The Paraguayan War
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In the 1860s, one of the bloodiest civil wars in the Western Hemisphere took place. And it was not the U.S. Civil War. It was a war between Paraguay and an alliance of Uruguay, Argentina, and Brazil. And it was one of the bloodiest ever fought in Latin America. It was a conventional war that resulted in a guerrilla war which spawned famine and disease. Learn more about the Paraguayan War or the War of the Triple Alliance on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

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Despite the severity of the Paraguayan War, shockingly few people have ever heard about it. It took place right after the American Civil War, which has gotten much of the historical attention because it came first and because the abolition of slavery was at its core.

The Paraguayan War was a much more traditional war insofar as the basis of the war had to do with territory. I previously touched on this war in one of my earlier episodes in which I explained why Rutherford B. Hayes is so popular in Paraguay. The origin of the war can be traced back to the original claims made by Spain and Portugal to the region. When they divided up the map, they did so far away from South America with no real knowledge of the reality on the ground.

These problems didn't just exist between Spain and Portugal. When Spain carved up its section into different colonies, the borders between them weren't very clear either. So long as they were colonies of the same European country, this really wasn't that big of a deal. However, in the early 19th century, when these colonies became independent countries, those land claims suddenly took on a new sense of urgency.

The land in the Rio de la Plata river basin was of particular interest. This basin is particularly fertile where all four of the countries in this episode are located. These land claims caused a significant amount of political tension between the countries in the region. Brazil was the first country to recognize an independent Paraguay in 1811, for example, mostly because Argentina didn't because they claimed it as a renegade province.

One of the biggest areas where this conflict between the countries played out was in Uruguay. Uruguay had become a scene for proxy battles between Brazil, Argentina, and Paraguay. Multiple military and political interventions, especially by Brazil, had occurred in Uruguay in the first half of the 19th century. So, that roughly was the geopolitical situation in the region. You had competing countries with overlapping territorial claims.

Now, the other thing you need to understand is what was happening inside of Paraguay. Paraguay was a dictatorship. While there were other strong leaders in other Latin American countries, the blueprint for the Latin American dictator could be said to have been invented in Paraguay in the early 19th century. Following Paraguay's independence in 1811, it was led by José Gaspar Rodríguez de Franquia, who was a dictator.

And when I say he was a dictator, I mean this in the most literal sense. His title was Supreme and Perpetual Dictator of Paraguay. Francia ruled from 1814 to 1840. During his reign, he executed most potential opposition and established a secret police force. He also created a prison that was like a Paraguayan gulag in the middle of the forest, 70 miles from the nearest settlement.

In many ways, he created the type of authoritarian government that was to be found in many countries in the 20th century. When he died in 1840, he was replaced by Carlos Antonio López, who eventually accumulated powers on a par with Francia. López held the title of president and eventually appointed his son, Francisco Solano López, as vice president. The elder López died in 1862 and his son became president.

Paraguay was much smaller than its neighbors. It's estimated to have had a population of approximately 450,000 during the rule of Francisco Lopez. In comparison, its neighbors of Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay had a combined population of 11 million people. Despite having a much smaller population, Paraguay had a much larger army than all of its neighbors combined.

There have been various estimates of the army's size, but current estimates put the army's size somewhere between 70,000 and 100,000 men. That was enormous for a population of that size. However, what it had in quantity, it certainly lacked in quality. The weapons the Paraguayans had were poor. And to make a comparison, the guns they had were decades-old smoothbore muskets, not modern guns with rifling.

Their artillery was just as bad. Their officers were untrained and the military had poor food and medical care. Economically, Paraguay practiced protectionism and was rather isolated from its neighbors, which made it much poorer than its neighbors. Before Francisco Lopez, Paraguay was extremely isolationist. Lopez, however, took an interest in the politics of the region. He aimed to expand Paraguay's influence and secure greater regional power.

Paraguay felt threatened by Brazil and Argentina's growing influence in the region, and Lopez saw himself as a protector of smaller countries, particularly Uruguay, against their larger neighbors. So, now with all that background, we can get into the immediate cause of the war, which was political instability in Uruguay. Ever since the 1830s, Uruguay had been divided between two factions, the Blancos and the Colorados.

The Blancos represented rural landowners and were supported by Argentina. The Colorados represented urban interests and had the backing of Brazil. In 1864, Brazil supported a Colorado rebellion in Uruguay, helping them overthrow the Blanco government. Lopez believed that if Paraguay did not act, it would eventually be squeezed by Brazil and Argentina.

So, after Brazil intervened in Uruguay, Paraguay invaded Brazil's Mato Grosso province on December 14, 1864. Brazil had about 16,000 men under arms at the start of the war and their quality was on a par with Paraguay, which really isn't saying much. Paraguay then decided to occupy Uruguay to support the Blancos. But there was a small problem. Paraguay doesn't border Uruguay.

If you look at a map, you'll notice that there's a branch of Argentina that extends up between Uruguay and Paraguay to border Brazil. Lopez asked Argentina for permission to cross the province of Corrientes to enter Uruguay, but he was denied. So on March 25, 1865, Paraguay declared war on Argentina and subsequently invaded.

