The Spanish-American War (1898)

20-4 The Spanish-American War (1898)
American interests in Cuba revived in the late nineteenth century. Periodic Cuban rebellions

The Spanish-American War (1898)
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against Spanish control and the relaxing of American isolationism combined to stimulate awareness in
the Caribbean. Government and business desired a stable Caribbean, and sensational journalism
attracted public attention to atrocities in Cuba. The timing of these attractions made Cuban
independence an American cause clbre. Source: “The War with Spain and After/ Atlantic Monthly (June 1898) vol. 18, pp. 722-25; reprinted in
Alfred B. Hart, ed., American History Told by Contemporaries vol. IV (New York: MacMillan, 1898-1929), pp. 573-575.
REASONS FOR WAR (1898)
We have had a Cuban question for more than ninety years. At times it has disappeared from our
politics, bat it has always reappeared. Once we thought it wise to prevent the island from winning its
independence from Spain, and thereby, perhaps, we entered into moral bonds to make sure that Spain
governed it decently. Whether we definitely contracted such an obligation or not, the Cuban question
has never ceased to annoy us. The controversies about it make a long series of chapters in one
continuous story of diplomatic trouble. Many of our ablest statesmen have had to deal with it as
secretaries of state and as ministers to Spain, and not one of member has been able to settle it One
President after another has taken it up, and every one has transmitted it to his successor. It has at
various times been a “plank” in the platforms of all our political parties, as it was in both the party
platforms of 1896,and it has been the subject of messages of nearly all our Presidents, as it was of
President Cleveland’s message in December, 1896, in which he distinctly expressed the opinion that the
United States might feel forced to recognize “higher obligations” than neutrality to Spain. In spite of
periods of apparent quiet, the old trouble has always reappeared in an acute form, and it has never
been settled; nor has mere recently been any strong reason for hope that it could be settled merely by
diplomatic negotiation with Spain. Our diplomats have long had an experience with Spanish character
and methods such as the public can better understand since war has been in progress. The pathetic
inefficiency and the continual indirection of the Spanish character are now apparent to the world; they
were long ago apparent to those who have had our diplomatic duties to do. Thus the negotiations
dragged on. We were put to trouble and expense to prevent filibustering, and filibustering continued in
spite of us. More than once heretofore has there been danger of international conflict, as for instance
when American sailors on the Virginros were executed in Cuba in 1873. Propositions have been made to
buy the island, and plans have been formed to annex it. All the while there have been American
interests in Cuba. Our citizens have owned property and made investments there, and done much to
develop its fertility. They have paid tribute, unlawful as well as lawful, both to insurgents and to Spanish
officials. They have lost property; for much of which no indemnity has been paid. All the while we have
had a trade with the island, important during periods of quiet, irritating during periods of unrest.
The Cuban trouble is, therefore, not a new trouble even in an acute form. It had been moving
toward a crisis for a long time. Still, while our government suffered these diplomatic vexations, and our
citizens these losses, and our merchants these annoyances, the mass of the American people gave title
serious thought to it The newspapers kept us reminded of an opera-bouflfe war that was going on, and
now and then there came information of delicate and troublesome diplomatic duties for our minister to
Spain. If Cuba were within a hundred miles of the coast of one of our populous states and near one of
our great ports, periods of acute interest in its condition would doubtless have come earlier and oftener,
and we should long ago have had to deal with a crisis by warlike measures. Or if the insurgents had
commanded respect instead of mere pity, we should have paid heed to their struggle sooner; for it is
almost an American maxim mat a people cannot govern itself till it can win its own independence.
When it began to be known that Weyler’s method of extermination was producing want in the
island, and when appeals were matte to American charity, we became more interested…. The American
public was in this mood when the battleship Maine was blown up in the harbor of Havana. The masses
think in events, and not in syllogisms, and this was an event This event provoked suspicions in the public
mind. The thought of the whole nation was instantly directed to Cuba. The fate of the sailors on the
Virginius, twenty-five years ago, was recalled The public curiosity about everything Cuban and Spanish
became intense. The Weyler method of war fare became more generally known. The story of our long
diplomatic trouble with Spain was recalled….
There is no need to discuss minor and accidental causes that hastened the rash of events; but
such causes were not lacking either in number or in influence But all these together could not have
driven us to war if we had not been willing to be driven,if the conviction had not become firm in the
minds of the people that Spanish rule in Cuba was a blot on civilization mat had now begun to bring
reproach to us; and when the President, who favored peace, declared it “intolerable,” the people were
ready to accept his judgment.
