Not much is known by the average American about America's involvement in the Philippines during this turn-of-the-century Imperialism Age.
This week for the blog, consult these sources...
Source One
Source Two-You don't have to read this whole page. It contains dozens of letters from soldiers about their involvement in the Philippines at this time. Choose 5-6 to read and you'll get the idea.
Source Three-Brief video
For the comment section, write 200 words about what you learned (that you didn't already know) about our involvement in the Philippines.
Due to these sources I learned that that the thought of gaining control over the Philippines was first proposed by Thomas Jefferson. Whom stated that the US should wait until Spain was done with the Philippines and the population is ready. Although throughout the Philippino occupancy many Americans were resentful of it and saw it as not worth the hassle. After Spain’s occupancy of the Philippines was over the US gained the Philippines after the treaty of Paris. whereas, the US paid 20 million dollars for the archipelago. The annexation went through on Febuarary 6th 1899. Consequently, urging the new government of the recently unoccupied Philippines to declare war on the US. The war against the Philippines took place (which I didn’t know before this) in 1899-1902 when Teddy Roosevelt declared victory. Throughout the campaign they used “water cure” ,or what today would be known as water boarding. After the war was over they ceased to have the Catholic Church as their central church and adopted English as its main language. I found this assignment very enlightening as I had never heard of this war , but have wished to learn more of this countries impearlism. Although I always wanted to research it I never had time due to being 2 weeks late on assignments for the majority of my scholarship. Now do to the fact this is my assignment I got to learn a lot I previously didn’t know know about the Philippino war which I’m oddly greatly for. (249)
ReplyDeleteOne thing I found interesting that I didn’t know is that the soldiers involved didn’t really know what they were fighting for. They weren’t sure what the issue was and so they were confused as to what was going on. The soldiers did however steal and loot from every house, and made “easy work” of the Philippine troops. Mark Twain and other writers disagreed with us going to war, as they thought it was pointless. They didn’t think the US has a purple in the Philippines. There were near 20,000 Philippines soldiers killed in the war, and about 4,500 US soldiers killed. Teddy Roosevelt declared victory in 1902. There were at least 250,000 civilians killed in total, and many students could have been spared had the war not ever started. The US used heavy torture tactics against the Philippines, and they begged the government for permission to do so. Some of the officials in the government thought this war would take years, and they didn’t think we would leave as early as we did. The war was a very short one dominated by the US. Overall the war was a way of trying to show our dominance, and I think we did so by handling the Philippine troops.(208)
ReplyDeleteWhat I found interesting is that the fact that we had a war with the Philippines I have never heard of this war. I learned that Mark Twain was a anti imperialist and so was William Jennings Bryan. They were the most notable critics of this war and did not like the way it was fought. Also I learned that during this war the soldiers would take things from peoples houses. Also by the end of this war there were 4,500 dead U.S soldiers and 20,000 Philippine soldiers that died during this war. The US soldiers would capture Filipinos and use some harsh torture tactics. These were very painful. After this war President Teddy Roosevelt declared victory in 1902. There was an estimated 250,000-750,000 civilian casualties. As we can see there were a lot of deaths in this war. I have learned a lot I did not know about this and it was pretty interesting.
