After 400 years of colonial power, there had not been much that had remained of the Empire where the sun never set. And the remnants - islands - were now occu- pied by American troops, whose government and compatriots were to decide if they would use them as the cornerstone of a new empire.

   In the case of Guam and Wake Island, the decision was easily reached. Most people didn’t even know they existed and those who cared to take a look onto the map, did soon come to the conclusion that the population of these tiny bits of soil in the vast sea was not worth quarrelling over. But some did care about those islands. For the armed forces and particularly the Navy, control over these islands was a dream of their mentor, Captain Mahan, come true. They promised to make, in com- bination with Hawaii, for perfect island-hopping to Asia. The erection of naval bases on these islands would decisively improve the strategic position of the United States in the Pacific. They were annexed.[62]

   Puerto Rico was no such far-off island. It lay right on the porch of the United States and had a considerable population. Spain had granted autonomy to the island and even allowed its inhabitants to elect their own legislature. But as the attention of public and politicians was focused on the large chunks of the prey, Cuba and the Philippines, no protest arose, when McKinley claimed it for the USA as a war in- demnity from Madrid. Instead of spreading liberty, the United States deprived Puerto Rico of it. The Foraker Act of 1900 turned the island into an ‘unincorporated territory’ which meant that it was not supposed to be integrated into the Union. McKinley had broken with the rule of Jefferson for expanding the nation state.[63]  Puerto Rico received a status similar to that of Hongkong. They would retain a par- liament, wherein a U.S. appointed governor had a veto right and although Puerto Ricans benefited from the low tariffs, they were left hanging in mid-air, without any
guaranteed human rights, and taxation without representation (!) .[64]

   Cuba had been the reason why the United States had entered into war with Spain in the first place. Although expansionists had been longing for decades to join the Caribbeans’ largest island with their nation, annexation was no option. In the Teller Amendment the United States Congress  had pledged to seek no acquisition of Cuba, Spanish rule was not to be substituted by American rule.[65]   And just like the editor of the magazine ‘The Nation’, President McKinley was sure that annexing Cuba would

„mean the admission to a share in this government of a motley million and a
half of Spaniards, Cubans, and Negroes, to whom our religion, manners, political traditions and habits, and modes of thought are, to tell the honest truth, about as familiar as they are to the King of Dahomey.“[66]

 
....But the chief executive also cultivated strong mistrust against the revolutionary government. After all he did not want any socialist or only leftist nation to rise right on the shores of the United States.[67]  The only possibility left in this dilemma, was establishing informal control over Cuba. In creating a new constitution for the island, the Cubans had to agree to ratify a set of principles, that would actually transfer all power into American hands.

   Officially recognized as a sovereign, independent nation, the Platt Amendment to the Cuban Constitution of 1901 actually rendered Cuban independence a farce, it was reduced to the concept that ‘we self-govern for you’. Among the provisions of that Amendment where i.e. the exclusive right to intervene as it pleased to the end of maintaining Cuban independence, the United States would supervise the Cuban budget policy in order not to provoke any European intervention to recover debts. The third demand of the U.S. Congress was that the Cuban government lease to its giant neighbor Guantánamo Bay for a time of 99 years. The Navy was eager to built a large base in the bay to secure the U.S. influence in the Caribbean.[68]

   The United States had succeeded in putting Cuba under the shield of ‘informal imperialism’; although they did exert no direct government and let the Cubans do the day-to-day business, American economic and military interests had been fully secured. Cuba was an exclusive U.S. sphere of influence. As a result, Cuban-Ame- rican trade skyrocketed in the next 20 years from $ 27 million to $ 300 million. But Congress had not thoroughly considered that this status meant long-term entangle- ment in Cuban affairs; in the future critics would of course -justly- make the United States responsible for the islanders' poverty and their lack of liberty. The acceptance of the United States as a big, benevolent brother had been severely damaged in Latin America.
From now on they would have to face charges of ‘imperialism’ that shattered their credibility.[69]

   While the fate of those islands had not aroused a wide public debate, the case was different with the Philippines. The fact that this archipelago lay just off shore from the Chinese and Southeast Asian markets and its renowned wealth of material re- sources made it particularly attractive. Secret societies that were dominated by upper-class western-orientated reformers had led a rebellion against the Spanish rulers since 1896. This fight against a colonial power found many sympathizers in the United States.[70]   The Philippines issue ignited a ‘Great Debate’ in the United States that reflected the division of the American public into imperialists/ expansio- nists and humanitarian isolationists/nationalists.

