Combat· Banana Wars
Cuba 1912 Negro Rebellion suppression
A protective deployment to eastern Cuba during a violent racial uprising.
In the spring and summer of 1912 the Partido Independiente de Color, a party of Afro-Cubans excluded from political life, rose in revolt in the eastern provinces, and the United States landed Marines, several hundred strong, who occupied a couple of dozen towns around Santiago and Guantánamo to protect American sugar properties and the railroads. The Marines' role was protective, guarding the estates and the rail lines and overawing disorder, rather than suppressing the rising themselves; that grim work was done by the Cuban army, which crushed the rebellion with great slaughter, killing thousands of Afro-Cubans. The Marine losses were minimal. The deployment was characteristic of the recurring American interventions in Cuba under the Platt Amendment, the landing of a protective force to shield American economic interests whenever the island's politics turned violent.
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Record no. 507