From Tragedy to War: The Maine Incident Explained
The catastrophic explosion of the USS Maine on February 15, 1898, serves as the focal point of our discussion today, as we delve into the intricate circumstances surrounding this monumental event. Initially perceived as a tragic accident, the incident's repercussions ignited fervent nationalist sentiments and ultimately catalyzed the United States' declaration of war against Spain, marking the commencement of the Spanish-American War. We will explore various historical interpretations regarding the explosion's cause, including the possibility of an external attack versus an internal malfunction, a debate that continues to stir scholarly contention even over a century later. The episode further examines the role of sensationalist journalism in shaping public perception and inciting a war fervor, illustrating how media narratives profoundly influenced American foreign policy. Join us as we unravel the complex tapestry of ambition, conflict, and consequence that emerged from the ashes of the USS Maine, reflecting upon the enduring implications of this pivotal moment in history.
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Takeaways:
- The explosion of the USS Maine in 1898 catalyzed the onset of the Spanish American War, fundamentally altering America's role in global affairs.
- Many historians now debate the true cause of the Maine's explosion, with theories ranging from external sabotage to internal malfunctions.
- Yellow journalism played a pivotal role in shaping public opinion against Spain, leading to heightened tensions and ultimately war.
- Despite initial humanitarian intentions, the aftermath of the Spanish American War resulted in American imperial control over territories like Puerto Rico and the Philippines.
- The debates surrounding imperialism in the late 19th century showcased a divide within American society regarding the principles of self-determination and governance by consent.
- The legacy of the Maine's explosion continues to resonate, posing questions about America's identity and responsibilities on the world stage.
Transcript
Welcome back to History's Greatest Crimes, the podcast that uncovers the dark underbelly of the past.
Speaker A:I'm Michael.
Speaker B:And I'm Alaina.
Speaker B:Today we're diving into an event that on its surface might seem like a tragic accident or.
Speaker B:But whose ripples created an empire and exposed a nation's raw ambition.
Speaker A:Picture this.
Speaker A: ,: Speaker A:Although the Maine was a large battleship equipped with modern armor, it had heavy guns and a crew of about 350 sailors.
Speaker A:It was intended more as a tool of intimidation.
Speaker A:It was designed to help keep order in the politically chaotic nation of Cuba through its mere presence.
Speaker A:In fact, the American leaders had expressly ordered the crew to avoid provocation.
Speaker B:That's right, Michael.
Speaker B:At this point, the United States wasn't officially involved in the bigger conflicts going on between Spain and its Caribbean colony, Cuba.
Speaker B:But American leaders were becoming increasingly concerned with the ways that the Spanish sought to crush Cuban revolutionaries.
Speaker B:And the hope was that the presence of the Maine in the Havana harbor would help to maintain peace on the island.
Speaker A:But at around 9:40pm While most of the Maine's crew was asleep or relaxing below decks, a sudden massive explosion ripped through the forward section of the ship.
Speaker A:It seemed that the ammunition magazines detonated, but by what, they weren't completely sure.
Speaker A:The result, a tremendous blast.
Speaker A:The front third of the ship was obliterated, and the rest quickly flooded and sank.
Speaker B:260American sailors were killed immediately or died shortly after.
Speaker B:Only 94 survived.
Speaker A:The explosion shocked both the American and Cuban public.
Speaker A:Yellow journalist newspapers in the United States sensationalized the tragedy, blaming the Spanish with bold headlines like Remember the Maine To Hell with Spain.
Speaker B:American public outrage in response to this horrific event would ultimately serve as an important catalyst.
Speaker B: th of: Speaker A:But were the Spanish actually responsible for such a heinous act?
Speaker A:Today, some historians suggest that they might actually be innocent, wrongly framed by the American media as the culprits.
Speaker B: hip into the Havana harbor in: Speaker A: ck the lens to America in the: Speaker A:The Gilded Age.
Speaker A:An era of dazzling technological progress, skyscraper fortunes, and under the surface, a simmering restlessness.
Speaker A:This period saw America leap to the forefront of industrialization, with transcontinental railroads stitching the nation together and men like Cornelius Vanderbilt and Jay Gould amassing fortunes, sometimes through rather dubious means.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:It was an age of stark contrasts.
