History of Paraguay

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This article (or section) may need to be wikified to meet Wikipedia's quality standards.
Please help improve this article, especially its section layout, and relevant internal links. (help)
This article has been tagged since March 2007.

This is the history of Paraguay. See also the history of South America and the history of present-day nations and states.

1 Discovery by Europeans
2 Independence
3 20th century
4 Modern Paraguay
5 References
6 See also
7 External links

[edit] Discovery by Europeans

The history of Paraguay began indirectly in 1516 with the failed expedition of Juan Diaz de Soli to the estuary of the Río de la Plata that divides present-day Argentina and Uruguay. After the cannibalized death of Soli by the hands of the Charrúa Indians (Old accounts attribute the cannibal feast to the Charrúas, but anthropologists say that the Charrúas were hunters and gatherers, or rather, Paleolithic. People groups with this type of culture do not normally practice cannibalism. However, Neolithic, the cultivating cultures, are known to practice cannibalism in order to supply required proteins.).

In synthesis: the ones suspected of the cannibalism are the Guaraní Indians who populate the islands in the Río de la Plata, but not the mainland areas in that region. Those islanders were cultivators, a characteristic belonging to the Guaraní, not the Charrúas. The remaining members of the expedition named the tributary "Río de Solís" and attempted to return to Spain, but on the return, some of the boats were shipwrecked on the Island of Santa Catalina, part of the present-day Brazilian coast.

Among the survivors was Alejo García, a Portuguese adventurer who had made contact with the Guaraní while living among the Indians. Through this melodious language, Garcia astounded the natives with tales of the “White King” who lived, it was said, farther west and ruled cities of incomparable riches and magnificent splendor. At last, García collected some men and gathered sufficient supplies to attempt a journey to the interior and finally was able to leave the Island of Santa Catalina after almost eight years to finally return to the kingdom of the “White King”.

Marching towards the west, García’s company discovered the massive waterfalls of Iguazú (in guaraní, "Great Waters"), crossed the river Paraná (according historian Efraim Cardozo, he only crossed the Paraná at the smaller waterfall called Monday, the bigger waterfalls of Iguazú were discovered by Alvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and not by Alejo García, years later), and arrived at the site of present-day Asunción thirteen years before it was founded. There the group recruited a small army of 2,000 local Guaraní soldiers as reinforcement to invade the promising new land and had to enter the Chaco, a rough semi-desert region. There they faced obstacles like dryness, rainstorms and tribes of the Chaco Indians, extremely dangerous Indians but not as much as the cannibalistic Guaraní Indians who accompanied García. This all took place between the end of 1524 and the beginning of 1525.

García was first the European to cross the Chaco and even managed to penetrate the outer defenses of the Inca Empire in hills of the Andes Mountains in present-day Bolivia, eight years before the fierce and greedy Francisco Pizarro. He operated according to a mixed plan including looting which raised an impressive booty of silver but before the army of the ruling Inca, Huayna Cápac, arrived to challenge him, he retreated with the spoils only to be assassinated by his Indian allies near the present city of San Pedro on the Paraguay river, but they spared the life of his son, the first Paraguayan mestizo. News of the excursion into Inca territory seduced Spanish explorers later and attracted Sebastián Gaboto to the Paraguay River two years later.

Sebastián Gaboto was the son of famous Italian explorer Juan Gaboto (who had attempted the first European expedition to North America). Gaboto was sailing east to the Orient in 1526 when he heard of García’s feats and concluded that the Río de Solís could provide easier passage to the Pacific and the East than the treacherous and stormy labyrinths of the Strait of Magellan, which was the only route known at that time to go towards the wealth of Peru. Gaboto was the first European to conscientiously decide to explore the estuary of La Plata.

