<P> "The White Man's Burden: The United States and the Philippine Islands" (1899), by Rudyard Kipling, is a poem about the Philippine--American War (1899--1902), in which he invites the United States to assume colonial control of that country . </P> <P> Originally, Kipling wrote the poem for the Diamond Jubilee celebration of Queen Victoria's reign (1837--1901), but it was exchanged for the poem "Recessional", also by Kipling . Later, he rewrote "The White Man's Burden" to address and encourage the American colonization of the Philippine Islands, a Pacific Ocean archipelago conquered from Imperial Spain, in the three - month Spanish--American War (1898). </P>

Who is being addressed in the white man's burden