How the Spanish Defeated the Inca Army, 1533

The defeat of the Inca armies in 1533 was not a single event but a series of engagements fought across a continent-sized polity over more than a year. The Spanish forces, which never exceeded a few hundred men in the field, were able to defeat Inca armies many times larger by exploiting three decisive advantages: their steel swords, plate armor, and cavalry, which the Andean armies had no effective counter for; their control of the Qhapaq Ñan, the imperial road system, which allowed them to move quickly across the empire and to provision their forces; and the support of large numbers of indigenous auxiliaries, drawn from groups that had been incorporated into the Inca state only recently and resentfully. The question of how a small Spanish force was able to defeat a much larger Inca army is, in essence, a question about the interaction of these three factors, and about the structural weaknesses of the Inca military system that the Spanish were able to exploit.

The Spanish forces

Composition and equipment

The Spanish forces that defeated the Inca in 1533 were small, but they were well equipped and well led. The main body of the force that marched from Cajamarca to Cusco in 1533 numbered about 200 Spanish soldiers, of whom perhaps 80 were infantry, 60 were cavalry, and the remainder were arquebusiers, gunners, and support personnel. The force was equipped with steel swords, plate armor, helmets, a few light cannon, and a small number of arquebuses. The Spanish also had a significant number of indigenous auxiliaries — perhaps 20,000 to 30,000 in total, drawn from the Cañari, the Chachapoya, the Huancas, and other groups — who served as porters, scouts, and light infantry.

The Spanish equipment was decisive in the engagements with the Inca armies. The steel sword, in particular the espada de dos manos and the lighter rodelero sword, gave the Spanish infantry a decisive advantage in hand-to-hand combat, and the Spanish plate armor protected the wearer from the worst of the indigenous missile weapons. The arquebus, a heavy matchlock firearm, was effective at a range of perhaps fifty meters, but it was slow to load and was less important in the early campaigns than the steel sword. The most important single piece of equipment, however, was the horse. The Andean armies had never seen a horse, and the animal’s size and speed had a devastating psychological effect in the early encounters. The Spanish cavalry, of which there were perhaps 60 in the conquest of Peru, fought as a shock weapon, charging in formation and using the lance or the sword.

Tactics and leadership

The Spanish forces were also tactically flexible and well led. The Spanish captains — Francisco Pizarro, Diego de Almagro, Hernando Pizarro, Sebastián de Benalcázar — were experienced soldiers who had fought in the Italian Wars and in the conquest of the Caribbean, and they applied the small-unit tactics and the combined-arms doctrine that they had learned in Europe to the Andean context. The Spanish used the Qhapaq Ñan — the imperial road system — to move their forces quickly across the empire, and they took possession of the imperial storehouses along the road to provision their armies. The Spanish were also skilled at using the highland terrain to their advantage, and they were able to engage the Inca armies in places where the Spanish advantage in cavalry and steel weapons could be exploited.

The Inca, by contrast, were slow to adapt to the new style of warfare, and their commanders, who had been trained in the traditional Inca manner of set-piece battles on open ground, were unable to cope with the Spanish hit-and-run tactics. The Inca military tradition was based on the use of large numbers of conscript soldiers in open battles, in which the goal was to surround the enemy and to defeat him by weight of numbers. The Inca had no tradition of cavalry warfare, no steel weapons, and no experience of the small-unit tactics that the Spanish used. The Inca commanders were also operating in a difficult political context: the civil war of succession between Huáscar and Atahualpa had divided the Inca nobility, and the capture and execution of Atahualpa at Cajamarca had left the Inca armies without an effective political authority.

The role of the Qhapaq Ñan

The imperial road system

The Spanish were able to defeat the Inca armies in 1533 in large part because they were able to use the Qhapaq Ñan — the imperial road system — to move their forces quickly across the empire. The Qhapaq Ñan was the most extensive road system in the pre-Columbian Americas, with two main trunk roads that ran from Quito in the north to Tucumán and Chile in the south, and a network of secondary roads that connected the principal Inca cities. The road system was supported by a network of tambos — way stations — at intervals of approximately 20 to 30 kilometers, where the Inca armies could find food, shelter, and fresh conscripts.

The Spanish, who had learned the structure of the road system from indigenous informants, were able to use it to move their forces at a speed that the Inca armies could not match. The Inca armies, although they too used the Qhapaq Ñan, were slowed down by the size of their forces and by the difficulty of provisioning large armies on the move. The Spanish, by contrast, were able to move in small, fast-moving columns, taking possession of the tambos along the road and using them as bases for further operations. The Spanish were also able to use the road system to launch surprise attacks on Inca armies, and to disrupt the Inca lines of communication.

The provisioning of the Spanish armies

The Qhapaq Ñan was also important for the provisioning of the Spanish armies. The Inca state had established a system of state granaries and storehouses — the qollqas — along the road, and the Spanish were able to take possession of these storehouses and to use them to provision their forces. The provisioning of the Spanish armies was a major logistical undertaking, but the Spanish were able to do it with a much smaller logistical tail than would have been possible in Europe, because the Inca state had already established the infrastructure. The Spanish were also able to use the indigenous auxiliary forces to carry supplies and to gather food from the local population, and the auxiliary forces were an essential part of the Spanish logistical system.

