Dangerous Nation: another look at the Spanish American War (Part II)
[See Part I.]
After Proctor’s turnaround speech, more and more former naysayers came on board in support of war with Spain for the liberation of Cuba. But still, McKinley tried his best at negotiations to avoid it, machinations that ultimately failed.
Finally, when McKinley felt war to be inevitable, his stated reasons for the conflict (and, Kagan believes, his deeper reasons, as well) were mostly—although not totally—humanitarian. The proximity of Cuba to our shores was part of the motivation, as was the fact that the US was flexing newly acquired muscles; it liberated Cuba in part because it could. But the liberation nevertheless had deeply idealistic motivations.
Europe, however, wasn’t having any of it. Many monarchs there quite naturally sympathized with Spain and were against US intervention. Queen Victoria’s reaction summed up this attitude about the perceived threat to European interests, “They might just as soon declare Ireland independent!”
But it wasn’t just the royals who were against the US drive for war. Europeans had long had a love-hate relationship with America, with the accent often on the hate. The asserted the superiority and refinement of the Old World over the crass New, and world-weary European cynicism trumped American claims of altruistic motives:
European commentators of all ideological stripes took the occasion of the war to revive long-standing images of American “materialism, greed, vulgarity, selfishness, hypocrisy, and barbarism.”…[E]ven outside Spain few accepted American claims that the war was for the liberation of Cuba or to relieve Cuban suffering. This was seen as more rank hypocrisy…Across Europe there was an “astonishing scarcity” of any discussion of Cuban suffering or aspirations.
But there was more. Even many of those who had previously seen America as a beacon of light, advocating and defending its republican principles, were disillusioned. It’s not all that clear why, but one of the reasons was that the US move was seen by many as a threat to the international legal order in which they’d been placing much hope.
Many US commentators were no less upset than the Europeans, and no less doubtful that the US could not possibly be truly going to war for mainly humanitarian motives. They sought to explain the war drive as a sort of mass psychosis; quotes such as “hysteria” and “emotional outburst” were not uncommon. Kagan writes:
Other historians have solved the problem differently, insisting that American expressions of moral outrage and humanitarian concern were just a cover for selfish economic reasons…Still others have argued that the American goal was, above all, to prevent Cuban independence and thereby gain control of the island; that this was a war, “deliberated and by design, for the purpose of territorial expansion.” This, even though McKinley made it clear he did not want to annex Cuba and even though the United States did not, if fact, annex it.
I doubt I need to point out how familiar this all sounds.
Kagan places the Spanish American War squarely in a prior tradition of a humanitarian and idealistic United States, one not entirely reluctant to intervene when necessary in the affairs of others. Some, of course, consider this a tradition that needs to be ended. But those who look at US activities in fighting WWI, WWII, and the Cold War, even though the conflicts were not on our own shores, find that our interventionist and freedom-defending proclivities might not be such a bad thing, after all. Certainly they are not above asking for our help when needed, even in haughty Europe.
There’s no doubt, of course, that the US—like every other nation on earth that ever has been and ever will be—has had its own selfish interests at heart, as well, in all these activities. Countries are not saints, nor could they ever be.
But the US, a country founded on an idealistic set of ideas, is an unusual combination of altruism and self-interest. This is a brew that has indeed led to our entry in wars in the past, and certainly the Iraq War is an example of such a war in the present.
Kagan mentions that, in the aftermath of the Spanish-American War:
The United States succeeded in putting an end to the civil war in Cuba and to the suffering of the reconcentrados. The intervention saved many lives, probably tens of thousands. But it left the United States saddled with the occupation of Cuba for the next four years, an occupation that ultimately produced mixed results that fell far short of most Americans hopes and expectations when they had entered the war, as well as most Cubans’ hopes and expectations.
It also led to some other unforeseen consequences, including the war in the Philippines, a much more morally ambiguous and problematic endeavor.
Kagan points out that the Spanish American War [my emphasis], “like all wars, solved one set of problems but unleashed another set.” It seems that in recent years this simple truth has been forgotten by many, war supporters and antiwar activists among them. War is the answer to certain questions, but it doesn’t come easy, and it sets up a host of other questions that may have other answers—including more wars.
But then again, so does the decision not to go to war.
