ABC Republics & Neighbors 1914
By Jamie Bisher
Argentina
Argentina was Latin America’s great success story in 1914. It had risen above poverty and anarchy to become one of the world’s richest and fastest developing nations. A fortuitous marriage of technology and trade had rescued Argentina from continuing fratricide in the early 1860s. In 1857, railway construction linked the cattle ranches of the pampas to the port of Buenos Aires, and refrigeration soon made Argentine beef a lucrative export that revolutionized the economy, and turned the nation’s attention from warfare to commerce. The wealth of semi-feudal cattle empires spawned a vibrant middle class who built Buenos Aires into an urban crown jewel. It was a modern city where conservative oligarchs presided over a rigid social hierarchy struggling to accommodate a fast-growing cosmopolitan populace.
The wealth and stability generated by international trade enabled Argentina’s military to evolve from gangs of thugs into professional soldiers, and its navy from privateers to a blue-water fleet. However, the legacy of the anarchy that reigned from 1829 until 1861—of the dictators Manuel Rosas and Justo Urquiza and the lesser caudillos and their execution squads, instilled a dark tradition of secrecy, suspicion and treachery in Argentine society.
In the 1890s Argentina was compelled to join a naval arms race with Chile. The increasingly martial and expansionist Chile had invaded and annexed sizeable, nitrate-rich chunks of Bolivia and Peru in 1880, and was eyeing Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego. Argentina promptly contracted Prussian military advisors to rejuvenate its ground forces to meet the Chilean challenge. Then, in 1904, Brazil felt obliged to join in the heated naval arms race and announced plans to build a fleet of massive dreadnought-type battleships. In response to this and to the dismay of European governments and industrialists, Argentina stubbornly chose a US shipbuilder—the low bidder—to construct a pair of costly capital ships. A half-century of prosperity and a healthy measure of regional political competition transformed Argentina’s navy from a motley collection of clumsy riverine ironclads into a modern fleet of cruisers, destroyers and torpedo boats led by graduates of a professional naval academy.
The Argentine Army also faced the formidable challenge of keeping pace with Chile and Brazil. James Gerard, US Ambassador to Germany, recalled, “Von Below, a German officer in Berlin who had been in the Argentine, used to make merry over the Argentine soldiers and said that they objected to drilling when it rained.” By 1914, Argentina had built a tightly organized, 21,000-man army with a national military academy and a formal system of education for officers and non-commissioned officers (NCOs). They even had the funds to field modern weapons: Mauser rifles, Maxim machine guns, Krupp field pieces and howitzers, and even a railway battalion and a budding aviation program with a motley assortment of French and German airplanes.
European influence had long permeated Buenos Aires and eased the assimilation of immigrants into the cosmopolitan sea of Porteños. Clubs, restaurants and other specialized services sprang up to assist or profit from every immigrant community. A number of the huge frigoríficos—beef-packing houses—were British-owned, and afternoon tea was a tradition in some neighborhoods. More than two million Italian immigrants had settled in Argentina since the middle of the nineteenth century, and many loudly championed the cause of Italia irredenta. In recent years, German influence had been competing head-to-head with French influence throughout Latin America. French was studied and spoken by the upper classes, and French art and literature imposed the standards emulated by Latin American artists and writers. Although French influence was felt strongly in the Argentine Army, German influence was widespread and especially evident in contemporary innovations and technology.
A sizeable German community had long called Buenos Aires home. The city had been a regular port-of-call for German shipping companies for more than 40 years and Germans had earned the best reputations among the commercial trading houses that controlled most imports and many exports. Regional utilities were dominated by German investments, managers, engineers and technicians. Toasts to Kaiser Wilhelm and the latest German tunes echoed in Restaurant Bavaria, Aue’s Keller, Restaurant Teutonia and other gathering places where Spanish was the second language.
