By Adam Graham
February 21, 2019 "Information Clearing House" - February 15 marks the anniversary of the destruction of the USS Maine, a momentous event that precipitated America’s involvement in the Cuban independence movement and what eventually became known as the Spanish American War. Most Americans gloss over this period in their history, it being quite overshadowed by the eventual scale of World War I.
But for those who dig in and familiarize themselves with the circumstances and aftermath of the war, a familiar pattern emerges. The Spanish American War very much established a blueprint and example of how to portray a crisis to justify proceeding toward a desired intervention. It also solidified a departure from the long-held American tradition and disposition of non-intervention and avoidance of imperial activity, in stark contrast to its closest global rivals like Spain, England, and France. By increasing our awareness of this pattern, we can better identify and avoid such problems in the future.
The Expansionist Zeitgeist
The turn of the century in America was a very transformational era for the Union. For years, president Grover Cleveland had done much to limit the size and scope of government, from handling a number of railroad union strikes through injunction to preventing the annexation of Hawaii. But his replacement in William McKinley did not share Cleveland’s anti-imperial temperament, at least not for long. As well, westward expansion to the Pacific was largely complete and, as Frederick Jackson Turner concluded in 1893, this left Americans for the first time in their history without a frontier. That expansionist culture and desire had long impressed itself on the fabric of American life and now there was nowhere else to expand but beyond its current borders.
On top of that, American industry was experiencing a glut in production and, everywhere one looked, there were voices, both within and without Washington, advocating expansion for the sake of the economy. Alfred Thayer Mahan, then director of the Naval War College, published a very influential book in 1890, “The Influence of Sea Power Upon History”, that advocated for a strong navy and the establishment of bases abroad to support that navy in protecting foreign trade. (Never mind that a potential naval expansion would greatly benefit his very institution) Mahan was politically well connected, winning over the support of famed Senator Henry Cabot Lodge and Teddy Roosevelt. The consensus seemed to be firmly established. And it did not hurt that politically connected crony American industry had more than $50 million invested in Cuba. In the words of John Carlisle, the Secretary of the Treasury under Grover Cleveland, “the prosperity of our people depends largely on their ability to sell their surplus products in foreign markets at remunerative prices.”
Given the spirit of the time, it is not difficult to see why Cuba represented an attractive first foray into such foreign adventurism. The largest Caribbean island, in very close proximity to the American coast, with a foreign occupier that was economically on the ropes, barely hanging onto its last remaining colonial vestiges, Cuba was quite the easy target. So, when a charismatic Jose Marti was able to unite a number of Cuban factions for one final stand against their Spanish occupiers in 1895, Washington found itself eager to assert itself.
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