Transcription
Did you know Paraguay used to be much bigger until it lost 40% of its territory and 50% of its population at the time to its neighbors? It happened in the year of 1870. And for a while, Paraguay existed as only half of its modern territory until 1940. So, what happened? The answer might be a little obvious. War. War never changes. Countries fight and usually one side loses land at the end. But to lose something to this extent is almost unheard of. Let's rewind a bit to understand exactly how they got there.
Since breaking away from Portugal and Spain in the early 1800s, the new countries of South America didn't exactly inherit a peaceful continent. The Empire of Brazil and the newly independent Spanish-speaking republics immediately found themselves arguing over where one country ended and the next began. Almost everyone had border problems with multiple neighbors. A big part of the issue was that their colonial rulers had never properly sorted things out in the first place. But just like as an adult, there's a point in life where you can't blame your parents anymore. There also comes a point in a country's existence where they can't blame the former rulers either. That's when war breaks out. But let's not get ahead of ourselves.
Back in 1494, Portugal and Spain had signed the Treaty of Tordesillas, basically drawing an imaginary line through the Atlantic and dividing the new world between them. The map is often used as a joke in a meme with people referring to how absurd it was, but I think it's misunderstood. The map didn't mean to divide the existing world between the two Iberian powers. It simply aimed to resolve territorial disputes between them exclusively when it came to newly discovered lands. So if Spain discovered anything past a specific longitude, it was theirs and vice versa. On paper, it looked simple, but in reality, it quickly became useless. Over the centuries, both empires pushed far beyond that original line as explorers, settlers, and soldiers moved inland. The map on paper no longer matched the land on the ground. By the time South America was fully colonized, the old treaty meant almost nothing in practical terms.
By the early 1700s, even the two countries admitted that the original agreement didn't work anymore. So in 1750, they signed the Treaty of Madrid, which tried to redraw the borders based more on who actually occupied what on the ground. Those new lines looked much closer to today's borders, but neither side was completely happy. Over the next few decades, more treaties were signed, tweaked, cancelled, and replaced. The Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1777 adjusted things once again. And finally, the Treaty of Badajoz in 1801 confirmed those later arrangements. On paper, the colonial borders were for all intents and purposes settled. But in reality, they were still vague and often poorly defined on the ground.
Then came the real chaos in the early 1810s. Spain's viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata collapsed during the wars of independence. Out of it emerged not one but four different countries: Argentina, Paraguay, Bolivia, and Uruguay. And when the big colonial structure disappeared, so did whatever loose internal boundaries had existed. Suddenly, these new countries had to figure out exactly where their territory began and ended between each other, and they didn't agree. I mean, look at these maps that show the disputed regions. It's completely chaotic. As one historian put it, Spain left behind not just its border disputes with Portuguese Brazil, but also unresolved internal disputes between its own former provinces. Once independent, the new states started arguing over huge stretches of land that were barely mapped. Much of it was sparsely populated, thick wilderness, or inhabited by indigenous communities who didn't recognize any of the new national governments, just like they hadn't recognized colonial ones.
For Paraguay and Brazil, one key question was simple in theory, but messy in practice. Which river marked the true border? The Apa or the Paraná? This wasn't a new problem. Spain and Portugal had exactly the same question in the late 1700s, and they just didn't really decide it. The land between the two rivers wasn't empty either. Indigenous groups lived there and frequently raided nearby Brazilian and Paraguayan settlements. So this tells us that the dispute wasn't just about lines on a map. It affected real communities on the frontier. By the mid-19th century, South America was a patchwork of young nations sitting on top of old imperial borders that had never been clearly settled. The stage was set for conflict. And in the Río de la Plata region, those tensions would eventually explode into one of the deadliest wars in Latin American history.
Which finally brings us to Paraguay specifically. Now there are different takes on why the Paraguayan War started. The traditional view says Paraguay's president Francisco Solano López was looking for an excuse to expand Paraguay's influence and land and used events in Uruguay as his opportunity. Others argue it was more complicated: that the old border disputes, rivalries between Brazil and Argentina, constant interference in Uruguay's politics, and Paraguay trying to defend their allies all contributed together to make this happen. But it's important to understand what was exactly happening in Uruguay because one could make the argument that Paraguay had a good reason to feel uneasy. Both Brazil and Argentina had territorial claims against them at different times and both had already intervened heavily in Uruguay's affairs. At the time, Paraguay built up a surprisingly strong army for its size. It had ongoing disputes with its neighbors over borders and also tariffs, actually, and it didn't want to end up bullied into submission sandwiched between these two huge neighbors.
Brazil had actually been the first country to recognize Paraguay's independence back in 1844. At the time, Argentina still considered Paraguay a rebellious province of their own. And Brazil, not wanting a strong Argentina, even helped Paraguay strengthen its defenses. They sent officers and technical experts to Asunción to modernize the Paraguayan army. But pretty soon, geography made things worse between the two countries. Brazil's inland province of Mato Grosso had no easy land connection to Huajénier. Brazilian ships had to sail up the Paraguay River, which ran through Paraguayan territory, to reach it. And that meant Brazil depended on Paraguay's permission to use the river, something that very frequently caused friction.
