What Were The Significant Factors That Led To America's Involvement In the Spanish-American War?

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Alex Day                                                                             May 2, 2007

What Were The Significant Factors That Led To America’s Involvement In the Spanish-American War?

In the late 19th century the United States began to dramatically reshape their foreign policies, and they soon found themselves in a bloody war that would shape the future of the country for years to come. When the United States was first created George Washington recommended limited foreign involvement, this all changed in 1823 with the Monroe Doctrine. This document set out the entire western hemisphere as the United States sphere of influence. However, at the time the Unites States did not have the power or the navy to back up this demand, until the late 1880’s when support for imperialism began to take off. People began to support imperialism because all other great powers had empires, strategic objectives became important, expanding the foreign market would support the economy, and social Darwinism was applied to nations, which meant that only the countries with the greatest wealth and largest empires would survive. As the 19th century came to a close, the United States saw an opportunity to put the Monroe Doctrine and a new sense of imperialism into action. At the time, Cuba was under going serious change, and was in the middle of a civil war with Spain. In 1895 a war escalated in Cuba to the point that 500, 000 Cubans were put into camps because of the reconcentracion policy.1 This policy had disastrous consequences causing nearly 200, 000 people in the camps to die because of the lack of proper food, sanitary conditions, and medical care.2 The policy generated severe anti-Spanish sentiment in the United States. As anger continued to rise among the American people, short-tempers eventually shattered into a gruesome war. The United States’ own President McKinley said that he “had no desire to go to war with Spain”, thus one must ask what were the overwhelming factors that pushed the American nation into another war?3

   Historians have suggested numerous reasons for the United States to enter into war. Many authors, such as Ivan Musicant4 and Frank Friedel5, believe the Yellow Press and their extraordinary stories pushed the American public to their limits, forcing the McKinley administration to finally intervene in Cuba. However, writers such as Wayne Morgan suggested that the United States pursued a peaceful policy toward Cuba, attempting to force Spain to reform the island, but the Spanish failure to do so provoked American intervention.6

   The overwhelming causes of the Spanish-American War can be attributed to a combination of five factors listed in order of importance. The Yellow Press, American economic interests, McKinley’s political agenda, and the sinking of the Maine. With these four factors in mind, the American motives for war will be accurately examined.

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        When the American people saw an opportunity to make money by investing in Cuba’s sugar plantations, they immediately took advantage of the opportunity. However, once they saw their economic interests were endangered by the civil war in Cuba, American people wanted to protect their valuable investments. One of the main reasons Cuban Nationalists revolted against Spain was because they thought the U.S. would likely come to their aid. They had good reason to think this because at the time the United States was investing increasing amounts of money into Cuban sugar production, $50 million by 1895 and conducted trade ...

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