Spanish Conquests of Inca and Aztec Empires

Spanish Conquests of Inca and Aztec Empires

The Spaniard's conquest of Inca and Aztec Empires are two of the most important chapters regarding the history of colonization in Americas. After Christopher Columbus had discovered America in 1492, he was able to convince the European traders to see America as a land of great opportunity. Even though there were other European countries like France, England and Italy who were setting up colonies in the new world, Spaniards were initially the most successful of them all and the reason of it was Spanish was already able to gain of Control of Cuba which served as its base from where military activities were handled something which was not enjoyed by the colonies set in North Section of Americas where Dutch, French, Italian and English were continuously fighting to save established colonies from each other.

The Cuban governor Diego Velazquez de Cuellar, sent an expedition to explore three ships to explore the Yucatan Peninsula under the leadership of Hernandez de Cordoba. This expedition was unsuccessful as the Spaniards who had conquered Cuba were not successful and then the governor Cuellar sent another expedition which indeed was quite successful in its expedition of Yucatan Peninsula. There were skirmishes at first with the locals but soon the Spaniards change their policy of total annihilation towards that of an alliance with the local tribes. (see below)

The conquest of Aztec Empire started in 1519 (Williamson, 1993), the people of Aztec who spoke Nahutal language were quite superstitious in their way of life; Brian Diaz in "The Truthful History of the Conquest of New Spain" writes that there were at least 8 omens which happened prior to the conquest Spaniards after which the people of Aztec knew that an invading force will attack them sooner or later. Although there have been historian who disowned the case of 8 omens nonetheless there are still who are quite convinced about such omens occurring, considering there were no contacts with that part of the land to either assume it to be true or consider it to be false.

The conquest of Inca Empire started in 1527; (Williamson, 1993) the reason for its triumph lies in the successful collaboration of conquistadores and their native allies. Prior to the invasion there was a civil war that had already destroyed the Inca Empire and the wrath of this civil war helped the Spaniards to easily take control of the Inca Empire. Spain used classical war doctrines of annihilation and was able to slaughter entire entities to intimidate their enemies because of relatively advanced military style warfare of which the Incan Army was not match but in the long run preferred.. (Williamson, 1993)

Another blow to the Inca Empire was the introduction of small pox by Europeans which greatly destroyed and caused the deaths of Incan leadership and citizens. (Williamson, 1993)The Spanish did bore the pain of small pox but for the Incan residents this caused a major crisis as the threat of Spanish attack and epidemic at the same time was too much to handle for the local residents. Even then Spanish policies of forming alliances are what gave the Spaniards an upper hand which proved the reason of ultimate triumphancy of Spaniards. (Conquistadors, 2002)

The basic strategy of Spain was to eliminate or at least capture the leaders of Inca Empire. This was a part of the plan to intimidate the locals not to supporting their leaders. After a year of small skirmishes and military evaluation, Spaniards under the leadership of Francisco Pizarro ambushed Sapa Inca Atahualpa who was the undisputed emperor of Inca Empire in the Battle of Cajamarca. This battle established the might of Spain which at the time was the mightiest empire in Americas and furthered demolished the moral of natives of Inca Empire who just came out of devastating Civil War (Conquistadors, 2002).