From The Newsletter of The Equal Employment Opportunity Working Group of the Defense Contract Management Agency, Philadelphia

Black History Month—February 1998

Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies

by Jared Diamond

Reviewed By Walter C. Uhler

Equality of Opportunity, or its absence, is at the core of Jared Diamond's survey of prehistoric man's (and woman's) attempts to master his (her) environment. Critical to that endeavor was the discovery, by nomads in the Middle East (around 8500 B.C.), that the planting of wild seeds and the taming and breeding of wild animals was more productive and predictable than hunting or gathering them. This domestication of plants and animals not only induced nomads to settle down to become farmers, it also resulted in the abundant food supply necessary for population growth. The high population densities that followed would prove to be the critical factor when attempting to understand why the Europeans conquered the Americas and colonized Africa (and the Chinese most of Asia), rather than vice-versa.

Permanent settlements permitted frequent reproduction (because nomadic women could carry but one baby for any long distance, they spread their births out), the use and storage of large pots (which facilitated widespread cooking of food), the manufacture of furniture, the construction of fixed dwellings (eventually churches and state houses), and the development of distinct languages and cultures.

Equally important, the ability of a relatively few farmers to provide much more food than could be gathered by the entire community freed the extra individuals to specialize—in military, scholarly, religious, political, artistic, technological, or other endeavors. Because the entire community would benefit from this specialization, the political and religious leaders did not hesitate to demand (as taxes or tribute) the surplus food from the farmers in order to support the specialists. And the new military specialists (the community's designated protectors) provided the muscle to enforce these demands.

High population density facilitated the emergence of two additional historically important phenomena, technological innovation and the spread of "crowd diseases." As Professor Diamond asserts, technological innovation is "autocatalytic," meaning that, for reasons inherent in the process, innovation "speeds up at a rate that increases with time." (p. 258) The second round of innovation occurs more quickly than the first, precisely because it is based upon the mastery of the technology worked out during the first. Similarly, the third round occurs more quickly than the second because it is based upon the mastery of the first two. Given the ever-quickening pace of technological change, it does indeed matter how early a nation or people started down that path.

Of equal importance, however, was the early spread of (and subsequent immunization to) infectious diseases, which arose as a consequence of the intermingling of many people and many animals in fixed locations (settlements). As Professor Diamond notes, "the major killers of humanity throughout our recent history—smallpox, flu, tuberculosis, malaria, plague, measles, and cholera—are infectious diseases that evolved from diseases of animals." (pp. 196–97) As "acute" infectious diseases—"within a short time, you either die or recover completely" (and develop an immunity to that disease)—"they need a human population that is sufficiently numerous, and sufficiently densely packed, that a numerous new crop of susceptible children is available for infection by the time the disease would otherwise be waning." (pp. 202–03)

When not introduced through diffusion from other lands, the crops planted and the animals domesticated were variants of the wild versions native to the area in which they lived. It follows, of course, that not all areas were equally blessed with the same plants and animals. Nor could these same areas sustain crops or animals readily sown or bred elsewhere. Consequently, the decision to replace hunting and gathering with agriculture was a much easier and more productive decision in some geographical locations and climates than in others. Deserts, tropical forests, and sub-arctic tundra, for example, were not areas where hunter-gatherers made a rapid transition to agriculture. Professor Diamond persuasively demonstrates that it was precisely the unequal opportunities available to the peoples of the different continents that literally guaranteed that the peoples of the Eurasian land mass who were blessed with the most domesticable animals and the best domesticable plants (and few barriers to rapid diffusion of them), and thus early domestication, specialization, political centralization, immunization, and technological innovation—would subjugate and, in many instances, annihilate the natives on other continents.

The Europeans benefited quite early from the rapid diffusion of rich plant and animal domestication in the Fertile Crescent of the Middle East, where wheat, barley, peas, and olives—as well as sheep and goats—were domesticated as early as 8500 B.C. The news, effects, and emulation of plant and animal domestication rapidly spread longitudinally—eastward towards India and westward to southern Europe and northern Africa. These zones shared a temperate "Mediterranean" climate that permitted the same plant seeds to be cultivated and animals to be bred. (A similar phenomenon emerged in East Asia from the independent domestication of rice, millet, and pigs in China.)

