[In] “A Defense of General Funston†(May 1902) [Twain] exposed Funston’s vain lies about his battlefield exploits, cataloguing some of the most recent brutalities committed by Funston and his cohorts in the Philippines. These included the capture of Filipino leader Aguinaldo by treachery and deceit, the torture and execution of Filipino prisoners, including the beating of wounded men and the use of water torture (pouring salt water down prisoners’ throats), and most chillingly, the wholesale massacres of Filipino men, women and children, of the kind ordered by General Jacob Smith and carried out by his soldiers. Mark Twain quoted Smith’s command: “Kill and burn - this is no time to take prisoners - the more you kill and burn, the better - Kill all above the age of ten - make Samar a howling wilderness!â€
Uncounted thousands of Filipino civilians were butchered by the American imperialists as a result of this order, carried out in retaliation for a Filipino attack on the U.S. garrison at Balangiga, on the large island of Samar in the central Philippines. Theodore Roosevelt, who had become president upon McKinley’s assassination in 1901, and was now organizer-in-chief of this brutal war of extermination, felt pressured enough by the outcry against the Samar massacre to order an investigation into it. A few years later, in 1906, Mark Twain spoke at Princeton University, thundering his denunciation of the outrageous slaughter by the American Army of nearly a thousand Filipino Moros, Muslims living on the remote southern island of Jolo.
SourceUncounted thousands of Filipino civilians were butchered by the American imperialists as a result of this order, carried out in retaliation for a Filipino attack on the U.S. garrison at Balangiga, on the large island of Samar in the central Philippines. Theodore Roosevelt, who had become president upon McKinley’s assassination in 1901, and was now organizer-in-chief of this brutal war of extermination, felt pressured enough by the outcry against the Samar massacre to order an investigation into it. A few years later, in 1906, Mark Twain spoke at Princeton University, thundering his denunciation of the outrageous slaughter by the American Army of nearly a thousand Filipino Moros, Muslims living on the remote southern island of Jolo.
Our commander, Gen. Leonard Wood, ordered a reconnaissance. It was found that the Moros numbered six hundred, counting women and children; that their crater bowl was in the summit of a peak or mountain 2,200 feet above sea level, and very difficult of access for Christian troops and artillery. Then General Wood ordered a surprise, and went along himself to see the order carried out.
Gen. Wood's order was, "Kill or capture the six hundred." There, with 600 engaged on each side, we lost 15 men killed outright, and we had 32 wounded--counting that nose and that elbow. The enemy numbered 600--including women and children--and we abolished them utterly, leaving not even a baby alive to cry for its dead mother. This is incomparably the greatest victory that was ever achieved by the Christian soldiers of the United States.
So far as I can find out, there was only one person among our eighty millions who allowed himself the privilege of a public remark on this great occasion--that was the President of the United States. All day Friday, he was as studiously silent as the rest. But on Saturday, he recognized that his duty required him to say something, and he took his pen and performed that duty. This is what he said:
Washington, March 10. Wood, Manila: I congratulate you and the officers and men of your command upon the brilliant feat of arms wherein you and they so well upheld the honor of the American flag. (Signed) Theodore Roosevelt.
SourceGen. Wood's order was, "Kill or capture the six hundred." There, with 600 engaged on each side, we lost 15 men killed outright, and we had 32 wounded--counting that nose and that elbow. The enemy numbered 600--including women and children--and we abolished them utterly, leaving not even a baby alive to cry for its dead mother. This is incomparably the greatest victory that was ever achieved by the Christian soldiers of the United States.
So far as I can find out, there was only one person among our eighty millions who allowed himself the privilege of a public remark on this great occasion--that was the President of the United States. All day Friday, he was as studiously silent as the rest. But on Saturday, he recognized that his duty required him to say something, and he took his pen and performed that duty. This is what he said:
Washington, March 10. Wood, Manila: I congratulate you and the officers and men of your command upon the brilliant feat of arms wherein you and they so well upheld the honor of the American flag. (Signed) Theodore Roosevelt.
