In 1905, seven senators, 23 congressmen, a future president of the United States and the daughter of the then sitting president, Theodore Roosevelt, embarked upon a three month diplomatic cruise to Asia which, or so Mr. Bradley argues in The Imperial Cruise, determined the course of American-Asian relations for the next 50 years. And yet, labelling the cruise an important event in American history does not do it justice. The breezy role call of luminaries aboard ship passes over the brightest star in that constellation, Alice Roosevelt, a young woman of such fame and fortune that she was often hailed as the American princess. And though the diplomatic mission visited Japan, Korea, China and the Philippines, cementing at each turn American policies that would change the future of the nation, it was Ms. Roosevelt who attracted the crowds in tens of thousands who flocked to see the spirited, first daughter of a nation that would come to dominate the century ahead.
Though Alice Roosevelt's fingerprints are all over Mr Bradley's tale, his broader theme, that President Roosevelt's Aryan belief in white, Christian superiority was the driving force behind his belligerence towards Asia, is startling. A great deal of research has clearly gone into supporting this contention and the weight of Mr. Bradley's findings largely convince. Yet something of the claim feels a little too neat, a little too tidy. We sometimes reach for elaborate reasons to explain incomprehensible events when arrogance and a sense of self-importance will do well enough.
Mr. Bradley has chronicled a remarkable three months in American history and, in doing so, goes into some detail of the American war with the Philippines and the recent, cultural developments in Japan and Korea. This is an excellent piece of non-fiction that could've been 50 pages longer. Some of the foreign dignitaries and leaders encountered by our American delegates have been given quite short shrift. (4/5 Stars)
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