Speaker B:Unprecedented wealth for a few, like the robber barons building their monopolies, while millions, many of them new immigrants, toiled in grim conditions and burgeoning cities, facing dangerous workplaces and squalid tenements.
Speaker B:And beneath the surface, there was a growing sense that America, having tamed its own continent, should expand its territory in the world.
Speaker B:The old policy of isolationism was decidedly fraying.
Speaker A:Indeed, while US foreign policy for much of the Gilded Age had been unambitious for focused mostly on domestic concerns, that was suddenly changing.
Speaker A:American commercial interests were expanding, particularly in the Pacific.
Speaker A:And this wasn't just about territory.
Speaker A:It was about the US having more coaling stations for a modern navy and about access to Asian markets.
Speaker B: And at this time in the late: Speaker B:And influential voices were arguing that a powerful navy and overseas bases were essential to protect America's burgeoning commercial interests and project power globally.
Speaker B:This thinking directly fueled naval expansion and a more assertive outward looking foreign policy.
Speaker A:And the nearest, most volatile frontier.
Speaker A:Well, that was Cuba, just 90 miles off the coast of Florida, a Spanish colony, in what seemed like a never ending brutal rebellion.
Speaker A: ntrolled the island since the: Speaker A: But towards the end of the: Speaker A: of conflict, starting in the: Speaker A:Those last three years of revolution are officially known as the Cuban War of independence.
Speaker B: violent, the last part, from: Speaker B:For example, the Spanish general Valeriano Whaler, dubbed the Butcher by the American press, implemented his infamous reconcentration policy.
Speaker B:Hundreds of thousands of Cuban civilians were forced from their rural homes into fortified towns, essentially concentration camps, where famine and disease were rampant.
Speaker A:Contemporary reports describe conditions in Whalers camps as hell on earth.
Speaker A: Cubans perishing by: Speaker A:This humanitarian crisis was heavily reported, and it deeply disturbed many Americans and fueled calls for American intervention.
Speaker B:But in addition to humanitarian concerns, Americans were also concerned about the revolutionary conflict in Cuba.
Speaker A:Because of money, because of that cha cha cha ching.
Speaker B: And by the: Speaker B:American investments in Cuba's lucrative sugar and tobacco industries amounted to roughly $50 million, and nearly 95% of Cuban sugar exports went to the United States.
Speaker A:So you have this potent mix.
Speaker A:A powerful industrialized United States feeling its oats, significant economic states, a humanitarian outrage, and Spain struggle to hold on to the remnants of its once vast empire, which included Cuba, Puerto Rico, Guam and the Philippines.
Speaker A:It's hard not to see a collision course forming.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:But friendly in such a charged atmosphere that was debatable from the start.
Speaker A:Captain Charles Sigsbee, a bespeckled man whose walrus mustache made him look like a caricature of the Gilded Age itself, was the commander of the Maine, and he understood the delicacy of his mission.
Speaker A:His orders were to protect US interests and provide asylum to the US Consul in Havana if they needed it.
Speaker A:Sigsbee reported that Spanish officials were outwardly courteous and he sensed an underlying tension and, as he put it, took every precaution that could be taken against injury or treachery.
Speaker A:Still, he later wrote with tragic understatement, I did not expect that the ship would be blown up.
Speaker B:Then 9:40pm Feb.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:And his own account is really chilling.
Speaker A:He said at TAPS.
Speaker A:Ten minutes after 9 o' clock, I laid down my pen to listen to the notes of the bugle, which were singularly beautiful in the oppressive stillness of the night.
Speaker A:A half hour later, Newton the bugler was dead to me.
Speaker A:It was a bursting, rending and crashing sound or roar of immense volume, largely metallic in character, end quote.
Speaker B:In another account, Captain Sigsbee explained that quote, there was an awful moment of trembling and roar, then a tearing, wrenching, crunching sound of immense volume.
Speaker B:There was instantaneous darkness and smoke filled my cabin.
Speaker B:I knew that my vessel had been destroyed, end quote.
Speaker A:The devastation was immediate and horrific.
Speaker A:The explosion occurred in the forward part of the ship, precisely where the enlisted men's quarters were located.
Speaker A:The final death toll varies slightly across accounts, but at least 260American sailors were killed outright or fatally wounded.
Speaker B:The official inquiries began almost immediately.
