In 1846 the United States declared war against Mexico. The U.S wanted to spread west and follow Manifest Destiny but in doing that they took Texas away from Mexico. After annexing Texas, slavery was brought into the U.S. The United States under the leadership of President Polk clearly provoked Mexico into attacking US troops on the disputed border. These are all reasons that the U.S had no business starting a war with Mexico for territory that was legally theirs.
Although President Polk’s message was ratified by the Senate and House, the United States reason for war wasn’t good enough for them go to war with Mexico. The U.S. was not justified for three reasons: There was a territorial dispute, the U.S. provoked the war, and it was used to expand slavery. My first reason why the U.S. was not justified is that there was a territorial dispute between America and Mexico on where the border was. According to Document Hook, General Zachary Taylor and his troops purposely moved across the known border into the disputed border, as if they were trying to get a reason to start a war with Mexico. According to Documents C and Background, Polk ordered the troops to enter the disputed area, and after they were attacked by the Mexicans, he used them to get America fired up and give them a reason to go to war.
Meanwhile, President Polk had not been successful in his negotiations with Mexico to acquire California, so he began looking for a way to start a war without being seen as the aggressor. In 1846 he sent a unit of American soldiers into the disputed territory, which Mexico interpreted an invasion, and the bloodshed that followed resulted in a declaration of war by congress. Mr. Polk had gotten his war. The
” After repeated menaces, Mexico has passed the boundary of the United States, has invaded our territory and shed American blood upon the American soil…” This is a quote from chapter one, also it’s a war message that wrote by President Polk. This has already explained that the invading from Mexico is one of the reasons for staring the war. Also, manifest destiny is another important reason for the war. President Polk wanted to expand the boundary of Untied States. He vowed to bring California under the United States control.
Their main reason for that was that the creation of new states would decrease their power in congress. The Louisiana Purchase was not the only time Jefferson adopted the ideas of federalists about loose construction of the constitution. After he was reelected, war soon broke out in Europe between English and French. British needed more manpower and financial aid for the war soon began impressing American sailors and stealing their cargo. This made trade between the United States and Europe unsafe.
Also the book gives us another perspective about what really happen during the whole Mexican Independence and also how the United States considered itself superior in many ways to Mexico and other Latin American countries. Henderson examines several factors that explain why Mexicans permitted that the United States took its land, apparently he make us think that it was because the United States ambitions to become a powerful nation. I think that this book explains very well the reason why Mexico went to war with the United States and we can conclude that it was because Mexico was suffering very political troubles, also because Mexicans didn’t have the economical resources to success, in other words they were very weak. Finally we can see that even thought there has passed a lot of time since the Mexican and American war happened some struggles still going on in Mexico while the United States ambition still
This transition caused American settler's living in Texas to seize several of Santa Anna's garrisons, including the Alamo. The author states though that the questionable historical inaccuracies occur when historians and directors try and find out why the Americans decided to stay and fight for the Alamo when there was no clear chance of winning the battle. The 1960's movie suggests it was a fight for freedom for Americans, and therefore could be why the director left out the fact that the fight for defending the Alamo was led by four groups of people, including one group of Mexicans seeking to restore the Mexican Republic. In addition, the author
U.S. is fighting against Iraq and Afghanistan to bring back democracy and freedom to those countries. In Iraq they were only in search for resources, they wanted oil. The previous President, George W. Bush had claimed he was on a mission from God when he launched the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq.” (George Bush: 'God Told Me to End the Tyranny in Iraq', Oct. 2005) This sounds familiar to what President Polk was saying back in 1846, on how God has given them the mission to proceed with the invasion of these countries. U.S. is trapped in a cycle of maintaining that it is going to war for another country’s benefit. However, this is just an excuse to justify their own selfish reasons for going to war.
American Imperialism in the Nineteenth Century Imperialism was a highly controversial subject in the Nineteenth century. Many people opposed the fact while others wanted to hit it full force. Imperialism is the acquisition of control over the government and the economy of another nation, usually by conquest [ (Davidson, 2008) ]. The United State became an imperialistic world power in the late nineteenth century by gaining control over the Hawaiian Islands and, after the Spanish American War, Guam, the Philippines, Cuba, and Puerto Rico [ (Davidson, 2008) ]. With America wanting to be a power house country, they became just that when they gained control over these countries.
Japan wanted to acquire their oil and other resources from Indochina (peninsula containing Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.) The US threatened Japan to withdraw from Indochina, but the Japanese felt they had no choice. Japan did not want to withdraw from Indochina, and with the US, Britain and Netherlands freezing their assets, Japan felt there was no choice but war. To understand why Japan decided to start a war we need to understand the events that led up to the Pearl Harbor attack. It began with Japan’s desire for growth that brought them into conflict with the colonial powers.