German military advisors and arms dealers had been active in Argentina since the turn of the century. German instructors had helped establish the influential Escuela Superior de Guerra in 1900, and Mauser rifles and Krupp guns had become mainstays of the Argentine military arsenal. The director of the Escuela Superior de Guerra between 1907 and 1913 had been José Félix Uriburu, a prior graduate who had become a staunch Germanophile, arranging exchanges with the German Army and enjoying a personal audience with Kaiser Wilhelm II. On the eve of World War I, Argentina merited a visit by Kaiser Wilhelm II’s brother to observe military maneuvers and court favor with the locals.
Argentine insecurity facilitated German arms sales. Even though Argentina and Chile went through the motions of settling their border disputes in May 1902 with arbitration by Great Britain’s King Edward VII, a frontier war over turf and pride remained the region’s most volatile hazard. Minor friction with Brazil began regularly after the turn of the century, to the benefit of the agents of Krupp and Mauser. Even Kaiser Wilhelm II engaged in some aggressive marketing, pulling aside Argentine minister Indalecio Gómez at Germany’s annual naval review in 1907 to urge him to arms against Brazil, preferably with German-built warships.
Buenos Aires was also a center of international intrigue. Among the sea of immigrants swam an untold number of exiles, dissidents, political refugees and fugitives on the lam. One of several elaborate assassination plots against Spain’s King Alfonso XIII was engineered by a seditious “center in Buenos Aires.” German intelligence officer Horst von der Goltz claimed to have tipped off Alfonso’s security after overhearing two conspirators plotting in a Geneva café. When Spanish police interrupted the assassination attempt on May 24, 1910, only the bomber, one Jose Tasozelli of Buenos Aires, died (Von der Goltz also alleged that the plot involved an unnamed Spanish minister who continued in office after the foiled assassination). Anarchists and “wobblies” from several nations found fellowship in the Argentine melting pot, along with fugitives and plotters of every other political stripe.
The wealth and stability generated by international trade enabled Argentina’s military to evolve from gangs of thugs into professional soldiers, and its navy from privateers to a blue-water fleet. However, the legacy of the anarchy that reigned from 1829 until 1861—of the dictators Manuel Rosas and Justo Urquiza and the lesser caudillos and their execution squads, instilled a dark tradition of secrecy, suspicion and treachery in Argentine society.
In the 1890s Argentina was compelled to join a naval arms race with Chile. The increasingly martial and expansionist Chile had invaded and annexed sizeable, nitrate-rich chunks of Bolivia and Peru in 1880, and was eyeing Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego. Argentina promptly contracted Prussian military advisors to rejuvenate its ground forces to meet the Chilean challenge. Then, in 1904, Brazil felt obliged to join in the heated naval arms race and announced plans to build a fleet of massive dreadnought-type battleships. In response to this and to the dismay of European governments and industrialists, Argentina stubbornly chose a US shipbuilder—the low bidder—to construct a pair of costly capital ships. A half-century of prosperity and a healthy measure of regional political competition transformed Argentina’s navy from a motley collection of clumsy riverine ironclads into a modern fleet of cruisers, destroyers and torpedo boats led by graduates of a professional naval academy.
The Argentine Army also faced the formidable challenge of keeping pace with Chile and Brazil. James Gerard, US Ambassador to Germany, recalled, “Von Below, a German officer in Berlin who had been in the Argentine, used to make merry over the Argentine soldiers and said that they objected to drilling when it rained.” By 1914, Argentina had built a tightly organized, 21,000-man army with a national military academy and a formal system of education for officers and non-commissioned officers (NCOs). They even had the funds to field modern weapons: Mauser rifles, Maxim machine guns, Krupp field pieces and howitzers, and even a railway battalion and a budding aviation program with a motley assortment of French and German airplanes.
