Empire by default : the Spanish-American War and the dawn of the American century / Ivan Musicant.

"A Marian Wood book."

Includes bibliographical references (p. 704-716) and index.

Now, moving from the councils of Madrid to the conferences in Washington, from the victory at Manila Bay to the battle of San Juan Hill, from factional in-fighting to inflammatory journalism, prizewinning historian Ivan Musicant offers a dramatic narrative that, in this centenary year, will stand as the definitive account. Step-by-step, Musicant takes the reader through the thicket of arguments and decisions that led to America's almost accidental mantling as an imperial power. Here are the issues and debates, the strategies and obstacles, the ideals, interests, and missed opportunities. Here, too, are the political conflicts of the day - conflicts that America would encounter repeatedly in the century to come and that reveal as much about the flaws in its governmental system as they do about the ambiguities in the nation's vision of itself.