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His greatest error lay in that while dismissing Spain he did not dismiss
that nation's most powerful minion, the Church, and did not even localize
it or reward a South American separate branch to loyalty or do anything at
all (except extort money from it) to an organization which continually
worked for Spain as only it could work-on every person in the land in a
direct anti-Bolivar reign of terror behind the scenes. You either suborn
such a group or you take them out when they cease to be universal and
become or are an enemy's partner.
As the Church held huge properties and as Bolivar's troops and
supporters went unpaid, even of the penny soldiers' pay, if one was going
to overlook the Royalist estates, one could at least have seized the Church
property and given it to the soldiers. General Vallejo did this in 1835 in
California, a nearly contemporary act, with no catastrophe from Rome. Or
the penniless countries could have taken them over. You don't leave an
enemy financed and solvent while you let your friends starve in a game like
South American politics. Oh no.
He wasted his enemies. He exported the "godos" or defeated Royalist
soldiers. They mostly had no homes but South America. He issued no
amnesties they could count on. They were shipped off or left to die in the
"ditch"-the best artisan in the country among them.
When one (General Rodil) would not surrender Calloa fortress after Peru
was won. Bolivar after great gestures of amnesty failed to obtain surrender
and then fought the fort. Four thousand political refugees and four
thousand Royalist troops died over many months in full sight of Lima,
fought heavily by Bolivar only because the fort was fighting. But Bolivar
had to straighten up Peru urgently not fight a defeated enemy. The right
answer to such a foolish commander as Rodil as Bolivar did have the troops
to do it, was to cover the roads with cannon enfilade potential to
discourage any sortie from the fort, put a larger number of his own troops
in a distant position of offense but ease and comfort and say, "We're not
going to fight. The war's over, silly man. Look at the silly fellows in
there, living on rats when they can just walk out and sleep home nights or
go to Spain or enlist with me or just go camping," and let anybody walk in
and out who pleased, making the fort Commander (Rodil) the prey of every
pleading wife and mother without and would-be deserter or mutineer within
until he did indeed sheepishly give up the pretense-a man cannot fight
alone. But battle was glory to Bolivar. And he became intensely disliked
because the incessant cannonade which got nowhere was annoying.
Honors meant a great deal to Bolivar. To be liked was his life. And it
probably meant more to him than to see things really right. He never
compromised his principles but he lived on admiration, a rather sickening
diet since it demands in turn continuous "theatre". One is what one is, not
what one is admired or hated for. To judge oneself by one's successes is
simply to observe that one's postulates worked and breeds confidence in
one's ability. To have to be told it worked only criticizes one's own
eyesight and hands a spear to the enemy to make his wound of vanity at his
will. Applause is nice. It's great to be thanked and admired. But to work
only for that? And his craving for that, his addiction to the most unstable
drug in history-fame-killed Bolivar. That self offered spear. He told the
world continually how to kill him-reduce its esteem. So as money and land
can buy any quantity of cabals, he could be killed by curdling the esteem,
the easiest thing you can get a mob to do.
He had all the power. He did not use it for good or evil. One cannot
hold power and not use it. It violates the power formula. For it then
prevents others from doing things if they had some of the power so they
then see as their only solution the destruction of the holder of the power
as he, not using power or delegating it, is the unwitting block to all
their plans. So even many of his friends and armies finally agreed he had
to go. They were not able men. They were in a mess. But bad or good they
had to do something. Things were desperate, broken down and starving after
14 years of civil war. Therefore they either had to have some of that
absolute power or else nothing could be done at all. They were not great
minds. He did not need any "great minds", he thought, even though he
invited them verbally. He saw their petty, often murderous solutions and he
rebuked them. And so held the power and didn't use it.
He could not stand another personality threat.