Neither Africa nor the Americas were so geographically blessed. The northern Africans of the southern Mediterranean domesticated the same plants and animals brought their way from the Fertile Crescent. The natives of Ethiopia, the Sahel, and tropical West Africa, however, appear to have domesticated some crops before coming under the Southwest Asian influence (Ethiopia, for example, was the original home of coffee). Nevertheless, none of these domesticated plants made it quickly through the Sahara Desert to central and south Africa. Similarly, none of the newly domesticated animals in northern Africa could survive the bite of the tsetse fly when they attempted to spread across the continent. And most large animals native to Africa proved impossible to domesticate, by Africans or anyone else. Consequently, hunting and gathering (or pastoralism) predominated—with all its implications for limited population density, specialization, and susceptibility to future subjugation.

In the Americas, the story was much the same. A mass extinction of large animals (approximately 13000 B.C.) reduced the pool of domesticable animals in the Americas to three—the dog (everywhere), the turkey (Mesoamerica), and the llama (South America). The only crops having the potential to sustain large populations were corn, found growing wild in Mesoamerica, and the potato in the Andes and Amazon regions of South America. Significantly, these plants and animals were first domesticated no earlier than 3500 B.C. or some five thousand years later than domestication of the Fertile Crescent. The narrow stretch of land connecting Latin America with South America proved a sufficient barrier preventing the spread of the one large domesticated animal—the llama—to Mesoamerica (where it might have proved useful to till the soil or pull carts), and the diffusion of corn to South America. Similarly, the desert of northern Mexico prevented the early diffusion of corn to North America.

North America was the most impoverished of the large continents; possessing no large domesticable animals (except the dog) and no wild plants capable of sustaining a large population—until a corn suitable for growth in cool northern climates was brought under cultivation by Native Americans in the northeast around 900 A.D. (or a mere six hundred years before the Europeans arrived).

The "most dramatic moment in subsequent European-Native American relations was the first encounter between the Inca emperor Atahuallpa and the Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro at the Peruvian highland town of Cajamarca on November 16, 1532." (pp. 67–68) Although the leader of but little more than half of the Incas (a disease of European origin had killed his father, the undisputed leader, causing a split within the family and civil war), Atahuallpa still was "the absolute monarch of the largest and most advanced state in the New World." His empire numbered in the millions and he had 80,000 soldiers at his disposal. By contrast, Pizarro commanded 168 Spanish soldiers (62 mounted and 106 foot soldiers).

At Pizarro's request, the Inca chief agreed to meet with the Spanish leader in the town of Cajamarca. Atahuallpa came to town with squadrons of Indians, some "dressed in clothes of different colors, like a chessboard. They advanced, removing the straws from the ground and sweeping the road. Next came three squadrons in different dresses, dancing and singing. Then came a number of men with armor, large metal plates, and crowns of gold and silver..jt was a marvel to observe how the sun glinted upon it. Atahuallpa was carried into town in a litter ["the ends of its timbers covered in silver"] hoisted on the shoulders of eighty lords." (p.71) Behind him were more squadrons and the town filled with music as they occupied every comer of the plaza.

At Pizarro's direction. Friar Vicente de Valverde met the Inca chief in the center of the plaza and ordered him to submit to the law of the Lord Jesus Christ and to the King of Spain. Informed that the laws he must abide by were in the Bible, Atahuallpa asked to see it and, finding no meaning in the letters and paper it contained, threw the book to the ground. With this, the Friar shouted to Pizarro and his men (who had secretly surround the plaza): "March out against him, for I absolve you!"