European influence had long permeated Buenos Aires and eased the assimilation of immigrants into the cosmopolitan sea of Porteños. Clubs, restaurants and other specialized services sprang up to assist or profit from every immigrant community. A number of the huge frigoríficos—beef-packing houses—were British-owned, and afternoon tea was a tradition in some neighborhoods. More than two million Italian immigrants had settled in Argentina since the middle of the nineteenth century, and many loudly championed the cause of Italia irredenta. In recent years, German influence had been competing head-to-head with French influence throughout Latin America. French was studied and spoken by the upper classes, and French art and literature imposed the standards emulated by Latin American artists and writers. Although French influence was felt strongly in the Argentine Army, German influence was widespread and especially evident in contemporary innovations and technology.
A sizeable German community had long called Buenos Aires home. The city had been a regular port-of-call for German shipping companies for more than 40 years and Germans had earned the best reputations among the commercial trading houses that controlled most imports and many exports. Regional utilities were dominated by German investments, managers, engineers and technicians. Toasts to Kaiser Wilhelm and the latest German tunes echoed in Restaurant Bavaria, Aue’s Keller, Restaurant Teutonia and other gathering places where Spanish was the second language.
German military advisors and arms dealers had been active in Argentina since the turn of the century. German instructors had helped establish the influential Escuela Superior de Guerra in 1900, and Mauser rifles and Krupp guns had become mainstays of the Argentine military arsenal. The director of the Escuela Superior de Guerra between 1907 and 1913 had been José Félix Uriburu, a prior graduate who had become a staunch Germanophile, arranging exchanges with the German Army and enjoying a personal audience with Kaiser Wilhelm II. On the eve of World War I, Argentina merited a visit by Kaiser Wilhelm II’s brother to observe military maneuvers and court favor with the locals.
Argentine insecurity facilitated German arms sales. Even though Argentina and Chile went through the motions of settling their border disputes in May 1902 with arbitration by Great Britain’s King Edward VII, a frontier war over turf and pride remained the region’s most volatile hazard. Minor friction with Brazil began regularly after the turn of the century, to the benefit of the agents of Krupp and Mauser. Even Kaiser Wilhelm II engaged in some aggressive marketing, pulling aside Argentine minister Indalecio Gómez at Germany’s annual naval review in 1907 to urge him to arms against Brazil, preferably with German-built warships.
Buenos Aires was also a center of international intrigue. Among the sea of immigrants swam an untold number of exiles, dissidents, political refugees and fugitives on the lam. One of several elaborate assassination plots against Spain’s King Alfonso XIII was engineered by a seditious “center in Buenos Aires.” German intelligence officer Horst von der Goltz claimed to have tipped off Alfonso’s security after overhearing two conspirators plotting in a Geneva café. When Spanish police interrupted the assassination attempt on May 24, 1910, only the bomber, one Jose Tasozelli of Buenos Aires, died (Von der Goltz also alleged that the plot involved an unnamed Spanish minister who continued in office after the foiled assassination). Anarchists and “wobblies” from several nations found fellowship in the Argentine melting pot, along with fugitives and plotters of every other political stripe.
Brazil
Brazil’s natural wealth pitted the young republic against the European imperial powers in global commercial competition. The stakes of this vicious contest were high, as the modest, yet ambitious espionage of an obscure British consul would prove when it undermined the Brazilian economy generations later. James de Vismes Drummond-Hay, British consul in Pará, inspired a young wanderer named Henry Wickham to learn the processes involved in rubber cultivation and harvest. In 1876, Wickham smuggled 70,000 rubber tree seeds out of Brazil to British scientists at the Royal Botanic Gardens. They used Wickham’s seeds to sow British rubber plantations in Ceylon, Malaysia and elsewhere in the empire. Eventually the efficient British plantations took over the world market from the Brazilians. (Drummond-Hay later became Great Britain’s Chargé d’affaires in Valparaiso at the time of the War of the Pacific.) The episode was, perhaps, the most costly intelligence loss in Brazilian history.
|
Brazil had begun modernizing her intelligence and military arms in earnest in the 1870s. The loss of 40,000 men and 300 million dollars to vanquish Paraguay in the six-year Triple Alliance War (1864-1870) compelled the evolution of Brazil’s army and navy into modern fighting forces. Then Chile and Argentina’s frantic naval arms race at the turn of the century caused alarm in Brazil that spurred it into the race as well. Fortunately, Brazil enjoyed overwhelming strategic advantages over its neighbors in terms of population and industrialization.
