This book discusses how, and how much, America "should" involve itself with the rest of the word, and how that decision was determined historically. This is a very important subject that I wish more people would consider. The author appears knowledgeable and writes well, however I would have preferred a less biased analysis. ( )

​In "​The ​True Flag​: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire", Stephen Kinzer looks at how the U.S. became involved in foreign interventions, ​beginning with the Spanish American War. While the war began during the Presidency of William McKinley, Kinzer uses Teddy Roosevelt and Mark Twain as two voices on opposite sides of the debate about empire building vs. self-determination, and foreign interventions in general.

Kinzer​'s initial ​look at the Spanish American War points out how Yellow Journalism and business interests provided the false pretense for th​at war. While the explosion of the battleship "Maine" provided the ​stated ​provocation, few scholars today believe the claim that the ship's explosion was the result of military action of Spanish forces. Following th​at short war, the U.S. was awarded the Spanish territories of Puerto Rico, Cuba, Guam, and the Philippines, with the understanding or expectation ​of Cubans and Filipinos ​that these ​countries would soon become free and independent. Rather than becoming independent, Cuba was kept under U.S. control​ for years​, and ​any Philippine hope for independence was quashed by the U.S. military. The resultant war in the Philippines was particularly nasty, resulting in ​huge numbers of civilians being killed, villages destroyed, and many cases of waterboarding by U.S. troops on Filipinos.

Kinzer then briefly ​reminds us of other recent foreign interventions and their consequences. There was Teddy Roosevelt's intervention in Columbia/Panama; Taft's interventions in Nicaragua and Honduras to protect U.S. business interests​; Wilson's sending troops to Cuba, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Russia; FDR's support of dictators in the Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Nicaragua; Truman's stepping in to stop North Korea and China in South Korea; Ike's involvement in Vietnam and Cuba, ​along with ​his actions to depose leaders in Iran, Guatemala, the Congo, and ​attempts in Albania, Egypt, and Indonesia; JFK's fiasco with the Bay of Pigs in Cuba; the Vietnam escalation under LBJ; Nixon's bombing​s​ in Cambodia​, Laos,​ and North Vietnam, ​as well as ​his support of CIA overthrow of Salvadore Allende in Chile; Ford's ​sending arms to one side in Angola's Civil War, and supporting Indonesia​'s invasion and annexation of East Timor; Carter's support fo​r mujahideen in Afghanistan; Reagan's invasion in Grenada, his aiding of Hussein in Iraq, support for the Contras in Nicaragua, support of Guatemala and El Salvador governments against leftists, ​and ​sending troops to Lebanon​; G.H.W. Bush's interventions in Kuwait, Somalia, and Panama; Clinton in Kosovo and Haiti, George W. Bush's invasions in Iraq and Afghanistan; Obama's support in Libya and Sudan, etc.

​The above reminds us that we've intervened in multiple countries​ in the hundred years since the Philippines​, ​often ​with mixed or disastrous results. On one hand, ​some interventions may have benefit​ed our trade, industry, and labor, as expansionists promised. On the other hand, ​many of these ​interventions have set off anti-American resistance movements, insurgencies, rebellions, or terror campaigns. ​All of this leads to the question, ​"Does intervention in other Countries serve our National interest and contribute to global stability, or does it undermine both"? ​Kinzer doesn't directly answer the question, but ​the example he provides about General Smedley Butler gives a good indication as to how he'd answer the question. General Butler would have been Louisiana Senator Huey Long's candidate to be Secretary of War had he won the Presidential election of 1936. As a General, Butler led troops in a number of foreign interventions, including leading troops in Cuba, fighting Boxers in China, directed operations in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Honduras, etc. While a participant in these interventions, later in his life, he denounced his service saying in actions were simply for the benefit of sugar interests and big business such as the United Fruit Company, and Standard Oil, and not to benefit the those foreign nations.
( )

If Kinzer's thesis is clear -- that American's imperialist impulses originated in 1898 and for the most part they are unabated -- he at least closes, in the book's final paragraph, with some hope: "Nations lose their virtue when they repeatedly attack other nations. That loss, as [George] Washington predicted, has cost the United States its felicity. We can regain it only by understanding our own national interests more clearly. It is late for the United States to change its course in the world — but not too late."

