The Philippine-American War,

After its defeat in the Spanish-American War of 1898, Spain ceded its
longstanding colony of the Philippines to the United
States in the Treaty of Paris. On February 4, 1899, just two days before the
U.S. Senate ratified the treaty, fighting broke out between American forces and
Filipino nationalists led by Emilio Aguinaldo who sought independence rather
than a change in colonial rulers. The ensuing Philippine-American War lasted
three years and resulted in the death of over 4,200 American and over 20,000
Filipino combatants. As many as 200,000 Filipino civilians died from violence,
famine, and disease.

“Battle of Manila Bay”

The decision by U.S. policymakers to annex the Philippines was not without
domestic controversy. Americans who advocated annexation evinced a variety of
motivations: desire for commercial opportunities in Asia, concern that the
Filipinos were incapable of self-rule, and fear that if the United States did
not take control of the islands, another power (such as Germany or Japan) might
do so. Meanwhile, American opposition to U.S. colonial rule of the Philippines
came in many forms, ranging from those who thought it morally wrong for the
United States to be engaged in colonialism, to those who feared that annexation
might eventually permit the non-white Filipinos to have a role in American
national government. Others were wholly unconcerned about the moral or racial
implications of imperialism and sought only to oppose the policies of President
William McKinley’s administration.

After the Spanish-American War, while the American public and politicians
debated the annexation question, Filipino revolutionaries under Aguinaldo seized
control of most of the Philippines’ main island of Luzon and proclaimed the
establishment of the independent Philippine Republic. When it became clear that
U.S. forces were intent on imposing American colonial control over the islands,
the early clashes between the two sides in 1899 swelled into an all-out war.
Americans tended to refer to the ensuing conflict as an “insurrection” rather
than acknowledge the Filipinos’ contention that they were fighting to ward off a
foreign invader.

Emilio Aguinaldo

There were two phases to the Philippine-American War. The first phase, from
February to November of 1899, was dominated by Aguinaldo’s ill-fated attempts to
fight a conventional war against the better-trained and equipped American
troops. The second phase was marked by the Filipinos’ shift to guerrilla-style
warfare. It began in November of 1899, lasted through the capture of Aguinaldo
in 1901 and into the spring of 1902, by which time most organized Filipino
resistance had dissipated. President Theodore Roosevelt proclaimed a general
amnesty and declared the conflict over on July 4, 1902, although minor uprisings
and insurrections against American rule periodically occurred in the years that
followed.

The United States entered the conflict with undeniable military advantages that
included a trained fighting force, a steady supply of military equipment, and
control of the archipelago’s waterways. Meanwhile, the Filipino forces were
hampered by their inability to gain any kind of outside support for their cause,
chronic shortages of weapons and ammunition, and complications produced by the
Philippines’ geographic complexity. Under these conditions, Aguinaldo’s attempt
to fight a conventional war in the first few months of the conflict proved to be
a fatal mistake; the Filipino Army suffered severe losses in men and material
before switching to the guerrilla tactics that might have been more effective if
employed from the beginning of the conflict.

President Theodore Roosevelt

The war was brutal on both sides. U.S. forces at times burned villages,
implemented civilian reconcentration policies, and employed torture on suspected
guerrillas, while Filipino fighters also tortured captured soldiers and
terrorized civilians who cooperated with American forces. Many civilians died
during the conflict as a result of the fighting, cholera and malaria epidemics,
and food shortages caused by several agricultural catastrophes.

Even as the fighting went on, the colonial government that the United States
established in the Philippines in 1900 under future President William Howard
Taft launched a pacification campaign that became known as the “policy of
attraction.” Designed to win over key elites and other Filipinos who did not
embrace Aguinaldo’s plans for the Philippines, this policy permitted a
significant degree of self-government, introduced social reforms, and
implemented plans for economic development. Over time, this program gained
important Filipino adherents and undermined the revolutionaries’ popular appeal,
which significantly aided the United States’ military effort to win the war.

In 1907, the Philippines convened its first elected assembly, and in 1916, the
Jones Act promised the nation eventual independence. The archipelago became an
autonomous commonwealth in 1935, and the U.S. granted independence in 1946.