Yes, it's a complex issue that evolved over the course of centuries. But it's a remarkable exception that the Mapuche managed to settle a border with the Crown.

Yes, it's a complex issue that evolved over the course of centuries. But it's a remarkable exception that the Mapuche managed to settle a border with the Crown. I've never said that Chile was any better. I mean, it was in comparison to some periods, the early conquest saw mutilation as collective punishment and impalement as execution of POWs. What you just said isn't a defense of the Spanish Empire. If anything it is about the capacity to resist of the Mapuche and the power of decentralized self-organization. There just wasn't an emperor-high priest to kidnap and extort the Mapuche into surrendering like with the Aztecs or the Inca.