I have a bone to pick about choice to include Twain in his subtitle. Twain's role in the book is minor and the author doesn't make any significant entrance until the last third, then, still, plays only a marginal role. TR, on the other hand, is much more prevalent, and Henry Cabot Lodge is ubiquitous. ( )

This book explores the strains of American foreign policy which veers over the course of history between imperialist and interventionist goals and isolationism. Kinzer argues that these two positions have a long history, and the tension between them has repeated since at least the turn of the twentieth century. The imperialist urge emerges with the outbreak of the Spanish American War and the United States taking control of foreign territories for the first time in the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico. The interventionists argue that the peoples of these lands will find freedom under American control, seemingly at odds with the democratic ideals of our own Revolution. Anti-imperialists then as now try to get Americans to cling to these principles and restrain their militarist impulses, with Mark Twain the most prominent voice. Theodore Roosevelt stands as the icon of imperialism in this book, although Kinzer describes Henry Cabot Lodge as the actor working behind the scenes of the imperialist cause, up to and including engineering Roosevelt's rise to the presidency. ( )

5477. The True Flag Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire, by Stephen Kinzer (read 17 Jun 2017) This is an easy-to-read account of the fight to prevent the U.S. from becoming an empire. It tells of the fight against Teddy Roosevelt and Senator Lodge to prevent the U.S. conquering the Philippines. Instead of supporting the fight for independence the U.S. in a vicious war literally conquered a people who had thought we would help them win independence. It is a sad story. In the concluding chapter the author expatiates on various events of the 20th century, some of which discussion is questionable. For instance, he seems to blame us for becoming involved in the fight against Hitler! But till the last chapter the book is commendable and well-told, though the events related are sad. ( )

Interventionist or Isolationist? How should the US behave in the world? In 1898, Americans were confronted with this question... and we've been debating ever since. Kinzer brings us a vivid cast of characters, headed by Theodore Roosevelt, Henry Cabot Lodge and William Randolph Hearst on one side of the debate, and Mark Twain, Booker T. Washington and Andrew Carnegie on the other. A fascinating look at the history underpinning present US involvement in world affairs, as well as an opportunity for the reader to decide whether or not we should modify our approach and in what way. Do we still believe the arguments put forward for one or the other? Where does true safety lie? Has US military might turned us into a guard dog? Or a bully? Highly recommended and fascinating read. ( )

This well-conceived book tells of America's ambivalence with policies of expansionism and intervention in the world. Throughout the twentieth century America's foreign policy has included periods and episodes of active intervention ranging from imperialistic-style colonialism to covert and overt attempts at regime change. This activism on the world stage has seen countervailing times of isolationism when Americans eschewed involvement in affairs beyond our borders.

Kinzer marks the beginning of this contradictory sense of proper policy with the Spanish-American War of 1898. There was a thirst for war among some thought leaders including most notably journalist William Randolph Hearst, the ambitious rising star in politics Theodore Roosevelt and his close ally and mentor Henry Cabot Lodge. Spanish human rights atrocities in Cuba and the Philippines, inflamed by the so-called yellow journalism of the era, prompted America to declare war on Spain on humanitarian grounds and to bring the blessings of American-style democracy to oppressed people. What began as a war of liberation fairly quickly changed to colonial occupation of the conquered islands. At the same time, the country determined to annex the Hawaiian Islands, an action seemingly driven by commercial interests that had taken hold on the islands.

The factors behind this expansionist outlook following the war did, indeed, seem to lie in the chance for economic gains for America. American business had become so productive that there was worry that without new markets the growth of our economy would stall. What better way to open up trading possibilities than to take control of entire nations of people? Those who favored expansionism also looked at the rise of colonialism of the European powers and feared that without similar policy on our part America would be cut out of foreign markets. This policy was clothed in a morally disingenuous notion that it was the obligation of the Anglo-Saxon nations (the so-called "White Man's Burden") to bring the blessings of their advanced cultures to primitives, a manifestation of the overt racism that existed at the time.

