Chaco War
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| Chaco War | |||||||||||
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 Bolivia and Paraguay before the 1932 War |
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| Combatants | |||||||||||
 Republic of Bolivia |
 Republic of Paraguay |
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| Commanders | |||||||||||
| Hans Kundt | Mcal. José Félix Estigarribia | ||||||||||
| Strength | |||||||||||
| Army of Bolivia |
Army of Paraguay |
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The Chaco War (1932–1935) was fought between Bolivia and Paraguay over control of a great part of the Gran Chaco region of South America, which was incorrectly thought to be rich in oil.
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[edit] Origins
Though the region was sparsely populated, control of the Paraguay River running through it would have given one of the two landlocked countries access to the Atlantic Ocean. This was especially important to Bolivia, which had lost its Pacific Ocean coast to Chile in the War of the Pacific (1883).
[edit] Control of natural resources
Furthermore, the discovery of oil in the Andean foothills sparked speculation that the Chaco itself would be a rich source of petroleum. Two large oil companies were involved in the exploration: Standard Oil (later broken up into Exxon/Mobil, Chevron, and BP/AMOCO), which backed Bolivia, while Shell Oil supported Paraguay.
In international arbitration, Bolivia argued that the region had been part of the original Spanish province to which Bolivia was heir. Meanwhile, Paraguay had begun to cultivate the region, making it the world's largest producer of yerba mate, while the small indigenous population of Guaraní Indians was related to that country's own Guaraní population. Finally, Paraguay had also lost almost half of its territory to Brazil and Argentina in the War of the Triple Alliance and was not prepared to see what it perceived as its last chance for a viable economy fall victim to Bolivia.
Border skirmishes throughout the late 1920s culminated in an all-out war in 1932, when the Bolivian army, following the orders of the President Daniel Salamanca, attacked a Paraguayan garrison at Vanguardia.
The war was a disaster for both sides. Bolivia's European elite forcibly enlisted the large indigenous population into the army, though they felt little connection to the nation-state. While Paraguay was able to foment nationalist fervor among its predominantly mixed population, its soldiers were ill-prepared for the dearth of water or the harsh conditions of terrain and climate they encountered. In fact, of the war's 100,000 casualties, more died from diseases such as malaria and other infections than from the actual fighting. (About 57,000 of the total were Bolivian.) At the same time, the war brought both countries to the brink of economic disaster. In addition, on November 27, 1934, Bolivian generals frustrated by the progress of the war seized President Salamanca while he was visiting their headquarters in Villamontes and replaced him with the vice president, José Luis Tejada Sorzano.
[edit] Aftermath
[edit] Cease-fire
By the time a ceasefire was negotiated on June 12, 1935, Paraguay had seized control over most of the region. This was recognized in a 1938 truce, signed in Argentina, by which Paraguay was awarded three-quarters of the Chaco Boreal.
- Paraguay had a population only a third as large as Bolivia's (880,000 versus 2,150,000). But Paraguay's guerilla style of fighting compared to Bolivia's more formal strategy enabled Paraguay to win more battles.
- Paraguay received military supplies and intelligence from Argentina. Paraguay's use of poor-man's weapons also proved more effective in the Chaco than the expensive modern weapons the Bolivians used.
- A further advantage for the Paraguayans was their ability to communicate over radio in Guaraní, which was not intelligible to the typical Bolivian soldier.
Some years later it was found that there were no oil resources in the Chaco proper. Bolivia did get a small strip of land that bordered the Paraguay River's Puerto Busch.
Many middle-class Bolivians were humiliated by Bolivia's quick military defeat during the Chaco War, which led to a mass-movement away from the traditional order known as the Generación del Chaco, which was epitomized by the MNR-led Revolution of 1952.
[edit] Trivia
Some aspects of the Chaco War are the inspiration for Tintin's comic book The Broken Ear by Hergé.
