The Politics of Occupation 155superior resident control" because the Cubans now despaired
of ever managing self-government. Slocum put it bluntly to
Colonel Hugh L. Scott:
They [the Cubans] say that their dream, their hope, their sentiment
for which they and many others fought for, has been accomplished,
and they have failed beyond doubt. They have had their independence;
they have demonstrated that they cannot have it without a controlling
influence in the hands of our government; I entirely agree with it.^29
Lieutenant Colonel Greble, adviser to the Department of
Government, shared Slocum's views on Cuba's unfitness for
self-government or partisan politics. He disapproved of
Magoon's failure to attack Cuba's social ills. American policy,
he wrote Colonel Scott, "seems to be the idea ... to inter
fere as little as possible with existing conditions."^30 In writ
ing General Wood, Greble questioned the wisdom of the
occupation's goals:
.... It seems to me that the whole thing resolves itself into an
attempt to re-establish a government, the best possible, which will
protect the foreign interests in this Island, and such policy is being
pursued. There is no doubt that we can establish a government and
there is not much doubt in my mind that such government won't last
very long...^31
Eighteen months later, Greble saw no reason to change
his opinion that the United States government had taken
an expedient, but unwise, course by establishing a civil gov
ernment in Cuba. "I've spent a lot of time in half dreams,"
he wrote Wood, "of the old days in Cuba with you and
perhaps whole dreams of what would have happened had the
old crowd been here again." Greble assured Wood that the
elections would go all right in form, but there would be no
change in the people's voting habits; they would vote for
local protection and favors, for the candidate most likely to
win. The Cubans were still unfit to govern: "There will be
no trouble while we are here," but a new Cuban government
"will not last without an active intervention of the U.S. or
some force strong enough to make the malcontents behave."^32