The Inca, by contrast, were unable to disrupt the Spanish use of the Qhapaq Ñan. The Inca had no tradition of guerrilla warfare or of destroying the road infrastructure, and the Inca armies, which were designed for set-piece battles on open ground, were unable to prevent the Spanish from moving along the road. The Inca were also unable to prevent the Spanish from taking possession of the tambos and the qollqas, and the loss of the road system was a major strategic defeat. The Spanish, in effect, were able to use the Inca state’s own infrastructure against it, and this was one of the principal reasons for the Spanish victory.

The role of indigenous allies

The Cañari and the Chachapoya

The Spanish did not defeat the Inca armies alone. From the first expedition of 1531–1532, the Spanish forces were accompanied by large numbers of indigenous auxiliaries, drawn from groups that had been incorporated into the Inca Empire only recently and resentfully. The most important of these were the Cañari of southern Ecuador, the Chachapoya of the cloud forest, and the Huancas of the central highlands. The Cañari, in particular, had fought against the Inca in the civil war and had been punished by Atahualpa for their support of Huáscar; the Spanish were able to recruit thousands of Cañari warriors by promising them an end to Inca rule.

The Chachapoya, who had been resettled in the north by the Inca, were also willing allies. The Chachapoya had been incorporated into the Inca empire by Huayna Capac in the 1470s, and they had been resettled in the northern highlands as a form of political control. The Chachapoya retained a strong sense of their own identity, and they were willing to fight against the Inca in exchange for an end to Inca rule. The Huancas, who had been the victims of a major Inca military campaign in the 1460s, joined the Spanish against the Inca. By the time of the conquest of Cusco in 1533, the Spanish force included perhaps as many as 30,000 to 40,000 indigenous auxiliaries, without whom the conquest would not have been possible.

The role of the auxiliaries in the campaigns

The indigenous auxiliaries played several important roles in the campaigns of 1533. First, they provided a numerical force that the Spanish themselves could not have provided: a Spanish force of 200 men would not have been able to defeat an Inca army of 30,000 men, but a combined force of 30,200 men could. Second, the auxiliaries were familiar with the highland terrain, with the local population, and with the Inca system of roads and storehouses, and they were able to provide intelligence and logistical support that the Spanish could not have provided on their own. Third, the auxiliaries fought with a ferocity that the Spanish could not match, since they had their own grievances against the Inca and were fighting for their own survival as well as for the Spanish cause.

The auxiliaries also played an important role in the battle of Quipaipán and in the other major engagements of 1533. At Quipaipán, in the weeks before the fall of Cusco in November 1533 (most chronicles place the engagement on or about 16 November 1533, though the exact date is disputed), the Spanish and their indigenous auxiliaries defeated a large Inca army under the general Quisquis, and the victory opened the road to Cusco. The Spanish accounts, which include the eyewitness Relación of Pedro Sancho, report that the indigenous auxiliaries played a decisive role in the battle, particularly in the pursuit of the Inca forces after the initial Spanish charge. The auxiliaries were also important in the siege of Cusco and in the subsequent pacification of the central highlands.

The structural weaknesses of the Inca military system

The concentration of political authority

The Inca military system, although it was capable of raising very large armies, was structurally vulnerable to the kind of attack the Spanish mounted. The system was based on the personal authority of the Sapa Inca, and the Sapa Inca was the commander-in-chief of the armed forces. The military commanders of the Inca — the generals Quisquis, Chalcuchima, and others — were appointed by the Sapa Inca, and they owed their positions to the Sapa Inca. The death or capture of the Sapa Inca therefore left the military system without a legitimate commander, and the capture of Atahualpa at Cajamarca in November 1532 left the Inca armies without a political authority.

The Inca military system was also vulnerable because of the system of succession. The Sapa Inca was succeeded by his eldest son, but the eldest son was not always the most capable, and the succession was often contested. The civil war of succession between Huáscar and Atahualpa was the result of a contested succession, and the war had weakened the Inca state on the eve of the Spanish arrival. The Spanish were able to exploit the contested succession by supporting different factions at different times, and the capture of Atahualpa in 1532 left the political authority of the Inca state in dispute.

The dependence on the imperial road system

The Inca military system was also dependent on the Qhapaq Ñan, the imperial road system, and on the system of state granaries and storehouses that supported it. The Spanish, who had learned the structure of the road system from indigenous informants, were able to use the road to move their forces quickly across the empire and to take possession of the storehouses. The Inca, by contrast, were unable to disrupt the Spanish use of the road, and the loss of the road system was a major strategic defeat. The Spanish, in effect, were able to use the Inca state’s own infrastructure against it, and this was one of the principal reasons for the Spanish victory.

The Inca military system was also vulnerable because of the absence of a formal written language. The Inca used the quipu, a system of knotted cords, for accounting and for the transmission of information, but the quipu was not a writing system in the European sense, and the Spanish were able to intercept the quipu-based communications of the Inca with relative ease. The Inca were also vulnerable because of the absence of a professional military class. The Inca armies were raised by conscription from the general population, and the soldiers returned to their homes after a campaign. The Spanish, by contrast, had a small professional force of experienced soldiers, and they were able to fight campaigns that the Inca armies could not have sustained.