A couple of weeks ago a friend recommended that I read My Confession by Samuel Chamberlain describing a soldier’s life in U.S. Army that occupied northern Mexico during the Mexican American War of 1847.  There are two things that are mind-blowing about this book.
1)What went on is really intense.  There were two U.S. Armies that invaded Mexico, the first one invaded from the north and marched down through Monterrey the other one landed at Veracruz and captured Mexico City.  The army in Monterrey basically stayed stationary for most of the second half of the war and was subjected to boredom and brutal guerrilla attacks.  Forces allied with the army like the Texas Rangers would often brutally retaliate on the guerrillas and the local population.   It shows the awfulness of our conquest of the continent and the destructive and creative forces that went in to expansion.

2) The other thing that this had me think of is the nature of conquest.  The Americans invading Mexico were very influenced by a book that had just been written on the Spanish conquest of Mexico and conquistadors were very much on their mind – everyone was already talking about the “Halls of Montezuma.”  The second American army landed in Veracruz and marched on to Mexico City, following a similar path to Cortes when he conquered the Aztecs.  There were many reasons why the US was able to conquer Mexico so quickly including superior technology and infighting within Mexico, however it’s really interesting to see the similarities and differences between the US invasion and Cortes’s invasion.  Both invasions were wrapped up very quickly.  The more I read about the conquistadors the more I’m shocked at how quickly the Spanish took over everything. In 1492 no one had any idea that there was anything going on over here.  It took them ten years just to figure out that they weren’t in India.  But just 10 to 25 years after that they had conquered the major civilizations in Mexico and Peru.  It blows my mind because they had no maps, no supplies, no communications and no conception of the people they were encountering.  How did they do it so quickly??

I also have been thinking a lot about American unity.  Making all the countries in the Americas a little bit closer and have it be that when we say American we mean all Americans from Tierra del Fuego to Nanuvut.  Are there any organizations already doing this? Does anyone have any thoughts about this?