I have discussed this before, and as a shortcut I will post this, which is a thread on the topic of colonialism. In it I comment on how Spain’s colonization of the Philippines became a different sort of situation than their colonization of the Americas. As well, the Philippines was really, aside from resource extraction, a potential access to China for the Spanish. In this much longer, multipart comment, I discuss much more in-depth some of the concepts I mentioned above. More on actual policy by the Spanish.