Brazil’s neighbors had reason to be wary of the giant in their midst. A Brazilian version of Manifest Destiny instigated the Acre Wars between 1899 and 1903 that cost Bolivia the loss of Acre province, a thickly forested territory five times the size of Belgium. As the world price of rubber multiplied, Acre’s forests had attracted 18,000 settlers from drought-stricken areas in Brazil. It was a region without roads, towns or much government presence until Bolivia opened a customs station at Puerto Alonso on January 2, 1899, sparking a series of uprisings by Brazilian settlers and other adventurers. An April 1899 secession was foiled by Bolivian authorities but three months later a Spaniard who had been Bolivia’s consul in Belem, Brazil revolted and declared Acre independent. A coup d’etat soon deposed him, and the Brazilian Navy restored order in March 1900 and returned the area to Bolivian control. Eight months later, the governor of Brazil’s Amazonas territory outfitted an armed expedition to Acre but failed to detach it from Bolivia. Bolivia then tried to lease the troublesome Acre to a powerful group of foreign investors, the Bolivia Trading Company Incorporated of Jersey City, New Jersey, until a public uproar forced it to renege on the deal. Meanwhile Brazilian separatists resumed attacks against Bolivian forces in August 1902, and coerced Bolivia to sell the province to Brazil effective November 17, 1903.
In 1910, Brazil became the third country in the world to possess the ultimate weapon of the day, two massive (19,000-ton displacement) Dreadnought-type battleships, the Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo. She had little to fear from her smaller neighbors, although the response time of military units across the country’s vast distances made good intelligence imperative to defend more than 11,900 miles of littoral approaches and to anticipate trouble spots along nearly 9,770 miles of mostly remote frontier. Brazil’s downstream location on the continental system of rivers that flowed out of the Andes Mountains gave her another strategic advantage over her Andean neighbors. The Andean nations had to carry their armies over the mountains while Brazil could sail up river much more easily.
To the European combatants, Brazil factored much more than its smaller Latin American neighbors, and not only because of its bountiful natural and human resources, and strategic position dominating the South Atlantic. A strategic trans-Atlantic communications cable linked telegraph stations in the New World and Old World, running from Pernambuco to Monrovia, Liberia. Another significant factor was Brazil's sizeable German immigrant population, an asset in peacetime but a potential liability should it become mischievous during wartime. On the other hand, Brazil had welcomed more than one million Italian settlers who sympathized with their oppressed brethren under Austro-Hungarian rule. Brazil's strategic value made it an important intelligence target.
Brazil’s neighbors had reason to be wary of the giant in their midst. A Brazilian version of Manifest Destiny instigated the Acre Wars between 1899 and 1903 that cost Bolivia the loss of Acre province, a thickly forested territory five times the size of Belgium. As the world price of rubber multiplied, Acre’s forests had attracted 18,000 settlers from drought-stricken areas in Brazil. It was a region without roads, towns or much government presence until Bolivia opened a customs station at Puerto Alonso on January 2, 1899, sparking a series of uprisings by Brazilian settlers and other adventurers. An April 1899 secession was foiled by Bolivian authorities but three months later a Spaniard who had been Bolivia’s consul in Belem, Brazil revolted and declared Acre independent. A coup d’etat soon deposed him, and the Brazilian Navy restored order in March 1900 and returned the area to Bolivian control. Eight months later, the governor of Brazil’s Amazonas territory outfitted an armed expedition to Acre but failed to detach it from Bolivia. Bolivia then tried to lease the troublesome Acre to a powerful group of foreign investors, the Bolivia Trading Company Incorporated of Jersey City, New Jersey, until a public uproar forced it to renege on the deal. Meanwhile Brazilian separatists resumed attacks against Bolivian forces in August 1902, and coerced Bolivia to sell the province to Brazil effective November 17, 1903.
