The main purpose of the United States in provoking the Spanish-American War was to occupy Cuba, which had important economic interests for it, but it did not forget that there was also a Philippines in Asia.

The main purpose of the occupation of the Philippines was to turn it into a gateway to Asia and open up the Chinese market.

The result of large-scale industrial production is that the output of products is expanded without limit, and huge industrial products require a huge market.

In the early days of World War I, the market of the whole world was not globalized, but divided according to the sphere of influence of their own countries, and the whole world was divided into exclusive regional markets by those capitalist countries, not the kind of globalized economy of later generations, but the economic model of the regions within the spheres of influence that they divided.

This regional economic model has a strong exclusivity, they use fierce trade protection means to carry out exclusive trade protection, through guò greatly increase tariffs, increase transportation and storage costs, and other ways, push up the cost of other countries' goods into their own sphere of influence, and at the same time change direction to reduce the sales price of their own domestic goods in the sphere of influence, and carry out exclusive and discriminatory trade protection, so that the goods of other countries cannot enter their own sphere of influence for sale.

Compared with Britain and France, the United States was a post-industrial country at that time, and when it entered industrial mass production, the whole world had been carved up by the Western powers.

And the Great Qing Dynasty, the largest dumping ground for industrial products at that time, because its size is too large, has not been divided into a whole sphere of influence by a certain country, but by those countries in Europe to divide into a piece of sphere of influence, but this scope is a bit vague, or you have me, I have you, after all, this country is still an independent sovereign country, these old powers are not able to control the entire geographical scope like other colonies, There are still a lot of opportunities and business opportunities to enter.

In this way, the Great Qing Kingdom, which is a huge dumping ground for industrial products, will inevitably fall into the eyes of the United States, which is looking for dumping grounds for industrial products all over the world, and it is not easy to enter the Great Qing market.

Although the entire Daqing market is unclear and unclear by Britain, France and other countries, if the United States boldly and forcibly enters the Daqing market, it will still face strong trade resistance from Britain, France and other countries that have already eaten a mouthful of oil, and no one will release the meat they have eaten in their mouths, and the United States does not have the ability and courage to enter these old capital empires strongly, so it can only adopt a slow penetration method and enter this big market little by little.

If you want to enter Asia, especially the dumping ground of industrial products in the Qing Dynasty, you must have a place to stay, that is, a base for advancement.

However, looking around the Qing Dynasty, they were either enclosed into their own sheepfold by the British, or they were drawn as prisons by the French, and the remaining horns and corners were basically divided up by everyone, even if a Korea was occupied by the Sino-Japanese War, and the Northeast and Mongolia were also pressed into the hands of the Russians with bear claws, and other countries were not allowed to get involved at all, and if they wanted to build an advance base, they could only grab it from the hands of other powers.

In this way, the Philippines, a colony controlled by the old Spanish Empire, came into the eyes of the Americans, and it just so happened that the interests of the United States in the Spanish colony of Cuba were encroached upon by Spain.

At the end of the nineteenth century, sugar was a high-end consumer product, a luxury, not something that could be consumed by the common people today, and the price was high and the production was not high, so whether it was engaged in sugarcane cultivation or sugar extraction, the benefits were quite large.

At that time, the capitalists engaged in sugarcane cultivation and sugar extraction in the Cuban colony of Spain were mainly Americans, but in the face of such high profits, the Spanish government could not ignore and let the Americans happily make a lot of profits.

The Spanish government's method of raising taxes and raising export taxes substantially to squeeze profits out of the hands of the capitalists in order to fill the increasingly empty Spanish treasury led to irreconcilable contradictions between the capitalists and the Spanish government.

But after all, Cuba is a colony of the Spanish government, and in line with the principle that I am the master of my territory, the Spanish government completely ignored the demands of those American capitalists in the colony, and blindly raised taxes and taxes, which finally aroused the dissatisfaction of those Americans.

Made, if you don't listen to Lao Tzu's appeal, Lao Tzu will drive you away, and if you change it to an American colony, won't there be no such? As a result, the rebels were never able to be wiped out, until finally the Americans fought a Spanish-American War, and the Americans turned Cuba into their colony.

