Remember the Alamo

Ah the Alamo, we all know the expression, "Remember the Alamo."  What happened there? Oh yea, it was a massacre by the Mexican army; they came in and killed a bunch of Americans including Davie Crockett.  Was it a war? Was it an invasion of the United States?  What is the significance?  Or is it simply where we lost a battle?

The Alamo to me is a microcosm of the way the Union views the South.  The general of the Alamo requested back up because a Mexican attack was imminent but the request was ignored.  Kind of like Benghazi wouldn't you say?  No, not really.  Although, technically the U.S. Consulate is United States territory, even the surrounding area of the Alamo is still in the United States.  As I looked into it, I wondered what it is that spurred men to rally behind it.  Was it the ruthlessness of the Mexican army?  How vicious were they?   Did you know that many of the soldiers brought their wives and children with them into the Alamo because they believed it to be the safest spot?  Well, we know all the soldiers in the Alamo were killed so what did the ruthless, barbarous Mexicans do to those women and children???

The Mexican general told them to go home and spread the word of what they did to their husbands and fathers. You can spin that as insensitive and a little like Natural Born Killers but I actually think it was quite gentlemanly of them.  My conclusion is that the Mexican army's actions and nature were not what caused the uprising but merely the bravery of the men that stood and fought even though they were going to die.  Much like the 300 Spartans inspired a nation but the 300 Spartans took their fair share of Persians before perishing.  Those in the Alamo didn't do so well.  I'm not sure where the inspiration came from.

The history of how Texas became part of the United States when it was Mexican territory is what most fascinated me.  When Texas was a Mexican territory, Americans emigrated there and flocked there in droves to get away from the oppressive American laws.  The Mexicans began to worry that Americans were outnumbering Mexicans almost 10-1.  A few years after this population shift, the Mexican succession happened.  See any parallels?  Now the Mexicans are coming to America to escape the harsh living conditions of Mexico.  They say that even if no illegal  immigrants come, the breeding rate of the Latinos vs. the Whites will lead to more Latinos than Whites by 2020.  Interesting how these things seem to reverse themselves in less than 200 years.



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