In 1910, Brazil became the third country in the world to possess the ultimate weapon of the day, two massive (19,000-ton displacement) Dreadnought-type battleships, the Minas Gerais and Sao Paulo. She had little to fear from her smaller neighbors, although the response time of military units across the country’s vast distances made good intelligence imperative to defend more than 11,900 miles of littoral approaches and to anticipate trouble spots along nearly 9,770 miles of mostly remote frontier. Brazil’s downstream location on the continental system of rivers that flowed out of the Andes Mountains gave her another strategic advantage over her Andean neighbors. The Andean nations had to carry their armies over the mountains while Brazil could sail up river much more easily.
To the European combatants, Brazil factored much more than its smaller Latin American neighbors, and not only because of its bountiful natural and human resources, and strategic position dominating the South Atlantic. A strategic trans-Atlantic communications cable linked telegraph stations in the New World and Old World, running from Pernambuco to Monrovia, Liberia. Another significant factor was Brazil's sizeable German immigrant population, an asset in peacetime but a potential liability should it become mischievous during wartime. On the other hand, Brazil had welcomed more than one million Italian settlers who sympathized with their oppressed brethren under Austro-Hungarian rule. Brazil's strategic value made it an important intelligence target.
Chile
Chile fancied herself as the “Prussia of South America.” She was cocky after an untarnished record of victories over Peru and Bolivia in 1839 and 1883, subjugation of the Arauca Indians in 1883, and even a short, successful naval war against Spain in 1866. Some accused Chile of being a “client state of Great Britain,” a willing pawn of European banks and oligarchs against hemispheric development. Regardless, Chile was equipped with German advisors, modern military equipment and a formidable English-built navy which neighboring Argentina, Bolivia and Peru eyed with suspicion in light of Chile’s expansionist history.
The 1879 War of the Pacific against Peru and Bolivia changed the map of South America and sowed bitterness that would persist for decades. Peru had nationalized nitrate mining interests in 1875, dispossessing mostly European and Chilean investors, and then two years later Bolivia “unilaterally levied a special tax on the nitrate mines in the economic zone it shared with Chile.” Chile occupied the Bolivian port of Antofagasta and neighboring nitrate mines in February 1879, and while Peru sought to negotiate a peaceful settlement, Bolivia publicized its “secret” alliance with Peru and declared war on Chile. Ironclads clashed at sea, Chilean troops took Iquique, Tacna and Arica, and then, after peace negotiations failed owing to bumbling US diplomacy, landed far behind enemy lines to occupy Lima. For a short time, the US openly sided with Peru after President James Garfield took office in March 1881, and his newly appointed Secretary of State James G. Blaine briefly attempted to end the war and settle the dispute, lured by the possibility of establishing a US naval base in the natural harbor of Chimbote, Peru. This effort died with President Garfield when he succumbed to an assassin’s bullet in September 1881. Chilean pride and belligerency, allegedly egged on by European investors, almost led the country into conflict with the United States in 1891, when dissidents in Santiago sought refuge in the US consulate, which was soon besieged by taunting Chilean secret policemen, and Valparaiso mobs attacked US sailors in the street. Tacna and Arica became the Alsace and Lorraine of South America, a powder keg that could erupt into warfare at any time.
