Spanish-American War

A war between Spain and the United States in 1898, as a result of which Spain ceded Puerto Rico, the Philippine Islands, and Guam to the United States and abandoned all claim to Cuba, which became independent in 1902.

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Spanish-American war (1898), imperialist conflict in which the USA extended its formal authority over the Caribbean and across the Pacific, achieved on the back of long-standing insurgencies in Cuba and the Philippines, which traduced America's self-image and created many future complications. The American establishment wanted to establish American hegemony and to acquire naval bases in both places, but President McKinley shrank from embarking upon the necessary war. It was forced upon him by popular clamour whipped up by the yellow press and by Spanish intransigence.

American public opinion strongly sympathized with the nationalist guerrillas in Cuba, particularly after the Spanish military governor introduced a system of concentration camps (the origin of the term) in which as many as 100, 000 died. The flashpoint was the publication on 9 February 1898 of a dispatch by the Spanish ambassador in Washington, purloined by a Cuban revolutionary sympathizer, which spoke contemptuously of McKinley, followed six days later by the sinking of the battleship Maine in Havana harbour. Post-war investigation showed that it sank from an internal explosion, but at the time an American court of enquiry blamed it on a mine. Popular agitation led to a US ultimatum and Spain declared war on 23 April.

Already possessed of a two-to-one advantage in warship tonnage, the US navy spent over $30 million acquiring 131 new vessels and doubling its manpower between March and August. By contrast, the Spanish possessed neither the means to add significantly to their fleet, nor the diplomatic clout to obtain coal in foreign ports for the ships they had. Their armoured cruisers were designed as ocean-going raiders and certainly not to engage their heavier armoured and gunned American counterparts, built for coastal defence. They were to be sacrificed by the Madrid government, which incorrectly calculated that it could survive a heroic defeat.

In a classic demonstration of ‘mission creep’, Commodore Dewey of the Pacific squadron based in Hong Kong set out to neutralize the obsolete Spanish naval presence in Manila and ended by adding the Philippines to the US empire. In a one-way battle during the morning of 1 May, he sank or disabled the outgunned enemy squadron at Cavite. The Spanish admiral could have run to maintain some kind of ‘fleet in being’, or he could have anchored under the heavy guns of nearby Manila. He chose instead to bring about ‘heroic defeat’ sooner rather than later.

There were about 26, 000 Spanish regulars and 15, 000 local militia facing about 30, 000 insurgents throughout the archipelago. With the exception of the 12, 000 Manila garrison, the rest soon fell to the insurgents. That this was due mainly to Spanish defeatism is illustrated by the tiny outpost at Baler, which held out beyond the end of the war to June 1899. Once 11, 000 American ground forces had landed, Manila surrendered on 13 August after symbolic resistance. By conspiring with the Spanish governor to bring this about while excluding the rebels, who had done most of the fighting, the American military commanders set in motion the second Philippines insurrection.

There were 70, 000 Spanish ‘effectives’ in Cuba (27, 000 more were in hospital) with perhaps 30, 000 local militia. These were also scattered around the island and, as in the Philippines, pressure from the insurgents made concentration of forces impossible. Havana was strongly held, but the poorly provisioned garrison at Santiago numbered less than 12, 000. What made it the prize of the campaign was the arrival there on 19 May of the Spanish Atlantic squadron under Cervera, who believed he had nowhere else to go. This was fortunate, because it took the blockading fleet under Sampson ten days to locate him. An unsuccessful attempt was made to sink a blockship in the narrow mouth of the harbour on 3 June, and US Marines seized Guantánamo Bay to provide a sheltered anchorage in mid-month, but a decision awaited the arrival of the expeditionary force under Shafter.

After a rushed and chaotic embarkation at Tampa, followed by landings on open beaches at Daiquirí and Siboney, where it proved impossible to bring heavy equipment ashore, some 17, 000 US troops were available for the battles around Santiago. Much of the fighting was done by a spearhead formed by highly motivated dragoon units, including the African-American troops of the 9th and 10th regiments and the ‘Rough Riders’, the 1st USA Volunteer Cavalry, at Las Guásimas on 24 June and at El Caney, Kettle Hill, and neighbouring San Juan Hill on 1 July. Shafter failed to follow up, but the positions won were sufficiently menacing to force Cervera to steam out of Santiago harbour to annihilation on 3 July.