… We rushed into war almost before we knew it, not because we desired war, but because we
desired something to be done with the old problem mat should be direct and definite and final. Let us
end it once for alt…. Not only is mere in the United States an unmistakable popular approval of war as
the only effective means of restoring civilization in Cuba, but the judgment of the English people
promptly approved it,giving evidence of an instinctive race and institutional sympathy. If Anglo-Saxon
institutions and methods stand for anything, the institutions and methods of Spanish rule in Cuba are an
abomination and a reproach. And English sympathy is not more significant as an evidence of the
necessity of the war and as a good omen for the future of free institutions than the equally instinctive
sympathy with Spain that has been expressed by some of the decadent influences on the Continent;
indeed, the real meaning of American civilization and ideals will henceforth be somewhat more clearly
understood in several quarters of the world American character will be still better understood when the
whole world clearly perceives that the purpose of the war is only to remove from our very doors this
cruel and inefficient piece of medievalism which is one of the two great scandals of the closing years of
the century; for it is not a war of conquest.
20-8 Mark Twain, “Incident in the Philippines” (1924)
Famous writer Mark Twain had opposed the United States taking possession of the Philippines.
His satirical commentary on the battle between U. S. forces and the Moros made fun of the purported
Christian mission of U. S. occupation.
… This incident burst upon the world last Friday in an official cablegram from the commander of
our forces in the Philippines to our government at Washington. The substance of it was as follows: A
tribe of Moros, dark-skinned savages, had fortified themselves in the bowl of an extinct crater not many
miles from Jolo; and as they were hostiles, and bitter against us because we have been trying for eight
years to take their liberties away from them, their presence in that position was a menace. Our
commander, General Leonard Wood, ordered a reconnaissance [sic]. It was found that the Moros
numbered six hundred, counting women and children; that their crater bowl was in the summit of a
peak or mountain twenty-two hundred feet above sea level, and very difficult of access for Christian
troops and artillery…. Our troops climbed the heights by devious and difficult trails, and even took some
artillery with them [When they] arrived at the rim of the crater, the battle began. Our soldiers
numbered five hundred and forty. They were assisted by auxiliaries consisting of a detachment of native
constabulary in our pay-their numbers not given-and by a naval detachment, whose numbers are not
stated. But apparently the contending parties were about equal as to number-six hundred men on our
side, on the edge of the bowl; six hundred men, women, and children in the bottom of the bowl. Depth
of the bowl, 5O feet.
General Wood’s order was, “Kill or capture the six hundred.”
The battle began-h is officially called by that name-our forces firing down into the crater with
their artillery and their deadly small arms of precision; the savages furiously returning the fire, probably
with brickbats-though this is merely a surmise of mine, as the weapons used by the savages are not
nominated in the cablegram. Heretofore the Moros have used knives and clubs mainly; also ineffectual
trade-muskets when they had any.
The official report stated that the battle was fought with prodigious energy on both sides during
a day and a half, and that it ended with a complete victory for the American arms. The completeness of
the victory is established by this fact that of the six hundred Moros not one was left alive. The brilliancy
of the victory is established by this other fact, to with that of our six hundred heroes only fifteen lost
their lives.
General Wood was present and looking on. His order had been, “Kill or capture those savages.”
Apparently our little army considered that die “or” left them authorized to kill or capture according to
taste, and that their taste had remained what h has been for eight years, in our army out there-the taste
of Christian butchers….
Let us now consider two or three details of our military history. In one of the great battles of the
Civil War ten percent of the forces engaged on the two sides were killed and wounded. At Waterloo,
where four hundred thousand men were present on the two sides, fifty thousand fell, killed and
wounded, in five hours, leaving three hundred and fifty sound and all right for further adventures. Eight
years ago, when the pathetic comedy called die Cuban War was played, we summoned two hundred
and fifty thousand men. We fought a number of showy battles, and when the war was over we had lost
two hundred sixty-eight men out of our two hundred and fifty thousand, in killed and wounded in the
field, and just fourteen times as many by the gallantry of the army doctors in the hospitals and camps.
We did not exterminate the Spaniards-far from it In each engagement we left an average of two per
cent of the enemy killed or crippled on the field.
Contrast these things with the great statistics which have arrived from that Moro crater! There,
with six hundred engaged on each side, we lost fifteen men killed outright, and we had thirty-two
wounded…. The enemy numbered six hundred-including women and children-and we abolished them
utterly, leaving not even a baby alive to cry for its dead mother. This is incomparably the greatest victory
mat was ever achieved by the Christian soldiers of the United States.
21-2 William Graham Sumner, What the Social Classes Owe to Each Other (1883)
Advocates of American imperialism tied expansion overseas to the mission of civilizing other
peoples. William Graham Sumner was a major supporter of expansion and the right of the United States
to spread democracy to other peoples.
