Believe it or not, the US has an imperialist past. Not in the sense that it was colonized by Britain and other European powers, but in the sense that it colonized other nations. Specifically, these countries were Puerto Rico (also sometimes known as its 51st state), Guam, and (you guessed it) the Philippines.
As I learned today in the Everything Everywhere Daily podcast, the US occupation of the Philippines (too many ‘the’s) occurred in 1898. The Southeast Asian nation had been fighting its Spanish overlords for 400 years. In the pivotal year of 1898, the Americans won their war against the Spaniards and asked for the Philippines to be transferred to them. In their minds, they were doing the morally right thing. So in their trademark self-righteous manner, they announced to the world about their grand plans to bring peace and prosperity to the deprived Pacific nation.
So the Philippines went from being a colony of the Spaniards to a colony of the Americans, which they would remain for the next 48 years!
Sorry America, you don’t really inspire goodness the way you think you do.