Against this tide of American imperialism was the strongly held view by many that colonialism was antithetical to the values and principles that distinguished America from the rest of the world. America had broken the bonds of its colonial master to found a nation based on the principle of consent of the governed and certainly the imposition of authority over others was repugnant to the nation's values. The Anti-Imperialists organized a campaign to have America's military victories result in independence and self-governance for the people freed from Spain's yoke. Leading lights in this movement were the industrial magnate Andrew Carnegie, populist democrat William Jennings Bryan, the notable political figure Carl Schurz and Mark Twain. Bryan was thought by this alliance to be the key to prevailing as his popularity across the country made him potentially the next president. Bryan betrayed the aims of these advocates by taking a conciliatory stance in the hopes of political gain. President McKinley was equivocal on the matter and in the end went along with the wishes of the expansionists.

What followed was a disastrous occupation of the Philippines in which insurgents seeking independence fought American troops for several years in a campaign featuring torture and indiscriminate killing and pillage of civilians by the American occupiers.

Throughout the remainder of the century (and up to the present) American policy has shifted between an activist role in world affairs and isolationism. Before both world wars the sentiment of overwhelming numbers of the American public had been to stay out of the affairs of the rest of the world. After World War II American fears of communism marked a steady utilization of interventionism, sometimes covert and sometimes military. The idea of "threats" against which our engagement must be brought to bear seems to persist even after the decline of the other major super power of the world. Most of these interventions have turned out badly for the United States for the same reasons as in the Philippine occupation: arrogance, ignorance or blindness to the cultural and political ethos of other countries, and the unwillingness of the American people to suffer long term or large scale sacrifices in pursuit of foreign policy. There is a case to be made as well that underlying most if not all foreign engagements is not the altruistic spread of our morally superior "way of life", but rather the assurance of preserving and advancing the economic interests of our nation. Moreover, the idea that foreign wars are necessary to "preserve our freedom" is a cynical trope used to bring the people to a willingness to go along.

In one sense, American expansionism predates our forays into the world scene. America was expansionist since its inception albeit within the boundaries of our portion of the continent. This continental expansion was always at the expense of others who occupied the land, was decidedly racist and unquestionably motivated by hoped for economic gain. By the late 1890's our own territory had been completely occupied and it would not be a terrible leap of logic to strive to continue in this vein on the world stage. Perhaps strangely, internal expansion did not seem morally indefensible to most, but expansion beyond our national borders raised qualms about its incongruity with widely held core American values.

A word should be added about the book's picture of Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt is today admired in many respects for his activism, particularly with regard to conservation and his efforts to curtail monopolies and trusts. But, his belligerence and war mongering are quite unappealing. Roosevelt believed that war was necessary and salutary for society, that it was an integral component of a "manly" character. He shared the view of many that the superiority of Anglo-Saxon justified the imposition of western values on the "lessor races." Such view is abhorrent to our values today.

The author carries the story of American interventionism up to the present and his sentiments, with which I agree, are that great care and consideration should be applied to decisions to intervene abroad and that it would be wise to utilize the lessons of history in these circumstances. ( )

1898 was a terrible, terrible year.
A ship boiler room explosion turned into a pretext for war across the globe that a reluctant President McKinley who had seen the losses of the US Civil War first hand, did not want.
The rise of superiority biases against inferiors, perceived as such for their race, color or religion.
The fuel of mass media and a press that sold the news and bought any rumor.
The jingoistic dithyrambs of Theodore Roosevelt and their counter-discourses by Mark Twain, a man who had seen the miseries, hidden by pumps and circumstances, of Empire through his world travels.
Mr. Kinzer's short and lively rendition of these debates shows that history repeats itself as an ever lasting parody.
The empire of liberty and the capture of Guam under Spanish control since 1668 by the U.S. Navy through its U.S.S. Charleston is unique in that the naval bombardment of an out of use and out of ammo citadel is believed to be by two apologetic Spanish officers, a gun salute.