Speaker B:In fact, the US Navy created a naval court of inquiry called the Sampson Board specifically for the purpose.
Speaker B:They conducted diver examinations of the wreck and interviewed survivors and witnesses.
Speaker B: of: Speaker B:This meant that they believed that something was placed outside of the ship to cause damage to it, as opposed to an internal explosion.
Speaker B:They noted the ship's excellent discipline and found no internal cause for the explosion, pointing to the keel being bent into an inverted V and bottom plating forced upwards as evidence of an external blast.
Speaker A:So while they didn't explicitly blame Spain, the implication hung heavy in the air.
Speaker B:That's right, Michael.
Speaker B:Spain, of course, conducted its own inquiry, led by Don del Miro Delgado y Costa.
Speaker B:The Delgado Commission's findings, released around the same time, pointed squarely to an internal explosion.
Speaker B:They highlighted the absence of a significant water column typically associated with an external mine, the lack of dead fish in the immediate vicinity, and hull plating that appeared to bend outwards.
Speaker B:Their investigation, however, was hampered by what they termed the extraterritoriality of the main, limiting their access to the wreck itself.
Speaker A:In other words, the Spanish investigation claimed that while they couldn't definitively say what caused the explosion, it definitely wasn't the Spanish fault.
Speaker B:Correct.
Speaker B:And this is where the crime aspect becomes so fascinatingly murky, because the actual cause of the Maine sinking is still debated by historians over a century later.
Speaker B: In: Speaker A: Fast forward to: Speaker A:Admiral Hyman G.
Speaker A:Rickover, a renowned naval engineer, conducted his own exhaustive investigation.
Speaker A:He noted that the original Sampson board hadn't fully explored potential internal causes.
Speaker A:Rickover pointed to the spontaneous combustion of bituminous coal, which was often used at the time to generate electricity.
Speaker A:This, of course, was a known hazard on warships of that era, because bituminous coal could release flammable fire damp gas.
Speaker B:Yet the debate didn't end there.
Speaker B: A: Speaker B:Their conclusion?
Speaker B:That an external mind was more probable.
Speaker A:Here we go again.
Speaker A:So we're back to the exact same explanation.
Speaker B:Yes.
Speaker B: However, the: Speaker B:And even some analysts within the investigative company itself, Advanced Marine Enterprises, continue to support the internal explosion theory.
Speaker B: ically, the scenario that the: Speaker A:It's a classic historical whodunit, or perhaps a what done it.
Speaker B:And the lack of a definitive answer of what caused the explosion created some openings for those with an agenda.
Speaker A:Exactly.
Speaker A:It meant that there was no clear narrative to counter the emotionally charged speculation that that was about to erupt.
Speaker A:The mystery itself became a weapon, allowing the most compelling and often the least factual stories to take hold and shape public perception.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:The headlines of American newspapers were immediately dramatic, the goal being to draw in readers.
Speaker A:Even before the Maine exploded, William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal and Joseph Pulitzer's New York World were already locked in a ferocious circulation war.
Speaker A:The term yellow journalism, emphasizing sensationalism over facts in the newspapers, had actually originated from their rivalry over a popular comic strip.
Speaker A:The comic strip's name was the Yellow Kid.
Speaker A:For yellow journalists like Hertz and Pulitzer, the main wasn't just a tragedy, it was something with which to capitalize on.
Speaker B:They didn't bother waiting for the findings of any inquiry.
Speaker B:The ink was barely dry on official reports of the explosion When Hearst's New York Journal on February 17th screamed from its front page.
Speaker A:Destruction of the warship Maine was the work of an enemy.
Speaker A:And not content with mere accusation, Hearst's paper offered a $50,000 reward for the detection of the perpetrator of the Maine outrage.
Speaker A:Talk about fanning the flames.
Speaker B:Pulitzer's New York World was right there with them.
Speaker B:Its headline on February 17 asking, Main explosion caused by bomb or torpedo.
Speaker B:Both papers and many others that followed their lead published unsubstantiated rumors of Spanish plots, accentuated the harshness of Spanish rule in Cuba, and used bold, often misleading headlines and dramatic, sometimes entirely fabricated illustrations to capture public attention and sell newspapers.
Speaker B:They essentially declared Spain guilty until proven innocent.