   The first group included all those who had seen the war as an opportunity for charting a new course of American foreign relations, to break away from the old isolationist ideal. Social reformers stated that the martial spirit had shown the unity of the nation and considered it a purifying experience that brought out the best in Americans. In their eyes imperialism was an acceptable means of revitalizing the nation and papering over fault lines in society. Advocates of seapower and naval expansion were content with the results of the war so far and considered the Philippines the missing part in a comprehensive puzzle of bases and a powerful fleet. Most commercial and industrial groups that depended on exports were in favor of an annexation as that would mean facilitated access to the vast markets in East Asia that Europeans were already competing for. Those who voiced their demands for keeping the islands the loudest were the imperialists. For them the war had brought the United States fame and status, established its ‘rightful place among nations’, that would be endangered if the nation gave up what had fallen into its hands. America would have to prolong its commitment to establishing control over
uncivilized nations unfit to govern themselves, to fulfil its divine mission as guar- dian and promoter of Christianity and civilization and thus render a service to man- kind in contributing to its progress.

   Although this position did not reflect a single ideology or interest group, they all considered imperialism a necessary means to keep up progress and power.[71]

   Their adversaries seemed to be a strange ‘melange’. They included progressives who criticized America’s foreign adventures for diverting the interest from the loss of liberty at home; why were Americans trying to make over other societies, when their own one needed an urgent overhaul. National priorities were to be realigned to coping with the growing disparities of wealth and the concentration of economic power in the infamous trusts. They questioned the amount of freedom that was left to Americans in comparison to earlier days.[72]
In the Anti-Imperialist league that formed in Boston seven weeks after the war had broken out many idealists and traditionalists assembled. They were mainly Demo- crats and aged New England conservatives, including former Presidents Cleveland and Harrison, politicians Carl Schurz and William J. Bryan and writer Mark Twain. [73]  Its vice-president, Thomas W. Higginson criticizes the imperialist position:

            „Probably there never yet was an insurrection, large or small, in which the party
            apparently stronger did not honestly believe the weaker party to be utterly in-
            capable of self-government. The flaw in the whole reasoning in such cases is in
            leaving out the principle of liberty. When a nation (...) enters on the project of
            managing the affairs of its neighbor, it is on the wrong track.“[74]

   The organization, for which billionaire Andrew Carnegie provided the funding, referred to the purity and integrity of the past American foreign relations. As the United States had itself taken up the immoral methods of the European imperialist nations, it was charged with alienating the nation from its historical values and losing the role of a beacon of liberty in the darkness. But there were also not so idealistic motives that drove some to oppose the annexation of the Philippines. Some feared that imperialism would bring new responsibilities for the United States which would necessitate an enlarged administration and army that would have to be paid for with increased taxes and increased government interference in the lives of individuals. Xenophobia was another reason for opposing to keep the war bounty. Many who agreed with Josiah Strong’s Anglo-Saxonism were afraid of a stream of immigrants from the islands that would endanger the maintenance of racial purity in the United States. They did not want to add Hispanics and Asians to the Slavic, Catholic and Jewish immigrants they already had to cope with.[75]   Southern plantation owners feared cheap foreign competition whereas trade unions were afraid of cheap foreign laborers.[76]

   The opposition to continued imperialism in the Pacific was a blend of nationalistic thinking and idealistic concerns which was too diverse to stop the front of ambitious imperialists.

   McKinley revised his initial plans for keeping only a few bases on the islands as he was told by advisers that to secure the strategic Manila harbor, one would have to control the entire island of Luzon for whose safety all of the Philippine archipe- lago would be necessary. Furthermore he feared that only scarce presence of Ame- rican forces might lead to a vacuum of power which other nations would only be all too eager to fill. Senate approved of the retention of the Philippines in a close vote which reflected the debates over imperialism. In the Paris Peace Treaty of December 1898 Spain had to cede the islands to the United States for $ 20 million.
In 1899 a revolt against American rule broke out, which took three years to put down and cost the lives of 4,200 Americans and up to 200,000 Filipinos, whom the U.S. put into concentration camps just as the despised Spanish had done with Cubans before.[77]