Uncle Sam's War of 1898 and the Origins of Globalization by Thomas D. Schoonover

Author:Thomas D. Schoonover [Schoonover, Thomas D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: History, Military, United States, Wars & Conflicts (Other), General, Political Science, Globalization
ISBN: 9780813143361
Google: JpsRZqopiN4C
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
Published: 2013-07-24T16:06:18+00:00

Dunne was also hard on the moralistic and humanistic arguments advanced to support U.S. expansion by war. He had Dooley comment: “Take up th’ white man’s burden an’ hand it to th’ coons.” Dooley noted the crass reality behind the alleged humanitarianism: “Hands acrost th’ sea an’ into some wan’s pocket.”4

Some major political figures, including House Speaker Thomas Reed and Senator George Hoar, saw racism and anti-democratic conduct guiding U.S. relations with the Filipinos. After peace in the War of 1898, Hoar observed, the U.S. government and military “crushed the Republic that the Philippine people had set up for themselves, deprived them of their independence, and established there, by American power, a Government in which the people have no part, against their will.” In fact, many Filipino municipalities had instituted self-government after the Spanish willingly or unwillingly departed.5

In the 1890s, U.S. society debated immigration restriction. Speaker Reed distrusted the 1898 version of U.S. idealism: “Now we are going to take in eight million barbarians and semi-barbarians, and we are paying twenty million dollars to get them.”6 Reacting to the U.S. payment for the Philippines, he remarked acidly, “We have bought ten million Malays at $2.00 a head unpicked,” and added in a most prescient comment, “nobody knows what it will cost to pick them.” Picking them was dangerous and costly. On 4 February 1899 fighting broke out between Filipinos and U.S. troops.7 The fighting endured for decades.

Dunne and Dooley recognized the difference between a benefactor of civilization and a bandit. Dooley described the potential fates for Emilio Aguinaldo around 1899. Claiming that Aguinaldo mistakenly thought “th’ bom [boom] was still on in th’ hero business,” Dooley recognized that Aguinaldo sought to make “th’ Ph’lippeens indepindint on us f’r support. … If he’d [laid down his arms] come in, ye’d be hearin’ that James Haitch Aggynaldoo’d been appointed foorth-class postmasther at Hootchey-Kootchey; but now th’ nex ye know iv him ’ll be on th’ blotther at th’ polis station.”8

Speaker Reed shared Dunne’s satirical humor over U.S. conduct in the Philippines. Aguinaldo was captured in March 1901. Reed, in mock surprise, asked his partner: “What, are you working today? I should think you would be celebrating. I see by the papers that the American Army has captured the infant son of Aguinaldo and at last accounts was in hot pursuit of the mother.”9 Then the conflict seemed to wind down.

The war was costly, and forces on both sides committed atrocities; the inhumanity reflected the intensity. By the summer of 1901, things seemed nearly over in the northern islands. But at Balangiga on Samar Island, a U.S. detachment was overrun and seventy-four U.S. soldiers killed. Major General Adna R. Chaffee determined to end the conflict in the northern islands. He sent one brigade to southern Luzon and a second to Samar Island.10

At Balangiga, most U.S. soldiers had died in the fort or trying to cross the bay to Leyte. U.S. troops in Leyte quickly crossed the bay to find a ghastly sight of dead and mutilated U.

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