Speaker A:Let's offer our readers a couple of examples of how yellow journalists stretch the truth about the conflict in Cuba just to sell more newspapers.
Speaker B:Well, there was the Olivet incident.
Speaker B:Apparently, a young Cuban woman named Clemencia Irongo was taken into custody aboard the ship.
Speaker B:The Olivet was by Spanish officials under suspicion of delivering letters to rebel leaders in the city.
Speaker B:She was taken into a private room and searched.
Speaker B:A passenger and reporter working for Hearst named Richard Harding Davis reported the incident.
Speaker B:And despite the fact that the search appears to have been conducted quite properly by a police matron with no men present, the headlines that followed stated, quote, refined young woman stripped and searched by brutal spaniards.
Speaker A:Another example took place soon afterward.
Speaker A:It involved a Cuban dentist named Ricardo Ruiz, who had fled to the United States in the earlier decades of Cuban revolutionary efforts.
Speaker A:And while in the United States, he became a US Citizen.
Speaker A:But then later, Ricardo Ruiz had voluntarily returned to Cuba, married and had children.
Speaker A:Eventually he was imprisoned under suspicion of associating with the rebels and died in prison.
Speaker A:Hearst published a headline the next day that read, Americans Slain in Spanish Jail.
Speaker B:And then when the American battleship exploded, Hertz, Pulitzer and the other yellow journalists forged the rallying cry, remember the main to hell with Spain.
Speaker B:It became ubiquitous, plastered on posters, sung in jinguistic songs, a national mantra repeated from street corners to political rallies.
Speaker B:It was a remarkably effective piece of propaganda.
Speaker A:It's very catchy.
Speaker A:I still find myself saying it today.
Speaker A:But it's often said that Hearst, in a cable to his illustrator Frederick Remington, who was in Cuba and finding very little to draw, declared, quote, you furnish the pictures and I'll furnish the war.
Speaker A:End quote.
Speaker A:While the authenticity of that exact quote is debated by historians, it perfectly encapsulates the aggressive interventionist spirit of the yellow press.
Speaker B:However, it's important to note, as many historians do, that these newspapers didn't create anti Spanish sentiment out of whole cloth, nor did they single handedly caused the Spanish American War.
Speaker A:W.
Speaker A:Joseph Campbell, a historian of media, puts it well.
Speaker A:He notes that while these newspapers didn't create the policy differences with Spain that led to the war, their sensational coverage sold a lot of papers and undeniably helped to create a climate conducive to the outbreak of international conflict.
Speaker A:They weren't just reporting the news, they were shaping the public's emotional response to it.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:Although this wasn't a simple case of the press leading a passive public to war, Americans were already deeply sympathetic to the Cuban cause and outraged by reports of Spanish atrocities like their use of concentration camps.
Speaker A:The Gilded Age had also fostered a potent, if sometimes unacknowledged brew of American exceptionalism and a yearning for a more assertive role on the world stage.
Speaker A:The sinking of the Maine, with its tragic loss of American lives, was a genuinely shocking and infuriating event for many.
Speaker B:The yellow press, locked in its own fierce commercial battles, expertly tapped into these existing veins of anger, patriotism and jingoism.
Speaker B:They used those screaming headlines, those heart wrenching and often misleading images to amplify and direct the public's emotions, creating immense pressure on politicians to do something.
Speaker B:The media acted as an accelerant then, making war seem not just an option, but the only Honorable response to a public now clamoring for action.
Speaker A:With the public baying for blood, fanned by these relentless headlines, President William McKinley, a man who initially urged caution, found his options narrowing.
Speaker A:The drums of war were beating louder and louder with each passing day.
Speaker B: ,: Speaker B:Citing the ongoing brutal conflict in Cuba, the need to protect American citizens and property, and the imperative to establish a stable government on the island, he asked for authorization to intervene militarily.
Speaker B:Congress responded swiftly, passing a joint resolution on April 20 that acknowledged Cuban independence and demanded Spanish withdrawal.
Speaker A:Congress also issued the Teller Amendment.
Speaker A:At this time it disavowed any US intention to annex Cuba and instead emphasized that the US would leave the government and control of the island to its people.
Speaker A:This amendment aimed to reassure anti imperialist sentiment in the US that the war was not motivated by a desire to colonize Cuba.
