It’s hard to fight a more technologically advanced invader when your 30 to 50% of your population is dying in a short period.
Lord knows they were almost wiped out by the ensuing diseases and brutality, but the Spaniards wouldn't even have gotten a toe-hold if it hadn't been for their superiority in arms. Even after Montezuma wised up about the new Quetzalcoatl, his troops still couldn't win. Plus, I think their method of combat was more one-on-one compared to the organized Spaniards.
The Aztecs were largely overthrown by other Indians they had oppressed, but the Incas are a much more clear case of the lethal combination of Guns, Germs and Steel. (To coin a phrase.)
Good phrase. That conquest amazed me. Lucky for Pizarro he came in in the middle of a civil war and played each side against the other. But just look at our own Indian wars - as long as we had muzzleloaders the Indians held their own. When breechloaders and repeaters came in, it was all over. Our locust-like numbers didn't help either.
The Spanish came from a dramatically more advanced society both technologically, and probably more importantly, socially and culturally.
A society that had produced Machiavelli was far more advanced politically than the God-King society of the Aztecs.
Technological surprise was a huge impact initially. As with all surprises, it loses effectiveness quickly. After the rapid initial rollover of the Meso and South American Empires, Spanish advance in other areas was much slower. In Chile, for instance, the Araucanians held them off for centuries, pushing them back in many cases, till the mid and late 19th century.
BTW, the Guns, Germs and Steel bit was a joke.
VERY big bestseller by that name. Interesting ideas, and at least he’s able to come up with a rationale why Europe won other than that the white man was meaner than everybody else.
But he’s still a little too PC and doesn’t leave enough territory for the social and cultural differences between societies and how these non-material factors effect their ability to defend themselves.