Shortly after finishing this book, I saw the 2016 movie by Spanish Director Salvador Calvo "1898. Los últimos de Filipinas" that describes how a Spanish company of 50 forgotten by its government sustains a siege in Baler in the Philippines against the revolutionary forces of Philippino leader Aguinaldo. The portrayal of the book of Aguinaldo and the Philippino's people resistance is a moving passage of this book as it was directed against the Spanish first as a US ally and then as an enemy of the USA.I am now ready to know more about this 400 years Spanish occupation that dated from Ferdinand Magellan 1521 travel and feel I have now a better understanding after reading this book of how the ethical dilemma represented by the USA succeeding a long colonial occupation agitated the public then. ( )

This book traces the history of the debate that followed U.S. victory in the Spanish-American War -- a debate, as the author points out, which is largely forgotten today, but is still deeply relevant to American foreign policy making. One side of the debate, the imperialist side, wanted to take over the islands which had been won from Spain -- Guam, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. The other, the anti-imperialist side, wanted to give these lands their independence, forswearing any increase in US territory. Both sides had very major figures lined up in support. For the imperialists, Theodore Roosevelt led the charge, backed by President McKinley. For the anti-imperialists, Andrew Carnegie, Samuel Gompers, Booker T. Washington and Carl Schurz were leaders, with Mark Twain eventually becoming the major spokesman, and William Jennings Bryan an ambiguous supporter. The disagreement was about the role of the US in the world, and about what kind of country we wanted to be. Kinzler makes it clear that the imperialists were in tune with their times, while the anti-imperialists were deeply attached to traditional American values.

The book was fun to read, full of vivid quotes and strong personalities. It was also highly informative -- I did not know how destructive to the Philippine people was the US war against those who wanted Philippine independence, nor had I any idea how close the anti-imperialists came to winning the debate. This debate has had long consequences, Kinzler argues in an abbreviated final section that traces the rise and spread of American imperialism (or multi-nationalism, or what you will).

Kinzler clearly has a strong point of view, even if you aren't familiar with some of his other works -- "Overthrow", and "The Brothers", for example. But his facts and his narrative are compelling. Well worth reading. ( )

Review of: The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire, by Stephen Kinzer
by Stan Prager (1-17-17)


