Talk:Paraguayan War

Translation

I'm in the process of a first-draft translation of the featured-Portuguese article on this same topic. I'm going by only a decent conversational command of Spanish and the Babelfish/Freetranslation translators, so it's a slog. Please don't remove/alter the stuff inside the <*!-- --*> brackets; that's what I haven't yet translated (unless you want to do some translating yourself!). Thanks. :) Zafiroblue05 02:18, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

The following comment was left on my talk page, it might also be relevant: -- Jmabel | Talk 18:15, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

Hello, I am a user from the Catalan Wikipedia (Montag73) and the writer of the article on the Triple Alliance War there. I am a reader of the English Wikipedia and I have been reading some of your contributions in the Catalan related subjects. In my opinion the Catalan article for the Triple Alliance War is pretty good, although it is more focused on the political aspects of the war than in the war itself. So, I encourage you to use any part of it you think could be useful for the English article.

Best regards,

Salvador —preceding unsigned comment by (ca:usuari:montag73) 5 Dec 2005

Cleanup

i started to add an index to make the article more readable, i am not quite satisfied with the headlines, but at least it looks better like that... i alos added the template box, it is very helpfuzl, but should be changed to another style... --Larzan 16:32, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

• The page now [1] is radically different than it was in July. [2] I'm removing the clean-up tag. Zafiroblue05 22:47, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Copyright

I have found almost the same text at the following URL: http://www.onwar.com/aced/data/tango/triple1864.htm

This may be a copyright violation

I've dropped a note to User:Kulkuri, who originated the article; it hasn't changed much over time. - Jmabel | Talk 21:56, Feb 6, 2005 (UTC)

I have used source with permission. Anyway I will do some edits with article with more sources. --Kulkuri 15:09, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

In general, when you copy material with permission, it's a good idea to put a note on the talk page; the best is to copy the email that gave you permission, or to note that there is general permission on the site, etc. -- Jmabel | Talk 18:23, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

Yeah, i noted the same and dropped another note, asking him to post the legitimation he has on this page.... --Larzan 16:32, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

Odd removal

Why was "northward into the Brazilian province of Mato Grosso and southward into the province of Rio Grande do Sul" changed to just "southward into the province of Rio Grande do Sul"? -- Jmabel | Talk 18:59, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

Misc.

This article needs a rewrite, If I get a chance Ill try soon. Poorly worded sections and missing references. (e.x. Who is Mitre ? )

24.3.189.49 21:58, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Nothing about Paraguay's American friends? (anonymous, somewhat cryptic, remark, 12 March 2005)

I have substituted 'British' for 'English' which is more acceptable to non-English British readers (i.e. Welsh and Scottish) MRJ

It mentions twice that Paraguay declared war on Argentina twice in March 1865. Quite confusing due to some lack of chronological order. -Aaron 27 February 2007, 6:59 PM EST

References

I notice that the article lacks references. The following list comes from the corresponding Catalan article; it may be useful to someone who wants to fact-check this. If you do actually use any of these, please add them as references to the article, and cite to them appropriately for what can be verified from them. Some of these may be Spanish-language editions of works where English-language editions also exist.

• Bethel, Leslie (ed.): Historia de América Latina, vols. VI i X; Barcelona: Crítica, 1992.
• Bushnell, David & Macaulay, Neill: El nacimiento de los países latinoamericanos; Madrid: Nerea, 1989. ISBN 8486763193
• Croccetti, Sandra (dir.): Nueva historia del Paraguay, vol. IV; Madrid: Editorial Hispana Paraguay, 1997.
• Fausto, Boris: Brasil, de colonia a democracia; Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1995. ISBN 8420642363
• Halperin Donghi, Tulio: Historia contemporánea de América Latina; Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1975. ISBN 9504000193
• Iglesias, Francisco: Historia política del Brasil; Madrid: Maphre, 1992.
• Rock, David: Argentina 1516-1987; Madrid: Alianza Editorial, 1988. ISBN 8420642215
• Williams, John Hoyt: The Rise and Fall of the Paraguayan Republic; Austin, University of Texas Press, 1979. ISBN 0292770170

The German article offers:

• Jürg Meister: Francisco Solano Lopez - Nationalheld oder Kriegsverbrecher? Der Krieg Paraguays gegen die Triple-Allianz 1864 - 1870. Osnabrück 1987, ISBN 3-7648-1491-8

-- Jmabel | Talk 23:05, 9 December 2005 (UTC)

Bloodiness

The War of the Triple Alliance, also known as the Paraguayan War, was fought from 1864 to 1870, and was the bloodiest conflict in Latin American history (why not America History??), and the second (What is the first??) bloodiest conflict that occurred on the American continent. -->

I would say it was the third, after the Mexican Revolution (1 million killed) and the American Civil War.

