American Imperialism In The Mid And Late 1800s

The Spanish-American war commenced with the Wilson- Gorman Tariff, 1894. The American tariff on sugar imports hurt the Cuba's economy that was manufactured sugar. Angry nationalists (insurrection) revolted against the Spanish Colonial regime. Therefore, Spain sent General Weyler to Cuba to deal with the situation.

Toward the end of the nineteenth century and early twentieth century, the United States was becoming an increasingly powerful nation and world power. The country was competing with other nations also expanding. Their motives for expanding were to gain land and resources. While there was a slight departure from past expansionism, the United States mostly continued as it had been in the previous years. In order to accomplish expansionism, the United States needed to acquire foreign territories to increase their global presence.

Spain had freed Cuba and turned over the islands of Guam in the Pacific and Puerto Rico to the United States. Spain had also sold the Philippines to the United States for twenty million.

Imperialism was a big impact on the late 1800’s leading into the early 1900’s with counties like the British, Spanish, Russia, and Germany pushing to gain more land in different counties. This would lead to an arms race and the buildup which would lead into World War 1. Many different alliance were made if another country would attack another other countries would help with the fight. This would keep peace till the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria.

The imperialistic mentality of the American government after the Civil War, led to some degree to the Spanish-American war that would render a great acquisition of land for the United States. However, imperialism would not be the sole factor that led to the war against Spain, but also the sympathy felt by the American government towards Cuba’s efforts in fighting for their independence; additionally, the United States would seek to protect its commercial interests (sugar) in the island. Therefore, after invoking the Spanish to secede from their brutal practices towards Cuban rebels and attain a peaceful end to the situation, the United States arbitrarily sent a navy ship, “The USS Maine” to monitor the area.

The United States did not go to war with Spain with the sole purpose of helping Cuba gain independence. The oppressive treatment of the Spaniards to the Cubans was only used to justify going into war. The U.S was the victor of the Spanish-American War because they were closer to Cuba and had a larger navy than Spain. This victory meant that the U.S was able to attain the islands in the Caribbean through the Treaty of Paris. This Treaty gave Guam,

United States Imperialism in the late 19th century was very selfish time. Many people in that time, debated about whether are not benefiting our country was the right way or the wrong way. The motiving factors that impacted our imperialism are economic, military, and cultural. These factors impacted the American Imperialism from 1890-194 by having control over weaker territories meeting our expanding needs.

America’s first intervention in Cuba dated back to the 1898 Spanish-American war (S.Foner, 1972). Historian Pérez argues that imperialist intentions for benefitting US national goals were behind the intervention (Pérez, 1998). Whereas L. Hoganson disputed it to sympathy for Cuba as their fight against Spanish colonials exemplified their American Revolutionary war (Hoganson, 1998). Nevertheless, Cuba encountered imperialistic rule under the Platt Amendment as it gave the US permission to form US provisional government in 1898-1901 (S.Foner, 1972), 1906-1909 and 1917-1922 (Guerra, 2005). In addition, the US held power over Cuba through puppet presidencies of the Liberal parties and the Auténtico who relied on US sugar companies for stabling the

During the Spanish-American War, the Spanish ruled over Cuba for approximately 400 years and finally, Cuban rebels declared independence. Also during this time, Americans had expansion fever so we decided to help Cubans overthrow the Spanish. However, Americans used yellow journalism to create reenactments of the war to show citizens back home what war was like, but sometimes the reenactments were lies. The war started because the United States’ ship, the Maine, mysteriously exploded in one of the harbors of Cuba and we blamed it on the Spanish with no proof.

There were many important causes and effects of the Spanish American War. In the 1880’s the U.S. wanted to achieve manifest destiny and so they expanded out west and took control over the Native Americans. There were four different motives that the United States could’ve used to imperialize: political and military interest and economic interest were mostly with trading. Humanitarian and religious interest, to help those that you have allied with or to spread religion and the rich help those who were “under privileged.” Lastly, social darwinism, the idea that you are superior than someone else.

Well, things went to down, straight to war when Spain started fired and destroyed the Maine which people didn’t know that the firing was an accident. The Americans, us, were furious and they declare war, even Roosevelt and

Spain was dead set on not leaving Cuba and going back to Spain. In a sense America and Spain would have settled this issue quickly if the Maine

Before the 20th century the United States was an isolationist nation but around the late 19th century America decided to convert into an imperialist power. They had numerous reasons to shift into being an imperialist nation. America didn’t want to begin imperializing to settle and live in the nations they were taking over, they already had America for that reason, they wanted to adopt these nations for what they had to offer, which was many things. America saw an opportunity to improving their nation and took it. Even if there were many causes for America to imperialize, three of them stood out the most.

At the start of the 19th century, America was already expanding its territory. In 1803, the United States of America had bought the Louisiana Territory, it was bought from France which had made the country two times larger. In 1819 Spain had given up their territory of Florida to the United States. President Monroe issued the “Monroe Doctrine” in 1823, its main purpose was to warn the European countries to not enter the Western Hemisphere. In order for America to achieve its goal of becoming an imperialist nation they had conquered other countries economically, culturally, and with a strong military in the late 1800’s.

Essay One: Imperialism Flies circle great black lumps as the moist air ravages the corpses. Dried blood soaked into the ground after faceless soldiers brutally destroyed its owners’ lives. These were the stories in the newspapers, the movies, and the films. Horrified by these crimes against humanity, the American public was spurred into action against the Spanish oppressors. the United States invaded Cuba in 1898 to pursue humanitarian efforts.