Although
Theodore Roosevelt only visited Panama once -- in 1906 to inspect
construction of the canal while President of the United States --
his vision, policy and drive concerning the need for a canal
across Panama was decisive at the turn of the 20th Century. Without
his forcefulness in 1903 and subsequently, the Panama Canal would
not have been started by the Americans in 1904 and completed in
time for the beginning of World War I (see below).
Appointed Assistant
Secretary of the Navy in 1897, Roosevelt worked hard to modernize the Navy and
prepare it for war, long before the Spanish-America war in 1898 was imminent.
He was a fervent advocate of a two-ocean Navy. The U.S.
Army, under-manned and ill-prepared for war, began mobilization
for a week before President McKinley's April 23, 1898,
call for volunteers. Among the ranks of the eager volunteers
was the 40-year-old Roosevelt.
When at last war
was declared in 1898, he tried repeatedly to obtain command of a
fighting force, resigning his position with the Navy to assist his
friend Colonel Leonard Wood (an Army surgeon) in raising and training
the First United States Volunteer Cavalry,
a mounted
cavalry for deployment in the Spanish-American War that became
well known as the "Rough Riders". In command of the
Rough Riders, on July 1, 1898 Lieutenant Colonel Roosevelt led his Rough Riders in
the assault on Kettle Hill in Cuba and also participated in the taking of
nearby San Juan Hill. As Roosevelt led his dismounted cavalry in
the assault, he spurred his mount to lead the charge, finding
himself well in advance of the rest of his troops. Armed only with
a pistol and with only four or five men immediately behind him, he
charged courageously into the heavy fire of the enemy to inspire
and lead his Rough Riders to victory.
After the war, war hero Roosevelt was easily elected Governor of New York in
1898, and two years later ran successfully as Vice President under
William McKinley. Upon McKinley's death in 1901, Roosevelt became
president, and was elected to his first full term in 1904.
No action during his presidency
aroused as much controversy as his actions taken on
building a canal through Panama at a time when the
Spanish-American War and the emergence of the U.S. as a world
power brought new urgency to the problem posed by the long trip
around Cape Horn in South America. Shortly
after the Colombian Senate had rejected in 1903 a treaty approved
by the U.S. Senate for building a canal through Colombia's province
of Panama
which French efforts had unsuccessfully started two decades
earlier, Roosevelt -- while careful not to endorse a revolt then
brewing in Panama for independence from Colombia -- discreetly let
it be known in Panama that the U.S. would view it as a positive
development and could be counted on to act accordingly.
A short, bloodless coup was
successfully carried out in Panama -- with a contingent of U.S.
Marines from the gunboat Nashville having just arrived
there and several U.S. warships standing off shore -- and Panama's
independence as a new nation was proclaimed the next day, November
3, 1903, quickly recognized by the United States and several Latin
American nations. Fearing that the U.S. might choose an alternate
route through Nicaragua, an enterprising group of Panamanian
businessmen -- anxious to reap the commercial benefits of a
canal -- seized the moment. The new government quickly
agreed to a treaty based on the original offer to Colombia
(calling for construction of the Panama Canal within a ten mile
wide strip of territory bisecting the country and to be called the
Canal Zone, which the U.S. would govern as if sovereign for
perpetuity). The treaty was quickly ratified by both
nations.
With the completion of the Panama
Canal in 1914 -- a massive engineering feat, the United States
gained a strategic and economic advantage of immeasurable value.
Roosevelt died seven months before the U.S. Pacific fleet passed
through the Panama Canal for the first time in 1919.
President Theodore Roosevelt became the first
American to receive the Nobel Peace Prize (for mediation of the
Russo-Japanese peace treaty in 1905), though the one honor that he
desired most, the Medal of Honor, eluded him during his lifetime.
(Once awarded the MOH -- see below, he became the only U.S.
president and person awarded both the Nobel Peace Prize and the
MOH.)
Many historians believe the
Medal of Honor was denied Roosevelt after the end of the war, based upon
political pressure from Secretary of War Alger as a personal
vendetta. Finally, after repeated efforts by surviving
family and admirers, on the centennial of the war, Roosevelt was
posthumously nominated for the Medal of Honor and, after its
authorization by Congress, it was presented
to his grandson by President Clinton. Roosevelt was the only
president to receive the Medal of Honor and -- with his son --
only the second father-son to have been awarded the Medal of
Honor.* (During World War II his son,
Army Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt, Jr. received the Medal of Honor posthumously
for his own heroic leadership on the battlefield during the World
War II D-Day Invasion of Normandy June 6, 1944.)
(Drawn principally from Theodore Roosevelt and the
Panama Canal, by David C. Hanson, Virginia Western Community
College at http://www.vw.cc.va.us/vwhansd/HIS122/Teddy/TRCanal.html
and the discussion on the Rough Riders from Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough
Riders on Home of
Heroes.com website at http://www.homeofheroes.com/wallofhonor/spanish_am/08_roughriders.html)
----------------------------------
* Arthur MacArthur,
Jr.,
was awarded the MOH for bravery in combat in the Civil War.
He was finally awarded the Medal (in 1890) for that service. His
son, Army General Douglas
MacArthur, was awarded the MOH
for bravery in World War II for conspicuous leadership in
preparing the Philippine Islands to resist conquest, for gallantry
and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty in action
against invading Japanese forces, and for the heroic conduct of
defensive and offensive operations on the Bataan Peninsula.
Sources:
Home of Heroes.com website
(MOH citation and photos) at http://www.homeofheroes.com
Theodore Roosevelt and the Rough
Riders on Home of
Heroes.com website at http://www.homeofheroes.com/wallofhonor/spanish_am/08_roughriders.html
Theodore Roosevelt and the
Panama Canal , by David C. Hanson, Virginia Western Community
College, at http://www.vw.cc.va.us/vwhansd/HIS122/Teddy/TRCanal.html
Theodore Roosevelt: Lion in the
White House, by David C. Hanson, Virginia Western Community
College, at http://www.vw.cc.va.us/vwhansd/HIS122/Teddy/TR_Lion.html
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