Or I´m wrong, or this war is the first bloodiest conflict in all Americas.

• It's really up for grabs, but the bloodies conflict in all the Americas was probably the American Civil War, in which approx 600,000 people died. Around 400,000-500,000 people died in the War of the Triple Alliance, most likely - although it could have been over a million if you ask the most radical pro-Paragauyan anti-Brazil/Argentina sources. Zafiroblue05 07:17, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • I'd like to see the tidbit about the "second bloodiest conflict" removed. The American Civil War probably had a higher body count, but I'm not convinced that "bloodiness" comes down to a raw body count. Having it in the intro seems to raise more questions than it answers, IMHO. --Bletch 16:34, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

• How about something like "one of the bloodiest conflicts"? I agree that "bloodiness" is hard to quantify, but the fact that so many people died is one of the notable things about the war - even, one of the things that makes it notable - and therefore belongs in the lead, IMO... Zafiroblue05 18:43, 15 January 2006 (UTC)

I also find this quite confusing. First of all, if we are going to call it the second bloodiest conflict, the article must mention who would be the first. A search for "bloodiest conflict" on wikipedia does not return the American Civil War. I do believe it is possible to intuitively determine how much a war is "bloody"... The Crimean war, for example, is take as one of the bloodiest conflicts in history, as the WW I is seen by some as bloodier than WW II, regardless of the number of casualties.

I do think this discussion should not be on the introduction, where we should only say it was "one of the bloodiest". I think the biggest reason to label it "bloody", more than because of the number of military casualties, is the impact on the civillians, and facts as the employ of women and children in the front; something I always heard of, but I can´t find references.

Wanna hear another confusing thing? The portuguese article only states it was the "largest international conflict in america", but some can say the American Civil War was between two independent nations... Not quite encyclopedic!...

Perhaps we should just change to "one of the bloodiest conflicts in american history", and link it to an article called "conflicts in american history", with a section about bloodiness, do you agree with that? -- NIC1138 00:52, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Agreed and done. As of right now, there's nothing really like Conflicts in American history - not anything that connects the Americas together. We have List of conflicts in North America and List of conflicts in South America (which had exactly one conflict listed when I came to it), but not a List of conflicts in the Americas. Zafiroblue05 01:58, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

¡Ahá! Check it out!. Edit (the whole article! (at least if you want to see what I did)) and hopefully you'll be as impressed with my solution as I am with myself! :-D Tomer^talk 05:47, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Nice! :) I added a link to the list in the first paragraph. Zafiroblue05 07:24, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

I like the new intro. --Bletch 14:35, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

• I believe this is settled, can we close this thread? Discussions about "which war was bloodier" belong to other articles, what we need here is to provide all the facts. -- NIC1138 03:45, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

If "bloodiest" is to mean anything much, ought it not be relative to the whole (a comparative)? Thus the USA civil war killed many, but not so large a proportion of the whole population, likewise an individual may be killed with the shedding of no, some, or much blood so if bloodiest is to characterise the manner of one person's death, it must relate the blood shed to that available. In this regard, only the assaults of G. Khan et al, and Tamurlane would be bloodier, as they attained nearly 100% slaughter of entire cities and provinces. During my travels in Paraguay, I read many references to (and disputes over) numbers such as these: of the population of Paraguay, women (16 years and over) 60% died, of the men (16+) 99.5% died, but I don't recall the exact details (was it the age of 14, or 12, or am I recalling those ages in a count of boys up to twelve? - a decade ago, alas) There was a book The Stupidest War in the World (in Spanish, thus I don't quite recall the proper title. Something like El Guerra mas estupido del mundo), which I now half-recall was more concerned with the Bolivian/Paraguayan battle over the Chaco, but offered comparisons.

Ought there not be some mention of the slaving raids against the Paraguyans? The post-war admission of Guarani culture into the dominant Spanish culture? The peculiar position of the surviving boys, raised by their mothers yet conforming later to machismo, and the revival of dictatorship? The shortage of menfolk and possible sharing of husbands? (very little was written on this) The early social progress (education for girls, divorce) that led to Paraguay being seen as a worker's paradise, prompting Australians, dismayed at the depression of 1880s knocking back gains, emigrating to produce their own colony at Nuevo Australia in Paraguay? Which alas sank into dictatorship and the Chaco war over oil prospecting. Regards, NickyMcLean 02:00, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

War of the Triple Alliance/Campaigns

Doesn't War of the Triple Alliance/Campaigns belong in Tempalte: space, not article space? Segv11 ^{(talk/contribs)} 08:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes. I'd suggest a move to Template:War of the Triple Alliance campaigns. -- Jmabel | Talk 07:43, 4 January 2006 (UTC)

