Critics of America, suggest that the founding occurred by stealing land from peaceful Indians. But as suggested in the book reviewed below, pre-European Indians fought wars against each other. To the extent that Indians chose, or were allowed to choose, to live under non-violent European rule-of-law, they could flourish.
(p. 17) In THE CUTTING-OFF WAY: Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500-1800 (University of North Carolina Press, 287 pp., paperback, $29.95), Wayne E. Lee argues that the fluid, Native American style of war was quite alien to the European soldiers who encountered it. Tribes like the Tuscarora and the Cherokee avoided battles and conventional sieges, instead carrying out what Lee calls “conquest by harassment” — dispersed campaigns of ambushes and raids, which could be sustained for years.
. . .
The aims of their wars were also different, argues Lee, a professor of early modern military history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. We tend to think of wars as being fought to conquer people, control them and occupy their land. But Native Americans often waged war not to settle territory but to clear it. Specifically, they aimed to push other tribes out of choice hunting grounds and hold exclusive access to them.
For the full review see:
(Note: ellipsis added.)
(Note: the online version of the review has the date Dec. [sic] 4, 2023, and has the title “How Different Peoples Around the World Fought and Built Empires.”)
The book under review is:
Lee, Wayne E. The Cutting-Off Way: Indigenous Warfare in Eastern North America, 1500–1800. Chapel Hill, NC: The University of North Carolina Press, 2023.