As time went by the pressure for war grew. Early in 1898 as riots erupted in Havana, the United States Navy fastened the USS Maine in the Havana Harbor to help assure the safety of American citizens and property (Smolinski, pg 9). A few months later the newspapers published an intercepted letter from the Spanish ambassador that insulted McKinley and called him weak. Later, on February 15 at nine forty pm there was an explosion on the Maine that killed more than 250 American sailors. The Maine laid about four hundred yards from the shore, and the explosion shattered many of the windows in the building along the wharves. (Walsh, pg 15) After that, an enraged American public blamed the Spanish for the disaster and called for war. Even with the immense pressure of the public McKinley still hesitated.
At the same time of the Cuban rebellion the people in the Philippine Islands, the last possession of Spain, were also rebelling. Theodore Roosevelt, the assistant secretary of state, saw the Philippines as a key base where the U.S. can protect its trade with Asia as well as a good place to set a naval and refueling base for ships. This desire caused Roosevelt to set military action against Spain while his boss, the secretary of state, was out of the office. When McKinley found out about his attended actions, he immediately sent most of the cables back with the exception of the cable directed by Admiral George Dewey. McKinley told Dewey to attack the Spanish fleet in the Philippines if war were to break out with Spain.
In a final attempt for a peaceful solution, McKinley sent a list of demands to Spain. Within the demands it included compensation for the Maine, an end to the concentration camps, Cuban independence and a truce. Though Spain accepted most of the demands and settled to negotiate about Cuban independence, McKinley could not withstand the mounting cries for war. On April 11, he requested for the permission of the Congress to go to war with Spain and a couple of days later Congress recognized Cuban independence and approved force against Spain. On May 1, 1898, Admiral Dewey unleashed a surprise attack near the islands of the Philippines, destroying the entire Spanish Pacific fleet. Meanwhile in Cuba, the US warships quickly finished off Spain’s Atlantic fleet in the harbor at Santiago. By July 3 the United States Navy sank every Spanish ship. In December 1898 the U.S. signed a treaty with Spain announcing that the Spanish government recognizes Cuban independence. With an addition of 20 million dollars U.S. also received Philippines, Puerto Rico and the Pacific islands of Guam. At the time of receiving these lands US had promised independence for Philippines and Cuba; however the Philippines didn’t gain independence until 1946 and Cuba didn’t gain their independence until after the Platt Amendment.
All wars commence because of a difference in people’s opinions, and the Vietnam War was no different. The Vietnam War was a vicious war that affected millions of people in numerous countries. For many Americans, the war in Vietnam is a bad memory. Millions of Vietnamese and 58,000 Americans lost their lives in a distant war few people understood. (Marquette, pg 5) It started because France and a Vietnam leader, Ho Chi Minh, had a difference in opinion about the type of government Vietnam should possess.
Vietnam was ruled by France from late 1800s until1939. In 1940 Japan invaded the country while still fighting a group call the Viet Minh in Vietnam. The leader, Ho Chi Minh, wanted a free country, where Japan would leave and France wouldn’t come back. The U.S. helped the Viet Minh fight the Japanese and by the end of World War II in 1945 the Japanese had left. Afterwards Ho declared Vietnam to be a democratic republic; however France didn’t want to lose Vietnam, so they sent in troops and drove the Viet Minh to the north side of the country (Marquette, pg 9).
Ho then asked the U.S. to support Vietnam’s independence. However during this time the U.S. was involved in the Cold War, fighting communist countries such as Soviet Union and China. Though Ho Chi Minh valued much of the U.S.’s beliefs he was still a communist and with the United States fearing that Vietnam would fall to communism refused to help (Marquette, pg 11). What the U.S. feared most was the effects of the Domino Theory, the naïve assumption that an entire region would collapse to the Communists one by one like dominos (Karnow, pg43). Instead the U.S. decided to assist the French against the Viet Minh; but the war did not go well for the French, and after losing major battles the French decided to call for a peace treaty. Under the treaty, Vietnam was divided along the 17th Parallel with Ho Chi Minh holding power in the north, while an anti- communist government in charge of the south. The people in Vietnam would then be able to vote for the leaders they desired and the French would leave (Marquette, pg 11).