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Kagan views the Spanish American war as a ‘humanitarian’ endeavor because of what exactly?
The proclamations of our noble leaders?
He doesn’t say, and neither does Neo that I can see- there is the bit about Cuba being close to our shores but that’s not humanitarian. Of course there could be other reasons that neo hints too, but we’re supposed to believe without a shred of evidence that here is another example our ‘altruism’ and ‘idealism’.
Bit of a stretch wouldn’t you say?
Part one, apparently. Sorry….
Wow, he(TC) CAN read! And I was going to comment on how easy it was for nazis like you to overlook words such as “(re)concentration camps” because it hits a little too close to home.
In point of fact, the “fortified Hamlet” idea came from the the British counter insurgency experience in Malaya.
This, even though McKinley made it clear he did not want to annex Cuba and even though the United States did not, if fact, annex it.
If He had annexed it, generations of Cubans would be living far better, and there would be more of them as well. Look at Puerto Rico to see what kind of benefits may accrue from a close relationship with the US. And Puerto Rico is small. Which matters on the world stage when bigger giants can crush you.
Certainly they are not above asking for our help when needed, even in haughty Europe.
I sense a bit of irony/sarcasm there, Neo 😉
War is the answer to certain questions, but it doesn’t come easy, and it sets up a host of other questions that may have other answers–including more wars.
Did people believe peace was something permanent? Foolish. Understandable, and yet all the more foolish for it.
Very good series, Neo. I’ve learned much here, and I didn’t even read the book. Which is just how I like learning, efficient.
Personally, I was rather disappointed that Bush was killing HIzbollah in Lebanon, killing Syrians in Syria, and blowing up Iranian Quds force in Iran (before I knew there ever was a Quds force). I wanted to see the conflict enlarged, I had believed that Iraq was only to be a logistics base, a hub, to advance forward more American legions.
I guess Bush didn’t want to continue the warpath… so he got boggled down, because he did not wish to advance. There are costs to trying to have peace when you need war, Neo.
Psychological beliefs such as “Ican’t do this because I’m overstretched” is pretty self-fullfilling in war.
Wasn’t. Very specific about that. Wasn’t killing, wasn’t going on the warpath. It’s too bad Bush really wasn’t what his critics made him out to be. But neither was he what his allies expected of him either… bad occurence there.
To pursue the course Ymar wants Bush to follow the President would have had another army, another popular political philosophy and another society. Such transitions can’t be easy and quick. They are inevitable, though, but many transforming events should have happened before. It will take years, and these years will be turbulent and bloody. But the point is that it means the restoration of the original American tradition, not the invention of anything new.
“Such transitions can’t be easy and quick.”
Just a note to Sergey’s provocative comments. It is easy to view with disdain the ‘anti- war (oh, our war, not Islam’s terror) protesters filling Washington today. Yet they represent no one but their own lost cause. The forces they seek to summon have failed to crash America today in the same fashion as the Vietnam era.
Most of us would manage the war differently from George Bush. Yet he has kept the fabric of American society from the same unravelling, while continuing the war in defense of America and freedom in Iraq.
I suspect those are 2 of the goals as a President he holds must dear.
No one today publicly will defend his work and record, and– yet despite the MSM lies such as the 3-17 AP story detailing how the war has cost America–we have made the world a more stable place in the face of this wave of Islamic terrorism.
Who else, what other country, will pay the price? Is that, as Sergey ends, a re kindling of the ‘original American tradition?’
blackfive.netblackfive.netSergey, the American military is the best guerrila force in the totality of the world. I know you don’t find much association with such because Russia doesn’t do guerrila warfare. And the reason the US does it well is because of the initiative of individual soldiers. Trained to follow orders, yes, but also trained to improvise.
So, you don’t need an army for a raid, a guerrila war raid. You need another army to “occupy”. But there is no need to occupy, as I said to Laer about Zimbabwe.
The one thing that people should have learned from Bush’s example is that there is more ways than one to attack and undermine someone. What do you need armies for when you can use cunning, deceit, propaganda, and psychology?
http://www.blackfive.net has a podcast link you should hear nad see.
Link
I’ll look for this book at the library; in the meantime can you tell me if Kagan discusses this: The selling of the war to the American people? A king or a despot can simply order up a war, but in a democratic republic such as ours, persuading people to leave their wives and kids to kill and possibly be killed, takes a bit of salesmanship. Pearl Harbor was a no-brainer; Cuba must have been a harder sell.