Leaving a small force on the northern border of the wide estuary, Gaboto came slowly up the Paraná River for about 160 kilometers and founded a fort named Sancti Spiritu near the present-day Argentine city of Rosario. He continued upstream for another 800 kilometers, past the joining of the Paraguay River and the Paraná but he stayed on the Paraná. When navigation became difficult, Gaboto retraced his steps, but not without obtaining some objects of silver that the Indians affirmed came from a place well into the west. Gaboto then decided to retrace his steps from the Paraná River to enter the Paraguay River. Approximately forty kilometers south of Asunción, Gaboto found a Guaraní tribe that had possession of silver-plated objects, perhaps some of the treasure left by García. Believing that he had found the route towards the wealth of Peru, Gaboto named the Paraguay River “Río de La Plata”, meaning “River of Silver”, though today the name is only where it borders the city of Buenos Aires.

The uncertainties generated by the exit of Pedro de Mendoza took Carlos V to promulgate a certificate (decree) something one of a kind in colonial Latin America. The certificates granted the colonists the right to elect the governor of the Río de Plata province if Mendoza had not designated a successor or if the successor had died. Two years later, the colonists elected Irala as governor. His domain included actual Paraguay, Argentina, Uruguay, and most of Chile and good parts of Brazil and Bolivia. In 1542 the province transformed to part of the Virreinato recently established in Peru, with the capital in Lima. Beginning in 1559, the Audience of Charcas (actual Sucre, Bolivia) controlled the legal subjects of the province.

The administration of Irala set the standard for the subjects on the interior of Paraguay until the independence. Asunción was not only populated by the Spanish, but also by people from France, Italy, Germany, England, and Portugal. This community of approximately 350 men chose Guaraní women as wives and concubines. Irala had several aborigine concubines and encouraged his men to marry Indian women so they would lose feelings of homesickness. Paraguay quickly became known as a land of mestizos. Following the example set by Irala, the Europeans raised their children as Spanish who became the creole elite despite the continual arrivals of more Europeans.

The Guaraní, the Kario, the Tape, the Guarajos, and the Tupi were tribes who inhabited an immense area that began from the mountainous regions of the Guyanas near Brazil until the Uruguay River. The Guaraní were always surrounded by other hostile tribes and so warred frequently. They considered permanent wives an improper show of conduct by warriors in the way that some tribes practiced polygamy with the objective of augmenting the number of offspring. Many times the caciques had twenty or thirty concubines, of whom the caciques shared openly with occasional visitors. The chiefs treated their official wives with respect but did not deny punishing the adulteresses with death. The following observation is worth taking note of: as they were polygamous, the Spanish felt inclined to follow such a way of life. And as they shared the women, the Indians were decimated by the sifilis, a disease unknown in America and important to the conquistadores. In that manner, the pure-blood Guaraní were numerically reduced in the course of the years.

Like other tribes in the zone, the Guaraní were cannibals. But they normally ate only their prisoners of war who were brave and gave the hope of acquiring the courage and strength of their victims.

In contrast with the hospitable Guaraní, the tribes of the Chaco, like the Payaguás (of where the name Paraguay originated, according to various versions on the origin of the name of the country), the Guaycurúes, the M’bayá, the Abipones, the Mocoríes, and the Chiriguanos were implacable enemies of the whites. The travelers in the Chaco told how the Indians were capable of quickly learning the use of the horses (animals of European origin) to win wars. The Guaraní accepted the arrival of the Spanish and looked to them for protection from the ferocious neighboring tribes but also waited for the Hispanics to join them in battle against the Incas once more.

The peaceful era established by Irala Prevailed in 1542 when Carlos V named Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, one of the famous conquistadores of his era as governor of the province. Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca arrived at Asuncion after spending 10 years with the Indians in Florida. The people who opposed Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca at that time accused him of abusing his power against the Indians. He needed to get rid of the people who were against him so he sent them to north of Paraguay crossing the Chaco in search of route to Peru. This expedition angered the Indian tribe that lived in the Chaco; in fact it angered them so much they started a two years war. Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca’s time was about to end. In one of the first many rebellion of the colony against the crown he was arrested and sent back in chains to Spain.

