Havana Cuba. – In the second decade of the 19th century, John Quincy Adams, then Secretary of State of the United States, made clear his country’s interest in annexing Cuba. The official argued a series of reasons why, one way or another, the archipelago should be part of the American Union. The geographical situation of the largest of the Antilles was, by itself, a sufficient reason to seek its control by the nascent empire. To this would be added other incentives, such as the good land, the proximity and the nature of its people.
However, it was not until 1848 that President James Polk, through his ambassador to Spain, Romulus Mitchell Saunders, made a juicy offer to the Crown: 100 million dollars for the Island of Cuba. The proud metropolis, which was losing its dominance in the American continent shaken by the wars of independence, clung to its small possessions, especially Cuba, which it considered the jewel of the Caribbean due to its enviable geographical position, right at the entrance to the Gulf of Mexico.
Although Spain would persist in its refusal, the offers continued to arrive. James Polk was a tenacious politician, regarded as the last strong president of the pre-Conquest era. Civil war. During his four-year term (1845-1849) he achieved all the national and international objectives that he had set for himself, resorting to dialogue and negotiation, or by force, in case these did not work out.
To cite an example: when Mexico rejected the annexation of Texas to the United States, Polk led the invasion that wrested from the Aztec nation all of what is now known as the Southwest of the American Union, and which represents almost half of the Mexican territory until so.
With Cuba he did not have the same luck. The United States had to wait another 50 years to intervene in the Spanish-Cuban War. Although the annexation was not achieved, the bases of political, economic and commercial relations between the Island and the American Union were created.