Speaker A:It apparently also spoke to some European nations whose leaders had expressed doubts themselves regarding the US's intention in getting involved.
Speaker B:On April 25, following Spain's refusal to withdraw and recognize Cuban independence, the United States formally declared war on Spain, starting the Spanish American War.
Speaker A:So began what Secretary of State John Hay would famously describe as a splendid little war.
Speaker A:This splendid little war ultimately only lasted 10 weeks.
Speaker A:American Commodore George Dewey, commanding the US Asiatic Squadron, delivered the first stunning blow on May 1 at Manila Bay in the Philippines.
Speaker A:His fleet utterly annihilated the Spanish Pacific fleet with almost casual efficiency.
Speaker B:Dewey's own report was a masterpiece of understatement.
Speaker B:He said, quote, the squadron maintained a continuous and precise fire.
Speaker B: At: Speaker B:The batteries were silenced and the ships sunk, burnt and deserted.
Speaker A:Then came the land campaign in Cuba.
Speaker A:This is where the legend of the Rough Riders was forged.
Speaker A:The first U.S.
Speaker A:volunteer cavalry was a motley regiment of cowboys, Ivy Leaguers and adventurers.
Speaker A:It was co commanded by Colonel Leonard Wood and more famously, Lieutenant Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, AKA the future President Teddy Roosevelt.
Speaker A:When the Spanish American War was declared, Roosevelt had eagerly resigned his post as Assistant Secretary of the Navy to seek battlefield glory.
Speaker B:During the Battle of Las Guasimas on June 24, Roosevelt narrowly avoided bullets buzzing by him into the trees, showering splinters around his face.
Speaker B:Although the rough riders lost seven men and 34 were wounded and they were successful at driving the Spanish back.
Speaker A:And during their charge up Kettle Hill on July 1, Colonel Teddy Roosevelt led a series of charges on his horse named Texas, while the Rough Riders followed on foot.
Speaker A:He rode up and down the hill, encouraging his men with the orders to march.
Speaker A:This Action was part of the Battle of San Juan Heights, which again resulted in victory for the Americans.
Speaker B:Roosevelt himself described the battle as the great day of my life, recounting how he led the charge of his horse, Texas, urging his men to march, and even claiming to have killed a Spaniard with a revolver salvaged from the Maine.
Speaker B:His account and the press coverage surrounding it cemented his image as a national hero.
Speaker A:Roosevelt and the Rough Riders fought alongside regular army units, including the highly effective African American Buffalo soldiers of the 9th and 10th Cavalry and the 24th and 25th Infantry.
Speaker B:The famous Buffalo Soldiers, later referenced by Bob Marley and his music, were black U.S.
Speaker B: he Native American wars after: Speaker B:They earned national praise for their service, and several were awarded the Medal of Honor for their heroism.
Speaker A:Now, we shouldn't idealize this war that much.
Speaker A:The grim truth is that more American soldiers died from diseases like typhoid, yellow fever and malaria than they did from Spanish bullets.
Speaker A:Estimates suggest that fewer than 400Americans died from combat deaths, compared to over 2,000 from disease, with a significant portion of those disease related deaths occurring in stateside training camps that were often filthy and unsanitary.
Speaker B:Absolutely.
Speaker B:The logistical aspects of the war were a nightmare.
Speaker B:Troops were often poorly equipped and supplied and.
Speaker B:And then there was the infamous embalmed beef scandal.
Speaker B:Soldiers reported being fed canned meat that was allegedly spoiled or adulterated with chemicals like boric acid and formaldehyde to preserve it, leading to widespread sickness.
Speaker A:And while it was commendable that some Buffalo Soldiers were awarded medals for their heroism in the war, black troops in the Spanish American War served in segregated units.
Speaker A:They faced pervasive discrimination from both white soldiers and local populations in the south, where they were often stationed.
Speaker A:And their heroism was frequently downplayed or ignored in the mainstream accounts, sometimes even by Roosevelt himself in his later writings.
Speaker B:The sentiment within the African American community was complex.
Speaker B:While many saw service as a way to prove patriotism and demand equal rights, others were deeply critical.
Speaker B:The Salt Lake City Broad Acts, an African American newspaper, voiced this frustration.
Speaker B:If we had the power, we would not permit one black battalion to assist unless they are officered from top to bottom by members of our own race.
