Puerto Rico Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ====Spanish–American War==== {{Main|Spanish–American War|Puerto Rican Campaign|Treaty of Paris (1898)}} [[File:Bombardment of San Juan, Porto (sic) Rico LCCN2001695573.jpg|thumb|Artistic rendering of the 1898 [[Bombardment of San Juan]] by American forces during the [[Spanish–American War]]]] In 1890, Captain [[Alfred Thayer Mahan]], a member of the Navy War Board and leading U.S. strategic thinker, published a book titled ''[[The Influence of Sea Power upon History]]'' in which he argued for the establishment of a large and powerful navy modeled after the British [[Royal Navy]]. Part of his strategy called for the acquisition of colonies in the Caribbean, which would serve as coaling and naval stations. They would serve as strategic points of defense with the construction of a canal through the [[Isthmus of Panama]], to allow easier passage of ships between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.<ref name="SP">Jorge Rodriguez Beruff, ''Strategy as Politics'', Universidad de Puerto Rico: La Editorial; p. 7; {{ISBN|978-0-8477-0160-5}}</ref> [[File:First Company of native Puerto Ricans in the American Army.jpg|thumb|left|upright|The first company of Puerto Ricans enlisted in the U.S. Army, within a year of the U.S. invasion.]] [[William H. Seward]], the Secretary of State under presidents [[Abraham Lincoln]] and [[Andrew Johnson]], had also stressed the importance of building a canal in [[Honduras]], [[Nicaragua]] or [[Panama]]. He suggested that the United States annex the [[Dominican Republic]] and purchase Puerto Rico and Cuba. The [[United States Senate|U.S. Senate]] did not approve his annexation proposal, and Spain rejected the U.S. offer of {{Nowrap|160 million}} dollars for Puerto Rico and Cuba.<ref name="SP"/> Since 1894, the United States [[Naval War College]] had been developing [[contingency plan]]s for a war with Spain. By 1896, the [[Office of Naval Intelligence|U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence]] had prepared a plan that included military operations in Puerto Rican waters. Plans generally centered on attacks on Spanish territories were intended as support operations against Spain's forces in and around Cuba.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=2f0Gf0DQfmUC&pg=PA72 |author=David F. Trask |title=The War with Spain in 1898 |pages=72–78 |publisher=University of Nebraska Press |access-date=6 February 2011 |isbn=978-0-8032-9429-5 |year=1996 |archive-date=8 February 2024 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240208215204/https://books.google.com/books?id=2f0Gf0DQfmUC&pg=PA72 |url-status=live }}</ref> Recent research suggests that the U.S. did consider Puerto Rico valuable as a naval station and recognized that it and Cuba generated lucrative crops of sugar, a valuable commercial commodity which the United States lacked prior to the development of the [[sugar beet]] industry in the United States.<ref>Jorge Rodriguez Beruff, ''Strategy as Politics'', La Editorial; Universidad de Puerto Rico; p. 13; {{ISBN|978-0-8477-0160-5}}</ref> On 25 July 1898, during the [[Spanish–American War]], the U.S. invaded Puerto Rico with a landing at [[Guánica, Puerto Rico|Guánica]]. After the U.S. prevailed in the war, Spain ceded Puerto Rico, along with the [[Philippines]] and [[Guam]], to the U.S. under the [[Treaty of Paris (1898)|Treaty of Paris]], which went into effect on 11 April 1899; Spain relinquished sovereignty over [[Cuba]], but did not cede it to the U.S.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/sp1898.asp |title=Treaty of Peace Between the United States and Spain |date=10 December 1898 |work=The Avalon Project at the Yale Law School |publisher=Yale Law School, Lillian Goldman Law Library |access-date=16 October 2010 |archive-date=8 July 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120708063629/http://avalon.law.yale.edu/19th_century/sp1898.asp |url-status=live }}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page