With the notable exception of the Civil War, Americans have largely forgotten the wars waged outside of living recollection. Other than the War of 1812, perhaps no war has been so utterly expunged from our collective memory as the Spanish-American War of 1898, although this conflict occurred barely at the edge of that envelope: as of this writing the oldest still thriving human being was born in 1899. Still, when prompted how many could conjure up more than a caricature of buck-toothed Teddy Roosevelt bedecked with pince-nez and cowboy hat leading the Rough Riders charge up San Juan Hill? But although the “splendid little war” – as it was famously dubbed by John Hay – was little more than a minor military adventure fought and won over a brief four-month period, it was nevertheless highly consequential, as it marked the dawn of a new era of American overseas intervention and imperialism. In The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire, journalist and academic Stephen Kinzer does a remarkable job of resurrecting the Spanish American War from the dustbin of our national amnesia and restoring its critical historical significance, despite an abysmal concluding chapter (more on this later!) that mars an otherwise fine work.
The United States has been an aggressive, expansionist, even predatory nation since its very foundation. What came to be called “manifest destiny” meant both the disenfranchisement of the aboriginal native peoples and the eviction – by force or treaty – of the British, French and Spanish that got in the way of the path “from sea to shining sea.” But except for some daydreams by antebellum Southerners of colonizing portions of Central America in order to extend slavery, Americans restrained themselves from overseas conquest and were passive observers of the late nineteenth century European rush to imperialism, as Britain, France and Germany competed for colonial empire. One of the most notable opponents of such restraint was Theodore Roosevelt, who actively called for a more internationalist – and interventionist – approach by the United States. As The True Flag neatly outlines, Roosevelt urged a war with Spain to divest her of her Caribbean colonies, turned himself into a hero once the war unfolded, and then used these events as a springboard to the vice-presidency. The assassination of President McKinley later put the nation’s most prominent imperialist into the Oval Office.
After five centuries, all that remained for Spain of the vast territory in the New World that Columbus had stumbled upon was a tiny toehold in Cuba and Puerto Rico. Americans were both hostile to Spain and sympathetic to the Cuban rebels who sought liberation. There was a growing cry for intervention. In addition to Roosevelt, there was an eager cast of notables – Henry Cabot Lodge, Elihu Root, William Randolph Heart, Alfred Thayer Mahan – urging action. President McKinley was at first a reluctant, albeit easily converted, warrior. When a likely mechanical malfunction caused an explosion that sank the USS Maine in Havana harbor with hundreds of fatalities, a rush to judgment blamed the disaster on a mine and with calls of “Remember the Maine” the United States went to war. It did not last very long. Vastly inferior Spanish forces in Cuba and in its faraway Pacific colony in the Philippines fell rapidly before American military might on land and sea. It had been more than three decades since the end of the Civil War, and while a new generation cheered this adventure, some veterans of the Union and the Confederacy even entered combat on the same side, a celebrated rapprochement by old enemies that added to the feel-good notions of righteousness that saw Spain finally expelled from the Americas and those it had long oppressed set free. Most Americans, including its great intellectual icon, Mark Twain, championed the virtue of this crusade for justice and liberation. At first.
If for most, details of the Spanish-American War are murky, few even know that its immediate aftermath ignited another conflict – the Philippine-American War – of a much longer duration with far more casualties. For an America seeking to expand its political power and economic reach on the world stage, the Philippines was a far greater prize than Cuba and there was a great reluctance to let her go once hostilities ended. Filipino rebels led by Emilio Aguinaldo at first welcomed Americans as allies and liberators, but were later bitterly disappointed as the United States opted to simply replace Spain as a colonial overlord. What followed was a long, ruthless, bloody war of oppression to crush Philippine resistance that turned out to be a tragic preview of American interventionism in the years to come. In what came to be a campaign of terror justified by race, national interests and necessity, combatants and civilians fell victim to American antiguerrilla efforts that included torture and murder. Water torture, a specialty of the Spanish, became a regular part of the American toolkit. As Kinzer notes: “This was the first time American soldiers had systematically brutalized a civilian population overseas.” [p194] As the result of the war, as well as attendant starvation and epidemics, hundreds of thousands of Filipino civilians died.
The stark evolution of Americans from liberators to oppressors spawned a wide movement at home of anti-imperialists, with Mark Twain as one of its most ardent spokesmen. Although he privately deemed it “rather poor poetry,” Roosevelt -- a Social Darwinist at heart who justified a world order dominated by Eurocentric white supremacy over the “lesser races” – extolled Rudyard Kipling’s latest poem written to encourage annexation, “The White Man’s Burden: The United States and the Philippine Islands,” which was to become a rallying cry for imperialism. It’s first stanza began [p120]:

Take up the White Man's burden—
Send forth the best ye breed—
Go bind your sons to exile
To serve your captives' need;
To wait in heavy harness,
On fluttered folk and wild—
Your new-caught, sullen peoples,
Half-devil and half-child.

Less famously, Twain countered this sentiment by rewriting “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” to reflect the rapacious nation we had become [p184]:

Mine eyes have seen the orgy of the launching of the Sword,
He is searching out the hoardings where the stranger’s wealth is stored;
He hath loosed his fateful lightnings, and with woe and death is scored,
His lust is marching on.


