Fox News host Jesse Watters defends Native American 'battlefield' comments: 'Not all fights are fair'

• In an exclusive interview with Insider, Jesse Watters defended a recent controversial remark.
• The Fox News host previously said "we won this nation on the battlefield" from the British and Native Americans.
• Watters told Insider "the history of the world is a clash of civilizations."

Fox News host Jesse Watters doubled down on his controversial Native American comments in an exclusive interview with Insider.

The co-host of "The Five" and host of his own weekend show "Watters World" drew backlash from descendants of indigenous people and activists for saying the US "won this land on the battlefield" on July 7.

Watters - whose new book hit number one on both Amazon and The New York Times best seller list - was also referring to the British and the Revolutionary War in his initial comments, in addition to the acquisition of future states from Spain.

"This land wasn't stolen," Watters said at the time. "We won this land on the battlefield."

In an interview with Insider alongside co-host Dana Perino, Watters defended the remark.

"Not all fights are fair," he said. "That's tough."

When asked if this was something he really believed or if he was using hyperbole for entertainment purposes, Watters said "The Five" is a TV show with a minimal amount of time to make a point, not a history class.

"It's not an hour-long history discussion on the US-Indian wars," Watters said. "If it was a long discussion on that, perhaps, you know, there's more nuance if you have the time. I have about a minute and 30 seconds to make a point."

American settlers' westward expansion led to clashes with Indigenous peoples over centuries. Many Indigenous were forcibly moved off land desired by settlers, such as relocation from the southeastern US of an estimated 60,000 people in the Cherokee, Seminole and Choctaw tribes in waves of marches collectively known as the Trail of Tears.

Troops were often called in to protect American settlers from Indigenous warriors. These skirmishes and wars often were characterized by massacres of surrendered warriors, as well as taking innocent women and children hostage or slaughtering them. Historians like UCLA's Benjamin Madley argue the totality of the US's relocations, military campaigns and condoning of vigilante violence far off pitched battlefields that decimated Indigenous populations constitute genocide.

Watters also invoked the "clash of civilizations" concept, a post-Cold War school of thought in foreign policy that has gained traction since the 9/11 terrorist attacks. US military officials and diplomats - save for some in the Trump administration such as former National Security Adviser John Bolton - have been reluctant to embrace it because of potential connotations with white supremacist groups using the same term.

"It wasn't even the main point, but the history of the world is a clash of civilizations," Watters said. "That was the history of this continent. Even the South American continent, the Europeans came, settlers clashed with the indigenous people. It was not a fair fight for a host of reasons, as we all know. And, you know, that's history."

At another point in the interview, Watters said American students should learn about slavery and other injustices "because without that, we don't, we don't have any understanding of where we came from. "