During World War I there were two opposing sides, the Allies and the Central Powers. A military strategy that England had was to make a blockade, when ships block or make a line to prevent a country from receiving resources, in Germany. If Germany was blocked in, then they wouldn't be able to import or export supplies for their army. Because of this, Germany was upset with England. Germany couldn't import or export weapons, military supplies, or even food.
Germany was also upset with the United States. Since the United States couldn't send in goods to Germany and they didn't challenge the British Blockade, the Germans were mad with the U.S. The U.S. then couldn't import foodstuffs, or fertilizer for crops. This led to famine in 1917 where about 750,000 Germans starved to death because of the blockade.
Germany felt the need to get rid of the blockade themselves, therefore they used U-boats, or a small German submarine, to sink the ships blocking them from the rest of the world. The Germans would sink many British ships claiming them to ammunition, or bullets/rounds, or other weapons. However those ships were not military ships, they had both British and American civilians inside. On May 7, 1915, a German U-boat sank the British liner, the Lusitania. They claimed it contained ammunition, when it really claimed more than 1,000 civilians. Of the 1,198 civilians, 128 of them were American citizens. This lead to the American public being against the Central Powers.
Woodrow Wilson, a president of the United States, wanted, " a peace without victory... a peace between equals." He basically didn't want war, or that neither opposing side to harm each other. One of Wilsons goals was to have all countries join a "league for peace" to extend democracy, keep the freedom of the seas, and reduce weapons. In other words he wanted a "League of Nations" however that did not do anything to stop World War II from happening.
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