3. The nature of the Spanish government of Cuba and the Cuban insurrections.

4. Geographical situation of Cuba, including her command of the Carribean and Gulf Sea-coasts.

Spanish statesmen felt that Spain could not renounce Cuba-Cuba and the Philippines, the last of her great colonial empire (in the Occident and in the Orient). Without these they felt that Spain could not long exist—they said as much.23

Mr. Lodge notes the following causes:

1. Sympathy for the oppressed and suffering Cubans. 2. American resentment against dominion of Europe in the New World.

3. Case of the Virginius (1873). An American vessel captured in high seas, taken to a Cuban port and about fifty of her crew shot. The United States accepted money and war was avoided, but the question of moral insult was unsettled.

Captain Mahan asserts that "the avowed purpose and cause" of the United States' action was not primarily for "redress of grievances (such as blowing up of Maine and executions of American citizens) against Spain, but to enforce the departure of the latter from Cuba. But, we may well ask, what motives led us to wish to drive Spain from the Western world? Was not the United States, after all, looking largely to her own ultimate interests? Did we not need the control, if not the actual possession, of Cuba in order to make complete the chain of United States predominance (in commanding the key to the Carribean Sea and Gulf region) in the New World ?"

Mr. Lodge's opinion coincides almost exactly with Captain Mahan's, on the purpose of the war. He says that what the United States desired above everything else her purpose in going to war, was to drive Spain out of Cuba, and Congress was very careful to frame its resolution so as to make that point explicit.

23 See Le Brand, p. 19.

Summing up, then, we may say that the causes of the Spanish-American war in 1898 were:

2. Immediate (which approached from some points of view but not in all respects, mere pretexts).

(a) The remote and one of the two fundamental or underlying causes was unquestionably the incompatibility of the Spanish and American race temperaments, and political institutions and ideals. It was impossible that the two ever should become blended or reconciled. Other considerations and events, such as the United States intervention in Cuba, with the slave problem of that time, the grievances the United States had against Spain on account of the outrages on Americans by the Spanish officials in Cuba, particularly the Virginius affair, were only occasions for bringing to the front this incompatibility of the two races, or were of the nature of mere pretexts for hostility. All these differences and difficulties could ultimately have been settled by peaceful means, and would have been, had the United States been dealing with another such nation as England or Germany.

(b) The economic situation in Cuba undoubtedly contributed its share in causing this war; but important as it was, it was by no means the fundamental cause. It cannot be separated from the other causes.

(c) The incompetence and inability of the home government in Spain made possible the abuses of her officials in Cuba, and these two things together were important factors in the United States' intervention. This cause is more or less blended, however, with the first, or fundamental cause above mentioned.

(d) The sympathy of the American people for the suffering Cubans-the cause of humanity. This was indeed an important cause-it swept away the whole American people in a great flood of enthusiasm for the war, and was indeed, a fundamental as well as an immediate cause of the war.

(e) The attitude of the McKinley administration (not at first as Secretary Alger observes, but after the pulse of the

nation had been felt, and the war fever detected) with its almost utter disregard of genuine diplomacy.

(f) The blowing up of the Maine, after all has been said, can be taken as little more than an occasion or mere pretext.

(g) The long desire of at least a portion of the American people to see Cuba become a part of the United States no doubt added no inconsiderable momentum to the rising tide of war spirit in the United States. Nor can we say that the United States was greatly to blame for this. It was (1) a natural self-interest; (2) it was seen that Cuba would be better off under our flag.

(h) In connection with the necessary interests of the United States in Cuba as Lebrand observes, there is, of course, the geographical cause. Cuba is "only a few hours sail from the United States, but several days from Spain; it is to the interest of the United States to possess or at least control an island which is so prominent at the entrance to the enclosed waters of the Gulf." This interest was sooner or later bound to clash with that of Spain.

CHAPTER XII

CAUSES OF THE FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR (1870)

HELDON AMOS (in his book on Remedies for War)

follows:

1. Growth of Prussia and Germany with Bismark's determination to secure a United Germany.

2. Alleged intervention of France in nominating Hohenzollern as successor to the Spanish crown.

3. Political schemes of the Emperor Napoleon III.

4. Antipathy existing between French and German people.

5. Territorial acquisition on both sides.

6. Enormously developed military institutions.

7. Alleged ill-treatment of the French Ambassador of Berlin.1

Among these, however, he recognizes only three important causes: "In some cases, as in the Franco-German War of 1870, it is difficult even for contemporaries to decide to which of the three causes-that is, (1) natural efforts after increased liberty and security proportioned to the growth and the consolidation of the internal resources of one of the Belligerent States, or resistance, by anticipation, to future aggressions or direct ambition and political acquisitiveness— the war is to be attributed." 2

Writers differ materially in giving the causes and ex

1 This certainly is as complete a list of causes for this war as could be found by anyone, no matter how much study he should put on an investigation of the causes; but it is true and sound despite its complexity.

2

Amos, pp. 70-71.

planations of this war. Saliers, a French author, claims that France had been "caught in 1870 in the dream of universal peace," and that that explains her being wholly unprepared for the war with Germany.3 The English historian, Rose, on the other hand, says that French feeling against Prussia had been growing for years before 1870, and that France's counting on Austria as an ally against Prussia (in revenge for the events of 1866) explains, in part at least, the Franco-Prussian War. Signobos avers that for such "unforeseen" facts (as war of 1870) no general cause can be discerned in the intellectual, economic, or political condition of the continent of Europe." 5 Another historian gives these

causes:

1. Bismark's policy of a United Germany-made this war necessary-naturally raised the apprehensions of Napoleon III, and caused the French to prepare for and expect war.

2. Question of succession to the throne of Spain stirred France into a ferment rapidly as news could fly. A Hohenzollern (Leopold von Hohenzollern) had been elected, and had given his consent. France could not possibly allow the government of Spain to fall into the hands of Prussia, which her acceptance of this election would mean.®

We will here give the causes the historian, Rose, assigns for this war:

1. sia.

France counting on Austria as an ally against Prus

2. Bismark realized that it would take war to solve the problems of reunion, which was impossible in time of peace. 3. The question of the Spanish succession now furnished this casus belli.

Mr. Rose here gives Gramont's (the French Minister) statement in the Chamber of Deputies, which is as follows: "We do not think that respect for the rights of a neighbor

Saliers, pp. V and VI in Preface, "La Guerre."

See Rose, I, Chap. I.

B Signobos, p. 847.

C. M. H., XI.