I'd feel this way if we didn't see similar situations happening fairly frequently in the conquest.
The difference between OTL and a good ATL is that the ATL has to be plausible.
I'd feel this way if we didn't see similar situations happening fairly frequently in the conquest.
The main thrust of the argument was meant to be that the English if they did invade are likely to have to have the help of native allies to achieve an early victory like the Spanish did on OTL (The Spanish did occupy Tenochtitlan early on, but only by seizing Moctezuma and holding him hostage. They were later thrown out, so I don't think that was the victory people portray it as. To me the real victory came later at the siege of Tenohctitlan which destroyed the Aztecs.) without a much larger force than Cortez's. It is clear to me now looking back at it that my comments weren't clear to you that this was the point. I am sorry.What makes you think the English can't do deals with the Aztecs' enemies just as easily as Cortes did?
No he didn't conquer an empire with 400 soldiers. Cortez held the capital city of a loose empire hostage by holding the Emperor hostage after being invited in by him, then was thrown out of the city by a rebellion. Then to recapture Tenochtitlan he had to go back with an army of tens of Thousands of natives (plus Narvaez's troops) and then hold a siege for months. The conquest of the rest of the empire lasted for another couple of decades and that only after the overwhelming destruction of an independent coordinated defense and the arrival of man more Spanish. Yes, the English could have repeated this feat, but much of it had to do with luck (his path just happening to meet the Tlaxcallans, being able to ally with them, then him being able to capture Moctezuma and a host of other implausible things)Cortes and his group of what 400 soldiers conquered an empire of millions. I'm going to throw it out there that ANY european country would be able to repeat the feat.
I have no idea about what England would be likely to do in this situation, but I do think (that as above) It would likely beharder to conquer the Aztecs as fast as the Spanish if they choose to invade.The English merchants realize just how backward these peoples' weapons are, reports are relayed back to the English metropolitan, and some of the Hispaniola or Cuba English garrison invades Mexico.
See, I wasn't assuming that the English would just invade and succeed in the invasion as quickly as the Spanish did, and might therefore choose to trade. if they did conquer it then obviously yes they wouldn't trade with the Inca. I was only responding to some people's thoughts that the Inca would be better trade partners than the Aztecs.The Spanish didn't trade with the locals because they realized that they could just conquer the locals. Trading requires you giving the locals stuff, while the better option is just killing some of them and stealing their trade goods (i.e. gold and silver).
Cortez didn’t really conquer the Aztecs using a few hundred men. He actually had tens upon tens of thousands of Mesoamerican Indians on his side. If you take the situation and turn it sideways and squint a little bit you can say that Cortez was the determining factor on who won an ongoing civil war. His adventure almost failed at several junctures and is an amazing and unlikely success. Please; lets stop with the "If the Cortez could do it, any one could" talk.
As mentioned up-thread, the recoquista gave early 16th century Spain a very different character than other nations. During the Recinquista local nobles, acting on their own, would organise military groups (perhaps not large enough to be called armies) to take nearby land. They enticed others to join their cause with the lure of spoils and promise of titles. These engagements were done with out the approval of or even knowledge of the king (much less financing from the king). If the effort failed, that failure was its own punishment. But if they succeeded they then received authorization for their actions, provided they gave 1/5 spoils and future revenue to the crown. This was a no-lose situation for the king. The Castilian tradition then encouraged small military groups to act on their own initiative. They were used to acting without prior authority, to being motivated by spoils, to organizing themselves and so on. This is exactly the behavior they continued when they reached the New World. Most of the famed Spanish expeditions were actually failures, and very few of them were financed by the crown. England had plenty of soldiers, but they did not have the same Reconquista traditions.
It is interesting that both England and the Castilians both used "settlement strategies" in the New World. Actions in the New world that came from other areas (southern coast of Spain, Genoa, France, Dutch for example) often used a "mercantile strategy". Time proved the "settlement strategy" to be much more successful. So even though England lacked the tradition of the Reconquesta they were probably the group second most likely to succeed in the Caribbean.
The English tended to want land to settle. If Indians were already on that land, then the English moved them out. This is not very nice, to be sure, but it is also very different from the things the Conquistadors did. The English would probably settle Espanolia (or whatever they chose to call it), grow sugar and develop a need for slaves. Slowly they would expand, pushing locals out as needed.
To be sure, a huge amount of silver and gold were gained from the conquest of the Aztecs, but the really massive amounts of wealth started flowing to Spain in 1530-1560 from the silver mines in Peru. In the 1560’s this already large amount quadrupled when new chemical techniques were developed for extracting silver. In the 16th century the amount doubled again. Lots and lots of money - but most of the "Aztec gold" was really silver from Peru. So the question may not be who conquers the Aztecs, but is who controls the mines in Peru.
Without this money Charles V would not be able to fend off the Turks to the east nor the Protestants to the North. We have been talking about what an English Columbus might do to the New World, but the changes to the Old World may be more staggering.
. . . but maybe not. Let’s imagine that Columbus’ first, and even his second, expedition follow the rout used in OTL. But then what? Spain would surly take note. They would send expedition of their own and make claims of their own. Due to geography, England would have a harder time with the colonies than Spain. Charles V also has more influence with the pope and his claims are more likely to ultimately be considered legitimate.
So we would have English settled on Espanola, and Spain would settle somewhere else (Cuba?). The Castilian Conquistadors would still get a base to stage their adventures and things would follow the rough same lines as OTL.
Maybe you need an different POD. One where the Reconquista is not over, and the Castilians are too distracted by local wars to become involved in the New World.
So obviously the Spanish just rolled total sixes twice. The Spanish system was so outrageously good at producing soldiers that it produced the diplomatic-military geniuses of both Cortes and Pizarro. I don't buy that. I think that the history shows that the arrival of Old World diseases combined with pre-existing political conflict among the natives, made the Aztec Empire very unstable. Cortes arrived at a particularly good time, and conquered the whole thing before the Aztec Empire had a chance to fly apart, so maybe a different European power takes longer to take over, but take over they will. Not once in the history of Native American resistance were the natives able to hold out in the long-term against the Europeans.
The new Maya on the Yucatan held out for a couple of centuries, the Mapuche held out for 350 years or so. If this isn’t "long-term" then we don’t yet know if the USA will become a major power in the "long-term".Not once in the history of Native American resistance were the natives able to hold out in the long-term against the Europeans.
Well these "small units" had hundreds of men or thousands of men in them - similar to the size of expeditions in the New World.So the soldiers were trained to be good small unit fighters. That must have come in handy when commanding those armies of tens of thousands of Mesoamericans.