Why did the US 'Indian Wars' happen?

Question

CharlieNoble asked here:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Aj1g6jb8FpJOQRXNu3nmXD6HxQt.?qid=20070701114732AAQKXKE

A question that seems to me, legitimate, though misplaced and inappropriate as an answer to a question about the German Holocaust.

The series of US wars in the west generally known as Indian wars weren't characterized by massacres by US troops. Some did occur, most notably at Sand Creek and Wounded Knee. The best testimony to this truth is illustrated by the fact those two events are frequently, almost exclusively cited as 'typical' by those who'd have us believe it.

The same isn't true of the war behavior of the tribes. A person wishing to encapsulate tribal massacres in a single event would have too large a deck to draw from.

But those were wars involving the US citizenry deliberately and calculatedly driving the residents off their land by armed force without compensation.

I'm not particulary bothered by it.

How about you?

guitarpicker - I'm familiar with the Bascom affair. However, Cochise survived to cause plenty of regret about what happened. Mangus Colorado didn't. He was tortured and killed by California Column troops at Pinos Altos in 1862 after Jack Swilling lured him in to palaver in much the same way Bascom lured Cochise in 1856.

Lots of such incidents on both sides, probably with Sitting Bull being the most famous, assassinated by tribal police.

However, I'd suggest there's a gulf of scale, cruelty, depravity between the war activities of the whites, on the one side, and the tribes on the other.

Babies probably weren't slaughtered routinely by whites, slaves weren't taken, torture was sometimes, though rarely used.

If you know differently I'll be glad to examine your sources.

CLR: What do you see as a favorable alternative? I'd be interested to know your views. What, for instance, would be the western boundary of the US?

CLR: What do you see as a favorable alternative? I'd be interested to know your views. What, for instance, would be the ideal western boundary of the US?

I'd also be interested in knowing, anyone who'd care to reply, whether you believe the tribes would have been simply 'left alone' by the French, British, Spaniards, Mexicans, Russians, whomever, had the US chosen to leave the western lands in their pristine state for the tribes to war against one another on.

Keep in mind that French and British troops invaded Mexico while the US was busy with the Civil War.

Answer 1

American "Expansion Polices" placed in the mind that the United States could take what it wanted. Just a short simple answer.
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Answer 2

In one particular instance that began the Apache Wars of the Southwest is known as "Cut the Tent" episode, known by the Chiricahua, or the Bascom Debacle. Greenhorn Army Lieutenant George Bascom had invited Cochise to palaver, then taking him hostage over events not his prompting.

With the hanging of relatives over an accusation not proved, Cochise grabbed his knife and cut away the side of tent and escaped. From this bungling lieutenant, ten years of atrocious warfare filled the Arizona Territory and ceased temporarily when Jeffords, a white agent for Butterfield Stage Lines, through sheer bravery, was able to gain the audience of Cochise.

The history books will reveal more of this story, but check out the reference book I give.

Answer 3

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Answer 4

In my own genealogical research massacres and deprivations mostly happened to my people because, as I understand it, Brits & French found it to their interests to stir the aboriginals against the colonial settlers to inhibit encroachment on territories they claimed and up through the War of 1812-14 hadn't quite gotten over the Revolution. (And as I read it, the Pennamites weren't much better.) Things weren't always great either in the early Western Reserve.

Perhaps a couple centuries of these behaviors predictably conditioned the later strategies in the post-Civil War westward movement.

Answer 5

I'm bothered by the so-called "Indian Wars."
And the cause behind them was the concept of Manifest Destiny.

Answer 6

It was basically about land, the native americans were on the land, and the white settlers wanted it for themselves