Irala govern all the way until his death in 1556, in many ways his governing system was one of the most humane and new to the new world of Spain which marked a difference with the conquistadores era. Irala maintain a good relationship with his people and the gurani Indians. He pacified the hostile Indians in Chaco and started to trade with Peru. This helped the Paraguayan economy because it boosted textile reproduction and introduced cattle to Paraguay. The arrival of Pedro Fernandez de la Torre in abril end 1556, as the founder of the Catholic Church in Paraguay.

In the last years of his life Irala surrendered to colonial complains and pressure, causing him to establishing an encomienda. Under this system, the colonial citizens received land with rights to labor and production of the Indians living in that area. Although it looked like a good idea this system failed quickly and turned into slavery. Although Irala could did not find or conquest like the conquistadores he was loved by the people and his death was lamented. Irala was so great that the following rulers were always ruling after his shadow.

[edit] Independence

The Viceroyalty in Peru and the Charcas Audiencia had authority over Paraguay. Madrid had ignored this colony to avoid complexity, spending money, and defending a remote colony that was loyal in the beginning but useless in the end to the crown. Because of these reasons, Paraguay does not have a troop of its own, and must depend on an irregular militia composed by the colonist. The Paraguayan natives took advantage of the situation and demanded that the certificates of 1537 give them rights to choose and demote their own governors.

The colony (particularly Asunción) gained a reputation as the rebellious colony that is always fighting against the crown.

The tension between the authorities and the colony reached its highest point in 1720 because of the Jesuits, whose efforts to organize the Indians had denied the colony’s use of Indian labor. A great rebellion known as the Scrambled Comunera happened when the Viceroyalty in Lima refunded a pro-Jesuits governing, which the colonies had already demoted before. This revolt was a ‘rehearsal’ of the events that ended at the Independence of 1811. The most prosperous families of Asunción (whose plantations of tobacco and grass kill competed directly with the Jesuits) organized the revolt but when the movement attracted support of the poor farmers in the interior, the rich ones left it and next they asked authorities the restore order. In response to this, the farmers began to seize properties of the high class and to take them to the field. A radical army almost captured Asunción and, ironically, it was repelled by the Indian troops of the Jesuits’ reductions.

The revolt was a sign of decline. From the refund of Buenos Aires in 1580, the rapid deterioration of Asuncion’s importance contributed to the growth of the political instability within the province. In 1617 the province of the Rio de la Plate was divided in two smaller provinces: Paraguay with Asunción as its capital, and the Rio de la Plate with Buenos Aires as its main city. With this action, Asunción lost the control of the estuary of the river and became employee of Buenos Aires for marine shipments. In 1776, the Crown founded the Viceroyalty in Rio de la Plata. Paraguay, which was subordinate to Lima, happened to be a region controlled by Buenos Aires. Located in the periphery of the empire, Paraguay served as a state cork: the Portuguese blocked the Paraguayan territorial expansion in the north, the Indians blocked it in the south until their expulsion, and the Jesuits blocked it in the east. They forced Paraguayan young people to serve in the colonial military service to make tours extended far from home, and this contributed to a severe labor shortage.

Because Paraguay was located far from the colonial centers, it had very little power in the important decisions that can affect its economy. Spain took control of the wealth of Paraguay through heavy taxes and other regulations. At the same time, Spain was collecting resources and raw materials in the New World to be manufactured in the most industrialized countries in Europe, especially in England. The Spanish businessmen asked the British businessmen to support their finances, at the same time the Argentinean businessmen asked for Spanish support. The people in Asunción asked for rendering from the “porteños” (those born in Argentina) and finally the Paraguayan laborers (farmers without land and in debt with the landowners) bought merchandise on credit. Its result was the horrible poverty in Paraguay and a gradual impoverished empire.

The French Revolution, with Napoleon Bonapart’s ascension and the subsequent war zone in Europe inevitability weakened Spain’s capacity to control its colonies. When the British troops intended to invade and dominate Buenos Aires in 1806, the attack was repressed by the city’s residents with some Paraguayan help, not Spain’s. Napoleonic invasion of Spain in 1808, the capture of the Spanish king Fernando VII (governed 1808 and 1814-33) and Napoleon’s imposition on the Hispanic throne towards his brother José Bonaparte disunited what was left of the links between the metropolis and its satellites. José didn’t have any help whatsoever nor had the loyalty of the Spanish American. Therefore, without a recognized king, all the colonial system lost its legitimacy and the colonists incited rebellions. Encouraged by the Porteños for his recent victory against the British troops, the town hall in Buenos Aires demoted the Spanish viceroy on May 25, 1810 and swore to govern in Fernando VII’s name.