Pausing to satisfy ‘honour’ and to obtain repatriation at American expense, the Spanish commander surrendered the whole province and 23, 000 men on 17 July at a ceremony from which the leader of the Cuban insurgents, hitherto working in close concert with the Americans, was excluded. Further operations in Cuba and those of army commander Miles in Puerto Rico ended with the suspension of hostilities on 12 August. By the Treaty of Paris, the USA annexed Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines, paying $20 million compensation for the latter, and Cuba exchanged Spanish rule for an independence subject to US intervention.

In a war that ended in bitter mutual recrimination among American commanders ashore and afloat, the popular hero was the Rough Riders' dynamic Theodore Roosevelt, who had already played a significant role in the mobilization as assistant secretary of the navy. He led on horseback up much of Kettle Hill and culminated a day of outstanding temerity by charging from there to take San Juan Hill.

It was to be called ‘a splendid little war’, and while the first adjective is debatable, there can be no argument about the second. US combat casualties were 385 dead (2, 061 more by disease) and 1, 662 wounded. While the financial cost was considerably higher than the Mexican war 50 years earlier, it was greatly inflated by the crash naval expansion and the enrolment of 308, 000 men, most of whom never left training camp.

Bibliography

• Trask, David, The War with Spain in 1898 (New York, 1981)

— Hugh Bicheno

In 1895, the Cuban patriot José Martí renewed his homeland's attempt to achieve independence from Spain, triggering a guerrilla war that eventually brought about U.S. intervention. The Spanish government tried to suppress the insurgency, but the Cubans, led by Maximo Gomez and Antonio Maceo, managed to remain in the field. One Spanish general, Valeriano Weyler, adopted a policy of reconcentration of the civilian population in detention camps, but this measure backfired when it aroused international concern, notably in the United States. Presidents Grover Cleveland and William McKinley both extended good offices to Spain, eventually urging a policy of home rule. This campaign proved successful. The Spanish premier Práxedes Sagasta granted a form of autonomy to Cuba and Puerto Rico beginning 1 January 1898, but the insurgents, sensing weakness, rejected it.

U.S. opinion gradually coalesced in favor of the insurgent cause, but only the mysterious sinking of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor on 15 February 1898 led to vast popular support for armed intervention on behalf of the Cubans. McKinley proved reluctant to go to war. He attempted to obtain Cuban independence by diplomatic measures. The Spanish government balked. It recognized that the United States would most likely prevail in battle, but Sagasta and his colleagues, after unsuccessfully seeking assistance from other European powers, decided that failure to defend the Pearl of the Antilles might lead to revolution at home. An unsuccessful war appeared preferable to overthrow of the established order. On 25 April, the United States declared war, retroactive to 21 April.

Spain had a large army in Cuba and a strong garrison in its other insular possession, the Philippine Islands, but its navy was largely based in home ports. A weak squadron defended Manila. There were no significant naval forces in Cuban waters. In an attempt to retain its principal overseas colonies, Spain adopted a defensive strategy, depending on troops already in the field to fend off American attacks. The navy would reinforce and resupply threatened locations.

The United States fielded a small regular army of only 28,000 men, although it would eventually mobilize an impressive volunteer army to support the efforts of its modest but well‐prepared navy. Prewar preparations envisioned a naval blockade of Cuba and command of the Caribbean Sea—an achievement that would permit land operations when the U.S. Army was sufficiently mobilized to take such action. A secondary naval campaign would take place in the western Pacific. The Asiatic Squadron would attack the Spanish Squadron at Manila to preclude commerce raiding and to exert maximum pressure on Spain.

On 21 April, Adm. William Sampson took the North Atlantic Squadron to Havana and established a blockade, and on 1 May, Commodore George Dewey smashed Adm. Patricio Montojo's squadron in Manila Bay. Sampson extended his blockade to other Cuban ports while awaiting the arrival of a Spanish squadron under Adm. Pascual Cervera. Dewey remained in Manila Bay, unable to take further action until land forces came to his assistance. Early in May, the McKinley administration decided to send troops under Gen. Wesley Merritt to seize Manila and to prepare for eventual land operations at Havana. The Eighth Army Corps assembled at San Francisco finally reached Manila.

Plans for operations in Cuba changed when Cervera's squadron, reduced to six vessels, arrived at Santiago de Cuba, only to be blockaded in port by 28 May. This event led McKinley to organize a force at Tampa composed mainly of regular army regiments. It was ordered to Santiago de Cuba to help destroy Cervera's squadron.

