“The Iraq war bears an eerie resemblance to the Spanish-American war,” writes the columnist of the New York Times in a dispatch disparaging our partner Conrad Black. In parentheses the columnist adds, “There was never any evidence linking Spain to the Maine’s demise.” The lack of clear evidence with respect to the sinking of the Maine, which took place in Havana harbor on February 15, 1898, was apparent to many, pitting the big broadsheets like the Times and the paper whose flag we fly, the Sun, against the yellow press. But that didn’t mean the government — or the broadsheets — failed to exercise judgment in favor of action, which the Times did in an editorial of March 29, 1898, after the government commission concluded that the Maine had been sunk by “the explosion of a submarine mine”

“That is to say, the destruction was not an accident,” the Times thundered, “but a deliberately organized massacre. It was carried out by means not ordinarily within the control of private persons. If a fanatical Spaniard had taken a rifle and from a boat or from the shore had killed one of the officers or men on the Maine’s deck, it would be easy to believe that his act was all his own, and that nobody but himself was responsible for it. But this is a very different case. The preparation, placing, and explosion of a machine able to destroy a ship like the Maine involved a conspiracy. Such a massacre required long premeditation, expensive preparations, and a considerable number of accomplices.”

The Times editorial writers grew sarcastic in their derision of those who would not draw the obvious conclusion. “A submarine mine,” it said, “is an engine of war exclusively. It can have no peaceful use. It is not within the reach of any private person. No dealer has such a thing ‘in stock.’ It is doubtful whether there is any citizen in Havana capable of constructing one. A private person or a private association has no more use for a powerful submarine mine than for a battery of artillery or an armored cruiser. It is not an article of commerce. Governments may buy guns or even battleships, but submarine mines are made as they are wanted, in the ordnance department of armies.”

“Neither the appliances for their construction nor the experience and skill required to construct them are to be easily found, except in the military or naval services. An equal or greater degree of experience and skill is needed to direct them successfully against the object intended to be destroyed, and to insure the explosion at the right time. These qualities are not to be expected among civilians. To be sure of finding them it will be necessary to employ experts. The only experts are professional military or naval officers who are also specialists in the use of explosives. In the case of the Maine the care and skill with which the explosion was arranged in all its details are attested by its complete and unqualified success.”

In conclusion, the Times made it clear that the burden was on the doubters of Spain’s guilt. The presumptions in the government’s report, it said, could be repelled by positive evidence that the destruction of the Maine was caused by some other persons than those who usually possess the means of destroying her as she was destroyed. “But it is only by such evidence that they can be repelled,” the Times said. And it made clear that it reckoned the questions raised by the report of the government board of inquiry that looked into the sinking of the Maine were questions “for Spain to answer.”

Those were the days when even the opposition party in America was prepared, in an ambiguous situation, to put the burden of proof on America’s enemies. The congressional votes to underwrite the war against Spain were overwhelmingly in favor. And they had the support of the Times, which quoted admiringly the message of Congressman Dolliver of Iowa, who reckoned the real crime in Cuba was not the sinking of the Maine but Spain’s tyranny on the island, which, “within sight of our own shores, has turned the fairest landscape on earth into a hideous spectacle of cruelty and torture.”

Said the congressman of the impending regime change: “The Nation of America, in the fear of God, counting all the cost, exacts from Spain indemnity in full for the abuses of the past. Not the spoil of subjugated provinces, but the emancipation of an oppressed race; not the ransom of besieged cities, but the nobler satisfaction of raising the flag of a free commonwealth to keep watch with tender gratitude forever above the dust of the unforgotten heroes of the Maine.” Neither President Bush nor Secretary Rumsfeld nor Ahmad Chalabi could have put it better.