Children in the war

I always heard that Paraguay, after losing many man, had to use children and women in the army, but I could not find any references about this, and the only thing the article has is a picture of a boy, but it says that he is from Argentina!... What´s wrong here? -- NIC1138 03:14, 18 January 2006 (UTC)

• The use of children in war was relatively common in 19th century total wars (eg, US Civil War) - hell, it's fairly common today. See Military use of children. Paraguay certainly used children as well in the war, probably to a much greater extent than Argentina, mainly because by the end of the war it had degenerated into first a guerrilla war (in which the line between civilians, children, and soldiers was very hazy) and then into basically a flat-out genocide (although a term like that might be disputed by some sources) - and children were certainly involved. I'm currently in a long, slow, off-and-on process of finding sources for all the claims made in this article - as well as adding to the mortality and consequences section, so I'll see if I can find any direct sources on this issue. (And if you want to help, please! :P) Zafiroblue05 07:33, 18 January 2006 (UTC)
  • There was an specific battle where it seems an army of 3.500 children fought 20.000 men from the Alliance, the Acosta Ñu battle. This date is currently the children´s day in Paraguay. I believe this is a very conspicuous fact of the Paraguayan War (sadly, the only thing I knew about it for many years). I was very surprised not to see any mention of it in any article, neither in the english, portuguese OR spanish wikipedias. This article about military use of children talks mostly about drummer boys, brainwashing, human shields and guerilla warfare, there´s very little there about actual armies of children.

We are talking about an army of children fighting alone (altough it seems women, wounded and older people were there too). Not in a guerilla war, or during attacks to civillians, but in a large battle. This is possibly the largest number of children to ever engage in a battle!... (I don´t know even about modern conflicts, that article for example doesn´t bring figures like this). We really must take a good look on this subject! And also it´s HIGLY ironic that there is this picture of an argentinian boy soldier, and not of a Paraguayan one. -- NIC1138 04:27, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

A Brazilian version of History

I propose to change the name of this article to “The Brazilian-Paraguayan War” And that’s because I guess even Brazilians will have to cope with the fact that Paraguay was there too. That is somehow a relief: I assume that they are taking full responsibility for the possible death toll of 1.000.000, and exonerating Argentinian officers (Mitre (the supreme commander), Gelly y Obes, Paunero, Rivas, Luis María Campos, etc) for this massacre. I imagine that we will find soon that even the son of the emperor of Brazil died in the war, like Domingo Sarmiento (h) (of course, son of the would be president of Argentina) did. Because even López before he died spoke Portuguese (he was well prepared, wasn’t he) saying “Morro com minha patria” and not the more conventional “Muero con mi patria”, that up to now was the accepted version. But what I would really like to know is how Brazil defended Paraguayan interests by keeping for himself el Mato Grosso and occupying the country for six years. (Argentina was not really in a position to claim anything, since it had two wars to fight: with the Indians and the never ending civil war with los caudillos del interior. And later even with Mitre, who supported a revolution against Avellaneda in 1874) And why, if Brazil is so concerned with territorial integrity, they are not opening the files that would explain the border settlement of 1876. (And that’s not Mitre’s La Nación, but La folha de Sao Paulo of 12-22-2004 that informs us of Lula’s, or the army’s or who knows whose decision it was, that blocked for ever this opening. They called it “sigilo eterno”, eternal silence). All this is plain nonsense. But I guess that the author(s) is/are using the books for Brazilian schools as a source for an encyclopedic article. And that, more often than not, leads to nationalistic views of history. But that shouldn’t come as a surprise: this article is an English version of the Portuguese one. As a balance of sorts, we have the Spanish version that, of course, blames the Brazilians. And the French one, que comme d’habitude, blames no one. I am not saying this article is not respecting the NPOW policy. No, I wouldn’t. It is just one-sided childish stuff. And it needs much re-writing. Ou moito máis sigilo eterno.

• Agreed - it could use rewriting. It's a long process... Wanna help? :) For me, claims should first be referenced. In regard to calling it the Brazilian-Paraguayan War - absolutely not. What about Argentina? Or even Uruguay? Why just Brazil and Paraguay? And who uses that term? (Essentially nobody on Google, at the very least). The article should be named by its most common name, which is the War of the Triple Alliance in common (English-language, as well as Spanish-language) parlanace, and Paraguayan War in common Brazilian parlance. After all, being PC is just another form of POV. Zafiroblue05 01:39, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

• You really don´t help coming here and calling the article "one-sided childish stuff". Please, contribute saying specifically what sections of the article do you dispute. Help us getting to the level of NPOV and then getting over it!...