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DeleteThe Spanish-American War ended in1898 with the Treaty of Paris. One concession of Spain to the United States was the group of islands in the Pacific Ocean known as the Philippines.Spain had occupied these islands for over 400 years. Spanish rule had been harsh.The people of these islands had been fighting the Spanish authorities for many years for their independence to rule themselves. These people at first believed the United States would support their independence. This was not the case and the United States policy resulted in the Philippine–American War. The United States backed up their claim of the islands with ships and soldiers in small numbers. The people of the Philippines backed up their position with very large numbers. The Battle of Manila occured between the United States and the Philippine Republic in February 1899. War was declared against the United States in June that same year. The United States won this war which lasted three years. This was not a civilized war between gentlemen for glory. The accounts of U.S. soldiers revealed they didn’t always want to be there. They didn’t always agree with what it took to overcome the native people. But mostly, these accounts revealed their senior officers allowed them to kill prisoners, destroy property, and loot homes. No wonder very little is known of this particular war; to know the details or the actions of our soldiers is to be ashamed of our nation. (242)
ReplyDeleteAmerica defeated Spain in 1898 and the Filipinos at the time thought the century of colonialism was finally over. They started acting as their own country and wrote a constitution and formed a government under Emilio Aguinaldo. But because of the Treaty of Paris America took over the 7,600 islands that make up the Philippines by paying Spain $20 million for the islands. The american philippine war lasted from 1899-1902. When America went to war with the Philippines many people like Mark Twain and William Jennings Bryan we’re against the war and huge critics because they didn’t understand the point of us going and fighting them. There were around 4,500 US soldiers killed in the war and 20,000 Philippine soldiers killed, and 250,000 people killed in total not including soldiers. The US military begged the government to us torture as a way to get ahead in the war. Although this cost the US a lot of controversy, it helped America dictate their power and how big of a country we were becoming. The Philippines were released from the US sovereignty in 1946. This was a big war for the US but it was also a big moment for the Philippines as it helped them create their government and everything.
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One of the many things that I found interesting was that America paid 20 million for the Philippines when the Philippines actually thought America just won the war. This caused many of the people in the Philippines to grow outraged and this kinda started the war. The war mainly started because the Philippines soldiers wanted their rights and US soldiers had no clue what they were fighting for. The war ended in 1902 with 4200 US casualties and over 20000 Philippines casualties. These two numbers were no where near the number of civilian casualties what was estimated from 250000-750000. This was pretty interesting to me because of it being more defenseless people dead than people actually fighting for their rights. I did not see a reason why so many defenseless people died compared to the people in the war but my guess would be is the battles happened where they lived or they were targeted to gain power so the other side would give up. But this was definitely one of the biggest things that I got out of these sources that I read. All in all I believe that the American and Philippines battle or war should have never happened and been settled other ways. (206)
ReplyDeleteTo begin with, I never even knew that there was a war in the Philippines at all so this whole subject is completely new to me and I was going in completely blind. The Philippines had been in control of Spain for 400 years since it was found by Portugal in the 1600s. After 400 years of being under the control of Spain, the Philippines thought that the Americans were coming to help the already going rebellion and free them from the Spanish rule. It became apparent that this was not the intention of the U.S. after the leader of the rebellion and his troops fight with them against Spain. The U.S. held a conference about whether they should give the Philippines their freedom, annex them, or even just give the Philippines right back to Spain. Many Americans and anti-imperialists were against annexation of the Philippines but the people in power thought much lower of the people of the Philippines and believed that they were not fit to government themselves. On February 6, 1899, the treaty to annex the Philippines was put before the US and barely won by just a single vote and the Philippines was officially a US territory. But the Philippines obviously were not happy with this and on June 2 the Philippines had declared a war on the US that would last 3 years. The US would win the war and the Philippines suffered upwards of 220,000 casualties.
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DeleteI learned America paid $20 million for all 7600 islands that make up the philippines. The phillipino american war was the first counterinsurgency fought by the U.S and had guerrilla warfare. Waterboarding was used during the war. The roosevelt administration declared victory in 1902. 4200 US soldiers and 20000 filipino soldiers were dead. American soldiers sought brutality towards Filipinos during the war. Soldiers were also racist during the war towards Filipinos using the N word frequently to describe them though it didn't change much until the late 1900’s it just went to show the brutality of Americans during the war. Spanish colonies like puerto rico and the philippines attempted to make opposition in their countries to combat the increasingly brutal war. The soldiers looted all the houses and left nothing behind which kind of reminds me of the grinch from how the grinch stole christmas just because of how they took everything and left nothing behind. They thought it would take years to subjugate the natives. Unless the conditions changed there would barely be any soldiers left to fight. They put the natives in lines and brutally executed them. The american soldiers were so brutal during this war that you can compare them to today's terrorist organizations that care little about their standards. (214)
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