European influence was particularly strong in Chile. In Santiago and Valparaiso, British and German businessmen and trading houses dominated thriving commerce, knowing that Chilean nitrates, copper and coal would become strategic commodities during wartime. An industrious and homogeneous German colony of farmers and tradesmen had populated towns and villages in southern Chile around Valdivia since the mid-nineteenth century. German professors on contract to the Ministry of Education had implanted Kultur in two generations of public and technical school graduates. Decades of military advisors had instilled Soldatengeist—German military spirit—into the Chilean Army. On the other hand, the Chilean Navy had a long association with the Royal Navy and honored the English mariner Lord Cochrane as a hero of Chile’s War of Independence.
|
Chile’s modern professional army owed its’ efficiency to an energetic German officer named Emil Körner Henze. He was born, raised and educated in Prussia, fought with an artillery regiment during the 1866 Austro-Prussian War, and served as a second lieutenant in the Franco-Prussian War, after which he was promoted and selected to attend the Prussian War Academy where he befriended fellow students Paul von Hindenburg and Jacob Meckel. Körner was chosen for further military studies and exchanges in France, Italy, Spain and Russia, was promoted to captain in 1878, and in 1882 was assigned to the school of artillery and engineers in Charlottenburg, where he distinguished himself as a brilliant teacher. In 1885 he was seconded to the Chilean Army, where he received the rank of lieutenant colonel and a charter to help reorganize the service in the wake of the victorious War of the Pacific. Two years later he co-founded the Academia de Guerra and became professor of military history and strategy. In 1891 he was promoted to colonel, then jumped to brigadier general, and in the following year he reorganized the Guardia Nacional. He led an 1894 commission to Europe that returned to Chile with 32 German officers. They had a dramatic effect on the Chilean Army and propelled Körner’s career to the highest levels of military leadership, culminating in his appointment as inspector general in 1904. In 1910, he retired and returned to Germany, but left a lasting legacy in Chile.
Germany became uncontested supplier as well as the mentor of the Chilean Army. German companies fulfilled the vast majority of Chile’s military procurement needs, everything from Fokker monoplanes, Krupp artillery and Mauser rifles to horseshoes and musical instruments. Dozens of Chilean bureaucrats and officers toured factories in Essen, Meppen, Tangerhütte and elsewhere. A regular flow of delegations crafted large acquisition and training programs that rooted German influence ever deeper and forged strong ties between the two countries.
In 1914, Chile had just completed a sweeping seven-year overhaul of its military organization and arsenal, pointedly incorporating “German doctrine.” In the European mold, Chile created the Estado Mayor General del Ejército (EMGE), Supreme General Staff of the Army, to prepare for possible conflicts by cataloging “maps, methods of communication, transport, and all such details required to refine projects” of contingency plans that could be incorporated into annual maneuvers, training, conferences and historical studies. Such planning demanded systematic military intelligence collection. Ecuador, El Salvador and Colombia maintained close military relations with Chile, and exchanged military missions. Feared by its neighbors and eyed with suspicion by the United States, Chile was not reluctant to wield its intelligence and military instruments against them.
Germany became uncontested supplier as well as the mentor of the Chilean Army. German companies fulfilled the vast majority of Chile’s military procurement needs, everything from Fokker monoplanes, Krupp artillery and Mauser rifles to horseshoes and musical instruments. Dozens of Chilean bureaucrats and officers toured factories in Essen, Meppen, Tangerhütte and elsewhere. A regular flow of delegations crafted large acquisition and training programs that rooted German influence ever deeper and forged strong ties between the two countries.
In 1914, Chile had just completed a sweeping seven-year overhaul of its military organization and arsenal, pointedly incorporating “German doctrine.” In the European mold, Chile created the Estado Mayor General del Ejército (EMGE), Supreme General Staff of the Army, to prepare for possible conflicts by cataloging “maps, methods of communication, transport, and all such details required to refine projects” of contingency plans that could be incorporated into annual maneuvers, training, conferences and historical studies. Such planning demanded systematic military intelligence collection. Ecuador, El Salvador and Colombia maintained close military relations with Chile, and exchanged military missions. Feared by its neighbors and eyed with suspicion by the United States, Chile was not reluctant to wield its intelligence and military instruments against them.
