European Domination of New Worlds

Conquest is an extremely violent thought, to subjugate and assume control of a group of people and their land with military force. It’s hard to imagine a large following, much less countries, that support imposing brute force onto strangers. Given that conquest is violent, why did Europeans conquer the Americas as they did? The Europeans followed the belief of Christianity, which forbids such massacres and hate, how could they have conquered and killed? Many, like Jared Diamond, promote the idea that it was pure geographical luck which granted Europe easier diffusion of knowledge; metal weapons and political organization which were more advanced. However, this idea becomes problematic because it assumes that no matter the inhabitants of the more fortunate land, conquest would have happened because of predetermined facts like geography. With this argument, one could say Natives would have conquered Europeans or that they would have been able to defend from their conquest if they had the same or better geographical luck. I believe that geographic luck is not enough to enable the conquest of the Americas. I want to argue that the major reasons behind the European conquest of the Americas were largely in their motivation to gain riches to boost their economy and the justification of their conquest by disguising themselves as saviors to the Native Americans.

Europeans brought diseases to the Americas, such as smallpox and measles. The original descendants did not bring the diseases because they traveled through the cold and they had no domesticated animals. Many of these diseases were caused by domesticated animals. At

Many Native American’s died due to diseases, but the one who survived obtained many great things from the Columbian Exchange. The number of indians before the diseases of the New World killed most of the native population is disputed (Document 3). Though, it is known that a great fraction of them did die, but it was not from labor (Document 6). It is actually from diseases such as Measles and Smallpox. Since Indians had no immunity against these diseases they spread quickly, often devastating populations before conquistadors got to the villages (Document 7). The explorers unintendedly spread these silent killers throughout the New World because they were naive to the idea of contagion and cleanliness.

Disease was a major factor in the change of the Native American culture. When the Europeans came they brought diseases that the Native Americans immune systems had never faced before. These diseases wiped most of the Native Americans. Some of the diseases were Smallpox, measles, malaria, yellow fever. However there was one disease that was taken back to Europe, and that was Syphilis. The diseases brought to the New World weakened the Native American population so they were easier to conquer by people like Pizarro and Cortes.

Claim 1: The Europeans’ came over the idea that the Native Americans used primitive tools. As noted by Christopher Columbus in 1492, the Europeans noticed that the Natives had basic tools such as bows and arrows, spears, wooden swords, stone tools, had no knowledge of iron, etc (Doc 2b). This led the Europeans to think that the Native Americans were primitive because they had weak tools and weapons (Doc 2b). In 1519, The Aztec Empire later discovered that the Europeans’ had iron swords, guns, and cannons (Doc 1b). This caused much fear in Aztecs because they have never seen anything like that before (Doc 1b).

The coming of the European to the Americas was catastrophic for the indigenous American civilisations

The exploration and settlement of the Americas by the Europeans had devastating effects on the Native Americans. As Europeans began to explore the Americas and form settlements a great majority of them saw the Native Americans as savages and pagans that needed to be civilized. As exploration and settlements expanded the Native American population and culture was decimated by disease, war, loss of land, the exploitation internal feuding among the tribes and enslavement.

During this time, the Americas had been isolated from the rest of the world and away from all its unknown diseases. When the discovery of the New World led to Europeans coming to dominate the Americas, the Native Americans did not stand a chance against the many diseases the Europeans brought. Diseases such as malaria, smallpox, and yellow fever were brought to the Americas and in turn started to decline the population of the Native Americans. The Europeans had the advantage where they were able to wipe out the natives with their diseases and take over the

The reason why the Native Americans were hit so hard by this disease was because their immune systems were not strong enough to protect their bodies from contracting these diseases. When the Europeans landed they brought diseases with them that were completely foreign to the Native Americans immune systems and they were not ready to deal with all of the European diseases and as a result the Native Americans acquired these diseases that they could not prevent or cure.

The Europeans brought about diseases that initially never transpired in the Native Americans communities. Indian [Native Americans] population of 10 million that lived north of Mexico when Columbus came would ultimately be reduced to less than a million. Huge numbers of Indians would the from diseases introduced by the whites. (Zinn 14). An example of such was smallpox associated with a Spanish called Herman Cortes and his army when they came to America in 1521. Europeans were also responsible for bringing about other diseases such as influenza and measles to healthy Native Americans.

By the time European adventurers came to North America, a lot of things were already not in favor of the Native American people. They had problems ranging from a bad economy to weak empires. Of the many problems, there was also natural disasters that created distress amongst the tribes. These problems are what helped the European adventurers to be able to somewhat easily defeat the European adventurers.

When the Spanish first came to the Native American civilizations, they brought along infectious diseases with them, that the Natives were not used to, which ended up killing most of the Natives. The Europeans had better weapons as well, so it was easier to enslave the Natives and succumb them to more disease. So, it was an epidemic of the highest

Biological exchange was a significant factor in Europeans’ success in the New World in part because the widespread deaths of the Native Americans made it easier for Europeans to conquer and control them. Individual groups of Native Americans dwindled, leaving those who remained susceptible to English domination. In some cases, Europeans such as Cortés even used the mass deaths to place men loyal to them in leadership positions within the Native American peoples, which further compromised the strength of their nations (Jones, 54). Because the Native Americans were so easy to conquer, European explorers and settlers were able to easily establish lasting presences in the Americas.

The actions of European nations for the new world largely affected the Native American population by spreading disease from the spaniards to the natives. Up to 90% of the Native population died, leaving around 30 million. Then an outbreak of the smallpox killed 27 million of them, eventually leaving the Native population at around 3 million which caused the spaniards to take over the New world. The culture of the Natives dropped immensely, they lost around 60 languages and a lot of their structures were removed by the spaniards. Besides the diseases the Europeans brought animals to the new world which helped the Natives sustain and the Natives had crops (maize) that helped Europe's famine.

In early history, cultures outside of Europe were seen as simple and primitive. The powerful Europeans were lucky to find new worlds, bring their cultures and values to the Natives who needed them for their own salvation. Africa was a poverty stricken backwards world that never accomplished anything significant. Native Americans were easily conquerable and primitive. These oversimplified and false statements hide the flourishing cultures in the Pacific 's, Africa and Americas that existed before the Europeans started their conquests driven by the lust for power, resources, allies and wealth. The Asian and African trade systems were vital components for the European economy to thrive. The Pacific regions, African regions and Americas were