A SPLENDID LITTLE WAR
The Spanish-American War and America's Imperial Moment, 1898By Richard Horace Pemberton
Length5h 47m
About this audiobook
The complete narrative history of the Spanish-American War — Theodore Roosevelt, Dewey at Manila Bay, the Rough Riders, the Filipino betrayal, and the untold story of America's imperial moment, 1898.
On February 15, 1898, the battleship Maine exploded in Havana Harbor — 266 men killed, cause never definitively established. In 1898, neither the press nor the public was in the mood for ambiguity. "Remember the Maine, to Hell with Spain" became the rallying cry of a nation building toward war for a decade, and Secretary of State John Hay's four-month conflict produced something neither Spain nor America expected: an empire.
In this Spanish-American War history, historian Richard Horace Pemberton follows the full arc of America's imperial moment — from José Martí's Cuban independence struggle and Hearst's yellow journalism machine, through Dewey's destruction of the Spanish Pacific fleet at Manila Bay and the Rough Riders' charge up Kettle Hill, to the Philippine-American War that followed. Central figures include Theodore Roosevelt, Commodore George Dewey, Emilio Aguinaldo, the Buffalo Soldiers of the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry, and the Filipino independence movement that won a revolution and lost a country in the same year.
Inside this Spanish-American War history:
• The yellow journalism machine — how Hearst's New York Journal manufactured the moral case for war: the Evangelina Cisneros rescue staged for circulation, banner headlines declaring Spanish treachery before any evidence was gathered (Chapter 2)
• Dewey's seven-hour victory — at 5:41 a.m. on May 1, 1898, Dewey ordered "You may fire when you are ready, Gridley." Seven hours later, 381 Spanish sailors were dead, the Pacific fleet destroyed, and not a single American life lost in battle (Chapter 9)
• The Rough Riders at Kettle Hill — Roosevelt on Little Texas, leading 490 men across an open meadow under Mauser fire, 86 casualties in one afternoon — the war's defining image and the launch of a presidential career (Chapter 6)
• The betrayal of Aguinaldo — Dewey returned the Philippine revolutionary to his homeland, encouraged him to believe independence was coming, then watched the Treaty of Paris sell ten million Filipinos to the United States for twenty million dollars (Chapters 10, 13)
• The Buffalo Soldiers' forgotten war — the Black regulars of the Ninth and Tenth Cavalry who fought alongside the Rough Riders at San Juan Heights, whose performance was decisive, and who received a fraction of the glory (Chapter 19)
The splendid little war lasted four months. The empire it produced — the Philippines, Guam, Puerto Rico, a protectorate over Cuba — lasted for decades. The questions it raised about American power, imperial responsibility, and the distance between proclaimed values and practiced interests have never been fully answered.
For readers of David Traxel's 1898: THE BIRTH OF THE AMERICAN CENTURY and Ivan Musicant's EMPIRE BY DEFAULT.
Audiobook details
GenreHistory
Length5 hrs 47 mins
Narrated byListen with 1,000+ voices
FormateBook with Audio
Publish dateJun 3, 2026
LanguageEnglish
Table of contents
1Introduction
2Prologue: Remember the Maine
3PART ONE: THE ROAD TO WAR (1890-1898)
4Chapter 1: Cuba Libre — The Cuban Independence Struggle and American Interest
5Chapter 2: Yellow Journalism — Hearst, Pulitzer, and the Press That Made a War
Show all chaptersShow less
6Chapter 3: The USS Maine — Explosion, Mystery, and the War Cry
7Chapter 4: McKinley's Decision — The President and the Path to Conflict
8PART TWO: THE WAR IN CUBA (1898)
9Chapter 5: The Naval War — Dewey at Manila Bay and Cervera at Santiago
10Chapter 6: The Rough Riders — Roosevelt, Wood, and the Charge at San Juan Hill
11Chapter 7: The Siege of Santiago — Victory and the Spanish Surrender
12Chapter 8: The Fever — Disease, Death, and the Army's Medical Crisis
13PART THREE: THE PACIFIC WAR
14Chapter 9: Dewey's Victory — The Battle of Manila Bay, May 1, 1898
15Chapter 10: The Philippine Revolution — Aguinaldo, American Allies, and Betrayal
16Chapter 11: Puerto Rico — The Southern Campaign and Acquisition
17Chapter 12: Guam and Wake — Acquiring the Pacific Island Chain
18PART FOUR: THE IMPERIAL RECKONING
19Chapter 13: The Treaty of Paris — The Terms of American Empire
20Chapter 14: The Philippine-American War — Suppressing the Insurrection, 1899-1902
21Chapter 15: The Anti-Imperialists — Mark Twain, Carnegie, and the Opposition
22Chapter 16: Cuba as Protectorate — The Platt Amendment and American Control
23PART FIVE: THE WAR'S PEOPLE
24Chapter 17: Theodore Roosevelt — The War That Made a President
25Chapter 18: William Randolph Hearst — The Publisher and His War
26Chapter 19: The Buffalo Soldiers — Black Troops in Cuba and the Philippines
27Chapter 20: The Filipino Perspective — Independence, Betrayal, and Resistance
28PART SIX: LEGACIES
29Chapter 21: American Empire — The Philippines, Guam, Puerto Rico, and the New Role
30Chapter 22: The Open Door Policy — China, Trade, and American Commercial Ambition
31Chapter 23: The Anti-Imperial Tradition — Dissent and Its Limits in American Foreign Policy
32Chapter 24: 1898 and American Power — The Splendid Little War's Long Shadow
33Epilogue: An Empire Acquired
34Acknowledgments
35Selected Bibliography
36About the Author
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