The study of history

[GePap]

Honestly Chris62, there must be something wrong with your reading comprehension:

First of all, that comes from a site devoted to the history of a US regiment involved in the war: hardly a flaming revisionist source. The Phillipines insurgency lasted 3 years: 100,000 US soldiers were involved in it. Unless you find a "non-revisionist source" that claims a much lower number of US forces were involved, then right now you look like a petulant child proven wrong but unwilling to admit it. And in a time when it took a good many weeks to go from the US to the Phillipines, my guess is that the amount of rotation of units was not one unit every month, so that the regular number of troops involved in the Phillipines had to be high.

Yes, concentration camps existed: as I said before, but you ignored, the act of rounding up all the people of an area, putting them in camps under gaurd, so that you could go hunt the guerilas without them being able to join with the civilian population, was a common practice in the early part of the 20th century, started by the Spanish in Cuba, immitated by the English in South Africa, and the US in the Phillipines. You Chris have given no sources. My definition of revisionist history is one that ignores facts, or makes them up, or makes claims devoid of fact and based solely on opinon. GIVE US A SINGLE SOURCE FOR YOUR ASSERTIONS, CHRIS, JUST ONE.Otherwise, it is you who prove the point about "revisionist" history.

[Chris 62]

For the record, Major general Elwell S.Otis had 21,000 men under his command at the outbreak of Aguinaldo's uprising, of which only 12,000 were combat effectives, the rest were USV, being sent home as enlistments had run out.

The US raised 10 regiments to re-inforce this, a total 35,000 men.
Not, 120,000, not 70,000.

The source of this is my own umpublished book on the subject, and I used ONLY offical US army sources.

MrFun, now your attempting to put the "twist' on a spin, comparing the US to Hitler and Saddam.

If your serious about being a professional historian, you'd best lose this, you may sell a book, but you will be condemned by scholars. Some may subscribe to it, but serious discussion would not have dared to bring in Hitler and Saddam as represenitive of the US fight in the Phillipennes.

[Chris 62]

Gepap, you can remove the foot from your mouth at any time.
Petulant child...

[GePap]

Chris62: Did your book cover the entire Phillipinnes insurgency from 1899-1902, or the Campaign around Manilla and the war up to Aguinaldo's capture?

Also: what did the records you use put the number of US casualties at? And the number of Phillipino dead, during the insurrection?

And why did you use only US records? What about Phillipino records, if any?

[GePap]

Another question:

In the book you were writting, what did you make of the Balangiga affair and the court martial of Gen. Jacob Smith and Major Littleton Waller, USMC?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Why was there a recession during Bush I's presidency, right near the beginning? Why did the economy went up quite nicely just right after Reagan took over. Hint: economics isn't instantaneous.

Yes, and you misrepresent history interestingly. The 'boom' of the 80s did not start until 1983-84. That was more than a few years than 'right after' Reagan took over.

Furthermore the Bush recession ('90-91) was a minor recession, which was simply the process of the boom-bust cycle. No President can avoid that.

To make the story short: Presidents have little effect on the economy. I believe Reagan had a minor positive effect upon it.

[Chris 62]

First, it's a history of the entire US army, from it's birth to when I wrote it (1984), so it needs revision to include the current time.

Next, there are no difinative Phinnipenne source materials, the only accurate count of troop strength is the dailey reports of the regiments involved, and even this is spotty. This is a century ago, record keeping on numbers fluxuates.
You must also seperate combat casualties to those of illness, which are FAR higher, and losses amoung the native population is often speculated even from the reports themselves (which you can read, BTW, contact the national archieve, and request the reprots under the freedo of information act).

The best I was able to assemble for US losses are that
4,234 US soldiers were buried there, and 2,800 more were wounded in action.

Phillipenne losses are harder, but the number is about 18,000 soldiers lost in total.
HOWEVER, as many as 200, 000 civilians (approx ONE FIFTH the total population) may have lost their lives due to famine brought on by both sides destroying crops and food stocks.

Again, hard and fast numbers are difficult to asertain, but these figures can be considered as good as any, and better then most.

[Chris 62]

Originally posted by GePap
Another question:

In the book you were writting, what did you make of the Balangiga affair and the court martial of Gen. Jacob Smith and Major Littleton Waller, USMC?

I mentioned it, but only the two versions, the US army version is the rebels were dressed as nuns and mouners, and some of the trial transcripts, but when your doing a large history, you can't cover every detail.