Speaker B:This really underscores the painful paradox of fighting for a nation that still largely denied African Americans their basic dignities.
Speaker A:So the narrative of a splendid little war was actively constructed.
Speaker A:It focused on the swift victories, the heroic figures like Roosevelt, and the relatively low combat casualties for the US while conveniently downplaying the devastating toll of disease, the logistical blunders and the morally uncomfortable racist aspects.
Speaker B:And the American public ate it up because they were eager for tales of national glory and power.
Speaker A:It also helped that the Spanish American War was actually very short in temporal length.
Speaker A: s largely ceased by August of: Speaker A:The Treaty of Paris, formally ending the war, was signed in December of the same year.
Speaker B:Under the terms of the treaty, Spain relinquished all claims to Cuba, which meant that it was now independent.
Speaker A:And that was great news to the American people.
Speaker A:Another nation overthrew its brutal oppressor and was free now.
Speaker A:But as a result of the war, Spain also ceded Guam and Puerto Rico to the United States, and for a payment of $20 million, sold the Philippines to the US as well.
Speaker B:In other words, Guam, Puerto Rico and the Philippines would not have their independence or ability to govern themselves.
Speaker B:They were now colonies of the United States.
Speaker A: g the same period, In July of: Speaker B:So by the turn of the century, America had its empire.
Speaker B:Puerto Rico, Guam, the Philippines, a vast new domain.
Speaker B:But as the victory parades ended, a chorus of dissenting voices began to rise, questioning the price and the principle of this new American reach.
Speaker B:The acquisition of an overseas empire, particularly the Philippines, ignited a fierce debate within the United States.
Speaker B:It just didn't sit well with everyone.
Speaker B: y formed in Boston in June of: Speaker A:We're talking about former presidents like Grover Cleveland and Benjamin Harrison, the industrial titan, Andrew Carnegie, celebrated author Mark Twain, labor leaders like Samuel Gompers, pioneering social reformers like Jane Addams, and, and the great commoner himself, the three time presidential candidate, William Jennings Bryan.
Speaker A:It was a broad coalition, united by their opposition to what they saw as a dangerous and un American turn.
Speaker B:Their arguments were diverse, reflecting different motivations.
Speaker B:Mark Twain, for instance, initially supported American expansion.
Speaker B:He wrote, quote, I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific.
Speaker B:Why not spread its wings over the Philippines, I asked myself.
Speaker B:But his views shifted dramatically once he understood the U.S.
Speaker B:s intentions.
Speaker A: he New York Herald in October: Speaker A:But I have thought some more since then, and I have read carefully the Treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Philippines.
Speaker A:We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem.
Speaker A:And so I am an anti imperialist.
Speaker A:End quote.
Speaker B:Andrew Carnegie, the Scottish born steel magnate and philanthropist, brought both moral and pragmatic arguments to the table.
Speaker B:He vigorously condemned US Foreign policy, warning that governing alien races and distant lands was fraught with peril and would ultimately weaken the Republic by drawing it into foreign entanglements and expensive military commitments.
Speaker A:Carnegie wrote, I regard possessions in the Far east as fraught with nothing but disaster.
Speaker A:To the Republic.
Speaker A:He believed America's true strength lay in its industrial ideals and its compact, defensible territory.
Speaker A:He argued that true Americanism was about moral force and civilization, while imperialism implies naval and military force behind brutal physical strength.
Speaker B:Now, just to add one more thing about Andrew Carnegie in this context, he was apparently so against the idea of maintaining governance over the Philippines that he attempted to buy independence from the nation with a personal check for $20 million what the United States had originally paid Spain for it.
Speaker A: Democratic party in the early: Speaker A:He argued that imperialism, particularly governing a people without their consent, was a betrayal of the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker B:Bryan declared in a famous speech, if we are to govern them without their consent and give them no voice in determining the taxes which they must pay, we dare not educate them, lest they learn to read the Declaration of Independence and Constitution of the United States and mock us for our inconsistency.
Speaker B:End quote he passionately asserted, quote the highest obligation of this nation is to be true to itself.
Speaker B:No obligation to any particular nations or to all the nations combined can require the abandonment of our theory of government.
Speaker A:Jane Adams, the founder of Chicago's Hull House, also lent her considerable moral authority to the anti imperialist cause.