Lopez thought that he could get the support of the leader of the Corrientes province, who was an opponent of the Argentine central government, but that plan backfired. On May 1st, Brazil, Argentina, and the Colorado government of Uruguay signed a treaty forming the Triple Alliance. While Paraguay had a larger army to start the war, the nations of the Triple Alliance had an over 20 to 1 advantage in population. The long-term odds were overwhelmingly against Paraguay.

One of the most significant battles of the war was the naval battle of Riachuelo, which took place on June 11, 1865, when the Brazilian Navy decisively defeated the Paraguayan flotilla on the Parana River. While landlocked Paraguay didn't have much of a navy, this loss weakened Paraguay's ability to transport troops and materials along the river, marking a turning point in the war.

The war was not over quickly. It dragged on for several years, and for most of that time, things did not go well for Paraguay. The largest battle of the war, and one of the largest in South American history, was the Battle of Tuyuti, which took place on May 24, 1866. The Allied forces launched a massive assault on Paraguayan positions at Tuyuti, and the battle ended in a decisive victory for the Triple Alliance, although Paraguayan forces did manage to put up a fierce resistance.

From July 1867 to August 1868, over a year, the Allies laid siege to the fortress of Humaita, a key Paraguayan fortress that controlled access to the Paraguay River. The Brazilian Navy blockaded the fortress while Allied ground forces besieged it. After a long and grueling siege, Humaita fell in August of 1868, opening the way to Paraguay's capital, Asunción.

Brazilian forces captured Asuncion on January 1, 1869. However, that was not the end of the war. Francisco Lopez refused to surrender and continued to resist with guerrilla warfare. Lopez retreated into the Paraguayan countryside where he organized a guerrilla resistance. The remnants of the Paraguayan army, now drastically smaller, continued to fight a brutal and relentless campaign against the occupying forces.

Lopez became increasingly paranoid, executing or imprisoning those he suspected of disloyalty. The guerrilla campaign continued until March 1st, 1870, and the final battle of the war, the Battle of Cerro Cora, in which Brazilian troops decisively defeated the Paraguayan forces. Lopez was killed during the battle, effectively ending the war. Now I rushed through much of the actual fighting and battles that took place during the war, and that might give the impression that it wasn't much of a war.

But it was anything but. The war dragged on for six years, and it was brutal. In fact, the reason I'm doing an episode on this is because of the extreme nature of the conflict. Paraguay suffered the most devastating consequences of the war, with estimates suggesting that between 50 and 90 percent of the entire population of the country died.

The exact number is controversial, as there were no reliable pre-war population censuses. The population before the war is estimated to have been around 400,000 to 525,000, but some estimates place it well over 1 million, which is now considered to be highly unlikely. Regardless of the actual headcount before the war, after the war, the population had dropped dramatically.

The most shocking estimates suggest that up to 90% of Paraguay's male population perished, leaving a population with an enormous gender imbalance and a much smaller, predominantly female society. The losses were not due only to combat, but also disease, starvation, and displacement caused by the war. In most wars of this era, armies faced each other in open fields and engaged in set-piece battles. And to be sure, there was a fair number of those that took care during this war.

But when the capital fell, civilians were caught up in the violence. Then, when the war entered a guerrilla phase, the distinctions between military and civilian became blurry, and the battleground was now in civilian areas. Much of the population loss, particularly in Paraguay, was due to non-combat factors such as disease, famine, and displacement. This complicates the death toll estimates, as these deaths were often indirect consequences of the war rather than battlefield casualties.

Most modern estimates, even the most conservative ones, claim that at least half the population of Paraguay died during the war. In addition to the staggering death count, the loss of the war had other devastating ramifications for Paraguay. Paraguay's leadership was almost entirely wiped out during the war. After the war, Paraguay was left in a state of political chaos with a weak civilian government under occupation by the Allies. The Triple Alliance imposed harsh terms on the country.

Paraguay was forced to cede significant portions of territory to both Brazil and Argentina. The Treaty of Asunción, signed in 1872, formalized the new borders and established Paraguay as a semi-dependent state under Brazilian and Argentine influence. The modern borders of Paraguay today are significantly different and smaller than the borders of the country before the war.

Uruguay, the smallest participant in the Triple Alliance, saw the Colorado faction achieve political dominance, which was secured with Brazil's backing. However, Uruguay played a relatively minor role in the post-war settlement. Brazil, despite suffering its own heavy losses, emerged as the big winner and the dominant regional power after the war. The war helped to solidify its influence in the Rio de la Plata Basin and contributed to the centralization of the Brazilian Empire under the Emperor Dom Pedro II.

Argentina gained territory at Paraguay's expense, but was less influential than Brazil in post-war Paraguay. The war also helped solidify Argentina's internal cohesion, but it would continue to face political instability in the following years. The Paraguayan War was a transformative event in the history of South America, shaping the geopolitical landscape of the region for decades.

Paraguay's near-total destruction and its long-term recovery left a lasting scar, while Brazil's dominance in the aftermath redefined the power dynamics in South America. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Benji Long and Cameron Kiefer. I want to give a big shout out to everyone who supports the show over on Patreon, including the show's producers. Your support helps me put out a show every single day.

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