As far as I know, the bells of Balangiga are still out west somewhere.

[GePap]

http://www.army.mil/cmh-pg/reference/picmp.htm

I found the following link while searching online. If one goes to the link and reads the excerpts for all the little individual campaigns, it state that there was atime, between 1899 and 1902 when there were over 70,000 men in the Phillipines.

I don't know if this is an army website (I would assume from the URL but perhaps the army URL is usarmy.mil, not army.mil.)

[Chris 62]

THIS mat be the source of your confusion, from the web site:

"During this pause the first Philippine Scout units were organized and large numbers of additional troops began to arrive, bringing the strength of the American force (Eighth Army Corps) to some 47,500 men by the end of the year and 75,000 a year later.

Native forces are auxilleries, NOT US forces, and ARE NOT included in US totals, nor should they be.

For example, in WWII, the forces on Bataan had only appro 10,000 Americans, even though the army was over 100,000 that surrendered to Japan.

That is a common error, BYW.

[GePap]

Well then.

Let me ask another question: why do you think the Phillipines camapign is so overlooked by American history? 4000+ American dead makes it a bloodier war than the Spanish American war about which everyone is taught.

[Imran Siddiqui]

I don't know about you, GePap, but I spent quite a bit of time on the Phillipine Revolt in high school and college.

The S-A war is given more weight because it was more important. The US beat an imperial European power. It was the first message that said the US had arrived. It (along with the 1905 Russo-Japanese war) was beginning to show the decline of Europe (at least at the fringes).

[Chris 62]

Probaly because it would not seem to have been a "good" war, in light of Vietnam, for example.

The large native contingents are further proof of just how unpopular Aguinaldo was, but to the modern audience, this conflict is easy to twist, as we saw in this thread.
Accusations of concentration camps, rediculous casualties, all kinds of things. Plus there is quite a bit of racism involved, the US regulars certainly looked down on the natives, not considering them equals, but STILL believeing they should be free.
This is a hard idea to grasp, but it is essentially true.
This attitude is also seen in China by the Americans.

Look at the aquisitions of the Spanish American war, Cuba and the Phillipennes are free countries, no colonial power ever got their hooks in them again.
Puerto Rico is STILL happy as a US common wealth.

One thing should not be over-looked, Japan quickly found in the Phillipennes how popular the United States was, if even a TENTH of what the revisionists charge was true, why, just 40 years later, would Americans be revered?

Well, time to head home, and remember, history is about TRUTH, not feelings, leave feelings to comentators.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Lord Merciless


The ultra-leftist, self-loathing intellectuals tore apart the US education systems between the late 60s and late 80s.

For example, a math problem in 1960 would be formed in this way in 1980:

1960: A forest worker sells the trees he fell for $100. His cost was 80% of his selling price. What is his profit?

1980: A forest worker sells the trees he fell for $100. His cost was $80, and his profit $20. Your job here is to UNDERLINE the number "20".

Did you go to school in 1980? I did. I was in 7th and 8th grade that year. The trush is, rather than school being too easy for kids, most experts today are saying that it is quantitaviely harder for kids, who have workloads far in excess of anything with which their parents had to deal. But that doesn't fit in with the right-wing lie being fostered about America's education.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Ned
Mr. Fun, I am all for writing history based on factual accounts and for debunking myths that tend to whitewash "difficult" facts.

But, even you must admit, that a lot of current revisionism is more that this. It is about rewriting history to remove "difficult" facts from the history of communism and to add "difficult" facts to the history of capitalism.

Actually, most revisionism is about re-adding in the "inconvenient" facts of American, etc., history. The history of women in America is revisionist. Women didn't take part in history until the feminist movement started teaching about the stuff that women had accomplished. The history of Africa is revisionist history. When I went to school, Africa had no history. Since then, activists have managed to get that idea changed, since in fact there was a quite facinating history of Africa. In fact, the Kingdom of Mali is indirectly responsible for the discovery of America, but I didn't learn that when I went to school. I had to wait until history was revised.

Many of the "difficult" facts of communism are outright lies. Many of them are true. Many of the "difficult facts" about America's conduct in the world are ignored, and revisionists need to fight to get them included.

For example, the Historical revisionists of Israel base their revisions of Israeli history on first hand accounts, contemporary primary sources, etc. These people are reviled for being revisionists, when in fact all they are doing is exposing some "difficult facts" that the world (and especially Israel-boosters) don't want to hear. The same is true of revisionism everywhere.