American draftees in front of their barracks.

Despite rising American outrage against the Germans over the Lusitania sinking, President Wilson has continued to show restraint. But the German Kaiser knows his country is losing badly in the war of public opinion, and he announces a halt to the "sink on sight" submarine warfare campaign in British waters. But even giving up what might be Germany's best weapon for winning the war doesn't help his country's reputation. An editorial in the Times of London rants about "the hideous policy of indiscriminate brutality which has placed the German race outside of the pale," and claims that unless Germany is invaded and subjugated, "all the blood which has been shed will have flowed in vain." The Allies will continue to reap enormous propaganda benefits from the Lusitania's sinking.

Ultimately, despite President Wilson's threat to break off diplomatic relations, in early 1917 an increasingly desperate Germany will resume the "sink on sight" policy. That, coupled with British naval intelligence's interception of the infamous Zimmerman telegram, in which Germany offered U.S. territory to Mexico in exchange for support, will prompt the U.S. to enter the war on the Allied side in April 1917.