Paraguay
Two generations after almost every able-bodied Paraguayan adult male had been killed or maimed in a suicidal war against the Triple Alliance—Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, Paraguay was peaceful and prosperous in the wake of several post-war “rebellions, revolutions and full-scale civil wars.” In the economic desolation of this violence, foreign investors had grabbed huge tracts of territory in the remote Chaco region at cut-rate prices, where boundaries with Bolivia had never been properly delineated. This property quarrel slowly festered into antagonism that was destined to boil into a deadly fight with Bolivia.
In the meantime, relative political stability allowed Paraguay to reorganize the army in 1912 and send officers for professional training in Chile, Argentina and Europe. The following year a German military mission arrived for a tenure that would be cut short by the outbreak of war in Europe. Landlocked Paraguay was crisscrossed by rivers and took her navy seriously, making up for lack of funds with innovation and creative maintenance. Similarly, the country boasted an excellent intelligence service, perhaps fostered by the cultural cohesiveness of Paraguay’s dominant Guaraní heritage. A similar cohesiveness bonded several German settlements on the west bank of the upper Parana River, who maintained close contact with their countrymen in Brazil (German settlements in Paraguay included Pueblo San Migel, Curuzu, Cambyreta, Mansion Alborada, Obligado, Colonia Bella Vista, Capitan Meza, Colonia San Lorenzo, San Bernardino, Nueva Germania, Nueva Australia, Yegros and Nueva Italia). |
Uruguay
Uruguay tread carefully to maintain its sovereignty in the giant shadows of Argentina and Brazil. It shared a common demographic heritage with the predominately European population of Argentina, and had been liberated from Brazil by Argentina in 1828 after a three-year war. A decade later the Argentine civil war spilled into Uruguay and, until 1852, attracted intervention by the British, French and an idealistic Italian mercenary named Giuseppe Garibaldi. Uruguay even welcomed the stationing of Brazilian troops from 1854 until 1857 to prevent invasion by Argentina, then became the coveted prize of Paraguayan dictator Francisco Solano Lopez during the horrendous Triple Alliance War. Fighting between caudillos and political bosses raged in an atmosphere of corruption, rigged elections and assassinations until the second four-year term of President Jose Batlle y Ordóñez began in 1911.
Uruguay was just strong enough to make a show of force but not to resist a determined invasion. The country’s small army had begun professionalizing and modernizing under President Batlle y Ordóñez, a former journalist and son of an earlier president, purchasing French and German artillery, Mauser rifles and Colt machine guns in the years before the First World War. The navy relied upon a new, German-built torpedo-gunboat, backed up by a twenty-seven year old Italian cruiser, a thirty-five year old British schooner, an armed paddle steamer, and small dispatch vessel. Since 1913, Uruguay’s Ministry of Defense had been trying to arrange for aviation training in Chile, but could not afford it. Meanwhile, with Uruguay sandwiched between Argentina and Brazil, the countries most likely to violate her, intelligence and diplomacy were Montevideo’s best weapons.
Uruguay was just strong enough to make a show of force but not to resist a determined invasion. The country’s small army had begun professionalizing and modernizing under President Batlle y Ordóñez, a former journalist and son of an earlier president, purchasing French and German artillery, Mauser rifles and Colt machine guns in the years before the First World War. The navy relied upon a new, German-built torpedo-gunboat, backed up by a twenty-seven year old Italian cruiser, a thirty-five year old British schooner, an armed paddle steamer, and small dispatch vessel. Since 1913, Uruguay’s Ministry of Defense had been trying to arrange for aviation training in Chile, but could not afford it. Meanwhile, with Uruguay sandwiched between Argentina and Brazil, the countries most likely to violate her, intelligence and diplomacy were Montevideo’s best weapons.
Copyright 2018, 2023, Jamie Bisher