The decision set off feverish activity at Tampa. Shafter assured Washington that “I will not delay a minute longer than absolutely necessary to get my command in condition,” but readying the command was difficult. The obese Shafter, who looked like “a floating tent,” had no experience in organizing a large force. The expedition’s size depended on the number and capacity of transports, but the quartermaster general could not find many. The Navy had acquired most available auxiliary cruisers, shallow Cuban waters precluded use of deep-draft ships, and international law forbade the transfer of foreign vessels to American registry. The Army had to rely on small, run-down coastal steamers. Tampa had only two rail connections to the north and lacked storage facilities. Railroad cars were backed up as far as Columbia, South Carolina. Boxcars reaching Tampa arrived before the bills of lading, so no one knew what they contained, and the 5th Corps had too few staff officers to sort out the mess. Only one rail line ran from Tampa to the embarkation point at Port Tampa, creating an even narrower bottleneck.
His patience worn thin by the delays, on June 7 McKinley ordered Shafter “to sail at once with what force you have ready.” The next day, after a disorganized scramble to get aboard ships, the expedition was nearly out to sea when an urgent War Department message stopped it. An erroneous report of two Spanish warships near Cuba caused the halt. For a week the Navy searched for the ghost ships while the soldiers remained on the transports, living in compartments “unpleasantly suggestive of the Black Hole of Calcutta.” The convoy finally sailed on June 14. Although expected to number 25,000 men, the expedition contained just under 17,000 soldiers, dangerously overcrowded aboard the miserable transports. The troops consisted primarily of regulars, plus the Rough Riders and two volunteer regiments.
The disembarkation might have been a disaster without assistance from the Cubans and the Navy. After conferring with Sampson and Calixto Garcia, the insurgent commander in the area, on June 22–23 Shafter landed at Daiquiri and Siboney. Although still in reasonably good health, the Americans had spent nineteen days on the transports, sweltering in blue woolen uniforms and eating unappetizing travel rations. They were not in the best condition to fight their way ashore. Fortunately, the Navy provided small boats for the landings and naval gunfire support. Moreover, Miles had initiated contact with Garcia in early April, and by mid-June cooperation between Americans and Cubans was routine. Now Garcia’s men and the Navy’s guns drove the few and scattered defenders away from the landing beaches. The Cubans also besieged every major Spanish garrison in eastern Cuba, preventing the Spanish commander, Arsenio Linares, from reinforcing Santiago.
Shafter and Sampson held divergent views of the expedition’s purpose. The naval commander saw it as a limited operation to capture the batteries at the harbor entrance. But Shafter’s orders were discretionary, authorizing him to move against the forts or toward Santiago. The orders also specified two tasks for his command: capturing the Spanish garrison and assisting the Navy against Cervera, listed in that order. Reading between the lines, Shafter realized that the War Department expected a major land campaign, and he made Santiago his objective. Once ashore, he virtually ignored the Navy, striking obliquely inland along the road from Siboney to Santiago.
Three miles northwest of Siboney, 1,500 Spaniards occupied Las Guásimas, a strategic gap on the Santiago road. On June 24, Major General Joseph Wheeler, a former Confederate general now commanding Shafter’s dismounted cavalry division, attacked the position with 1,000 men. After a sharp fight the Spanish “retreated”; unbeknownst to the Americans, Linares had previously ordered his men to withdraw. The skirmish had several important effects. The Americans assumed they had routed the foe, and their morale soared. Control of Las Guásimas allowed the Army to reach Sevilla, the only good camp site near Santiago. Finally, the skirmish opened the way to the main enemy position just east of the city.