The economy is one thing, the politics are above, the United States was in a period of expansion, urgently need overseas markets and raw material bases, search the world, the whole world has been carved up, looking for it can only be taken from the hands of those old empires, and the globe is found to be a little better to bully Spain, and at the same time bullying Spain will not cause dissatisfaction with Britain and France, Britain and France have been bullied by Spain in history, which is also Britain and France remained neutral during the Spanish-American War. The main reason for acquiescing to the Americans fighting a Spanish-American war.

The ambitions of the emerging capitalist empire of the United States, coupled with the power of capital, thus drove a war, the Spanish-American War.

Okay, let's ignore Cuba and talk about the story of the Philippines.

Although Gao Hongsheng obstructed Aquino's first peace negotiations with the Spanish colonial army, in October 1897, Aquino still reached an armistice negotiation with the Japanese and the Spanish colonial army, and in December, Aquino took the 800,000 pesos and went to Hong Kong to become a rich man.

This Aquino, who took 800,000 pesos and secretly went to Hong Kong to become a rich man, but when he left, he denounced the revolution, urged the Filipino fighters to disarm, and declared those who continued to carry out fierce operations bandits, but some Filipino revolutionaries still continued to carry out the armed struggle against the Spanish colonial government.

But on April 23, 1898, Philippine resistance leader Benigno Aquino secretly arrived in Singapore from Hong Kong, and then secretly met with the U.S. Consuls in Singapore, Pratt and Wildman.

Pratt and Wildman persuaded Aquino to once again become the centerpiece of the revolution, and Pratt telegraphed Admiral Dewey, commander of the U.S. Asian Fleet, to whom Dewey promised Aquino that he would at least recognize the independence of the Philippines under the protection of the U.S. Navy, adding that there was no need for a formal written agreement, since the words of the admiral and the U.S. consul amounted to the most solemn promises, and their verbal promises and assurances would be fulfilled to the letter. It is not attributable to the promise of the Spaniards or the promises of the Spaniards. Aquino, gullible to the Americans, foolishly called back and agreed to return to the Philippines, where he arrived in Hong Kong on the steamship Malacca, from Hong Kong, and from there on the USS McCulloch, arriving in Cavite in the Philippines on May 15.

Of course, as everyone later knew, the Americans fooled Aquino, and the United States, after driving out the Spaniards, raised a butcher's knife against the Philippine Independence Army.

Aquino later recalled: "I asked Dewey if he had really sent all those Platt telegrams to Mr. Pratt, the consul in Singapore, and Dewey had received.

The Admiral's answer was in the affirmative, adding that the United States had come to the Philippines to protect the natives and free them from the Spanish yoke, in addition to saying that the United States was very rich in territorial tax resources and therefore did not need colonies, which ultimately convinced me that I had no reason to doubt the recognition of the independence of the Philippines. ”

In this way, Admiral Dewey succeeded in using a verbal promise to fool Aquino, the leader of the Philippine "revolution", onto his own warship.

In fact, as early as February 1898, when the American fleet led by General Dewey arrived in Hong Kong, it was already stepping up preparations for war, he purchased a coal ship and a supply ship for the fleet, he ordered the mechanical part of the battleship to be overhauled, the hull and underwater part were cleaned, and the white side of the ship was painted gray, and he personally checked the details of the ship, and required the ship's personnel to practice every day, and all the planes on the ship must be ready for battle, and they can operate continuously as soon as they receive the order. In order to find out the situation of the Spanish fleet and the fortifications on the Philippine island, he sent a spy to Manila, and his lieutenant disguised himself as a tourist to spy on the passengers arriving in Hong Kong.

On April 25, 1889, the U.S. Secretary of the Navy sent a telegram to Dewey: "The United States and Spain have started a war, hurry to the Philippines, start operations, and do everything in their power to capture or destroy the Spanish fleet." ”

But Dewey did not act immediately, and waited another 36 hours until the American consul arrived from Manila with information on the preparation of the Spaniards for war.

On the 27th, Dewey ordered the fleet to go south to conquer the Philippines.