Muslims in the Philippines

The Moros had a history of resistance against Spanish, American, and Japanese rule for 400 years. The origin of the war between the Moros and Christian Filipinos during the Spanish colonization of the Philippines.[citation needed] During the Spanish–Moro conflict, Spain repeatedly tried to conquer the Moro Sultanate of Sulu, Sultanate of Maguindanao, and the Confederation of sultanates in Lanao. The violent armed struggle against the Japanese, Filipinos, Spanish, and Americans is considered by current Moro Muslim leaders to be part of a four-century-long "national liberation movement" of the Bangsamoro (Moro Nation). The 400-year-long resistance against the Japanese, Americans, and Spanish by the Moro Muslims persisted and morphed into their current war for independence against the Philippine state.

The root of the conflict originates in the Spanish and American wars against the Moros.

Following the Spanish–American War in 1898, another conflict sparked in southern Philippines between the revolutionary Muslims in the Philippines and the United States military that took place between 1899 and 1913. Filipinos opposed foreign rule from the United States, which claimed the Philippines as its territory. On 14 August 1898, after defeating Spanish forces, the United States had established a military government in the Philippines under General Wesley Merritt as Military Governor. American forces took control from the Spanish government in Jolo on 18 May 1899, and at Zamboanga in December 1899. Brigadier General John C. Bates was sent to negotiate a treaty with the Sultan of Sulu, Jamalul Kiram II. Kiram was disappointed by the American takeover, as he expected to regain sovereignty after the defeat of Spanish forces in the archipelago. Bates' main goal was to guarantee Moro neutrality in the Philippine–American War, and to establish order in the southern Philippines. After some negotiation, the Bates Treaty was signed which was based on an earlier Spanish treaty. The Bates Treaty did ensure the neutrality of the Muslims in the south, but it was actually set up to buy time for the Americans until the war in the north ended. After the war, in 1915, the Americans imposed the Carpenter Treaty on Sulu.