Gen. William Shafter hastily transferred the Fifth Army Corps, 17,000 men strong, to Santiago de Cuba, arriving there on 20 June. Admiral Sampson urged him to attack the batteries defending the entrance to the harbor. When these were reduced, he could sweep naval mines from the channel and steam in to engage Cervera. Shafter had different ideas. He decided upon an interior line of operation, proceeding westward from a beachhead in the Daiquirí‐Siboney area to Santiago de Cuba, depriving himself of much needed naval gunnery support. After landing virtually unopposed, the Fifth Corps moved toward the San Juan Heights, the principal bulwark in the first of three defensive lines around the city. Spanish artillery supported this position from a second line of defenses. The only opposition to the advance occurred at Las Guásimas, where a small skirmish gave the Fifth Corps its baptism of fire (24 June).

Shafter chose to form three divisions in line for the attack on the San Juan Heights, which would roll over the hills and move on to capture Santiago de Cuba. To protect his right flank, he asked Gen. Henry Lawton, commanding one of his divisions, to seize the Spanish fortifications at El Caney before moving into the line of battle at the heights. The Spanish commander, Gen. Arsenio Linares, played into Shafter's hands: he distributed his force of 10,000 at various points around the perimeter of Santiago de Cuba instead of concentrating at probable points of attack. Only 500 men defended the heights.

Shafter attacked on 1 July, but the engagement did not develop as expected. Lawton encountered difficulty from a garrison of a mere 500 Spaniards at El Caney. After considerable delay, Shafter decided to attack the heights without Lawton. After a difficult deployment under Spanish artillery fire, the dismounted cavalry division under Gen. Joseph Wheeler attacked up the northeastern extension of the heights, a rise known as Kettle Hill, and the infantry division to its left commanded by Gen. Jacob Kent assaulted the principal elevation to the southwest. Fortunately, a battery of Gatling guns positioned at El Pozo about 600 yards to the rear was able to drive the Spanish defenders off the heights. Fifth Corps struggled into the Spanish positions and hastily entrenched. All thought of continuing on to Santiago de Cuba was forgotten. American casualties for the day were 1,385, with 205 killed, about 10 percent of the troops engaged. The Spanish suffered less—593 casualties, with 215 killed, about 35 percent of some 1,700 troops in good defensive positions. Theodore Roosevelt's ability to publicize his exploits as a commander of The First U.S. Volunteer Cavalry Regiment—the Rough Riders—during the Battle of San Juan Hill helped propel him into the governorship of New York and later the vice presidency.

After the action of 1 July, Cervera received orders to leave Santiago de Cuba. On 3 July, the reluctant admiral complied. His six ships—four cruisers and two destroyers—began their exit from the channel at 9:00 A.M. Sampson had left the blockade to meet Shafter, leaving Commodore William Schley as the senior officer present. The American vessels were able to concentrate their fire on each Spanish ship as it emerged from the channel. Only one, the Cristóbal Colón, managed to avoid immediate destruction or beaching. It fled for about seventy miles westward toward Cienfuegos, but the pursuing Americans finally obtained its range, and the Spanish commander drove his vessel onto the shore. After the war, a controversy erupted over credit for the victory between Schley and Sampson, dividing the officer corps for many years.

Shafter decided to besiege the city, a measure that forced its capitulation on 17 July. The Fifth Corps meanwhile fell victim to tropical diseases. Early in August, it was evacuated to Long Island for recuperation and other troops arrived to continue the occupation.

The victory at Santiago de Cuba forced the Spanish government to inaugurate peace negotiations, but during this process, the army undertook two more campaigns. One was an expedition to Puerto Rico, led by the Commanding General of the Army, Gen. Nelson Miles, which landed on the south shore of the island and advanced against token opposition toward San Juan. The other was an attack on the city of Manila. The land operations of the Eighth Corps amounted to a sham battle because Admiral Dewey managed to arrange a Spanish capitulation that took place after a brief engagement satisfied Spanish honor. A third operation, a naval sortie into Spanish waters by a detachment of Sampson's fleet designated the Eastern Squadron, did not occur because Spain finally agreed to a protocol signed on 12 August that ended hostilities.

