Killing in the Name of Democracy

[norml]

Killing in the Name
of Democracy
An excerpt from
Attention Deficit Democracy
by James Bovard


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President William McKinley proclaimed that, in the Philippines, the U.S. occupation would "assure the residents in every possible way full measure of individual rights and liberties which is the heritage of a free people substituting the mild sway of justice and right for arbitrary rule." McKinley also promised to "Christianize" the Filipinos, as if he did not consider the large number of Filipino Catholics to be Christians. McKinley was devoted to forcibly spreading American values abroad at the same time that he championed high tariffs to stop Americans from buying foreign products.

The United States Christianized and civilized the Filipinos by authorizing American troops to kill any Filipino male 10 years old and older and by burning down and massacring entire villages. (Filipino resistance fighters also committed atrocities against American soldiers.) Hundreds of thousands of Filipinos died as the United States struggled to crush resistance to its rule in a conflict that dragged on for a decade and cost 4,000 American troops' lives. Despite the brutal U.S. suppression of the Filipino independence movement, President George W. Bush, in a 2003 speech in Manila, claimed credit for the United States bringing democracy to the Philippines: "America is proud of its part in the great story of the Filipino people. Together our soldiers liberated the Philippines from colonial rule."

President Woodrow Wilson raised tub-thumping for democracy to new levels. As soon as Wilson took office, he began saber-rattling against the Mexican government, outraged that Mexican President Victoriano Huerta had come to power via military force (during the Mexican civil war that broke out in 1910). Wilson announced in May 1914: "They say the Mexicans are not fitted for self-government; and to this I reply that, when properly directed, there is no people not fitted for self-government." Wilson summarized his Mexican policy: "I am going to teach the South American republics to elect good men!" U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain Walter Hines Page explained the U.S. government's attitude toward Latin America: "The United States will be here 200 years and it can continue to shoot men for that little space until they learn to vote and rule themselves." In order to cut off the Mexican government's tariff revenue, Wilson sent U.S. forces to seize the city of Veracruz, one of the most important Mexican ports. U.S. soldiers killed hundreds of Mexicans (while suffering 19 dead) and briefly rallied the Mexican opposition around the Mexican leader.


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http://www.antiwar.com/orig/bovard.php?articleid=8448