For four centuries, from the Spanish assaults on the Arawak people in the 1490s to the U.S. Army's massacre of Sioux Indians at Wounded Knee in the 1890s, indigenous populations in the Americas faced relentless violence, leading to a decline of as many as one hundred million people. Historian David E. Stannard argues that the European and white American destruction of native peoples was the most significant act of genocide in history. He begins by depicting the rich diversity of life in the Americas before Columbus's voyage in 1492, then traces the path of genocide from the Caribbean to Mexico, Central and South America, and north to the United States. Stannard reveals that wherever Europeans went, native populations faced imported diseases and brutal atrocities, often resulting in the annihilation of 95 percent of their numbers. He provocatively questions the nature of those who commit such acts, concluding that Christians were the perpetrators. By examining ancient European and Christian views on sex, race, and war, he finds a cultural foundation for the genocide campaign against the New World's original inhabitants. Stannard posits that the ideology behind the American Holocaust parallels that of the Nazi Holocaust, a dangerous mindset that persists today, influencing justifications for military interventions in various regions. This work is both expansive and meticulously detailed, poised to spark significant historical an