After Las Guásimas, Shafter planned a delay to make preparations for a final assault, but an immediate attack became essential. On June 28 he learned that Spanish reinforcements had broken through a Cuban covering force and would soon reach Santiago. Shafter had to race not only against the arrival of enemy reinforcements but also against a collapse of his logistical “system.” The entire 5th Corps relied on one lighter to move supplies from the transports to the beaches. Although food had priority, Shafter had difficulty stockpiling more than one day’s supply. Many vital items, such as medical stores, remained aboard ship. If supply from the transports to the beaches was bad, supply from the beaches to the soldiers was worse. The road to Santiago was little more than a rutted trail. Hemmed in by the jungle, the path was barely wide enough for a single wagon and passed through deep ravines and across several unbridged streams. Streams flooded and the soil turned to mud when it rained, which it did often. Wagons got stuck and broke down, pack trains could not ford the swollen streams, and tropical diseases incapacitated teamsters and packers. Gaining access to Santiago’s wharves to ease the logistical crisis reinforced Shafter’s primary concern over enemy reinforcements, prompting him to attack sooner than he had planned.
The campaign’s one hard day of fighting came on July 1, when Shafter’s troops attacked El Caney, a hamlet to the northeast of Santiago, and the San Juan Heights, which rise along the Santiago road east of the city. Flanking the road were Kettle Hill to the north and San Juan Hill to the south. Although the enemy positions were within range of Sampson’s naval guns, Shafter did not ask the admiral for fire support.
Shafter’s attack plan unraveled from the start. Troops were slow getting into position, and some high-ranking commanders, including Shafter, were too ill to participate. El Caney’s 500 defenders tied down more than 5,000 Americans for the entire day instead of the two hours Shafter expected. Planned to commence when El Caney fell, the attack on the heights began late and took place without assistance from the division engaged at El Caney. While deploying in the jungle terrain, the two divisions assigned to storm the heights endured a galling fire that caused many casualties and demoralized the troops. The movement up Kettle and San Juan Hills was no romantic charge, with streaming flags and cheering men. A few brave soldiers led the advance into the hailstorm of Mauser bullets, which went “chug” when they found flesh. Behind these stalwarts came two single lines of men, spreading out like a fan, who drove the badly outnumbered defenders from the heights.
“Another such victory as that of July 1,” wrote correspondent Richard H. Davis, “and our troops must retreat.” Davis expressed the belief of many officers and men that the Battles of El Caney and San Juan Heights had brought the 5th Corps to the edge of disaster. After the unopposed landings and success at Las Guásimas, Americans assumed the Spanish would not fight well. The battles of July 1 proved otherwise, as enemy troops, outnumbered more than ten to one, held back the Army’s best corps for the better part of a day, inflicting 1,385 casualties. Among many others, the normally irrepressible Roosevelt, who led the Rough Riders up Kettle Hill, felt discouraged. “We have won so far at a heavy cost, but the Spaniards fight very hard and charging these entrenchments against modern rifles is terrible,” he wrote. “We must have help—thousands of men, batteries, and food and ammunition.” Even more dismaying, El Caney and San Juan Heights were mere outposts in advance of the main defensive position.
Believing the situation was desperate, Shafter telegraphed Washington that he was considering a withdrawal to a position where he could be supplied by railroad. Preoccupied with his difficulties, the 5th Corps commander overlooked his adversary’s even worse condition. Coming on top of three years of warfare against the insurgents, the 600 Spanish casualties were a severe loss. Short of ammunition, food, and water, the Santiago garrison was near collapse. Shafter also failed to understand the implications of a retreat. Depending on a strong show of force, McKinley’s peripheral strategy could not stand such a setback. Thus Shafter’s retreat message created consternation in Washington. Although leaving the final decision to Shafter, his civi
lian superiors tried to stiffen the general’s resolve, urging him to hold his position, promising reinforcements, and ordering Miles to Cuba should a change in command be necessary.
On July 3, the day Shafter sent his alarming telegram, the situation changed dramatically. First, convinced that Santiago was about to capitulate, the Cuban governor general ordered Cervera to make a sortie rather than surrender. Cervera’s escape attempt surprised the blockading squadron, which was below full strength and under Schley’s immediate command. One cruiser had taken Sampson to Siboney to confer with Shafter, and other ships were refueling at Guantanamo. Still, Schley’s broadside was triple the weight of Cervera’s, and the Americans easily destroyed the enemy squadron. The victory produced no hero comparable to Dewey. An acrimonious debate soon developed over whether Sampson, who commanded the squadron, or Schley, who was in tactical control during the battle, deserved paramount credit. The squabble tainted both their reputations.
