Carlson, Keith2024-08-132024-08-1319901990https://hdl.handle.net/1828/17390While America's role in the Philippine Islands had been controversial throughout half a century of colonial rule, seldom had policy debates reached the intensity witnessed in the final years before the granting of independence in 1946. In selecting the date for independence in the 1930's, American officials could not have predicted Japan's invasion of the islands or the United States's subsequent postwar global concerns. Resultingly, final American decisions regarding issues of Filipino collaboration with the Japanese and future Philippine-American economic relations became urgent concerns in the mid-1940's. The road to Philippine independence which had originally seemed so well engineered, now proved treacherous and intimidating. American policy regarding Philippine independence has been the subject of three distinct historical approaches. The first views America as a benevolent parent granting its maturing child considerable political freedom while gradually weaning it from economic dependency. The second far more cynical approach sees America's hesitation to completely remove war time collaborators from power as an expression of Washington's reactionary response to indigenous Filipino leftist elements and to the rising spectre of cold war communism. This school contends that the final economic arrangements calling for continued post-independence free trade were attempts by American business interests to perpetually subordinate the agrarian Philippine economy to that of the industrialized United States. Scholars of the third historical perspective, while not yet having looked at the specific issues surrounding independence, have generally contended America was never sufficiently interested in the Philippine Islands to consistently assist or exploit them. Rather America paid only cursory attention to its colony, leaving the traditional Philippine elite essentially free to shape events to their own advantage. In describing and analyzing American policies concerning Philippine independence, this study, while borrowing from all three historical approaches, will most closely resemble the third. However, while acknowledging that Washington's interest may have been cursory throughout the colonial period, this paper will argue that there were times, including the mid-1940's, when American officials became intimately involved in shaping Philippine policy. Due to the sporadic nature of this attention Americans were usually inclined to act within established political, cultural, and economic parameters, yet the role of major individuals could also be significant. Regarding the collaboration issue, the conflicts between General Douglas MacArthur (who selectively exonerated certain prominent puppet government figures) and Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes (who led the forces opposing all collaborators) will be examined. Specific attention will be paid to the hitherto ignored possibility that due to MacArthur's personality and to his prolonged exposure to the islands, the General's conduct was heavily influenced by dictates of Filipino culture. Concerning post-independence trade, American officials were forced to choose between rebuilding or recreating the war devastated Philippine economy. The precedent of colonial trade policy combined with a desire to rehabilitate the islands as quickly, humanly, and inexpensively as possible all helped influence the Truman administration's decision. Also, Philippine legislation would have to conform to the State Department's postwar policy of dismantling trading blocks and the administrations reluctance to antagonize powerful vested interests in the Cuban-American sugar market. Finally, much of American policy resulted from the confusing era in which it arose. Squeezed between the Second World War and the beginning of the Cold War, the issue of Philippine independence was often subordinated to more pressing domestic and global concerns.126 pagesAvailable to the World Wide WebThesis