According to an eyewitness account, "the governor then gave the signal to Candia, who began to fire off the guns. At the same time the trumpets were sounded, and the armored Spanish troops, both cavalry and infantry, sallied forth out of their hiding places straight into the mass of unarmed Indians crowding the square... We had placed rattles on the horses to terrify the Indians. The booming of guns, the blowing of trumpets, and the rattles on the horses threw the Indians into panicked confusion...The cavalry rode them down. killing and wounding, and following in pursuit. The infantry made so good an assault on those that remained that in a short time most of them were put to the sword." (p.72)

Pizarro captured Atahuallpa and held him hostage for ransom (promising to release him after the Incas filled a room 22 feet long, 17 feet wide, and 8 feet high with gold) until treacherously killing him after the Incas had fulfilled their part of the bargain. The stone, bronze and wooden clubs, hand axes" slingshots and quilted armor of the Incas were no match against steel sword and armor, guns and horses. As Professor Diamond concludes, "the novelty of horses, steel weapons, and guns undoubtedly paralyzed the Incas a Cajamarca, but the battles after Cajamarca were fought against determined resistance by Inca armies that had already seen Spanish weapons and horses...All those efforts failed because of the Spaniards' far superior armament." (pp.75–76)

The superiority of European technology notwithstanding, it was European germs that killed off much of the Native American population and permitted its displacement by Spaniards, Frenchmen, Englishmen and Germans. Two examples should demonstrate the enormity of the epidemics: (1) A slave from Spanish Cuba. infected with smallpox, arrived in Mexico in I520, "the resulting epidemic proceeded to kill nearly half of the Aztecs...By 1618, Mexico's initial population of about 20 million had plummeted to about 1.6 million." (p.210) (2) The Indian population of Hispaniola "declined from around 8 million, when Columbus arrived in 1492, to zero by 1535." (p. 213)

Professor Diamond goes to great lengths to detail the processes which permitted the Europeans to defeat the Aztecs in Mexico, the Incas in Peru, and the Native Americans of North America, as well as colonize much of Africa. Learned and fascinating chapters on such subjects as the availability and nutritional value of various plants, the reasons why certain animals could not (and cannot) be domesticated, the behavior of bacteria. and the dynamics of technology persuasively support his conclusion that it was the early domestication of plants and animals, the rapid diffusion of that domestication and its consequent population density which provided the peoples of the Eurasian land mass with the guns, germs and steel to conquer or colonize the other continents. RACE WAS NOT A FACTOR!

To drive home his point, Professor Diamond reviews the history of the Maori people. Descendants of Polynesian farmers, the Maori settled the tropical northern tip of New Zealand about 1000 A. D., where they continued their agricultural life. Soon thereafter, a group of Maori moved to the cold climate of the Chatham Islands, where they became known as the Moriori. Given that climate, the Moriori soon found that they had no alternative but to adopt a hunter-gatherer mode of existence and thus forego the possibilities available to densely populated agricultural areas—no craft specialists, armies, bureaucrats, scientists, or chiefs.

They lived that simple life for centuries until, on November 19, 1835, they encountered a ship "carrying 500 Maori armed with guns, clubs, and axes...followed on December 5 by a shipload of 400 more Maori." (p. 53) The subsequent Maori attack on the peaceful Moriori resulted in the slaughter of hundreds and enslavement of the rest (who were killed in a more leisurely fashion over the next few years).

Given that these two tribes were of the same ancestral stock, the victory of the Maori "clearly illustrates how environments can affect economy, technology, political organization, and fighting skills within a short time." (p.57)

Environmental advantages then (and not the racial superiority that most people would assume) have determined that the peoples of the Eurasian land mass would colonize the Americas and Africa—and not vice-versa.

Professor Diamond goes so far as to speculate that, "had Africa's rhinos and hippos been domesticated and ridden, they would not only have fed armies but also have provided an unstoppable cavalry to cut through the ranks of European horsemen. Rhino-mounted Bantu shock troops could have overthrown the Roman Empire." (p.399).

Although he demolishes the widespread supposition that racial differences best explain why the Europeans prevailed over the Africans and annihilated the Native Americans, Professor Diamond's book remains but a learned outline of the forces which have shaped today's world. He acknowledges as much when he notes the many areas where further work remains to be done.

Additionally, he questions the extent to which these forces continue to operate. Nevertheless, the study is profound and the book critic for the Washington Post was quite right to suggest that Jared Diamond's book is of such great significance, that no college student should be permitted to graduate without having read it.