The protocol settled all major issues except the disposition of the Philippine Islands. Early in June, the United States signaled its war aims to Madrid through a third party. They included independence for Cuba, the cession of Puerto Rico in lieu of a monetary indemnity, the cession of a port in the Ladrones (Marianas), and a port in the Philippines. In the protocol, Spain agreed to the first three demands. A peace conference was arranged to confirm this agreement and to decide the disposition of the Philippines. McKinley eventually instructed the American peace commission to obtain the entire archipelago, responding both to a burst of annexationist sentiment and to the lack of a viable alternative. Spain reluctantly accepted a payment of $20,000,000. On 6 March 1899, the Senate gave its consent to the treaty, and on 19 March, the queen regent of Spain overrode opposition in the Cortes and agreed to ratification. Ratifications were exchanged on 11 April 1899.

The acquisition of the Philippines led to a long insurgency that was finally quelled by July 1902. McKinley and his successor, Theodore Roosevelt, were able to exert sufficient force to bring down the Filipino insurgents while overcoming an active but ultimately ineffective protest from anti‐imperialists who offered constitutional, political, economic, and even racial arguments against annexation. The imperialist impulse proved short‐lived. As early as 1916, Congress began preparations for Philippine independence, a process that was completed in 1946.

Although the United States triumphed during the Spanish‐American War, inefficiency, waste, and even scandal characterized the army's mobilization efforts, especially the supplying of troops. Widely investigated by the newspapers and the Dodge Commission, appointed by the McKinley administration, these problems prompted calls for a restructuring of the War Department and reconsideration of the relationship between the regular army and the National Guard. During the tenure of Secretary of War Elihu Root, a series of reforms were implemented.

[See also Caribbean and Latin America, U.S. Military Involvement in the; Cuba, U.S. Military Involvement in; Militia and National Guard

Bibliography

• Chadwick, French Ensor. The Relations of the United States and Spain: The Spanish‐American War, 2 vols., 1911. Reprinted New York: Russell & Russell, 1968.
• May, Ernest R. Imperial Democracy: The Emergence of America as a Great Power, New York: Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1961.
• Rickover, Hyman G. How the Battleship Maine Was Destroyed, 1976.
• Offner, John L. An Unwanted War: The Diplomacy of the United States and Spain Over Cuba, 1895–1898. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1992.
• Trask, David F. The War with Spain in 1898, N.Y.: Macmillan, 1981. Reprinted Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1996.
• Cosmas, Graham A. An Army for Empire: The United States Army and the Spanish‐American War, Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1971. Reprinted College Station: Texas A & M University Press, 1998.
• Louis A. Pérez, Jr., The War of 1898: The United States and Cuba in History and Historiography, 1998

(1898) A conflict between the U.S. and Spain triggered by Cuban patriot José Martí's attempt to achieve Cuban independence from Spain. The Spanish government tried to suppress the insurgent forces (also led by Máximo Gómez and Antonio Maceo), including adopting a reconcentration policy that placed the civilian population in detention camps. The reconcentration policy drew the attention of Presidents Grover Cleveland and William McKinley, both of whom encouraged Spain to adopt a policy of home rule in Cuba. When Spain responded by issuing such a policy on January 1, 1898, however, the Cuban insurgents rejected it and continued their struggle. The mysterious sinking of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor on February 15, 1898 pushed U.S. leaders and public opinion from an ambivalent position to one supporting armed intervention on behalf of the Cubans. President McKinley first pursued diplomatic channels to achieve Cuban independence, but Spain balked, fearing that a failure to defend the colony would trigger revolution in Spain itself. The U.S. then declared war on Spain on April 25, 1898, retroactive to April 21. Spain had a large army in Cuba and a strong garrison in the Philippine Islands, but its naval presence was weak in the Philippines and nonexistent in Cuba. Spain thus adopted a defensive strategy, using troops in the field to fend off American attacks, with the navy periodically reinforcing and resupplying threatened locations. The U.S. had a small regular army of 28, 000 men and a large volunteer army that supported its strong navy. It planned a naval blockade of Cuba that would permit land operations, and a second naval campaign in the Philippines. The naval blockade was established in Havana on April 21 and broadened while Spain awaited the arrival of a squadron under Pascual Cervera. By the time the squadron arrived, it had been reduced to six vessels and was quickly blockaded in port by May 28. McKinley organized a force at Tampa to go to Santiago de Cuba to destroy the squadron. Gen. William Shafter transferred the Fifth Army Corps, 17, 000 men, to Santiago de Cuba on June 20. Shafter approached Santiago de Cuba from the east, landed virtually unopposed, and moved toward San Juan Heights, the principal bulwark around the city. Shafter attacked on July 1, struggling into the Spanish positions. All thought of continuing to Santiago de Cuba was forgotten, given the 1, 385 casualties suffered that day. Part of this assault was the Battle of San Juan Hill by the First U.S. Volunteer Cavalry Regiment (or Rough Riders), which Theodore Roosevelt later used in his campaigns for the governorship of New York and the vice presidency. After the action of July 1, Cervera received orders to leave Santiago de Cuba, complying two days later but encountering assaults from the American blockade vessels as they emerged from the channel. Only one Spanish vessel, the Cristobal Colón, escaped the harbor. Shafter then decided to besiege the city, which forced its capitulation on July 17. The victory at Santiago de Cuba forced the Spanish government to inaugurate peace negotiations. During this process, however, U.S. forces undertook a campaign in Puerto Rico and an attack on Manila, where U.S. forces had established a presence on May 1. Spain agreed to a protocol on August 12 that ended hostilities among the nations, specifying independence for Cuba, cession of Puerto Rico to the U.S. in lieu of a monetary indemnity, and the cession of a port in the Ladrones (Marianas). However, the protocol did not address the Philippine Islands. McKinley, riding a domestic annexationist wave and lacking a viable alternative, instructed the American peace commission to obtain the entire Philippine archipelago; Spain accepted a payment of $20, 000, 000. The treaty was ratified on March 6, 1899 by the Senate and on March 19 by the queen regent of Spain (overriding opposition in the Cortes). Ratifications were then exchanged on April 11, 1899. The acquisition of the Philippines led to a long insurgency that was finally quelled in July 1902. The imperialist impulse proved short-lived, though, since by 1916 Congress had begun preparations for Philippine independence, which was ultimately achieved in 1946.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