At the end of the nineteenth century, U.S. industry was expanding at a dizzying pace and Americans used this growing might to challenge European trade by conquering their own markets and territory abroad. The nation’s first experience with empire building was booting Spain out of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines during the Spanish-American War of 1898.
...During the last two decades of his life, Mark Twain’s published and unpublished writings and speeches were overwhelmingly antiracist, anti-imperialist and revolutionary. He believed that America had been transformed from a Republic to a Monarchy – a monarchy not ruled by a king or queen but by money men, corporations and their lackey politicians, all driven by "money lust."
Source...During the last two decades of his life, Mark Twain’s published and unpublished writings and speeches were overwhelmingly antiracist, anti-imperialist and revolutionary. He believed that America had been transformed from a Republic to a Monarchy – a monarchy not ruled by a king or queen but by money men, corporations and their lackey politicians, all driven by "money lust."
In a February 1901 article titled, "To the Person Sitting in Darkness":
There must be two Americas: one that sets the captive free, and one that takes a once-captive's new freedom away from him, and picks a quarrel with him with nothing to found it on; then kills him to get his land. . .
And as for a flag for the Philippine Province, it is easily managed. We can have a special one--our States do it: we can have just our usual flag, with the white stripes painted black and the stars replaced by the skull and cross-bones.
A Boston Herald transcript of a speech in 1900:
General Wood was present and looking on. His order had been, "Kill or capture those savages." Apparently our little army considered that the "or" left them authorized to kill or capture according to taste, and that their taste had remained what it had been for eight years in our army out there--the taste of Christian butchers.
From the New York Herald, October 15, 1900:
I left these shores, at Vancouver, a red-hot imperialist. I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific. It seemed tiresome and tame for it to content itself with he Rockies. Why not spread its wings over the Phillippines, I asked myself? And I thought it would be a real good thing to do
I said to myself, here are a people who have suffered for three centuries. We can make them as free as ourselves, give them a government and country of their own, put a miniature of the American constitution afloat in the Pacific, start a brand new republic to take its place among the free nations of the world. It seemed to me a great task to which had addressed ourselves.
But I have thought some more, since then, and I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Phillippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem. . .
It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.
SourceThere must be two Americas: one that sets the captive free, and one that takes a once-captive's new freedom away from him, and picks a quarrel with him with nothing to found it on; then kills him to get his land. . .
And as for a flag for the Philippine Province, it is easily managed. We can have a special one--our States do it: we can have just our usual flag, with the white stripes painted black and the stars replaced by the skull and cross-bones.
A Boston Herald transcript of a speech in 1900:
General Wood was present and looking on. His order had been, "Kill or capture those savages." Apparently our little army considered that the "or" left them authorized to kill or capture according to taste, and that their taste had remained what it had been for eight years in our army out there--the taste of Christian butchers.
From the New York Herald, October 15, 1900:
I left these shores, at Vancouver, a red-hot imperialist. I wanted the American eagle to go screaming into the Pacific. It seemed tiresome and tame for it to content itself with he Rockies. Why not spread its wings over the Phillippines, I asked myself? And I thought it would be a real good thing to do
I said to myself, here are a people who have suffered for three centuries. We can make them as free as ourselves, give them a government and country of their own, put a miniature of the American constitution afloat in the Pacific, start a brand new republic to take its place among the free nations of the world. It seemed to me a great task to which had addressed ourselves.
But I have thought some more, since then, and I have read carefully the treaty of Paris, and I have seen that we do not intend to free, but to subjugate the people of the Phillippines. We have gone there to conquer, not to redeem. . .
It should, it seems to me, be our pleasure and duty to make those people free, and let them deal with their own domestic questions in their own way. And so I am an anti-imperialist. I am opposed to having the eagle put its talons on any other land.
More Mark Twain on anti-imperialism.
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