But oddly, it wasn't Paraguay's disputes that triggered the war starting. Because remember that I mentioned that there was a set of events in Uruguay that were potentially used as an opportunity to start a war? Well, this was what was happening. Uruguay was politically unstable at this time. Both Brazil and Argentina were attempting to influence them, and everything culminated in 1863 when a rebellion, with the backing of Argentina, was launched against the government who was an ally of Paraguay. In April of 1864, Brazil stepped in too. They sent their fleet and demanded compensation for Brazilian ranchers along the border who had suffered some type of loss in a local dispute. Not so much in opposition to Argentine influence here, but in an attempt to together with them crush and potentially split Uruguay. Brazil even issued an ultimatum: comply or face invasion. Paraguay warned Brazil that occupying Uruguay would upset the balance of power in the region and threaten Paraguayan security too. But Brazil ignored it, and their troops invaded Uruguay. As a result, Paraguay formally broke diplomatic relations with Brazil and then went to war by capturing a Brazilian steamer ship in the river and invading the Brazilian province of Mato Grosso. Ironically, Brazil and Uruguay settled their conflict super quickly in 1865. And now Paraguay was stuck in a war with Argentina and Brazil over an ally that they no longer had. Not only that, but Uruguay then switched sides and formed a triple alliance with Argentina and Brazil against Paraguay. And at the start of the war in 1864, Paraguay was facing not one but three enemies.
They actually looked pretty strong on paper. Estimates vary, but Paraguay could mobilize roughly 60 to 80,000 men early on, a huge number for its population. It had fortified positions, a disciplined standing army, some river gunboats. The country was relatively centralized, too, and so it could act quickly. The problem was scale. Paraguay's total population was probably under 500,000 at the time. It had limited industry, almost no heavy manufacturing, and once losses started to mount, there was no deep reserve to draw from. The Triple Alliance had far greater long-term capacity. Brazil alone eventually mobilized over 100,000 men over the course of the war, and it had the strongest navy in the region. This proved decisive. Argentina contributed tens of thousands of troops and actually held the leadership of the joint forces. They controlled key river routes and, along with Uruguay, whose military role was pretty small, they had far larger populations and economic bases. Even when they suffered heavy losses, they could replace them while Paraguay could not.
In early 1865, Paraguay escalated by invading Argentina's Corrientes region. And it actually seemed like they were winning for a while, but a major turning point was coming up. At the Battle of Riachuelo, where Brazil's navy destroyed Paraguay's fleet and gained full control of the rivers that cut Paraguay off strategically and shifted the initiative to the Triple Alliance. From then onwards, the fighting moved into Paraguayan territory. There were massive and brutal battles, especially Tuyutí in May of 1866. It's up to today one of the bloodiest battles ever fought in South America. Paraguay fought fiercely, and at Curupayty later that year, it even inflicted a major defeat on the allies. But these were temporary successes. Over time, the allies' numerical superiority and naval control wore Paraguay down. By 1868, the Brazilian army broke through Paraguay's defensive lines along the Humaitá fortress complex. In July of 1869, they captured Asunción, the capital of Paraguay. Even then, the war didn't immediately end. Paraguayan President López refused to surrender. He retreated and continued a desperate guerrilla-style resistance in the north until 1870, drafting teenagers and even children as manpower. Later that year, however, he was killed in battle and resistance collapsed.
The results of the war were catastrophic for Paraguay. It lost significant territory to both Brazil and Argentina. More devastating was the human toll. Modern estimates suggest that somewhere between half and perhaps over half of Paraguay's population died during the war, with an especially extreme loss of adult men. The country's economy was shattered, its infrastructure was destroyed, and it remained occupied for years. They were now a minuscule country sandwiched between many others. But if you know the map of South America, you know that while Paraguay is small, it's not that small. They ended up recovering some territory. Well, not the territory that they lost. They just gained more somewhere else. And want to guess how? That's right, another war. But this one, they won.
After the previous war ended in 1870, Paraguay was occupied, devastated, politically reshaped by the victors. Brazilian troops even remained in the country for several years. And a new government, more aligned with Brazil and Argentina, took power. Argentina actually wanted to annex even larger parts of Paraguayan territory, especially in the Chaco. But Brazil opposed that, preferring a weak but independent Paraguay rather than a strong Argentina. That rivalry between the former allies helped ensure Paraguay's survival as a sovereign state. By 1876, Brazilian troops withdrew, and Paraguay regained full independence.
In the early 20th century, attention shifted north to the Chaco region, a vast dry area claimed by both Paraguay and Bolivia. And tensions eventually led to the Chaco War, which lasted between 1932 and 35. Despite Bolivia's larger population, Paraguay adapted better to the harsh environment and managed its supply lines more effectively. Maybe they had learned from the previous defeat. By the end of the war, Paraguay controlled most of the disputed territory. The 1938 peace treaty confirmed its gains, awarding Paraguay roughly 3/4 of the contested Chaco Boreal. So although Paraguay had nearly collapsed a few years earlier, it not only preserved its independence but later expanded its territory northward, compensating a little bit for the loss. It was a dramatic recovery for a country that had once lost over half of its population and territory. It's still not as big as it once was, but hey, at least it survived. The neighboring Bolivia also lost much of its territory. It used to be much bigger, but that's a topic for another video.