Speaker A: a Chicago Liberty meeting in: Speaker B:Adams stated, quote, to protect the weak has always been the excuse of the ruler and tax gatherer, the chief, the king, the baron, and now at last of the white man.
Speaker B:She saw imperialism as a continuation of historical patterns of domination incompatible with true democratic ideals.
Speaker A:While these prominent Americans debated the ethics and wisdom of empire, the Filipinos had a starkly different perspective.
Speaker A: st Spain in a revolution from: Speaker B:They initially welcomed the Americans as allies, believing as Aguinaldo later claimed, based on interactions with US Officials, that the US Would support their bid for an independent Philippine Republic.
Speaker A:That hope was quickly shattered when it became clear that the United States intended to annex the Philippines, replacing one colonial master with another.
Speaker A:The Filipinos resisted.
Speaker A: an War erupted in February of: Speaker A:It was a brutal, protracted and bloody conflict, a guerrilla war that far exceeded the splendid little war against Spain in terms of casualty and and moral complexity.
Speaker B:Aguinaldo's writings from this period reveal his profound disillusionment.
Speaker B: In September of: Speaker B:You have been deceived all along the line.
Speaker B:You went to the Philippines under the impression that their inhabitants were ignorant savages.
Speaker B:But we are simply Filipinos.
Speaker A:The statistics from the Philippine American War are grim.
Speaker A:While American combat deaths were in the thousands, Filipino deaths, including civilians lost to violence, famine and disease are estimated by historians to be as high as 200,000.
Speaker A:But I think it's probably more.
Speaker A:It was a stark and brutal counterpoint to the triumphalism that had surrounded the war with Spain.
Speaker B:I've got to tell you, Michael, this entire episode highlights a profound irony.
Speaker B:A war ostensibly fought in part on humanitarian grounds to liberate Cuba from Spanish oppression directly led the United States to assume its own colonial role over multiple other nations.
Speaker A:This created a glaring contradiction with America's stated ideals of self determination and government by consent of the governed.
Speaker A:Even the United States interactions with Cuba were controversial.
Speaker A:If you remember, a few minutes ago, we talked about the Teller Amendment and how it explicitly devoured any intention to annex Cuba.
Speaker A: Yet There was in: Speaker A:It allowed for US Intervention in its foreign affairs and secured a naval base at Guantanamo Bay.
Speaker A:It effectively made Cuba a U.S.
Speaker A:protectorate.
Speaker A:Was that really different then from being annexed?
Speaker B:Not by a lot.
Speaker B:And then the decision to annex the Philippines against the will of its people led directly to that horrific war.
Speaker B:These actions sowed seeds of resentment and created complex, often troubled relationships that would define much of American foreign policy in the 20th century and beyond.
Speaker A:Now.
Speaker A: ines received independence in: Speaker A:But that wasn't the ending for Guam or Puerto Rico.
Speaker A:Both nations remain connected to the United States today as territories rather than states.
Speaker A:Although the people there are considered US Citizens.
Speaker B:That's right.
Speaker B:Michael Many Puerto Ricans and Guamanians initially welcomed the change in sovereignty, thinking that the United States would offer more democracy and economic development.
Speaker B:However, those hopes faded during the first three decades of the 20th century as people realized that the transfer of power led to a concentration of political and economic power in the hands of the United States and American companies.
Speaker A:For Puerto Rico in particular, the debate over the nation's status continues to this day, with varying levels of support for statehood, independence and its current status.
Speaker A:But while independence has been a recurring aspiration for some over the years, it has gardened much less support than official statehood in recent referendums.
Speaker B: explosion of the USS Maine in: Speaker B:It thrust the nation onto the world stage, redrew maps and sparked a profound, often bitter debate about what America truly stood for.
Speaker A: oes of that February night in: Speaker B:And the fundamental questions raised by those like Mark Twain, Andrew Carnegie was William Jennings Bryan, and Jane Addams about the nature of empire, the meaning of consent, the responsibility to power, and indeed, the very soul of America.
Speaker B:Are these questions truly settled?
Speaker A:And maybe we need to know who sunk the Maine.
Speaker A:Join us next time on history's GREATEST crimes.
Speaker B:Until we meet again, stay curious.
Speaker A:Sam.