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The sinking of the battleship Maine in Havana harbor on 15 February 1898 provided a dramatic casus belli for the Spanish-American War, but underlying causes included U.S. economic interests ($50 million invested in Cuba; $100 million in annual trade, mostly sugar) as well as genuine humanitarian concern over long-continued Spanish misrule. Rebellion in Cuba had erupted violently in 1895, and although by 1897 a more liberal Spanish government had adopted a conciliatory attitude, U.S. public opinion, inflamed by strident "yellow journalism," would not be placated by anything short of full independence for Cuba.

The Maine had been sent to Havana ostensibly on a courtesy visit but actually as protection for American citizens. A U.S. Navy court of inquiry concluded on 21 March that the ship had been sunk by an external explosion. Madrid agreed to arbitrate the matter but would not promise independence for Cuba. On 11 April, President William McKinley asked Congress for authority to intervene, and, on 25 April, Congress declared that a state of war existed between Spain and the United States.

The North Atlantic Squadron, concentrated at Key West, Florida, was ordered on 22 April to blockade Cuba. The Spanish home fleet under Adm. Pascual Cervera had sortied from Cadiz on 8 April, and although he had only four cruisers and two destroyers, the approach of this "armada" provoked near panic along the U.S. East Coast.

Spanish troop strength in Cuba totaled 150,000 regulars and forty thousand irregulars and volunteers. The Cuban insurgents numbered perhaps fifty thousand. At the war's beginning, the strength of the U.S. Regular Army under Maj. Gen. Nelson A. Miles was only twenty-six thousand. The legality of using the National Guard, numbering something more than 100,000, for expeditionary service was questionable. Therefore, authorities resorted to the volunteer system used in the Mexican-American War and Civil War. The mobilization act of 22 April provided for a wartime army of 125,000 volunteers (later raised to 200,000) and an increase in the regular army to sixty-five thousand. Thousands of volunteers and recruits converged on ill-prepared southern camps where they found a shortage of weapons, equipment, and supplies, and scandalous sanitary conditions and food.

In the Western Pacific, Commo. George Dewey had been alerted by Acting Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt to prepare his Asiatic Squadron for operations in the Philippines. On 27 April, Dewey sailed from Hong Kong with four light cruisers, two gunboats, and a revenue cutter—and, as a passenger, Emilio Aguinaldo, an exiled Filipino insurrectionist. Dewey entered Manila Bay in the early morning hours on 1 May and destroyed the Spanish squadron, but he had insufficient strength to land and capture Manila itself. Until U.S. Army forces could arrive, the Spanish garrison had to be kept occupied by Aguinaldo's guerrilla operations.

