Benevolent Assimilation: The American Conquest of the Philippines, 1899-1903

by Stuart Creighton Miller

Book Overview

American acquisition of the Philippines and Filipino resistance to it became a focal point for debate on American imperialism. In a lively narrative, Miller tells the story of the war and how it challenged America's sense of innocence. He examines the roles of key actors--the generals and presidents, the soldiers and senators--in America's colonial adventure.
"The most thorough, balanced, and well-written study to date of America's imperial adventure...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0300030819
• ISBN13: 9780300030815
• Release Date: September 1984
• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Length: 342 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.4" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

An Excellant Account Of 20th Century American Imperialism

I cannot recommend this book enough to those who wish to understand the roots of American imperialism and what motivated it. The author presents an honest look at both sides of what was then a burning political question. He quotes not only from media sources but also letters and interviews of soldiers who fought on both sides, court documents, diaries, memoirs and legal papers. He spares no uncomfortable fact and provides a vivid account of both the atrocities and the brutality of guerrila warfare. He also delves into the arguments of congress, the press and the White House for how and why decisions were made (which were mostly due to the political winds of the prevailing election cycle). It's a great eye-opener for those that have never been confronted with the fact that the United States often acted with both greed and callousness. And yet the book is not a condemnation of the United States, rather a look back to what really transpired from 1899-1903 under Presidents McKinley and Roosevelt and America's ill-conceived attempt to enter what it thought was an elite club of nations that practiced third world colonialism.

Essential

A very interesting story about the American armies attempt to end the Phillipine insurgency that broke out in the wake of the Spanish-American war. Originally allied with the Americans the Phillipinoes were angry that the U.S had promised indpedendence and from their point of view, reneged on the promise. An insurgency broke out and the American army used classic anti-insurgency methods to break it, including creating institutions and providing incentives for the people not to back it, as well as combatting it. Famous figures such as Roosevelt, Taft, Pershing and Macarthur's father were involved. This is an important part of American history that is often forgotten. Seth J. Frantzman

American politics and media surrounding the colonization of the Philippines

This book reviews the politics and media surrounding the actions by the US in the Philippines following the Spanish-American war. It gives great insight into the propaganda used to sell the war to the American pubic and to obfuscate the atrocities that American soldiers committed there. Miller paints a fascinating picture of egocentric American political and military commands steeped in duplicity and self-delusion; these patterns will be interesting and familiar to any student of the wars in Vietnam and Iraq. The material is sourced mainly from newspaper editorials, political speeches, congressional inquiries and the letters of politicians and high ranking military figures. This book will not tell you anything about what the war was like for the soldiers on the ground, American or Philippino. It won't tell you much about tactics. It won't teach you anything about Philippine culture of the time, either.

Suberb history of a forgotten war

An excellent telling of a period that most Americans and Filipinos know little or nothing about. With America's new ownership of the Philippines, we were drawn into a second conflict once the Spanish were routed. The insurrectionist movement against America brought about a bloody and savage war that cost tens of thousands of lives. The third phase was the attempt to subdue the Moros, some of the toughest and most fearless warriors on the planet. The troops involved thought they would only be fighting Spanish regulars and then sent home. Rather, many spent years fighting in jungles and swamps against a clever and determined foe, and many were then shipped off to fight the Boxer's in China in 1900, only to be returned to battle the often fiendish inhabitants of places like Sibago Island, Jolo and Samar. A classic account and ranks with "Muddy Glory" and "Little Brown Brother" to name but a couple. There isn't much written about this conflict, but the information is out there. These lessons should have taught America about getting involved in smaller nations affairs.

The lesson that should have kept us out of Vietnam.

Stuart Miller's book is an excellent study in the political turmoil and subterfuges involved in the transition of America into an imperialist power. The book is not really a military history; the military aspects are secondary to Miller's coverage of how Americans justified, reacted to, and lied about our subjugation of the Philippines. It is a very sobering history of the river of lies poured out by the military, especially General Otis, and the administration of William McKinley. This is also a study in racism; how allegedly "superior" Anglo-Saxons needed to "civilize" and "Christianize" the Filipinos, many of whom were Catholic. Overall, this book is a good primer about a shocking and somewhat vile episode in American history. High School history teachers in particular should read this book and include it in their lessons about the outcome of our "splendid little war" with Spain. It is a sad truth that as a result of this conflict, America did not seem to learn anything about the nature of guerilla warfare with a people fighting to be free of foreign control. Our failure to profit from this episode helped propel us into another such quagmire in Vietnam, a nation not too far from the site of our earlier fiasco in the Philippines.