Fr. World Future Fund: The Death Toll in the Philippines during the Spanish-American War of 1898: The overall cost in human lives of American actions in the Philippines was horrific. One scholar has concluded concerning the American occupation that "In the fifteen years that followed the defeat of the Spanish in Manila Bay in 1898, more Filipinos were killed by U.S. forces than by the Spanish in 300 years of colonization. Over 1.5 million died out of a total population of 6 million."