It’s easy to regard Spain as an obsolete feudal power—the Sick Man of the Caribbean. But Spain had a sizable and seasoned imperial army. Its 200,000 troops in Cuba, 30,000 in the Philippines, and 8,000 in Puerto Rico easily outnumbered the 25,000 officers and men that the United States had on hand on the eve of the war. McKinley hastily inflated the army to some 275,000 troops, but it reached that size only at the end of the war, well after the major battles had been won.