In the Atlantic, Cervera slipped into Santiago on Cuba's southeast coast. Commo. Winfield Schley took station off Santiago on 28 May and was joined four days later by Rear Adm. William T. Sampson. To support these operations, a marine battalion on 10 June seized nearby Guantánamo to serve as an advance base. Sampson, reluctant to enter the harbor because of mines and land batteries, asked for U.S. Army help. Maj. Gen. William R. Shafter, at Tampa, Florida, received orders on 31 May to embark his V Corps. Despite poor facilities, he had seventeen thousand men, mostly regulars, ready to sail by 14 June and by 20 June was standing outside Santiago. On 22 June, after a heavy shelling of the beach area, the V Corps began going ashore. It was a confused and vulnerable landing, but the Spanish did nothing to interfere.

Between Daiquiri and Santiago were the San Juan heights. Shafter's plan was to send Brig. Gen. Henry W. Lawton's division north to seize the village of El Caney and then to attack frontally with Brig. Gen. Jacob F. Kent's division on the left and Maj. Gen. Joseph Wheeler's dismounted cavalry on the right. The attack began at dawn on 1 July. Wheeler, one-time Confederate cavalryman, sent his dismounted troopers, including the black Ninth and Tenth cavalries and the volunteer Rough Riders, under command of Lt. Col. Theodore Roosevelt, against Kettle Hill. The Spanish withdrew to an inner defense line, and, as the day ended, the Americans had their ridge line but at a cost of seventeen hundred casualties.

Shafter, not anxious to go against the Spanish second line, asked Sampson to come into Santiago Bay and attack the city, but for Sampson there was still the matter of the harbor defenses. He took his flagship eastward on 3 July to meet with Shafter, and while they argued, Cervera inadvertently resolved the impasse by coming out of the port on orders of the Spanish captain general. His greatly inferior squadron was annihilated by Schley, and on 16 July the Spaniards signed terms of unconditional surrender for the 23,500 troops in and around the city.

At the end of July the VIII Corps, some fifteen thousand men (mostly volunteers) under Maj. Gen. Wesley Merritt, had reached the Philippines. En route, the escort cruiser Charleston had stopped at Guamand accepted the surrender of the island from the Spanish governor, who had not heard of the war. Because of an unrepaired cable, Dewey and Merritt themselves did not hear immediately of the peace protocol, and on 13 August an assault against Manila was made. The Spanish surrendered after token resistance.

The peace treaty, signed in Paris on 10 December 1898, established Cuba as an independent state, ceded

Puerto Rico and Guam to the United States, and provided for the payment of $20 million to Spain for the Philippines. Almost overnight the United States had acquired an overseas empire and, in the eyes of Europe, had become a world power. The immediate cost of the war was $250 million and about three thousand American lives, of which only about three hundred were battle deaths. A disgruntled Aguinaldo, expecting independence for the Philippines, declared a provisional republic, which led to the Philippine Insurrection that lasted until 1902.

Bibliography

Cosmas, Graham A. An Army for Empire: The United States Army in the Spanish-American War. Shippensburg, Pa.: White Mane Publishing, 1994.

Hoganson, Kristin L. Fighting for American Manhood: How Gender Politics Provoked the Spanish-American and Philippine-American Wars. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998.

Linderman, Gerald F. The Mirror of War: American Society and the Spanish-American War. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1974.

Musicant, Ivan. Empire by Default: The Spanish-American War and the Dawn of the American Century. New York: Holt, 1998.

Traxel, David. 1898: The Birth of the American Century. New York: Knopf, 1998.

In the late nineteenth century, the United States grew in industrial and economic strength. By the 1880s, the nation was one of the most robust in the Western Hemisphere, wielding increasing power in the region despite a stated policy of neutrality. In 1898, diplomatic relations between the United States and Spain began to sour over Spain's domination of Latin America and some parts of the Caribbean. Reports of the brutal rule of Spanish General Valeriano Wyler in Cuba inflamed public opinion in the United States. The convergence of anti-Spanish public opinion and the government's desire to protect American economic interests in Cuba prompted tense diplomatic meetings between Spain and the United States.

During the negotiations, two events spurred the United States to declare war. A U.S. ship, the USS Maine sank off the coast of Cuba on February 15, 1898. A Navy inquiry board incorrectly declared that a mine fatally wounded the vessel. 266 Navy seamen and two high-ranking officers perished in the accident. The event consumed newspaper headlines for weeks. Sensationalistic reporting, dubbed "yellow journalism," helped to swell the tide of pro-war sentiment in the United States.

