He liberated six modern nations, had a country and a currency named after him, and died impoverished in a borrowed shirt, convinced his life's work was a complete failure. In his own bitter words, he had spent his decades plowing the sea. This episode is a deep dive into the life, contradictions, and shattering final years of Simón Bolívar, El Libertador.

We trace the long arc of the Bolivarian wars: the early defeats that taught him that relying on the wealthy creole elite would never deliver independence; the pivotal alliance with Alexandre Pétion of Haiti, who offered weapons, money, and safe harbor on the condition that Bolívar abolish slavery in every territory he freed (a masterstroke that secured Haiti's borders by exporting its revolution); the audacious crossing of the Andes; and the brutal calculus of execution and terror t ...