The porteño’s actions had unexpected consequences in Argentinean and Paraguayan history. The news of the events in Buenos Aires stunned Paraguayan citizens who were usually loyal to the realistic position in the beginning. But it didn’t matter how grave the old regime’s offense was, the Paraguayans didn’t want to accept the porteños orders, naturals by a once low payment in the midst of an empty Pampas when Paraguay was a potential colony in the Spanish empire.

The poteños insisted on their effort to include Paraguay under its control choosing José Espínola and Peña as their spokesmen. According to the historian John Hoyt Williams, Espinola was perhaps the most hated Paraguayan during his time. Espinola’s reception in Asunción was not for anything amiable, in part because he had united with the atrocious politics of the ex governor, Lázaro de Rivera, who ordered to shoot over hundreds of fellow citizens until he resigned in 1805. He then escaped in exile to the north of Paraguay and crossed over to Buenos Aires. He lied about the magnitude of his support of the porteños in Paraguay and succeeded in making Buenos Aires’ send its entire cavalry of troops to the north. Manuel Belrano, portenian general and lawyer put together about a 1,100 men with the intention of entering Asunción. However, the Paraguayan troops spectacularly whipped the porteños in Paraguari and Tacuarí. Nevertheless, both armies’ officials fraternized openly during the campaign. Thanks to these contacts the Paraguayans comprehended that the Spanish domination in South America will extinguish and that they, not the Spanish, will have the true and sole power.

If Espínola and Belgrano’s case served to wake up the first nationalists in Paraguay, the sickly and conceived actions performed by the realists that still existed in the colonies inflamed. They believed that the Paraguayan officials that had fustigated the porteños army represented to be a threat directly to the government, the governor Bernanardo de Velasco dispersed and disarmed the forces under his order and sent most of the soldiers home without even paying their 8 months of service. Velasco had already lost respect of his officials when he fled the battlefield in Paraguarí. As a last misfortune, Asunción’s main town hall solicited the protection of the Portuguese army against Belgrano’s forces when they only camped just beside Argentina’s boundary. Far from sustaining the position of the cavalry, a movement ignited a rise and overthrew the Spanish authority the same time in Paraguay on the night of May 14 and on the dawn of May 15, 1811.

The independence was formally declared on May 17.

[edit] 20th century

In the 1930s and 1940s, Paraguayan politics were defined by the Chaco War against Bolivia, the Paraguayan Civil War, military dictatorships, and periods of extreme political instability. General Alfredo Stroessner took power in May 1954. Elected to complete the unexpired term of his predecessor, he was re-elected president seven times, ruling almost continuously under the state-of-siege provision of the constitution with support from the military and the Colorado Party. During Stroessner's 34-year reign, political freedoms were severely limited, and opponents of the regime were systematically harassed and persecuted under the banner of national security and anti-Communism. Stroessner also pursued an assimilation policy towards (non-mestizo) Indians; many Aché were killed in the process of sedentarisation. Though a 1967 constitution gave dubious legitimacy to Stroessner's control, Paraguay became progressively isolated from the world community.

On September 17, 1980, Anastasio Somoza Debayle, former president of Nicaragua, was assassinated in Asunción. Governmental response to this assassination led to further restrictions in Paraguayan civil rights.

On February 3, 1989, Stroessner was overthrown in a military coup headed by General Andrés Rodríguez. Rodríguez, as the Colorado Party candidate, easily won the presidency in elections held that May and the Colorado Party dominated the Congress. In 1991 municipal elections, however, opposition candidates won several major urban centers, including Asunción. As president, Rodríguez instituted political, legal, and economic reforms and initiated a rapprochement with the international community.