Within weeks of the sinking of the Maine, intelligence operatives intercepted a private letter between the Spanish Ambassador to the United States and a friend in Havana, Cuba. The letter disparaged U.S. President McKinley, and hinted at plans to commit acts of sabotage against American property in Cuba. The letter was published by several newspapers, further agitating public opinion. On April 19, 1898, Congress resolved to end Spanish rule in Cuba.

In the first military action of the war, the United States blockaded Cuban ports on April 22, 1898. The Navy transferred several vessels to neighboring Florida to consolidate the forces available to fight the Spanish in the Caribbean. Naval presence off the Florida coast also facilitated the transfer of information from the battlefront to the government in Washington, D.C.

The Office of Naval Intelligence established sophisticated communications intelligence operations in support of their efforts in Cuba. Martin Hellings, who worked for the International Ocean Telegraph Company, was sent to Key West, Florida, to intercept Spanish messages. Hellings convinced other telegraph operators to copy Spanish diplomatic messages and deliver the copies to him. Within a few days, he operated a sizable communications ring, conducting surveillance on underwater and land-based telegraph cables. Hellings also employed a courier to run special messages between his offices and United States ships in the region.

The theater of war rapidly expanded to include other Spanish strongholds, including the Philippines. Intelligence operations were not initially as well developed in the Pacific as they were in the region around Cuba. Cuba's proximity to the Florida coast aided intelligence and espionage operations. United States military commanders knew little about the Philippines and the Spanish defenses there. To obtain information, the Office of Navy Intelligence and the Army's Military Intelligence Division employed human intelligence. Agents were sent to the remote islands to obtain information about Spanish defenses, military strength, and island terrain. The operation moved swiftly, and within weeks, United States commanders learned that the Spanish were ill-prepared to fight a strong offensive in the Philippines.

On May 1, 1898, the United States Asiatic Squadron, under the command of George Dewey, sailed into Manila Bay and attacked the Spanish. The Spanish fleet was decimated, but the United States sustained no losses. Though the Spanish surrendered the Philippines, the United States fleet remained, and began a campaign to take the island as a United States territory. The ensuing conflict lasted until 1914.

Human intelligence was not limited to operations in the Philippines. The United States employed covert agents in Europe, Cuba, and Canada. These agents aided the war effort by spying on Spanish diplomats abroad and providing intelligence information to dissident groups in Cuba. German-educated Henry Ward traveled to Spain in the guise of a German physician. William Sims, an American attaché in Paris, managed a spy ring throughout the Mediterranean. In Cuba, Andrew Rowan united rebel groups and reported on the location and size of the Spanish fleet. He supervised the trafficking of arms to rebel outfits and helped plan their assaults on Spanish targets. Human intelligence also contributed to counterintelligence efforts. Based on agent reports, the United States Secret Service was able to infiltrate and destroy a Spanish spy ring working in Montreal, Canada.

In June 1898 United States intelligence learned, via telegraph intercepts, that the Spanish fleet planned to attack the U.S. blockade in Cuba and draw ships into a naval battle in the Caribbean. When the Spanish fleet arrived in the region, United States Naval Intelligence tracked them and gave chase. United States commanders hoped to deplete Spanish fuel reserves before engaging them in battle. The United States backed off, and redeployed to aid blockade ships stationed around Havana. The Spanish ships proceeded undetected to the narrow harbor of Santiago, Cuba. When the Spanish commander telegraphed his government to declare his position, U.S. agents working in Florida intercepted the cable. The United States fleet moved to intercept the Spanish at Santiago. The U.S. Navy blockaded the port and immobilized the Spanish fleet. The Spanish attempted to run the blockade on July 3, but the entire fleet of six ships was destroyed.

In the final phase of the war, the United States deployed ground forces to sweep Spanish forces out of Havana and Santiago. The "Rough Riders," the most famous of which was Theodore Roosevelt, worked with rebel groups to take control of the nation's capitol and ferret out remaining Spanish forces in the countryside. The U.S. troops then departed Cuba for Puerto Rico, driving the Spanish from the island.

