Post #1 – Comanche Empire

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Pekka Hamalainen made a strong case for a changed perspective of the American Southwest during Spanish and French colonization. Especially having read Brooks’ Captives and Cousins, I found myself very skeptical of the argument that the Comanche were the driving force of imperial control in such a vast, diverse, and changing landscape such as the Southwest. The idea that the Comanche empire did not just stall Spanish and French expansion but built their own empire “that subdued, exploited, marginalized, co-opted” and otherwise dominated a region with the kind of power that Hamalainen argued definitely peaked my interest (pg. 3). After finishing the introduction I was not entirely sure that I was willing to support the claim that the Comanche Empire could possibly stand out above the variety of native groups vying for influence among the clash of European encroachment. It was a strong thesis to start from and would require substantial evidence in order to prove.
As a whole, Hamalainen delivered a powerful narrative of a Comanche people that were adaptive to the environments in which they were surrounded or entered. I have to say that the argument for military might was not in question as Hamalainen clearly laid out the power the Comanche were able to gain over the use of horses and European weaponry. However, what caught my eye was the discussion about economic power that surrounded the trade and commerce networks that the Comanche set up or exploited throughout their empire. It was a very compelling case that Hamalainen made about how the Comanche were able to leverage their domination of horses on their lands to use it as a piece of capital. Comanche tribes did not have manufacturing but they were able to use the horse as a powerful chip in entering dominating positions of trade throughout the Southwest (pg. 72-73).
I felt as if there were some gaps or at least omissions from the argument that could have either supported Hamalainen or perhaps decreased the strength of his thesis. In multiple cases of Comanche expansion or growth–1750s-60s and then again in the 1770s-80s–there were major factors leading to pressure upon other groups on the fringes of the empire. There could be a case made that the Comanche were able to either leverage the turmoil due to their geographically centralized location and powerful networks of diplomacy and trade; or it could be argued that they were just quicker to adapt. Were Comanches able to use the destruction of the French empire and Spanish empires respectively because of their superior political, economic, and military jockeying? Or were Comanche just able to adapt and good at taking advantage of other’s misfortune? While Hamalainen comments on these issues, he does not spend a significant amount of time discussing the effects of both the French and Indian War and the Revolutionary War and connecting it to Comanche growth or decline.