[edit] Modern Paraguay

The June 1992 constitution established a democratic system of government and dramatically improved protection of fundamental rights. In May 1993, Colorado Party candidate Juan Carlos Wasmosy was elected as Paraguay's first civilian president in almost 40 years in what international observers deemed fair and free elections. The newly elected majority-opposition Congress quickly demonstrated its independence from the executive by rescinding legislation passed by the previous Colorado-dominated Congress. With support from the United States, the Organization of American States, and other countries in the region, the Paraguayan people rejected an April 1996 attempt by then Army Chief General Lino Oviedo to oust President Wasmosy, taking an important step to strengthen democracy.

Oviedo became the Colorado candidate for president in the 1998 election, but when the Supreme Court upheld in April his conviction on charges related to the 1996 coup attempt, he was not allowed to run and remained in confinement. His former running mate, Raúl Cubas, became the Colorado Party's candidate and was elected in May in elections deemed by international observers to be free and fair. However, his brief presidency was dominated by conflict over the status of Oviedo, who had significant influence over the Cubas government. One of Cubas' first acts after taking office in August was to commute Oviedo's sentence and release him from confinement. In December 1998, Paraguay's Supreme Court declared these actions unconstitutional. After delaying for 2 months, Cubas openly defied the Supreme Court in February 1999, refusing to return Oviedo to jail. In this tense atmosphere, the murder of Vice President and long-time Oviedo rival Luis María Argaña on March 23, 1999, led the Chamber of Deputies to impeach Cubas the next day. The March 26 murder of eight student antigovernment demonstrators, widely believed to have been carried out by Oviedo supporters, made it clear that the Senate would vote to remove Cubas on March 29, and Cubas resigned on March 28. Despite fears that the military would not allow the change of government, Senate President Luis González Macchi, a Cubas opponent, was peacefully sworn in as president the same day. Cubas left for Brazil the next day and has since received asylum. Oviedo fled the same day, first to Argentina, then to Brazil. In December 2001, Brazil rejected Paraguay's petition to extradite Oviedo to stand trial for the March 1999 assassination and "Marzo Paraguayo" incident.

González Macchi offered cabinet positions in his government to senior representatives of all three political parties in an attempt to create a coalition government. While the Liberal Party pulled out of the government in February 2000, the Gonzalez Macchi government has achieved a consensus among the parties on many controversial issues, including economic reform. Liberal Julio César Franco won the August 2000 election to fill the vacant vice presidential position. In August 2001, the lower house of Congress considered but did not pass a motion to impeach González Macchi for alleged corruption and inefficient governance. In 2003, Nicanor Duarte Frutos was elected and sworn in as president.

On August 1, 2004 a supermarket in Asunción burned, killing more than 464 people and injuring 409 [1].

On July 1, 2005, the United States reportedly deployed troops and aircraft to the large military airfield of Mariscal Estigarribia as part of a bid to extend control of strategic interests in the Latin American sphere, particularly in Bolivia. A military training agreement with Asunción, giving immunity to US soldiers, caused some concern after media reports initially reported that a base housing 20,000 US soldiers was being built at Mariscal Estigarribia within 200 km of Argentina and Bolivia, and 300 km of Brazil, near an airport which could receive large planes (B-52, C-130 Hercules, etc.) which the Paraguan Air Forces do not have. At present, no more than 400 U.S. troops are expected.^[1]^[2] The governments of Paraguay and the United States subsequently declared that the use of an airport (Dr Luís María Argaña International)[2] was one point of transfer for few soldiers in Paraguay at the same time. According to the Clarín Argentinian newspaper, the US military base is strategic because of its location near the Triple Frontera between Paraguay, Brazil and Argentina; its proximity towards the Guarani aquifer; and, finally, its closeness toward Bolivia (less than 200 km) at the same "moment that Washington's magnifying glass goes on the Altiplano and points toward Venezuelian Hugo Chávez — the regional demon according to Bush's administration — as the instigator of the instability in the region" (El Clarín^[2]), making a clear reference to the Bolivian Gas War.