The Supreme Court ruled that the Constitution did not apply overseas, but the war in the Philippines grew very unpopular at home. Still, Roosevelt, who became President after McKinley’s assassination, vigorously pursued victory under the guise of offering enlightened civilization to the misguided brown people who otherwise spurned it. General Arthur MacArthur (Douglas MacArthur’s father) obliged with ruthless tenacity. His homeland devastated, a kidnapped and imprisoned Aguinaldo eventually gave in to his new colonizers. (He lived to witness the birth of Philippine independence in 1945 and then on to his nineties; during World War II he supported the Japanese occupiers who ousted the Americans.) Meanwhile, something called the Platt Amendment created an emasculated independent Cuba dominated by the United States that endured for decades. America also controlled Puerto Rico, Guam, and Hawaii (annexed in 1898). The United States was now indeed a power to be reckoned with on the world stage, but there were unintended consequences. The unsuccessful anti-imperialist movement withered away, and so too did an appetite for further conquest abroad; a war-weary public fell into isolationism just in time for the outbreak of World War I.
Kinzer’s well-written narrative puts the Spanish-American War into its appropriate historic context, something missing in most other treatments. This was the same timeframe that saw the United States annex Hawaii, not long after supporting its white planter elite’s overthrow of the Hawaiian monarchy. This was the same era that saw the British employ machine guns to mow down thousands of native Ndebele warriors in Rhodesia, and to create the first concentration camps for civilians in the South African Boer War. These were the same years of the celebrated “Open Door Policy” in China, that asserted the right of the United States to prey upon Chinese markets as aggressively as their foreign counterparts, and to lend forces to put down Chinese nationals in the “Boxer Rebellion.” Like all events, this war and its aftermath did not occur in a vacuum.
Then the author nearly spoils it all with a dreadful penultimate chapter that seeks to connect all subsequent American foreign engagement to the events of this period. One could indeed argue with some conviction that the Spanish-American War represented a line that was crossed in American foreign policy that encouraged overseas interventionism and occupation justified by a vague and often unconvincing crusade of good intentions. With that and especially with the imbroglio of the Philippines in mind, one could perhaps draw a line to the quagmire of Vietnam, and especially to the late misadventure in Iraq. Yet, Kinzer makes the mistake of painting all that followed with far too broad of a brush. Isolationism is not always the vindication of anti-imperialism, as he seems to posit, nor is interventionism always its antonym. For instance, the role the United States played, or failed to play, in the run-up to World War II had little to do with the issues of 1898. There are many varieties of intervention, as well as isolation. History is nuance and complexity that always suffers when blurred with attempts to impose grand over-arching themes. In his final chapter, the author tries too hard to connect all the dots as if it was one common image. In this, he is ultimately unsuccessful. Still, the flaws of that last chapter should not deter anyone from reading The True Flag, an otherwise outstanding work that restores a long-overlooked chapter in American history to its appropriate prominence.

[NOTE: My copy of this book is an Advance Reader’s Edition I received through LibraryThing Early Reviewer’s program.]

My review of "The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire," by Stephen Kinzer, is live on my book blog … https://regarp.com/2017/01/17/review-of-the-true-flag-theodore-roosevelt-mark-tw... ( )

This book is best described as a narrow volume of Political history covering the period from 1898 to 1902, highlighting the country's focus on the Spanish-American war and question of how to deal with the islands of the Philippines. Very little attention is given to Puerto Rico, Guam, and Hawaii. Cuba is given barely additional treatment. The author's presentation of the politicking done by Senator Lodge (including the catty and unnecessary aside notifying the reader that Mrs. Lodge was conducting an affair), President McKinley, Mark Hanna, and William Jennings Bryan is riveting. His shallow caricature of Teddy Roosevelt is startling when one considers the wealth of writing and speeches available to even an amateur researcher. Twain's transition to the anti-imperialist faction is explained clearly, as are the arguments of faction-members Carl Schurz and Andrew Carnegie.

The author's assessment of American intervention outside of this instance, however, lacks nuance (not to mention comparative supporting evidence): his broad conclusion is that intervention is always corrupt or corrupted and that opposition to the flaws is to be admired. The book ends with a 21-page condemnation of the 112 subsequent years of American foreign policy, which at one point sincerely wonders that if FDR had lived longer, whether his personal relationship with Stalin could have averted the Cold War [No it could not, nor would it have. See Mitrokhin archives].

This book would be salvaged by Kinzer quitting his US analysis in 1902 and giving a summary history of the territories removed from Spain to the present, leaving to the reader the question of under what circumstances and for what duration should the US take guardianship of non-contiguous foreign soil, perhaps even hinting at the temporary custody of West Germany and Japan as alternate cases. But it does not. ( )

At the start of the twentieth century America faced a choice that has still not been resolved at the start of the twenty-first. Divided about whether to pursue an expansionist agenda — mostly to the benefit of commerce and industry, or to follow an isolationist course, believing that “every nation must be ruled by the consent of the governed”.

Stephen Kinzer’s The True Flag is a brilliant history of the expansionist beginnings of United States foreign policy, chronicling the invasions of Cuba, Hawaii, Guam and, most importantly, The Philippines. It is a bloody history that we have been doomed to repeat over and over — to the benefit of the American industrialist but the everlasting lose of the moral high ground. Mark Twain described our involvement in the Philippines as a “quagmire” —a term that would be used many times in our history of involvement in foreign wars — from Viet Nam to Iraq and Afghanistan.

