Porto Rico was annexed at the close of the war, and Cuba
became a protectorate; the Canal Zone was a little later leased on
terms that amounted to practical annexation, and the Dominican Republic
came under the financial supervision of the United States; President
Wilson went further and assumed the administration of Haitian affairs,
leased from Nicaragua for a term of ninety-nine years a naval base on
Fonseca Bay, and purchased the Danish West Indies. As a result of this
rapid extension of American influence the political relations of the
countries bordering on the Caribbean will of necessity be profoundly
affected. Our Latin-American policy has been enlarged in meaning and
limited in territorial application so far as its newer phases are
concerned.

In 1904 President Roosevelt made a radical departure from our
traditional policy in proposing that we should assume financial
supervision over the Dominican Republic in order to prevent certain
European powers from forcibly collecting debts due their subjects.
Germany seemed especially determined to force a settlement of her
demands, and it was well known that Germany had for years regarded the
Monroe Doctrine as the main hindrance in the way of her acquiring a
foothold in Latin America. The only effective method of collecting the
interest on the foreign debt of the Dominican Republic appeared to be
the seizure and administration of her custom houses by some foreign
power or group of foreign powers. President Roosevelt foresaw that
such an occupation of the Dominican custom houses would, in view of the
large debt, constitute the occupation of American territory by European
powers for an indefinite period of time, and would, therefore, be a
violation of the Monroe Doctrine. He had before him also the results
of a somewhat similar financial administration of Egypt undertaken
jointly by England and France in 1878, and after Arabi's revolt
continued by England alone, with the result that Egypt soon became a
possession of the British crown to almost as great a degree as if it
had been formally annexed, and during the World War it was in fact
treated as an integral part of the British Empire. President Roosevelt
concluded, therefore, that where it was necessary to place a bankrupt
American republic in the hands of a receiver, the United States must
undertake to act as receiver and take over the administration of its
finances. He boldly adopted this policy and finally forc