America at War

The story of the Spanish American War continues. In this episode we focus on the actions of the US Army and Navy in the aftermath of General Shafter's first moves. After capturing El Caney and San Juan Hill, the Spanish...

Welcome to the first episode of the year! We are continuing our series on the Spanish-American War. We are transitioning from Tampa, Florida to the Island of Cuba. The commanding general of V Corps, William Shafter...

Once war was declared in April, plans to send an American expeditionary force evolved. Once a Spanish flotilla was trapped in the harbor of Santiago de Cuba, rather than striking at Havana, the decision was to send the...

We are continuing our narrative on the Spanish-American War. In this episode we will concentrate on Admiral Dewey's victory in Manila Bay in the spring of 1898 as well as naval movements around the island of Cuba...

After discussing the origins of the Spanish-American War in our last episode, we bring the story forward to the declaration of war and the plans of the United States and Spain. Spain was unable to pour reinforcements...

We have done it! We have reached the end of the nineteenth century with the beginning of the Spanish-American War. In the first of a string of episodes, we will be exploring the country's first overseas venture - war...

The second and final episode of this arc take the story of the new steel navy to the beginning of the Spanish-American War. From the mid-1880s to the 1890s, the necessary infrastructure was put in place to expand the...

Perhaps one of the most prominent aspects of this period is the rise of the steel navy. After several decades of decline, the navy made a bold move and built a small fleet of steel warships. There was a growing, often...

In this episode we take a look at Harbor Defense in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. One of the most consistent missions of the US Army since the founding of the republic was defending the nation's...

In this episode we will continue and conclude our discussion of Emory Upton. We left off with the beginning of Upton's around the world journey. Upton traveled overseas on a mission to observe the armies of Asia and...

We are continuing our exploration of professionalization and what kind of Army would emerge through a long period of introspection. In this episode we are going to explore these issues through the eyes of Emory Upton. A...

We are continuing our exploration of reform and revitalization of the US Army in the decades after the end of the Civil War. This is a critical topic that deserves some coverage if you want to understand the army's...

In this episode, we will continue our story on the military's response to civil unrest. As we spoke of in the previous episode, we concentrated on how and why the National Guard and the US Army responded to civil...

We are back! Our series on the reform and revitalization of the American military continues with a focus on how the military responded to civil disorder. The rise of the factory system and the industrialization of the...

In this episode we kick off the Progressive Era with a brief overview of the National Guard in the late nineteenth century. The National Guard emerged from the volunteer militia's that dominated the scene from before...