious British code-breaking, dramatic chases around the Middle East, nefarious plotting to subvert governments and all for the very highest in political stakes - the outcome of a war engulfing the world.Some parts of the book have rather dated - even the 1966 preface flags up the volume of new evidence available since the original publication - and the clichéd picture of German personality traits feels very much of another era.For readers not too interested in the detailed history of American-Mexican relations, the sections on the plots and counter-plots in Mexican politics can feel a little slow. Yet even a skim read through these details gives a vivid picture of Mexican instability, American nervousness over its southern frontier and a climate in which spies and plots prospered.It all makes for a highly enjoyable read in addition to being a thought provoking reminder about how often people frame evidence to fit their views: those for whom the telegram suited their political views were generally easy to persuade that it was genuine and many of those who found it ran against their previous views initially latched on to all sorts of arguments for dismissing it as a fake. That lesson is still highly relevant today.

What more is their to say. This is an early Barbara Tuchman but, as always, full of well researched historical accuracy, startling and valuable insights, and old told in beautiful narrative prose, Simply the best.

This typically thorough and illuminating Tuchman history explains how the United States was dragged unwillingly into participating in the first world war, despite the great efforts of their president, Woodrow Wilson, to stop the fighting by achieving a 'no victory' ceasefire after two years of the slaughter.