What Mexico’s Underdog Victory Teaches America About Defending Democracy

Cinco de Mayo isn’t just a celebration, it’s a reminder that courage, conviction, and moral clarity can defy authoritarian power, then and now.

History has a funny way of disguising resilience as exhaustion. Feeling tired, overwhelmed, and anxious in the face of rising authoritarianism doesn’t mean we’re losing; it means we’re still fighting. From the ragtag Mexican army at the Battle of Puebla to the Ukrainian resistance against Russian invasion, from the American Revolution to the Civil War, the arc of struggle has often tilted in favor of those who should have lost, at least on paper. Economic and military might favored the opposition in every case. But power alone doesn’t dictate outcomes. What these prolonged, improbable fights reveal is a deeper truth: that moral conviction, collective principle, and the stubborn refusal to surrender can reshape the battlefield over time. A long fight doesn’t always favor the strongest, it favors those who know what they’re fighting for.

That’s why the Battle of Puebla, often reduced to festive imagery and margaritas, deserves a deeper look, because it embodies this dynamic in full. Outnumbered, outgunned, and dismissed by European imperial forces, Mexico’s unlikely victory wasn’t just a tactical win, it was a declaration that national dignity and democratic self-determination aren’t abstract ideals but principles worth bleeding for. The same moral backbone that held the line in Puebla resonates today in Ukraine, and it echoes in every American effort to push back against authoritarian creep. These moments teach us that resistance isn't measured by immediate success but by the long-term refusal to yield to inevitability.

They never should have stood a chance in the cold calculus of power politics. From the outnumbered Mexican forces at Puebla to Ukrainian civilians facing down Russian armor, history is punctuated by moments when the weaker party refuses to accept the mathematical certainty of their defeat. These acts of resistance - dismissed by realists as romantic folly - reveal an inconvenient truth about conflict that strategic planners consistently fail to quantify: human dignity, once mobilized, disrupts even the most sophisticated power equations. What appears as irrational defiance to outside observers often conceals a profound understanding of what makes resistance sustainable beyond immediate military outcomes.

Fighting when victory seems impossible might look like spectacular idiocy to the casual observer. Yet across time, such apparent foolishness carries a moral weight that the "practical" surrender lacks. When Mexico's ragtag army faced down French forces in 1862, they weren't just engaging in a performative exercise of national pride—they were fundamentally rejecting the imperial presumption that their sovereignty existed as a mere theoretical concept, subject to European whims. The virtue lies in the audacity to assert that your dignity isn't negotiable, even when the odds suggest you should be reasonable and accept your beating like a good little conquest.

The soldiers at Puebla weren't just playing war; they were declaring that their nation's sovereignty was worth bleeding for, statistics be damned. This preservation of dignity isn't just philosophical either; it establishes a moral precedent that echoes through generations.

Want to hear a dirty little secret? The underdog actually wins sometimes. At Puebla, General Ignacio Zaragoza led roughly 2,000 poorly equipped Mexicans to victory against 6,000 well-trained French troops who probably spent the previous evening discussing wine pairings. This triumph, however temporary in the French intervention's larger shit-show, proved that even the world's supposedly unbeatable military could get its ass handed to it by determined defenders fighting on home turf.

These unexpected victories often happen precisely because the stronger party's arrogance blinds them. There's a genuine psychological advantage in being underestimated, it's the strategic equivalent of being the unassuming nerd who suddenly reveals black belt skills when the bully attacks.

Perhaps the most interesting thing about these hopeless stands is how they echo through time in ways nobody could have predicted. The Battle of Puebla, though followed by the French occupation of Mexico City, transformed into a cultural touchstone that still inspires pride among Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. What began as a military skirmish evolved into something far more potent, a symbol that reminds people they don't have to accept imperialism as inevitable.

There's profound wisdom in what we might call "losing slowly", dragging out conflict until the world shifts around you. After Puebla, even though the French eventually took Mexico City and installed their puppet emperor, the delay caused by Mexican resistance allowed external factors to change. The American Civil War wrapped up, the U.S. could finally pay attention to the Monroe Doctrine again, and France's European problems diverted Napoleon III's attention span. History, it turns out, has a problem focusing its attention.

