European domination part II

Let’s start with what most people know about the conquest of America. The typical story told in the history books, is that the Europeans came and encountered the Native Americans in a “clash of civilizations”. The story goes on to claim that the fight was unfair because: the Native Americans respected mother earth, and were in harmony with nature, while the Europeans were cruel, racist, inhumane bastards, who were only out to enrich themselves, and subjugate or erradicate the indigenous populations. According to popular perceptions, the other reasons the Europeans took over were disease, and guns. The traditional textbooks would lead us to believe that if it wasn’t for smallpox, gunpowder and dishonesty, the Europeans would have had a difficult time conquering the continent.

Yes, disease and guns sped up the process of conquest. Yes, clever political maneuvering and some unnecessary cruelty may have been in place. However, what most people don’t realize is none of that was fundamental in determining the outcome of the encounter between the European invaders in the 1500s and their Native American contemporaries. Most people are aware that Europeans had a technological edge, but what they fail to realize is just HOW far behind the Americas were relative to the invaders.

So let’s start with North America first. Let's face it, in the XV-XVI centuries the greatest civilizations of North America were absolutely laughable in comparison to the invading powers. None of them had a writing system, and their greatest architectural achievements were large burial mounds. As my Chinese friend once remarked after visiting the Serpent Burial Mounds of Ohio "You call this a civilization?" With all due respect for their culture and harmonious living alongside with nature, these people weren't ready for their 15 minutes of fame on the world stage (let alone 5 centuries).

Then what about the Aztecs, the Maya or the Inca? Indeed against the backdrop of North American "civilizations", these could actually be called civilizations. They had a writing system, mathematics, astronomy, and stable systems of government, with the ability to control relatively large territories and resources. From what I know about the Maya and the Aztecs, they can be classified as "ancient civilizations", comparable to ancient Egyptians and the civilizations of Mesopotamia. They had no wheeled vehicles, no beasts of burden, and no iron weapons, using sophisticated "flint knives, stone axes, and very sharp cutting blades made from the volcanic rock obsidian". (LHAM, p.24). The Inca had domesticated the llama, and had a relatively impressive system of roads, but still had only stone weapons, no wheel, and instead of a writing system they only had a complex system of record-keeping called Quipu (source1) .
Thus, from the point of view of technology the American civilizations were at least 1000-2000 years behind the conquistadors. It's almost comparable to the Europeans trying to go back in time from the year 1500 to conquer the Roman empire at its height. Thus in the long run, the American civilizations were doomed when faced with the European invaders. Clearly, despite the overwhelming home-turf advantage despite the fact that the Aztec and Inca empires were at their height, it took only 50-100 years until the Spaniards were in control of most major cities (source2). To put things in perspective, that's only 1-2 generations to take over the most advanced civilizations present on the continent!

Now let's dig even deeper. Why were the American Civilizations so far behind in their development? I believe the answer lies in the fact that the American continents were settled considerably later than the Old World. The first humans only set foot on the American continent about 11000 B.C., and it took a while before they came across a set of climatic conditions that would force them to abandon their hunter-gatherer ways, develop agriculture, and complex societies. In the meantime, the Old World civilizations were already beginning to pop up. Here's a comparison chart for some of the important milestones in civilization development.

	Old World	New World
Domestication of plants	Middle East: 10000-8000 B.C., China: 10000 B.C.	Mesoamerica: 7000-5000 B.C.(LHAM, p.24)
First cities	Sumer (e.g. city of Ur) 2600 B.C.	Olmec (San Lorenzo): 1200 B.C. (LHAM, p.21)
First pyramids	Egypt 2700-2600 B.C.	Maya: 150 A.D (LHAM, p.21)
Writing system	Sumer 3500 B.C.	Maya: 200 A.D., Inca: never (only Quipu)
Invention of the wheel	Sumer 5000 B.C.	Never invented!!

As you can see, the foundations for the demise of the American civilizations in the hands of an Old World power had been laid long before the European conquests began. It wasn't the guns, nor was it the disease that brought the Americas down. It wasn't the weakness of the Aztec or Inca rulers, it wasn't the treachery of the Spanish conquistadors. It wasn't the cruelty of Andrew Jackson and Trail of Tears, regrettable as that event might be. It wasn't the naivette of the simple inhabitants of Manhattan, who sold it to the English for $24 (although that does foreshadow just how easy the conquest would have been). The grand battle of civilizations was decided thousands of years before that, it was just a matter of time before the Americas fell.

References:
LHAM: "The Lost History of the Aztec and the Maya", author: Charles Phillips with consultant Dr. David M. Jones
Wikipedia (see specific links)

P.S. I use Wikipedia mostly to confirm the knowledge from other, sources, such as textbooks on history and anthropology. I no longer have access to some of those textbooks, so I cannot site them here.