Loading…
History · book
American Datu
John J. Pershing and Counterinsurgency Warfare in the Muslim Philippines, 1899–1913
- Publisher
- University Press of Kentucky
- Year
- 2020
- Language
- English
- Pages
- 376
- ISBN
- 9780813178936
- Availability
- In print
Still in print: the link goes to a shop that sells it.
About the book
Pershing’s years among the Maranao and in Sulu, as a captain at Lake Lanao and as governor of the Moro Province, and the mix of diplomacy and force he learned there.
This book follows John J. Pershing's years in the southern Philippines between 1899 and 1913, through his military campaigns among the Moros. Ronald K. Edgerton shows how American ideas of counterinsurgency changed in the first long military encounter between the United States and Muslim fighters.
Pershing put less weight on so-called civilising efforts. He built relationships with local Moro leaders and took part in Moro customs, and Moros made him a datu. Edgerton argues that he came to see that no single method fits every place, and that tactics must suit local conditions. The press notes that the book gives voice to Filipino Muslims in their dealings with American officers, and sets Pershing's approach against harsher calls for force. The author also calls for a rethink of more invasive methods used by US officers against Muslim militants today.
Edgerton is professor emeritus of history at the University of Northern Colorado. He lived in the Philippines as a Peace Corps volunteer and a Fulbright scholar, and wrote People of the Middle Ground, a history of central Mindanao.
From kentuckypress.com.
HistoryColonial periodWar and conflict
Cover from Open Library, shown to identify the book; its rights stay with the publisher.
More by Ronald K. Edgerton
2008In print
People of the Middle GroundRonald K. Edgerton
A hundred years in the Bukidnon–Lanao borderlands, where Maranao, Lumad, settlers and the state met and sometimes made terms.
On the same shelf
1973In print
Muslims in the PhilippinesCesar Adib Majul
The standard history of the Muslim peoples of the Philippines: the coming of Islam, the sultanates of Sulu and Maguindanao, and three centuries of Spanish wars against them, told from the Moro side of the record. Reissued by the University of the Philippines Press in 1999.
1985Out of print
The Contemporary Muslim Movement in the PhilippinesCesar Adib Majul
Majul’s short account of the Moro struggle of the 1970s and the rise of the Moro National Liberation Front, written for readers abroad.
1905Free to read
Studies in Moro History, Law, and ReligionNajeeb M. Saleeby
The first English account of Maguindanao’s genealogies and of the law codes and Islam of Maguindanao and Sulu, translated by an American colonial official who read the originals. Out of copyright and free to read.
1908Free to read
The History of SuluNajeeb M. Saleeby
Sulu from its earliest written genealogies to the American arrival, drawn from the sultanate’s own documents, Spanish records and the author’s years in Jolo. Out of copyright and free to read.
1977Out of print
Mandate in MorolandPeter G. Gowing
How the United States ruled the Moro Province and the Department of Mindanao and Sulu, from the Bates Treaty to the start of Filipinization, from the records of the men who governed. Reprinted by New Day in 1983.
1979Out of print
Muslim Filipinos: Heritage and HorizonPeter G. Gowing
A general introduction to the Muslim peoples of the Philippines, their history, faith and institutions and their place in the republic, written for Filipino readers from the Dansalan Research Center in Marawi.