• Identify the traditional impulses that shaped U.S. foreign policy in the half-century following the Civil War, as well as the new factors that increasingly prompted Americans to turn their gaze abroad.

• Discuss the causes and consequences of the Spanish-American War.

• Outline the arguments made around the turn of the century by both anti-imperialists and those who favored U.S. expansion overseas.

• Compare and contrast the diplomatic tactics used by the United States in various parts of the world, notably the Caribbean, Central and South America, the Pacific, and the Far East, and indicate any changes over time.

• Describe and assess the foreign policy approaches of Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, and Woodrow Wilson.

1866 Trans-Atlantic cable completed.

1867 United States purchases Alaska from Russia.

1868 Cuban nationalists launch war for independence.

1875 United States eliminates tariffs on Hawaiian sugar.

1887 United States acquires rights to use Pearl Harbor as a naval base.

1890 Alfred Thayer Mahan publishes The Influence of Sea Power Upon History.

1895 Venezuela Crisis.

1896 William McKinley defeats William Jennings Bryan for president.

Spain sends troops to Cuba; launches reconcentrado policy.

1898 Explosion of the Maine and start of the Spanish-American War.

Annexation of Hawaii.

Anti-Imperialist League formed.

1899 Filipino nationalists declare war on the United States.

Secretary of State John Hay sends his first "Open Door Note."

1900 Foraker Act declares Puerto Rico an "unincorporated territory" of the United States.

China’s Boxer Rebellion prompts Hay’s second "Open Door Note."

President McKinley wins reelection.

1901 Platt amendment grants Cuba independence, with strings attached.

Supreme Court rules in the Insular Cases.

Assassination of President McKinley; Teddy Roosevelt becomes president.

1902 Most Filipino rebels surrender to the United States.

1903 Panama declares independence.

1904 Senate approves construction of the Panama Canal.

President Roosevelt issues the Roosevelt Corollary.

1905 President Roosevelt mediates the Russo-Japanese War.

1907 The "Gentlemen’s Agreement" ends Japanese immigration to the United States.

1913 Completion of the Panama Canal.

1914 American forces occupy Vera Cruz, Mexico.

1915 United States sends marines into Haiti; occupation lasts until 1934.

1916 United States sends marines into the Dominican Republic.

Punitive Expedition pursues Pancho Villa into Mexico.

1917 Puerto Ricans become citizens of the United States.