The U.S. did not support the treaty and as a result chose a man named Ngo Dihn Diem to become the leader of the southern part of the country. In 1954, Diem declared that the southern half of the country would be a new nation, called the Republic of Vietnam. (Marquette, pg 11) In 1955 the United States supported the establishment of the South Vietnam as a republic with Ngo Dihn Diem as its new president. It also supported Diem when he refused a North Vietnamese request to prepare for the elections that were to be held to reunify the country. Diem’s refusal was based, he said, on the belief that free elections were impossible in Communist North Vietnam. (Lawson, pg 17)
Viet Minh fighter who lived in the south began to join other people who opposed the Diem government to form a new group. With the support of North Vietnam the group became the National Liberation Front (Lawson, pg68). Diem later referred to these people as the Viet Cong. What followed then was merely a “battle of the “parallels”- attempts by both sides to enlarge the zones allotted them and to fill in the details of the armistice supervisory machinery- all punctuated by further bad news for the French and Vietnamese as their military efforts failed and Saigon’s administrative machinery slowly disintegrated. (Ed. Raskin and Fall, pg 84) When Diem’s army realized that they couldn’t defeat the Viet Cong, Diem asked for the service of the U.S. By 1963 there were almost 17,000 U.S. troops in Vietnam, including several ships and planes. In August 1964 it was said that gunboats from North Vietnam had fired on U.S. ship. At that moment President Lyndon Johnson asked Congress for more power to fight the war. Though the Congress didn’t declare war on Vietnam they passed an act called the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (Marquette, pg 13). The resolution allowed the president to use “necessary” military force in Vietnam.
When more than 1,600 North Vietnamese troops were killed, the U.S. believed that they had already secured a major victory. However at the same time the U.S. found itself sending more and more troop to fight; and by the peak of the war as many as half a million U.S. troop were in the country. This mad some Americans wonder whether we were winning or not. As the war escalated U.S. planes bombed targets in both North and South Vietnam. The bombs meant to destroy the bases and troop of the North Vietnamese Army as well as the Viet Cong, but it was often hard to tell which towns were the real targets; this caused many innocent people to die during the bombings (Marquette, pg 21).
Suddenly in early 1968, the Viet Cong launched a surprise attack that shocked the America. This attack later grew to be called the Tet Offensive. The Tet Offensive was a campaign to “liberate” the south before Ho’s death. (Karnow, pg155) The strike took place in Saigon during Tet, the Vietnamese New Year. In addition to attacking Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, the Viet Cong also tackled the U.S. Embassy, Tan Son Nhut air base, and the presidential palace. It took the U.S. three weeks to drive the Viet Cong back out of the city (Marquette, pg 21). Just after the Tet Offensive President Johnson starts peace talks with North Vietnam in Pairs. Unfortunately, the talks didn’t go far giving that South Vietnam’s new president, Nguyen Van Thieu, declared that he wouldn’t make peace with communists. When Nixon came to office the talks continued, still neither side could agree on a plan for peace. Both countries had a difference in opinion; North Vietnam wanted the U.S. to leave and allow the Viet Cong to have a role in a new government, while the U.S. wanted all enemy troops to depart the south (Marquette, pg 33).
As the peace talks sustained President Nixon launches a secret bombing in Cambodia and by April 1970 the U.S. troops invade the country. After that in January of 1973 all parties sign a treaty to end the war. When the treaty was established the U.S. left Vietnam and there was a cease fire between the North and the South. By 1975 North Vietnam launches a massive attack on the south, causing them to surrender and allowing Vietnam to become one communist country (Marquette, pg 34).
As one can see American foreign policies change through time. Though there are many differences there is always one true objective that forever stays, and that objective is to control the economics of other countries. Throughout the Spanish- American War the U.S. has shown its dominating influence over Latin America. Even before the war U.S. held its strong impact in Latin American economics through the Banana Republics. During this time an American named Minor C. Keith gained long-term leases for land and railroad lines by providing financial services to the Costa Rican government. By 1913 Keith’s United Fruit Company not only exported millions of bananas, but also dominated the economics and political organizations of Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Honduras. Therefore Central America became known as the Banana Republics. Then after the Spanish- American War the U.S. obtained Cuba and the Philippines, promising them their independence. However once they actually acquire these areas things changed significantly. Even though the Teller Amendment stated Cuban independence, the U.S. involvement in Cuba didn’t stop after the victory over Spain. McKinley worried about protecting American business interests during these chaotic times, so as a result he decided to put in a military government for three years. It only after these three year was Cuba able to gain independence through the Platt Amendment, but even so the Cuban government couldn’t enter any foreign agreements, had to allow U.S. to set up two naval bases on the island, and must give the U.S. the right to intervene when ever necessary. Meanwhile in the Philippines, the people too, assumed that they would achieve their independence since they too were involved in the war, nevertheless the U.S. decided not to give it to them just yet, giving that McKinley believed they were unfit for self government. This dispute ended up with a three year war with Emilo Aguinaldo and other Filipino rebels. The Philippines didn’t receive their independence until 1946.
These actions with the United States controlling the economics of other countries continued through the Cold War. An incident that shows this would be the Vietnam War. During this war the U.S. was unsuccessful, but still tried to establish its control. While Vietnam was attempting to become an independent country the United States intervened to stop the spread of communism. At home the U.S. told the public that they were trying to stop the evils of communism, but in reality the U.S. was trying to stop the domino theory, where communism would cover all of Asia, and with that the U.S. would loose it’s trade. As shown through two different incidents in history American foreign policies are overall always the same.