Putting my question more broadly, is there something inherent in democracies (ours at least), that requires that the people be presented with “idealistic” reasons to fight, rather than with a naked appeal to self-interest? After all, going into Iraq “because we need the damned oil” is a perfectly rational argument, although tempermentally Americans shy away from such bluntless–publically anyway.
On the other hand, TR called the Spanish American War a “splendid little war”. Did he mean that war is fun? Fun. Is that the real purpose of the idealism? To justify the fun?
Didn’t Teddy win a nobel peace prize for the Russo-Sino war ending?
Of course war is fun. Just remember LTGeneral Mattis when he said it was a hoot to shoot Taliban.
Russo-Japanese war via the Treaty of Portsmouth. Bully!
humboldt.eduNeo,
An interesting post. However, while you say that Kagan places the Spanish American War squarely in a prior tradition of a humanitarian and idealistic United States, one not entirely reluctant to intervene when necessary in the affairs of others. I have to ask specifically what prior tradition? Surely not the ‘ethnic cleansing’ of Indians from east of the Mississippi during the Jackson administration? Surely not the our annexation of Texas and oter Mexican territories during the Polk administration? Surely not our annexation of Hawaii? Surely not our in our dealings with oh say, the Sioux, when we occupied the Black Hills in the early 1870’s, which we clearly ceded to them in a treaty, until gold was discovered.
While I am not a progressive and consider myself a somewhat of a neo-con, on issues of defense and foreign policy anyway, I am amazed at that statement by Kagan and I think that Kagan is a good writer and historian.
In my opinion, while the 19th century expansion of the American state from coast to coast was driven by manifest destiny, the belief that the American state was meant to govern from ‘sea to shining sea, the Spanish American War was the first expansion beyond these natural boundaries and an open departure from this belief, hence the the reason for some of the resistance to this war.
I am not of the school of thought that seems so fashionable today and which seems to connote that our own national interests cannot coincide with altruistic intrests and I will agree with Kagan that our sympathies for the oppressed were in play, but so were other interests.
Indeed the most interesting aspect of the Spanish American War was that it was the first example of the new mass-media showing its ability to influence public opinion. See the Effects of the media on Spanish American Relations in 1898
I think that our involvement in the middle east today is also a congruence of interests consisting of parts both altruistic and realistic. Bringing democracy to the middle east will do more to stabilize the area than anything else, however, also insuring the world a steady supply of oil will prevent world wide economic chaos.
Where we are more altruistic than our empiricist predecessors is that we are going to leave, or at least reduce our presence once the country has been stabilized.
INtersting discussion and a good site, I’m glad I stumbled onto it.
Actually, I always thought the Civil War was quite “altruistic”. It should also be noted that Texas won it’s independence from Mexico. When Texas was annexed by the U.S., it was Mexico who invaded the U.S. After losing the war, Mexico ceded the southwest after being compensated for it with $15 million(throw in the Gadsden Purchase of 1853 for $10 million and it adds up to $25 million). So, in this case at least, there was no “imperial design” at play until after being attacked. And even then, the war was played as freeing the Mexican people from the yoke of the tyrranical Santa Ana. More altruism?
Whoops: Santa Anna. Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna.
Lee,
I mostly agree with you on the civil war but remember that though slavery was a festering sore, it was not the reason that the war was declared. There were other issues of importance as well, one such such was the question about states rights versus a more centralized national government. The emancipation proclamation wasn’t signed until January 1, 1863. I disagree with respect to Texas.
Here’s why…
Yes Texas did ‘officially’ gain its independence from Mexico, but its leaders had tried to persuade the US to annex it first. You might note that President John Quincy Adams offered to buy Texas in 1827 for one million and President Anrew Jackson also offered to buy Texas in 1829 for five million, so it wasn’t like we were uninterested. Ofcourse both offers were refused.
The US did not outright annex Texas at the time of Texan independence becuase it did not want to precipitate a war with Mexico, who never recognized Texan independence, just then. Later when it was more advantageous, war was initiated by us and with far greater gains. Not just Texas, but California as well.
