1855 United States Tycoon

By the end of 1897, because the situation in Cuba was further out of control, gunshots could now be heard in Havana from time to time. The crisp sound of "pop, pop" is the sound of rifle shooting, "suddenly", this is the sound of submachine guns, sometimes there will be the explosion of hand grenade, or even the heavy chant of the cannon. .

Under these conditions, the merchants who originally did business in Havana and the United States residents living in Cuba began to leave Cuba and return to the United States. So today the port of Havana is full of people.

...

Because of his great contributions in formulating the Fed’s plan, William McKinley received a large amount of political donations during the presidential election. Relying on the campaign funds that exceeded the Democratic opponents by as much as three times, William McKinley’s At that time, he became the president smoothly. In return for supporting him, both Scrooge and Morgan put forward the same request to him:

"We need war!"

This requirement cannot be violated, although Mr. President publicly declared during his campaign: oppose all unjust wars! However, from that time on, not only President William McKinley, but even everyone in his campaign team knew that this was just the language of the campaign. There is no war during the term of office. Is this still the President of United States?

And obviously, the war has no time to delay, because Spain is obviously unable to withstand the Cuban insurgents. With regard to the information obtained by the United States government, the Spanish have proposed to the Cuban Rebel Army a proposal to give Cuba a high degree of autonomy. According to this proposal, the autonomy that Cuba can obtain is not much different from that of the Transvaal Republic. But even this proposal was rejected with contempt by the insurgents. They quoted Patrick Henry's famous quote and replied: "You give me freedom or die!" They said that they would completely drive the colonists out of Cuba without leaving any remnants. .

Of course, Cubans would say this, the main reason is that they feel that victory is already in sight. In their view, the total defeat of the Spaniards is only a matter of time. Under such circumstances, why should they compromise with those damn Spaniards? The sentence "I would rather die" at this time should probably be interpreted as: If there is no complete freedom and independence, we would rather kill you all!

So now the United States people must start the war immediately, because if they don’t do anything, the Cubans themselves will solve the problem. In this case, the United States people, including Scrooge and Morgan, can get much less benefit in this process, but how to start the war is a problem. The principle of war in United States has always been to be so-and-so, and to build an archway. So although everyone is thinking "I can't allow others to snore on the side of my bed", there are not many people who are willing to speak honestly like Zhao Kuangyin. A suitable reason is naturally essential.

In the original history, the people of United States started the war on the pretext of the USS Maine incident. How the Maine sank has not been definitive, but it is certain that it was definitely not done by the Spaniards. Now that the Maine is in the Pacific, it is naturally impossible to count on it. Therefore, United States urgently needs an excuse.

...

In the port of Havana, the passenger ship Caribbean Pearl is embarking on passengers. Groups of people fleeing the war — some from United States, some from Spain, and some from Cuban — flocked to the boat. Originally, according to the regulations, only United States nationals could board the ship, but now there are too many people who want to flee Cuba, such as Spaniards who ran over to make a fortune, such as Cubans who have worked with the Spanish. They all know that if the Cubans win, they will never have any good results. So they will also find various ways to get on the boat. Of course, the captain and crew of the Caribbean Pearl are very welcome to such a request. As long as they can come up with the money, they are naturally not opposed to making a fortune easily. So a large number of non-nationals also boarded the ship.

Of course, these people have no good place to stay, they are all squeezed into the bottom silo. (Especially those Cubans who pay less) These people dragged large and small boxes, bags, etc., and squeezed into the bottom of the black hole. Then the springboard was lowered and the ship started to anchor.

But at this moment, with a sudden bang, the boat suddenly jumped up from the sea. The red-painted bottom of the boat, and the barnacles attached to the bottom of the boat, and the splashing sea water gleamed in the sun. Brilliance. However, shortly afterwards, the ship broke in two and sank to the bottom of the sea.

The entire port suddenly became chaotic. The battleship New York, which was originally responsible for protecting the expatriates, immediately rose to fire and anchored. The armors on the eight 12-inch cannons were also retreated and turned to point to the Spanish coastal defense turrets.