One important result of Cervera’s defeat was the Spanish government’s recall of Admiral Manuel de la Camara’s squadron. Spain had sent Camara toward the Philippines after Dewey’s victory, creating a strategic dilemma of whether to save Dewey or maintain unchallenged superiority in the main theater of war. Including a battleship and an armored cruiser, Camara’s force would be a stern challenge for the Asiatic Squadron. With all its battleships and armored cruisers committed in the Caribbean, the Navy Department ordered two powerfully armored monitors from the west coast to Manila, but strategists worried whether they could beat Camara to the Philippines. The department also organized the Eastern Squadron from Sampson’s fleet to pursue Camara or, by attacking the Spanish coast, force his recall. However, dispatching the Eastern Squadron would weaken Sampson, perhaps allowing Cervera to escape. Fortunately, Cervera’s defeat resolved the knotty problem. Recognizing that the Battle of Santiago Bay freed the Eastern Squadron to sail without endangering Sampson, Spain recalled Camara. The Navy Department never sent the Eastern Squadron to European waters but held it in readiness, exerting pressure on Spain to come to an agreement.
July 3 was also important because even as Shafter contemplated retreat, he boldly demanded Santiago’s surrender. General Jose Toral, who replaced the wounded Linares, refused but indicated an interest in further discussions. Buoyed by Cervera’s defeat and the prospect of negotiations, Shafter wired Washington that he would not retreat. During the talks between Shafter and Toral, which went on for two weeks, the rivalry between Sampson and Shafter sank to the nadir. Shafter urged the Navy to attack the harbor entrance forts and steam into the bay, taking the Spanish garrison in the rear. Sampson would gladly oblige, if only the Army would capture the forts. Claiming he needed all his men for the siege, Shafter refused. Although the stalemate with Sampson continued, Shafter achieved a breakthrough with Toral, who formally capitulated on July 17. Since he surrendered all the troops under his command, not just those inside Santiago, Spanish resistance in eastern Cuba ended.
In his moment of glory, Shafter was petty. He allowed no naval officer to sign the capitulation document. In callous disregard of the Cubans’ contribution, he did not permit them to participate in the surrender negotiations or ceremonies. Shafter’s ungracious behavior marked the final stage in the deterioration of Cuban-American relations that began immediately after the landings. The Americans’ prewar image of the Cuban army was that it fought in conventional style and contained many whites. But black men filled the ranks, kindling race prejudice, and without their rifles and cartridge belts the rebels “would have looked like a horde of dirty Cuban beggars and ragamuffins on the tramp.” Forgetting the privation Cuban soldiers had endured, American soldiers considered them “human vultures” when they begged or stole food and other items. Yet without the Cubans, Shafter probably could not have taken Santiago. Not only were they valuable allies in an immediate sense—helping at Guantanamo, covering the landings, preventing or delaying the arrival of reinforcements, digging trenches, and acting as scouts and guides—but they had also severely weakened Spain before America entered the war.
The day after Toral’s surrender, the War Department authorized Miles to launch his long-contemplated invasion of Puerto Rico. Departing on July 21, he landed at Guánica four days later and on August 9 launched a four-column offensive toward San Juan. Unlike Shafter’s hastily dispatched expedition, Miles’s had excellent logistical support and encountered little resistance. Events at Santiago sapped the enemy’s will to resist, the Puerto Rican militia deserted in droves, and civilians cheerfully cooperated with Miles. In six minor engagements the Americans suffered forty-one casualties before Miles received an August 12 telegram informing him that the U.S. and Spain had signed a peace protocol.
The peace message did not reach the Philippines in time to prevent a “battle” after the war was over. McKinley selected Major General Wesley Merritt to command the 5,000 volunteers that the administration planned to send to Manila. Merritt insisted that the expedition be enlarged and include regulars, and the War Department agreed, assigning him 20,000 men, including regulars. Designated the 8th Corps, the expedition assembled at San Francisco and deployed to Manila with little confusion. A more skilled administrator than Shafter, Merritt also had the advantage of time to prepare methodically and benefited from a more complete logistical mobilization. The general’s first contingent departed on May 25, captured Guam in the Spanish-held Marianas on the way, and arrived at Cavite on June 30. Another contingent left on June 15, a third later that month, and two more in July.