There is not a civilized nation that does not talk about its civilizing mission just as grandly as we
do. The English, who really have more to boast of it in this respect than anybody else, talk least about it,
but the Phariseeism with which they correct and instruct other people has made them hated all over the
globe. The French believe themselves the guardians of the highest and purest culture, and that the eyes
of all mankind are fixed on Paris, whence they expect oracles of thought and taste. The Germans regard
themselves as charged with a mission, especially to us Americans* to save us from egoism and
materialism. The Russians, in their books and newspapers, talk about the civilizing mission of Russian in
language that might be translated from some of the finest paragraphs of our imperialistic newspapers.
The first principle of Mohammedanism is that we Christians are dogs and infidels, fit only to be
enslaved or butchered by Moslems. It is a corollary that wherever Mohammedanism extends it carries,
in the belief of its votaries, the highest blessings, and that the whole human race would be enormously
elevated if Mohammedanism should supplant Christianity everywhere.
To come, last, to Spain, the Spaniards have, for centuries, considered themselves the most
zealous and self-sacrificing Christians, especially charged by the Almighty, on this account, to spread the
true religion and civilization over the globe. They think themselves free and noble, leaders in refinement
and the sentiments of personal honor, and they despise us as sordid money-grabbers and heretics. I
could bring you passages from peninsular authors of the first rank about the grand role of Spain and
Portugal in spreading freedom and truth.
Now each nation laughs at all the others when it observes these manifestations of national
vanity. You may rely upon it that they are all ridiculous by virtue of these pretensions, including
ourselves. The point is that each of them repudiates the standards of the others, and the outlying
nations, which are to be civilized, hate all the standards of civilized men.
We assume that what we like and practice, and what we think better, must come as a welcome
blessing to Spanish-Americans and Filipinos. This is grossly and obviously untrue. They hate our ways.
They are hostile to our ideas. Our religion, language, institutions, and manners offend them. They like
their own ways, and if we appear amongst them as rulers, there will be social discord in all the great
departments of social interest. The most important thing which we shall inherit from the Spaniards will
be the task of suppressing rebellions.
If the United States takes out of the hands of Spain her mission, on the ground that Spain is not
executing it well, and if this nation in its turn attempts to be schoolmistress to others, it will shrivel up
into the same vanity and self-conceit of which Spain now presents an example. To read our current
literature one would think that we were already well on the way to it.
Now, the great reason why all these enterprises which begin by saying to somebody else, “We
know what is good for you better than you know yourself and we are going to make you do it,” are false
and wrong is that they violate liberty; or, to turn the same statement into other words, the reason why
liberty, of which we Americans talk so much, is a good thing is that it means leaving people to live out
their own lives in their own way, while we do the same.
If we believe in liberty, as an American principle, why do we not stand by it? Why are we going
to throw it away to enter upon a Spanish policy of dominion and regulation?
UNITED STATES IMPERIALISM IN NICARAGUA
Independence came slowly to Nicaragua, as movements to break away from Spanish rule arose
in many colonies in the early 1800s. An 1811 uprising was crushed by colonial officials, and only when
Spanish authority collapsed in Mexico in 1821 did Nicaragua, along with most of Central America, break
with Spain. After the region declared independence, it was briefly part of the Mexican Empire of Agustin
de Iturbide, but when he fell in 1823, Nicaragua and four other states formed a federation, the United
Provinces of Central America.
This effort to unite the region was doomed by conflicts between Liberals and Conservatives and
by rivalries among the member states. Liberals and Conservatives advocated different political,
economic, and religious policies. Liberals promoted free-market capitalism, a strong central
government, and limited power for the Catholic clergy, while Conservatives favored the traditional
economic and social structure, dominated by large landowners and the church. Facing these divisions,
the federation began to break apart in 1838, when Nicaragua, along with several other members,
seceded and became independent states.
In the 1840s and 1850s Nicaragua was dominated by rivalries between Leon’s Liberals and
Granada’s Conservatives and by a struggle between the United States and Britain for influence over the
transit route across Nicaragua. The discovery of gold in California motivated U.S. investors, led by the
wealthy industrialist Cornelius Vanderbilt, to create the Accessory Transit Company to transport U.S.
citizens across Nicaragua. The company’s network of carriages and boats took passengers from the
Caribbean to the Pacific by way of the San Juan River and Lake Nicaragua. By 1852 a third of those
traveling to California by sea used this route. To protect U.S. interests, the administration of President
James Polk negotiated the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty with the United Kingdom. In the treaty, both nations
agreed not to take control over the transit routes across Nicaragua. This marked the end of U.S.-British
rivalry over Nicaragua and the beginning of U.S. dominance.
Meanwhile, Conservative-Liberal rivalry had broken out in open civil war. The Conservatives
were winning, so the Liberals asked an American, William Walker, to recruit a private army to aid them.