Ukraine's defense against Russia's 2022 invasion offers a contemporary example of this strategic patience. Despite Russia's military advantages, size, equipment, and nuclear capabilities, Ukraine's determined resistance extended the timeline long enough for the world to shift. International support materialized, sanctions started biting Russia's economy, and Ukrainian forces gained time to receive training and equipment that initially seemed pipe dreams.

"Losing slowly" isn't about prolonging inevitable defeat; it's recognizing that time itself is a player in the game. As conflict stretches, new allies appear, public opinion evolves, resource constraints bite differently, and strategic priorities shift for everyone involved. What looks like a foregone conclusion on day one can look radically different on day five hundred.

Ukraine's resistance beautifully demonstrates how moral positioning can ultimately outmaneuver raw military might. While Russia possessed the obvious advantages in conventional force, larger military, more equipment, and a nuclear arsenal, Ukraine leveraged the moral dimension with remarkable effectiveness. By framing their struggle as one for sovereignty, democracy, and self-determination against unprovoked aggression, Ukraine gained substantial advantages, including international coalition building, sustainable morale, strategic patience, and legitimacy.

The Cinco de Mayo example similarly shows how moral positioning enabled greater strategic patience. Mexico's defensive stand against imperial aggression generated sympathy and eventual support that would have been unavailable had it been the aggressors.

Fighting against overwhelming odds serves as a form of moral education, teaching by example that courage isn't just for action movies. The Mexican defenders at Puebla, many of whom were indigenous or mestizo soldiers with minimal training, demonstrated that courage transcends credentials, training, or social status. Their victory, celebrated annually as Cinco de Mayo (largely by Americans who have no idea what they're commemorating while ordering another margarita), continues to teach lessons about standing firm against supposedly superior forces.

Ukraine's resistance has similarly educated the world about collective resolve. Ordinary citizens transformed into defenders, farmers towing away Russian tanks with tractors, and civilians maintaining community cohesion under bombardment all demonstrate the extraordinary capabilities that emerge when people decide that some principles matter more than safety.

The escalating crisis of democratic governance has revealed something our institutional architects understood but we've conveniently forgotten: democracy survives not through procedural safeguards alone but through sustained collective resistance against autocratic encroachment. During the Trump administration, we’re witnessing this dynamic with stark clarity. Constitutional guardrails prove remarkably pliable when confronted with systematic pressure, while institutional resilience manifests primarily through dispersed acts of bureaucratic defiance and citizen mobilization. What can protect democratic functions isn’t primarily structural but human agency expressing itself through persistent, often thankless opposition to normalized transgression.

This pattern exposes an uncomfortable reality: maintaining the will to fight when victory seems improbable isn't merely a tactical choice - it's an existential necessity for democratic societies. The mathematical improbability of success has never been a sufficient reason to surrender fundamental principles. In fact, history demonstrates repeatedly that the degradation of resolve almost invariably precedes the collapse of democratic institutions.

This dynamic becomes particularly acute in confrontations with authoritarian systems. Authoritarianism thrives not primarily through overwhelming force, though it certainly employs it, but through manufacturing a perception of inevitability. The autocrat's most potent weapon is the quiet, collective surrender that occurs when citizens internalize the futility of resistance. We witness this pattern with remarkable consistency from Hungary's democratic backsliding to Russia's internal suppression of dissent, authoritarian consolidation accelerates precisely when citizens abandon the psychological terrain of possibility.

In our current moment, as democratic systems face multifaceted challenges from both external pressures and internal contradictions, these historical examples offer a crucial corrective to fatalism. The decision to maintain resistance when victory seems mathematically impossible isn't romantic delusion but clear-eyed pragmatism. It preserves the psychological infrastructure necessary for democratic function, creates opportunities for strategic realignment, extends timeframes that allow for institutional adaptation, and crucially, develops collective capacity for sustained defense of fundamental principles.

The essence of this approach isn't blind optimism about guaranteed success but rather a profound recognition that surrender to authoritarian inevitability represents a self-fulfilling prophecy. Democratic systems survive not because they are inherently stronger than their authoritarian counterparts, but because enough participants refuse to concede the narrative of their demise before the final chapter is written.