Anita Arnand

Which Padilla is mainly responsible for fending off.

I mean, we're sort of concentrating on Bolivar in this, who's sort of a landlubber in all his fighting.

But you're right.

Look, tall poppy syndrome is a thing, of course, but there is also the fact that he is now not in the mood to brook any kind of dissent.

Santander has been dispatched, the vice presidency has been cancelled, and Padilla disagrees with this liberator-dictator thing.

thing that he's got in Bolivar, the centralized control.

Padilla is much more aligned with the Santander thinking that regional interests, we should have some autonomy in these states.

They have big disagreements, big falling outs on military strategy and command.

Padilla, who's an experienced naval commander, feels quite disrespected by Bolivar and dismissed by Bolivar.

Yeah, and Padilla demands respect and gets respect from all those who are fighting and see the results of him, you know, sort of fending off any kind of threat from the seas.

And the rift between these two men turns to absolute paranoia because Bolivar believes that he is planning to overturn him.

Right.

And I have to say, that sort of paranoia, which probably is misplaced at the beginning, turns into a reality because Padilla becomes this figurehead or at least this sort of icon for those who do not like what Bolivar is doing.

Actually, we need a man like Padilla, not like him, to run things in the future.

Now,

Whether Padilla himself was actually in a plot to get rid of Bolivar, many modern historians say actually the evidence is really weak.

And they think that he was targeted due to racial prejudice and this political rivalry and all of Bolivar's paranoia at the time.

But what happens is that Bolivar has him imprisoned and then has him executed.

It lends itself, doesn't it, to all the things that you've been warning about this man.

It doesn't.