As for the Gadsden purchase of 1853, it was purchased because it was perceived a necessary part of one southern route of the proposed transcontinental railroad. Additionally, Mexico was hardly in a position to refuse our offer. Given the land acquired in the Gadsden purchase in addition to the land won in 1848, $25-million was a very small settlement indeed. The Louisiana purchase cost the US fifteen-million.
Aside from the historical quibbles discussed above, I have to question the premise of going to war for altruistic reasons altogether. It sounds to me, on the face of it like going to court to obtain justice.
War is a serious and deadly business and our leadership had better be looking at serious reasons for engaging American personnel and putting them in harm’s way. I happen to think that the regime change in Iraq and the possible opening up of the middle east to some form of more democratic government than is presently prevalent there is a strategic necessity.
Demographically, the middle east is one of the fastest growing areas of the world. If the chasm between that part of the world and the rest of the developed world continues, conflict will only increase. In this age of nuclear proliferation and chemical and biological weapons, it is in our strategic interest to act before we are struck, because a hard strike against us would be horrible. If it also has elements of altruism, so much the better. Let’s face it, if altruism were our prime motivation, we would have intervened in Darfur and Zimbabwe long ago. In fact, our only really altruistic mission of late was against Serbia in Kosovo. We’re still there and what a mess it still is.
Tim P, so, let’s see: we purchase less land for more money and you say it is “paltry” in comparison. OOOOH—KAY! Then you say we “initiated” the Mexican War. Never happened. It was Mexico who initiated the war to enforce it’s claim of the Matamoros River as the border rather than the Rio Grande. Mexico may have said they didn’t recognize Texan independence, but the Texans had Santa Anna’s signature on the agreement(remember San Jacinto?). And while politicians of the North and South postured about “state’s rights” and “preserving the Union”, the only “right” in conflict at the time was the right to enslave fellow humans.
Lee,
we purchase less land for more money and you say it is “paltry” in comparison
Precisely where did I say Paltry? Considering the amount of territory obtained, I stand by the actual statement that, “$25-million was a very small settlement indeed.” Nowhere did I say paltry.
I think you lost sight of the original topic here and drifted. I’d be happy to discuss the various details of history elsewhere, but that wasn’t the original point I was trying to make, here.
From our host’s post, There’s no doubt, of course, that the US–like every other nation on earth that ever has been and ever will be–has had its own selfish interests at heart, as well, in all these activities. Countries are not saints, nor could they ever be.
But the US, a country founded on an idealistic set of ideas, is an unusual combination of altruism and self-interest. This is a brew that has indeed led to our entry in wars in the past, and certainly the Iraq War is an example of such a war in the present.
Though I agree with that statement in part, I suspect there is less altruism and more self-interest. When the two run together, it’s a good thing, but if they are at odds, I suspect self-interest will always win.
Though I agree with that statement in part, I suspect there is less altruism and more self-interest.
Well, let’s get a bit picky about what “our host” actually said too: “But the US, a country founded on an idealistic set of ideas, is an unusual combination of altruism and self-interest.” Nowhere did she say how much was altruism, how much self-interest — her point was only that the US was an unusual combination of the two. And that point was taken, evidently, from Kagan, who supplies considerable historical evidence for it.
I’d phrase it a little differently than that myself. In general, and without getting too Ayn-Randian about it, I would distrust altruism as a motive in both individuals and nations. I’d say that American idealism at its best is manifested mainly in a willingness to act for goals that embrace more than their immediate self-interest — but see their long-term self-interest as being bound up with such goals. That too, however, is obviously not always the case, and when it isn’t the US deserves to be criticized. The difference between the left and the right on this is just that the left really does equate moral behavior with the abdication of self-interest, a fundamentally suicidal notion that goes a long way to explaining its current predicament.
No, Tim P, you didn’t say “paltry”, you merely “suggested” that(put my own description on it, problem?) by comparing these purchases to the Louisiana Purchase. ALL wars are sold with some modicum of altruism. Was our involvement in WWI about “unrestricted submarine warfare and rights of the high seas”, or was it about “making the world safe for democracy”? And quite frankly, it’s DIRECTLY on topic, since you were the one questioning our history of altruism up to that point by bringing up false assumptions of that history. I was merely correcting your mistakes in regard to those points. Now that you have been proven wrong, you want to “get back on topic”. How typical.