On June 27, 1914, Colonel Edward House, close adviser to U.S.
President Woodrow Wilson, meets with Foreign Secretary Edward
Grey of Britain, over lunch in London. The meeting, part of a
diplomatic tour of Europe that House made during the early
summer of 1914, took place several weeks after House's arrival
in London, the previous June 9, after visiting Berlin, Germany,
and Paris, France. The purpose of House's trip was to persuade
Germany and Britain to join with the United States in a
diplomatic alliance in order to preserve peace, not only in
Europe but in the world. House had long believed that, due to
the mass amount of military and naval might the great powers of
Europe had accumulated, they, along with America, could work
together to prevent major wars. On his trip to Europe, he sought
an agreement between Britain and Germany to limit the size of
their respective navies and cease the naval build-up that had
been occurring over the past decade, in order to preserve the
tenuous balance of power and avoid