The war ended with the Spanish surrender on July 17, 1898. The event signaled a new international stance for the United States, as the nation began to acquire territories and dominate the politics of the Western Hemisphere. As a result of the Spanish-American War, or in its immediate wake, the United States gained Guantanamo Bay, Puerto Rico, Guam, and Hawaii.

The Spanish-American War, though a brief conflict, helped to revolutionize United States intelligence organizations and their operations. Before the war, agencies like the Office of Naval Intelligence relied on openly available sources for their information. After the war, personnel were trained in espionage tradecraft, and covert operations became standard intelligence community practice. Congress briefly entertained the idea of establishing a permanent, civilian intelligence corps, but the agency never materialized. Despite the progress made with technological surveillance, espionage tradecraft, and inter-agency cooperation made during the war, the intelligence community was once again allowed to slip into disarray until the eve of World War I.

Further Reading

Books

Musicant, Ivan. Empire by Default: The Spanish-American War and the Dawn of the American Century. Henry Holt, 1998.

O'Toole, G. J. A. The Spanish-American War: An American Epic, 1898. New York: W.W. Norton, 1986.

The Spanish-American War of 1898 was brief, lasting only a few months. It resulted in a U.S. victory that not only ended Spain's colonial rule in the Western Hemisphere but also marked the emergence of the United States as a world power, as it acquired Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Guam. Theodore Roosevelt's military exploits in Cuba catapulted him onto the national stage and led to the vice presidency and, ultimately, the presidency.

The conflict had its origins in Spain's determined effort in the 1890s to destroy the Cuban independence movement. As the brutality of the Spanish authorities was graphically reported in U.S. newspapers, especially Joseph Pulitzer's New York World and William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal, the U.S. public began to support an independent Cuba.

In 1897 Spain proposed to resolve the conflict by granting partial autonomy to the Cubans, but the Cuban leaders continued to call for complete independence. In December 1897, the U.S. battleship Maine was sent to Havana to protect U.S. citizens and property. On the evening of February 15, 1898, the ship was sunk by a tremendous explosion, the cause of which was never determined. U.S. outrage at the loss of 266 sailors and the sensationalism of the New York press led to cries of "Remember the Maine" and demands that the United States intervene militarily in Cuba.

President William McKinley, who had originally opposed intervention, approved an April 20 congressional resolution calling for immediate Spanish withdrawal from Cuba. This resolution precipitated a Spanish declaration of war against the United States on April 24. Congress immediately reciprocated and declared war on Spain on April 25, stating that the United States sought Cuban independence but not a foreign empire.

The war itself was brief due to the inferiority of the Spanish forces. On May 1, 1898, the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay in the Philippines was destroyed by the U.S. Navy under the command of Commodore George Dewey. On July 3, U.S. troops began a battle for the city of Santiago, Cuba. Roosevelt and his First Volunteer Cavalry, the "Rough Riders," led the charge up San Juan Hill; he emerged as one of the war's great heroes. With the sinking of the Spanish fleet off the coast of Cuba on July 3 and the capture of Santiago on July 17, the war was effectively over.

An armistice was signed on August 12, ending hostilities and directing that a peace conference be held in Paris by October. The parties signed the Treaty of Paris on December 12, 1898. Cuba was granted independence, and Spain agreed to pay the Cuban debt, which was estimated at $400 million. Spain gave the United States possession of the Philippines and also ceded Puerto Rico and Guam to the United States. Many members of the U.S. Senate opposed the treaty, however. They were concerned that the possession of the Philippines had made the United States an imperial power, claiming colonies just like European nations. This status as an imperial power, they argued, was contrary to traditional U.S. foreign policy, which was to refrain from external entanglements. The Treaty of Paris was ratified by only one vote on February 6, 1899.

A war between Spain and the United States, fought in 1898. The war began as an intervention by the United States on behalf of Cuba. Accounts of Spanish mistreatment of Cuban natives had aroused much resentment in the United States, a resentment encouraged by the yellow press (see yellow journalism). The incident that led most directly to the war was the explosion of the United States battleship Maine in the harbor of Havana, Cuba, an incident for which many Americans blamed Spain (see Remember the ). The United States won the war easily. The best-remembered incidents in the Spanish-American War were the charge of the Rough Riders, led by Theodore Roosevelt, in the Battle of San Juan Hill in Cuba, and the Battle of Manila Bay in the Philippines, at which Admiral George Dewey said, “You may fire when you are ready, Gridley.” The United States acquired Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines in the war and gained temporary control over Cuba.