...

The Caribbean Pearl sank so fast that people had no time to react. On the entire ship, except for a few sailors who were thrown into the sea by the explosion, the rest, nearly a thousand passengers and nearly a hundred crew members were all killed. This disaster immediately caused an uproar in United States.

First, some newspapers began to accuse the Spaniards of unfavorable rescue.

"The ship sank in a Spanish port. There were so many people on the ship, but only a few people were rescued. We can't help asking why the Spanish reacted so slowly..."

Then more "details" were exposed:

"The Spaniards didn't really rescue them at all. They even applauded the shipwreck!" The Sun newspaper first made such a report, accompanied by a photo with the back of the photo showing the shipwreck. The main part of the photo is a guy who looks like an official in a port officer's uniform, facing the camera with a disgusting smile like an idiot.

Although all United States people know that if the Sun’s report is reliable, the sows will go up the tree and Judah can be canonized as a saint. But it can't be covered by other people's pictures and the truth. The photos are actually placed here.

Of course, ordinary people don’t know. Although there is no PS technology that can change the day, it is not impossible to synthesize a photo with a few knives, brushes, and some other negatives. Possible thing. At least, in the Cleveland University Laboratory, this kind of technology has long been nothing new.

Then there were more and more various kinds of unfavorable news for the Spaniards. Two more days later, the New York Times, pay attention. This is the New York Times, which has always been known for paying attention to facts and never talking nonsense. A report claimed that well-informed sources told them that the Caribbean Pearl was sunk by the Spaniards!

Although this statement seems completely illogical, because everyone can see the situation of the Spaniards, how dare they provoke United States if they don't even have the strength to deal with the insurgents? But what is the media used for? Isn't it used to fool the people? If they can't even fool the common people, what are they going to do?

Besides, ordinary people at home and abroad in ancient and modern times are very stupid and can easily be deceived. Not to mention the end of the nineteenth century, even in the twenty-first century, there are still a lot of fools who believe that a serf system that combines politics and religion is a peaceful Sage that advocates freedom. And if anyone tries to tell him the truth, he will yell at you: "You stupid bird, you have been brainwashed!" Or: "You die, you have the truth, but do you have a conscience?" Don't thank you for taking five cents!" The most shameful thing about being a person is that they always say that, but they never really come up with fifty cents, not even five cents. This is really, really like a certain executive who clearly owes me 10,000 yuan for SU-35 but refuses to take it out. It is as unbearable.

In short, as the prestigious New York Times took the lead in spreading rumors, other newspapers naturally followed up quickly, so it didn't take long for the entire United States to have only one voice left: "Tell the Spanish for justice!" In fact, It’s not that no one doubted this incident. Many years later, a reporter mentioned this in his memoirs:

"At the time, I said, Editor-in-Chief Bill:'Why did the Spaniards attack a passenger ship? This is no good. If it is really set underwater, why not install it under the battleship New York? Wasn’t the impact of sinking the New York even bigger? Although the Spaniards are all bastards, they don’t look like such silly fools. I think this should be just an accident, but the Spaniard’s rescue operation is really... '

And the editor-in-chief Bill said to me: ‘young man, what you think is not unreasonable, but we can’t express this idea. Because this idea may be correct in fact, but it is politically wrong. If such an article is published, we will all be regarded as traitors unless we are, and the newspaper itself will be abandoned by the readers. ’"

Some enthusiastic youths even went straight to the White House to demonstrate, shouting: "War! We need war!" Of course, when it was five o'clock in the afternoon, when it was time to go home from work, these youths would accept it. Their flags will be scattered separately, and the people who take the lead will gather together, and then one of them will take out a pocket and take out some shiny things out of it, and then everyone will be very happy and satisfied. Went home.

...

"This is a great opportunity," said President William McKinley. "Tomorrow we will release the official survey results and issue an ultimatum to them!"

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