Amy S. Greenberg

Innlimun Bandaríkjanna á Texas 1845 og síðan innrás í Mexíkó 1846, sem gafst upp fyrir Bandaríkjamönnum 1848 og afsalaði sér miklum landssvæðum, er umfjöllunarefni Amy S. Greenbergs í bók sinni A Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S. Invasion of Mexico.
Í bókinni byggir hún ítarlega á dagbókum og bréfum nokkurra einstaklinga innan Bandaríkjanna til að lýsa því sem oft er kallað Wicked War eftir að einn fremsti hershöfðingi þeirra lét hafa það eftir sér síðar að þetta hefði verið ljótt stríð og hefði hann verið reyndari og sterkari þá hefði hann neitað að taka þátt í því. Greenberg tekur fram að sagan sé skoðuð frá sjónarhóli þeirra einstaklinga sem hún byggir gögn sín á en fjallar t.d. ekki um stríðið frá sjónarhóli Mexikana.
Stríðið olli sundrungu á meðal Bandaríkjamanna og var gjarnan kallað stríð Polks í höfuðið á forsetanum, James A. Polk, sem ásældist landsvæði Mexíkó og þröngvaði Mexíkóum til hernaðar.
Að mörgu leyti vel skrifuð saga en oft langdregin.… (more)

"The U.S.-Mexican War is one of the few American wars not commemorated in Washington, D.C. There is no monument to the 1847 conflict in the nation’s capital, not even a statue"


This is a book about a very important war both in the history of the United States and in the history of Latin America (it is, after all, the first of many interventions of the US in its backyard).
This is not an introductory book to this war because it mostly focus on the United States and, specially, in the political struggles that caused this war and on its consequences. Little attention is paid to Mexico itself and to the military side of the war (the author states that this is her intention in the foreword).
I chose this book as my introduction to this war so I found it lacking and hence the thee star rating.… (more)

Most academics are politically left wing and for social scientists like this author that bias often prevails in their writing. That said there were a few factoids I picked up here that I did not previously know, e.g., many, perhaps most of the Mexican upper class wanted the U.S. to annex the entire country; American atrocities were a response to Mexican brigandage that did not accord with the rules of war as understood at that time.

What the author glosses over was that the American frontier was entering its final phase; the 1890 U.S. Census would show that it had closed within the previous ten years. One can call it manifest destiny but any modern nation feels the need to define its borders. This was not like Poland, Alsace-Lorraine or Crimea where borders have shifted back and forth over the centuries.

President Polk's predecessor had rattled the saber at Britain with "54-40 or fight!" but diplomacy had settled the boundary considerably further south at 49 degrees where it has peacefully remained ever since. Chaos, corruption and political intrigue among the Mexican ruling class prevented a negotiated settlement. Eventually it would have to have been settled. Given Mexico's legacy of systemic social problems its hard to imagine when if ever this issue could have ever been settled without recourse to violence or bribery (which President Polk also tried).… (more)