Francisco Pizarro and local grudges broke the Inca Empire
By Daniel Okafor · Reporting from New York ·
Military historian Si Sheppard explains that the Spanish conquest succeeded through political exploitation and biological luck, proving that centralized empires are often their own worst enemies.
Francisco Pizarro led 168 Spanish soldiers into the Andes Mountains to confront an empire. His men killed 10,000 Inca warriors while suffering zero casualties at the Battle of Cajamarca. Military historian Si Sheppard said on the podcast Dwarkesh Patel that this encounter remains one of the most lopsided events in human history. The Spanish exploited political fractures and biological luck to conquer the Americas.
The shock of the new The Spanish brought technology that the Americans could not comprehend. The horse was the critical asset because it allowed the Spanish to blast through native formations, Sheppard said. The Inca had no beast of burden except the llama, which served only as a pack animal. Steel armor and swords provided another edge. Native weapons used wood and obsidian, a volcanic glass that shattered against Spanish helmets. The psychological impact of gunpowder was even more devastating, Sheppard said. The Inca believed their ancestral founder was the "Thunderbear," and they saw the Spanish as men who could control the thunder.
Local allies provided the muscle The Spanish succeeded because they exploited political fractures. Hernan Cortez landed in Mexico and found that subject peoples chafed under Aztec authority. The Tlaxcalans fought Cortez to a standstill before joining him as partners. Sheppard said that 99 percent of the fighting forces that toppled the Aztecs were actually other natives. These groups saw the Spanish as a way to escape the strategic trap of Aztec hegemony. The Inca Empire faced a similar crisis because Pizarro arrived during a civil war between the brothers Atahualpa and Huascar. Subjugated tribes like the Canari and Chachapoya joined the Spanish to break free from Inca rule.
Why did the emperors cooperate? The centralized nature of these empires made them fragile. Montezuma II allowed Cortez into the Aztec capital because he preferred to keep the strangers close. Atahualpa met Pizarro at Cajamarca because he felt no threat from such a small force. Sheppard said both emperors suffered from a rigid faith once captured. They governed through Spanish commands and urged their people not to resist. This rigid faith meant that a few hundred men could decapitate an entire civilization. Hernan Cortez conquered Tenochtitlan in 1521, and Francisco Pizarro did the same thing to the Inca.
Critics might argue that Spanish bravery or divine favor decided the outcome. The Spanish were often divided and fighting each other. Cortez had to defeat another expedition sent to arrest him before he could finish his campaign. The Aztec Empire formed as a triple alliance in 1428, and in 1516, the king of Texcoco died and his two sons fought a civil war. The Aztecs were likely to collapse anyway, Sheppard said, following the pattern of Teotihuacan, a metropolis that overstressed its environment and fell. The events prove that power creates a point of failure. When the Spanish take the head, the body has no choice but to follow. The gold and silver the Spanish extracted did not build an economy, and wages in Spain fell as prices rose. True wealth comes from institutions, not the quick fix of bullion.