What was long term cause of the Spanish-American war?
Probably the longest term cause of the SA War was the brutal treatment of Cuba by her Spanish overlords. The Cuban insurrection had been going on for many years before the war, and American opinion was slowly but surely turning against Spain. Hearst and his newspaper whipped the flames of public opinion culminating in the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana harbor, the spark that ignited the war.