Known as filibusters, Walker’s troops began arriving in 1855 and soon took control of the country,
shoving aside leaders of both parties and installing Walker as president. This alarmed the rest of Central
America. With support from the British and Vanderbilt, whose business interests Walker had opposed,
the other countries in the region formed an army to drive Walker out, defeating him in 1857. Walker’s
fall brought the Conservatives back to power. Under their rule, which lasted until 1893, the capital was
moved to Managua in an effort to dampen the rivalry between Granada and Leon. Coffee became the
dominant export crop, and railroad construction was begun. United States interest in a possible canal
grew slowly, but an 1884 treaty that would have given the United States exclusive canal rights was never
ratified by the U.S. Senate.
In 1893 a Liberal general, Jose Santos Zelaya, seized power. He continued as president until
1909, putting down Conservative revolts and making Nicaragua a major player in Central Americas
power struggles. He tried to improve public administration and develop the economy, promoting the
beginning of banana exports. Railroads and ports were improved, schools were expanded, and the
military was modernized. An agreement with the British led to their final withdrawal from the Caribbean
coast. But hopes that the United States would build a canal were dashed when the administration of
President Theodore Roosevelt selected a route through Panama instead. Relations deteriorated, and
U.S. officials became convinced that Zelaya was an unstable element in the region and should be
replaced.
The Intervention Era, 1909-1933
In 1909 the United States encouraged a revolt against Zelaya, using naval forces to prevent him
from crushing the uprising. Zelaya resigned, but U.S. pressures continued until his successor turned over
power to a coalition government. This proved unstable, and in 1912 U.S. Marines landed and imposed
order, defeating a Liberal force and ensuring that Conservative Adolfo Diaz remained president. A small
Marine unit stayed in Nicaragua until 1925, making it clear that revolutions would not be tolerated. This
enabled the Conservatives, a minority party, to rig elections without fear of being overthrown.
Allied with the Conservatives, the United States and its interests soon dominated Nicaragua.
Conservative leader General Emiliano Chamorro signed the Bryan-Chamorro Treaty, which gave the
United States exclusive rights to build a canal across Nicaragua in exchange for $3 million, and became
president in 1916. The United States never planned to build a canal but wanted the treaty to ensure that
no other nation would be able to do so. For Nicaraguan nationalists, this became a symbol of U.S.
exploitation of Nicaragua. United States officials and businesses also came to dominate much of
Nicaragua’s economy and banking system.
In the early 1920s the United States sought to promote political stability in the country so that
the Marines would not be needed to prevent revolts. The United States tried to create a professional
Nicaraguan military that could maintain order and tried to reform corrupt election practices. After
elections brought a weak Liberal-Conservative coalition to power in 1925, the Marines left. Civil war
immediately erupted as Chamorro, the defeated Conservative candidate, ousted the Liberals from
government and took over the presidency himself.
This created a conflict for the United States: It feared that the Liberals might win the war,
especially when they seemed to be getting support from a revolutionary government in Mexico, but it
also wanted a stable government in Nicaragua and to prevent coups, such as Chamorro’s. Therefore U.S.
officials worked to force Chamorro from power, and former president Diaz again took office. The
Liberals continued to win the civil conflict, however, and in 1926 and 1927 the United States again
landed thousands of Marines in Nicaragua to support the Conservative government. Former U.S.
secretary of war Henry Stimson then negotiated a peace agreement, under which Liberals were given
some government posts; the United States agreed to supervise the 1928 elections; and troops of both
sides were disarmed. They were to be replaced by the National Guard, a new force that combined police
and military, created and trained by the United States.
One Liberal general, Augusto Cesar Sandino, refused to accept this agreement. He formed a
rebel army and carried on a guerrilla campaign against the U.S. presence until 1933. This made him a
symbol of nationalism to many Nicaraguans and others who opposed U.S. intervention.
In 1928 U.S.-supervised elections brought Liberal general Jose Maria Moncada to power.
Because of concerns about Sandino and the time needed to train the National Guard, the Marines
remained in Nicaragua until January 1933. Plans to improve the economy fell victim to the worldwide
depression of the 1930s and to a massive earthquake that destroyed Managua in 1931. The United
States also supervised the 1932 presidential elections, which were won by Liberal leader Juan Bautista
Sacasa. The Marines then withdrew, giving command of the National Guard to a Liberal politician,
Anastasio Somoza Garcia, who was married to Sacasa’s niece.
Sandino quickly negotiated a truce with the Sacasa government, ending his rebellion. Tensions
between the National Guard and Sandino mounted steadily, however, and in 1934 Sandino was
murdered by Guard officers. He became a hero to many Nicaraguans, and his name was adopted more
than 40 years later by revolutionaries trying to overthrow the government and change Nicaraguan
society, the Sandinistas.