Spanish-American War

The Path to War

After more than four centuries of global expansionism, the Spanish Empire at the end of the 19th century had been reduced to three distinct regions: Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Spanish East Indies (consisting of the Philippine Islands, Guam, and several other smaller Pacific regions). Spain's sense of national identity had been entrenched in its preservation of empire. Cubans, though, were reluctant to accept such political or cultural designations and fought several struggles for independence throughout the latter half of the 19th century, most notably the Cuba Libre movement. From 1897 to 1898, the Cuban revolt occurred alongside the destabilizing assassination of the Spanish prime minister, Canovas del Castillo, in Basque country, along with growing American military and cultural expansionism and American industrial firms’ economic interest in Cuba's natural resources. War was not desired by any of the involved nations, and a degree of Cuban autonomy was declared in 1898 by the new Spanish prime minister, Praxades Sagasta, in negotiations with the William McKinley administration in the United States, which favored political and economic stability in the region.

The Sinking of the Maine

The fragile coalition would be undermined by a series of events just 11 days following Cuban autonomy. A series of violent revolts had broken out on the island, and President McKinley agreed to send the USS Maine to Havana harbor to attempt to ensure stability. On February 15, [Page 1994]1898, there was an explosion in the ship's powder magazines. The ship would sink in Havana harbor, killing 266 of its U.S. military personnel. The cause of the explosion was in dispute at the time and remains so today, either an onboard accident or the ship hitting a mine in the harbor that ignited the magazines. Although the sinking of the Maine would provide hawks in Congress with cause for war, the public was generally ambivalent in the immediate aftermath of the sinking.

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