The Politics of Intervention

The Pacification of Cuba 139

curbing social and political exploitation of the common peo­
ple, and in eliminating violence.
However favorably disposed it might have been to increas­
ing American influence in Cuba, the Army did not take the
part of the annexationists. Indeed, its own institutional self-
interest demanded that it halt any political agitation which
might lead to rebellion. Cuban problems might come and
go, but the Presidency and the Congress went on forever,
and another war of pacification on the Philippine model could
hardly be to the Army's advantage. There was more to this
consideration than political expediency, for the Army re­
garded the new extracontinental possessions as strategic
aberrations. There were plenty of big-power competitors to
worry Army planners and too few forces to squander on more
unpleasant campaigns in the Indies and Pacific isles.
The Army's own inherent value system committed it to law
and order in Cuba just as surely as its belief in disciplined
democracy made further tutelage attractive. In reading the
Military Information Division's reports, one cannot help see­
ing that violence and anarchy for whatever purpose (and
however inconsequential) horrified the American officers. The
irony of the Cuban situation was that only another general
insurrection between 1906 and 1909 would have given Roose­
velt the justification to establish a clear-cut protectorate over
Cuba. The Army of Cuban Pacification, which best recognized
the long-range benefits that complete American political con­
trol of Cuba could bring the common people, saw to it that
such a revolt never occurred.

1. The original task organization is given in a memorandum from
   the Office of the Chief of Staff, September 22, 1906, Doc. File 1168303,
   FG 94. Subsequent modifications were the substitution of Company I
   for Company B, Signal Corps, and the addition of two Hospital Corps
   companies, one of which returned to the United States at the end of
   November. "Report of the Adjutant General," U.S. War Department,
   Annual Reports, 1906-1907, I, 207-11.


2. Brig. Gen. J. F. Bell to Col. H. L. Scott, October 1, 1906, Doc.
   File 1169753, RG 94.