While Teddy Roosevelt and Mark Twain get cover billing, the story really belongs to the prime mover of expansionist policy, Henry Cabot Lodge who mentored Roosevelt and plotted the future of American foreign policy. Opposed by Carl Schurz, Andrew Carnegie and, most importantly, William Jennings Bryan, Lodge’s “large policy” set a course that America seems to continue to this day.

The True Flag is an important new history of the beginnings of America’s debate on imperialism and highly recommended. ( )

I really enjoyed reading this book, which wasn't so much about Roosevelt and Twain precisely as it was a general history of the the expansionist and anti-expansionist movements that Roosevelt and Twain were a part of. The author makes the argument that this was the fundamental question of what the US would become. The anti-imperialists argued that conquering foreign lands would degrade the fundamental principle of liberty that the country was founded on. The imperialists argued that the US economy had expanded to the point where it was necessary to secure foreign markets for American goods. This argument would play itself out into the argument for and against American intervention overseas that is still being held today. ( )

In 1898, the most heatedly-debated question in America was “Is the United States to be an empire?” With the potential of annexing the disheveled Hawaiian Islands into the nation, as well as a revolutionary conflict occurring just off the Florida coastline in the tumultuous Spanish colony of Cuba, the stage was being set for American influence abroad to run rampant.

At the time, many Americans were content to continue the U.S. policy of isolationism, first begun during George Washington’s presidency; however others were enticed to abandon that stance, as well as ignoring some of the ideals this country was founded upon. With the American frontier settled, the American imagination was invigorated by the prospect of further expansion abroad and the potential profits that overseas colonies could provide. Giving up the lofty ideals of “government by the consent of the governed” did little to prickle its conscience of the American mind. America was in a time period of rapid industrial growth and it needed new markets to sell its goods. Late 19th century America was also in the throes of nationalism that compelled the nation to use its power to aid the other peoples out of humanitarian responsibility.

I highly recommend this book for its treatment of a pivotal time in American history.

I received a free advanced copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. ( )

This history focuses on the key period in American history right at the turn of the 20th century, when America was in the process of deciding to expand its territory beyond the North American continent. The central players were Theodore Roosevelt and the imperialists on the one hand, and Mark Twain and the anti-imperialists on the other. The imperial impetus was the continuation of the Manifest Destiny principle which had propelled the country to occupy the territory of the 48 states. In 1898 the country was faced with the key decision: would it remain within the American borders or would it expand across the seas to become an imperial (or colonial) power? The author describes in detail the key personalities and events which resolved the issue, which as we know was the victory of expansion, led by the irrepressible Roosevelt. It is an interesting story, set right at the cusp of the American Century. And the author fleshes out the eventual implications, with his description of the succeeding years and succeeding Presidents and statesmen, and how they followed (or resisted) the impetus to imperialism. ( )

The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of American Empire--an excellent, accessible, engaging history of America's transition from a separate, almost isolationist, nation to an international force. Covers basically the events leading to and through the Spanish-American War in the Caribbean and the Pacific, and the changes thus wrought in the nation's view of itself, the national government's use of economic and military power, and the consequences for the nation and the world a hundred years later. What I would have liked, and what I thought the title promised, was more about Mark Twain's role in the resistance to this expansionism. Twain gets about 10 pages altogether of the 250 page book. ( )

A history of the American imperialism debate of the late 19th and early 20th century and the wars that went along with it. Kinzer, much like his earlier excellent books Overthrow and All the Shah's Men, has written an accessible history of one of the darker, lesser-known events of American history. Members of the cult of Theodore Roosevelt will be angered or shocked at his pre-Presidential behavior and ideas. The nod to Mark Twain in the title is that, a nod, as he is certainly discussed in the book, but is not central to it.

