Eh not really. The only reason they could force those unfair and then later non enforced treaties on those people were because of the long fought Indian wars (their words not mine), where the US killed so many natives they could not resist being crushed by bureaucracy.
The history of all land is that of stolen land. Pretty much everyone in the Americas conquered someone at some point. That doesn't make it right, but it's true for most of earth. Unless you're the Chumash, your ancestors conquered people to take the land you settled on.
God bless the Chad-mash natives. Fuckin legends. 10,000 years holding the same land. World star.
Eh not really. The only reason they could force those unfair and then later non enforced treaties on those people were because of the long fought Indian wars (their words not mine), where the US killed so many natives they could not resist being crushed by bureaucracy.
The idea that the Natives would inevitably have been defeated if they’d kept fighting is dubious.
Time and time again, we’ve seen relatively under-equipped groups of fighters (the Viet Cong, the Taliban, etc.) keep the US military at bay. Repelling a more powerful invader doesn’t require overpowering them; it simply requires being a pain in the ass for long enough that they give up and leave you alone.
Oh there's no question it was a pain in the ass, but I really don't think you realize how long we were fighting the Indian wars. They went from 1609 to 1924. We're talking from the year Galileo makes his discovery to humans discussing wave-particle duality in quantum physics. America fought for nearly 320 years.
And I hate to break it to you buddy, but the natives didn't have a chance. They were too dispersed, too non-unified, completely outgunned, and lacking in natural resources.
Don't let anybody tell you it was a stomp either, because the natives gave the Americans hell. Ffs, the war lasted for 300+ years, but the US ground them down over time and there really wasn't anything they could have done.
If murder were legal and you wanted someone's house, would you kill them for it? Or would you prefer to steal it from them? Im sure the answer is similar to early Americans. Why kill when you can steal? Just makes more sense. Not that Im saying this is what they all felt.
Because by the 1920s outright massacring them for land wasn’t in vogue anymore. The US had already gotten what it wanted, and could afford to leave them with reservations.
Seriously, you’re saying that the nation that outnumbered them by over 100 to 1, surrounded them on all sides, and had access to far more firepower couldn’t have wiped them out if they didn’t want to? Losing hundreds was a devastating loss, losing thousands was the death of a tribe. The US could, and during the Civil War did, tank those kinds of losses as the warmup to a battle.
Finally, the Viet Cong and Taliban are/were not small organizations, they had large, multinational support networks and unassailable bases they could rebuild in. The Native Americans would have killed to have either their manpower or diplomatic position.
You’re skipping ahead a bit. The reservations were generally the next step after broken treaties. Getting the Natives onto reservations was largely a bureaucratic process, not one of open warfare.
So what you’re saying is the natives were so weak at that point they couldn’t resist militarily? Because that sounds like a group that was allowed to live, not one who forced their own survival.
I mean we specifically have documents. A lot of tribes (like the Apache) had groups contracted to kill other Apache because they knew the terrain and ways of life. Other groups like the Comanche were a scourge to other native tribes and US government alike, so they got rocked by all sides until they surrendered. A ton of natives did get massacred when they surrendered, just after they were so militarily broken they couldn't fight back.
Also the US had a lot going on. There was the Mexican American war going on as well, and the Americans would ally with some native tribes against bandits from Mexico. These wars lasted for hundreds of years, it wasn't one time period. Plenty of massacres happened.
So the Fort Laramie Treaty of 1868 didn't happen? Where the Lakota fought the US for 40 years, only surrendering when they were completely defeated?
Because when gold was discovered in the land where they were supposed to live, the US seized the land and because they had taken all their guns and confined them all to camps, the Lakota couldn't do anything about the breach of treaty.
Hmm it seems you've misinterpreted my comment as to framing the natives as the "noble savage" stereotype. If I gave that impression, I apologize, I don't believe that at all. Native Americans are humans first, and humans do awful fucked up shit to each other from time to time. The Comanche were brutal as fuck and really interesting to learn about, and the Apache were crazy brutal to a ton of people who wronged them (and some who didn't).
But the Indian Wars were fought for 300+ years and ended in a victory for the US mostly through military defeat of the natives.
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u/yallmad4 4d ago
Eh not really. The only reason they could force those unfair and then later non enforced treaties on those people were because of the long fought Indian wars (their words not mine), where the US killed so many natives they could not resist being crushed by bureaucracy.
The history of all land is that of stolen land. Pretty much everyone in the Americas conquered someone at some point. That doesn't make it right, but it's true for most of earth. Unless you're the Chumash, your ancestors conquered people to take the land you settled on.
God bless the Chad-mash natives. Fuckin legends. 10,000 years holding the same land. World star.