What was the Spanish-American War?

The Spanish-American War was a brief conflict from April 25 to August 12, 1898 between the United States and the Kingdom of Spain that resulted in American victory, the end of Spain's American empire, and the emergence of the United States as a global imperial power with overseas territories in the Caribbean, Pacific, and Asia. The war's roots lay in Cuba's long struggle for independence from Spain. The Cuban Ten Years' War from 1868 to 1878 had failed, but a new Cuban War of Independence began on February 24, 1895 led by Jose Marti and continued by Maximo Gomez and Antonio Maceo after Marti's death.

Spanish General Valeriano Weyler implemented brutal counterinsurgency policies after 1896, including reconcentration camps that killed perhaps 200,000 Cuban civilians. American sympathy for the Cuban cause grew through sensationalist yellow journalism by William Randolph Hearst's New York Journal and Joseph Pulitzer's New York World, which exaggerated Spanish atrocities to sell newspapers.

Two events triggered American intervention. The De Lome Letter, a private letter from Spanish Minister Enrique Dupuy de Lome insulting President William McKinley, was stolen and published by the New York Journal on February 9, 1898. Six days later, on February 15, 1898, the U.S. battleship Maine exploded in Havana Harbor, killing 266 American sailors. The cause was probably an internal coal bunker fire, but the press blamed Spain with the slogan Remember the Maine. President McKinley asked Congress for authority to use force on April 11, 1898. Congress declared war on April 25, 1898 effective from April 21.

The war was fought on two fronts. In the Pacific, Commodore George Dewey's Asiatic Squadron destroyed the Spanish fleet at Manila Bay on May 1, 1898 in a one sided engagement. American troops captured Manila on August 13, 1898. In the Caribbean, American forces invaded Cuba and Puerto Rico in June and July 1898. Theodore Roosevelt's Rough Riders, the First U.S. Volunteer Cavalry, made their famous charge up Kettle Hill (next to San Juan Hill) on July 1, 1898. Admiral William Sampson destroyed Admiral Pascual Cervera's Spanish fleet at the Battle of Santiago de Cuba on July 3, 1898.

Spain sued for peace on July 26, 1898, and a protocol was signed on August 12, 1898 ending hostilities. The Treaty of Paris signed December 10, 1898 transferred Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines to the United States for 20 million dollars and granted Cuba independence. The United States annexed Hawaii separately by joint resolution on July 7, 1898. About 2,500 American servicemen died in the war, about 90 percent from disease.