Merritt departed without a clear understanding of his purpose and entered into a confused political and military situation created by the presence of a Filipino army. “I do not yet know whether it is your desire,” Merritt wrote to McKinley, “to subdue and hold all of the Spanish territory in the islands, or merely seize and hold the capital.” The president’s formal instructions did not clarify the matter, although they implied an extensive campaign. The Filipino army resulted from a revolution against Spain, similar to the Cuban insurrection, that began in 1896. The Spanish had forced the revolutionary leader, Emilio Aguinaldo, into exile, but with the encouragement of Dewey and American consuls at Hong Kong and Singapore, he returned. Reorganizing his army, he soon controlled most of the Philippines, besieged Manila, issued a declaration of independence, and established an American-style Philippine Republic—all before American troops arrived. Dewey and Merritt had instructions to avoid entangling alliances with the insurgents “that would incur our liability to maintain their cause in the future.” Aguinaldo initially viewed the Americans as friends, but he became suspicious that the U.S. might annex the islands when soldiers arrived and officials refused to recognize his government.
The “Battle” of Manila exacerbated tensions between Americans and Filipinos. Knowing the futility of resistance, Governor General Don Fermin Jáudenes negotiated with Dewey and Merritt to surrender Manila after a mock battle that would save Jáudenes’s reputation and Spain’s honor. His troops would defend only the outer line of trenches and blockhouses, not the inner citadel, and would not use their heavy guns. In return the Americans agreed not to blast Manila with naval gunfire and to keep the Filipinos out of the city, for Jáudenes feared they might retaliate for past Spanish atrocities. After this collusion with an enemy against a presumed friend, the play unfolded pretty much according to the script. Some fighting occurred along the outer defenses, but the Spanish caused less trouble than the betrayed insurgents. Serious conflict threatened when Filipinos spontaneously joined in the attack and occupied several suburbs. However, both sides wanted to avoid an open break, and at the end of the day Americans controlled most of the city. But they faced outward, surrounded by angry Filipinos demanding joint occupation. Hostile Americans and Filipinos still glared at each other on August 16 when word arrived that the war had ended four days earlier.
Aftermath of the “Splendid Little War”
As prewar strategists predicted, the war at sea was decis
ive. When Spain signed the August 12 protocol its main garrisons at San Juan, Havana, and Manila were intact, but with the losses at Manila Bay and Santiago Bay they could no longer be maintained. Under the protocol’s terms, hostilities ended, Spain granted Cuban independence and ceded Puerto Rico and Guam, and the combatants agreed to decide the Philippines’ fate at a postwar peace conference, which began at Paris on October 1. The United States had many options regarding the islands: Grant independence, return them to Spain, acquire only a naval base, annex only Luzon, establish some form of protectorate, or annex the entire archipelago. For moral, economic, political, and military reasons, McKinley decided on complete annexation, and by the Treaty of Paris of December 10, 1898, Spain ceded the Philippines.
The decision to annex the Philippines touched off a wave of protest, spearheaded by the Anti-Imperialist League. Most anti-imperialists were not against expansion, favoring acquisitions within the Western Hemisphere and the retention of naval bases elsewhere. But the annexation of a distant, sprawling archipelago inhabited by diverse and alien peoples aroused their opposition, for it represented a clear break with past policies. The U.S. had never acquired territory that could not be eventually admitted as states, and if it meddled in the Far East, it could not reasonably forbid others from meddling in the Americas. Defending the colony would be difficult and costly, creating a large military establishment and leading to militarism abroad and despotism at home. A huge land grab tarnished the crusade to liberate Cuba. Despite these arguments, on February 6, 1899, the Senate consented to the treaty. Spain and the U.S. exchanged ratifications on April 11, 1899.
For the Common Defense Page 39