Excellent writing, and most definitely recommended to history buffs and interventionists everywhere. Bully! ( )

A thorough accounting of one of the most misunderstood wars in American history and the battle over the role of the United States in the 20th century. The author explores the debate between imperialism and isolationism within the scope of the ideology of the founding of the country and the question on whether those principles are applicable to the US in the early 20th century. The debate could be transplanted to the current crop of American politicians as we struggle to define our guiding principles in the 21st century. Kinzer's work is well worth considering as we attempt to create a viable and coherent foreign policy in these troubled times. ( )

In classroom studies one usually hears only of the final actions taken by our country's military decisions. In this book the author brilliantly sets forth not just conclusions but all the background and completely all of the actions and beliefs of each of the various American Executives and Congressional leaders leading leading up to the invasion of Cuba.
Brilliantly done and without wasted words. By the end of chapter three, I resolved no longer to continue underlining since I had already underlined 1/4 of the text!
Especially enlightening is the author's mentioning all four examples of American Imperialism together in one book: Cuba, Hawaii, Guam and the Philippines. Other treatises tend to treat them separately.
Apparently the author has written a series of separate books likewise covering Iran, Turkey, Rwanda, Nicaragua Guatemala and the Middle East.
other events. I look forward to reading them. This is history as it should be written ---- showing interconnected historical events. ( )

The internal debate within the United States about how the country should act around the world, to either avoid or intervene in foreign entanglements, has been going on for over a century. However, neither the arguments nor the situations that bring them on have changed over that time. Stephen Kinzer in his book The True Flag looks at when this debate began back at the turn of the 20th Century when the United States looked beyond the Americas in the “Age of Imperialism”.

The political and military history before, during, and after the Spanish-American War both inside and outside the United States was Kinzer’s focus throughout the book. Within this framework, Kinzer introduced organizations and individuals that opposed the actions and outcomes promoted by those more familiar to history, namely Theodore Roosevelt, as the United States was transformed into a “colonial” power. Yet, while this book is about the beginning of a century long debate it is more the story of those who through 1898 and 1901 argued against and tried to prevent the decisions and actions that today we read as history.

Although the names of Roosevelt and Mark Twain catch the eye on the cover, in reality Kinzer’s focus was on other important figures on either side of the debate. The biggest promoter of “expansionist” policy was Henry Cabot Lodge, Roosevelt’s long-time friend, who gladly let his friend become figure that history would remember. However, Lodge’s fellow senator from Massachusetts, George Frisbie Hoar was one of the fiercest opponents and critics of the “expansionist” policy that Lodge and Roosevelt promoted. One of the enigmatic figures of the time was newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst, who openly advocated and supported war in Cuba but then turned against the expansion when the United States fought the insurrection in the Philippines. Businessman Andrew Carnegie was one of many prominent individuals who founded the American Anti-Imperialist League to work against the United States ruling foreign territory. Amongst those working with Carnegie were former President Grover Cleveland and imminent labor leader, Samuel Gompers, but the strangest bedfellow was William Jennings Bryan. In Bryan, many believed they had the person in the political sphere that could stem the tide against the “expansionist” agenda but were twice stunned by the decisions he made when it was time to make a stand.

Kinzer throughout the book would follow the exploits and opinions of both Roosevelt and Twain during the period covered, however there was is a stark difference amount of coverage each has in which Roosevelt is in the clear majority. It wasn’t that Kinzer chose not to invest page space to Twain, it was that he did not have the material to do so. Throughout most of the period covered, 1898-1901, Twain was in Europe and out of the social and political landscape of the United States. However, once Twain stepped back onto U.S. soil his pen became a weapon in the cause against imperialism that Kinzer documents very well. Unfortunately for both the reader and Kinzer, Twain only becomes prominent in the last third of the book whereas Roosevelt’s presence is throughout. This imbalance of page space between the books’ two important figures was created because of marketing, but do not let it create a false impression of favoritism by Kinzer on one side or another.

History records that those opposed to the United States’ overseas expansion lost, however ever since the arguments they used have been a part of the foreign policy debate that has influenced history ever since. The True Flag gives the reader a look into events and arguments that have shaped the debate around the question “How should the United States act in the world?” since it began almost 120 years ago. This book is a fantastic general history of an era and political atmosphere that impacts us still today, and is a quick easy read for those interested in the topic. ( )