9. After Custer’s death, the US cracked down on their efforts to crus the Sioux and other Western tribes.
The Battle of the Little Big Horn was part of an ongoing United States military campaign against the plains Indians which is known as the Great Sioux War, though it also included actions against bands of the Cheyenne, the Arapaho, and other western tribes. Following Custer’s defeat and death, the US Army, which until then had been focused on returning the wayward bands to their reservations, changed its strategy. The destruction of Indian camps and the systematic capture of leaders in defiance of the United States became the mission of the US Army. The United States Congress made the possession of the Black Hills, rich with gold, a goal of the war.
Indian agencies, where those natives who had agreed to remain on the reservations in exchange for government protection and supplies, were fortified and garrisoned. In the autumn of 1876, the troops at the agencies began a crackdown on the reservations, withholding food from the Sioux and seizing horses and livestock to prevent them from being given to hostile bands. Indian leaders, including Red Cloud, were arrested under the suspicion of being sympathetic to and secretly supporting hostiles, including allowing them to remain on the reservations when not engaged in raids against the settlers or military patrols. By October, agents from Indian Affairs made it known that the Sioux must cede the Black Hills as a condition of peace.