I´m sure you can help if you just calm down a little... I did not remember the ominous sigilo eterno polemic, for example. We definitely should mention it in the article. ( Here are some links about this that I would be glad to translate [3] [4] )

I am from Brazil, and the Paraguayan War is a subject I´m very emabarassed about knowing very little. I´m sure the people who wrote this article didn´t read brazilian books, because this article has much more information than we give to our children. The vision tought in schools is the one of the aristocracy in Rio de Janeiro back then: the war gave political power to the army, and helped a little in releasing the slaves. Just this... I was lucky to have a more concerned teacher who gave us some dimension about the impact of it to Paraguay... I believe the naïveté of that view is disrespectfull to brazilians as well.

You said the french article doesn´t blame anyone, but it does mention the most important aspect of the war: the British economic interests.

You should stop complaining, and work. Help us to fix everything. I would be glad to help you change the portuguese article if you want. Make the corrections, take off the "childish stuff". Perhaps some day we can all stop having flame wars over this issue. I´m tired of being called imperialist or "the USA of south America". Childish stuff is coming here and saying that it is impossible that we, wikipedia users and writers, can´t create a good article. Fight for it, put a NPOV tag and complain in an organized way, don´t sit there screaming "help, I´m being oppressed". -- NIC1138 05:49, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

I’m most calmed. And certainly I didn’t want to start a little fight over this. I’m sorry if I offended someone. But the reason why I’m not contributing myself seems crystal to me now: I’m not quite proficient with the language. And frankly, I am no historian, either. However, I will try to explain myself in a much straightforward way this time. Wasn’t Bertrand Russell who used to say that people should learn history by reading the books of neighbouring countries? This is a most salutary exercise, but one that wouldn’t help with an encyclopedia article. For that we have NPOW. And the point I was trying to make was that this is a Brazilian vision of what happened. There is almost no mention of Argentinian officers (even to blame Mitre for Curupaytí) but we have a long list of Brazilians.

In fact, despite the statement of the article (and I hope that this is not acontroversial issue) Argentina did have at least one war against Brazil (not the independent Brazil, of course) between 1825 and 1827, after Brazil annexed Uruguay (Provincia Oriental del Río de la Plata) and re-named it Provincia Cisplatina. This war started with what is known as Los 33 orientales (which is part of the official history of Uruguay and you may find in Wikipedia in the Spanish section) and ended at la batalla de Ituzaingó. After that, and up to 1852, Uruguay took part in the Civil War of Argentina (in fact, many Unitarios were exiled at Montevideo which was under siege) against the tyranny of Rosas (Rivera was against, Oribe was in favor). This war ended with the intervention of Brazil against Oribe. (You may remember that 4.200 Brazilians paraded through Buenos Aires after Rosas felt). So, you see, all this goes way too back in the past. Now, I fully understand that you can not put all that in an article, but to say that Argentina and Brazil almost had had two wars is an understatement.

Of course, the Portuguese quote of the dying words of López should be removed by now, simply because he did not say them in Portuguese and this is an English article.

I am glad you found the sigilo eterno statement.

Finally, to say that Argentina wanted to annexed Paraguay and that Brazil stayed there six years to prevent it….well, that sounds a bit like a pre-emptive theory to me. First of all, because Brazil stayed there six years and Argentina did not, and secondly because you are forgetting la Doctrina Varela that stated that “La victoria no da derechos” (Victory gives no right) which was first accepted as a semi-official policy by Sarmiento, and later rejected (Mitre had something to say about that, you can imagine) but which was used in the negotiations with Brazil. And to say that Brazil (or Argentina, for all that matter) received the borders that had claimed before the war is not a legal argument, is it? Despite the heroic death of so many, and the incontrovertible fact that López invaded Corrientes, the war has always been highly criticized in Argentina. So is a shameful, but inevitable necessity to put it in the picture. And blaming one or the other won’t make this war less of a shame.

Again, I’m sorry if I offended someone. And I’m sorry for this boring post, but I thought I might contribute some way or another with some hints for a more qualified person than myself to work with. Despite being Argentinian myself I'm not enough presumptuous to meddle with someone else writing without at least as much as discussing it first.

But to reassure you nobody was calling you nor imperialist, nor anyting. Last time I was in Argentina (15 days ago) none cared nor complained about Brazil. We do not think about you, just as you do not think about us. And personally, I was most obliged to you in this travel: you were really cooperative (Polícia Federal and all) to help me find the passport I had lost at Guarulhos. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.168.186.74 (talk • contribs) 22 Jan 2006

Casualty counts

"One estimate places total Paraguayan losses - through both war and disease - as high as 1.2 million people, or 90 percent of its pre-war population.[2] A perhaps more accurate estimate places Paraguayan deaths at approximately 300,000 people out of its 500-525,000 prewar inhabitant"

1.2 million deaths out of a population of 525,000 doesn't do much to inspire confidence in this article. Do the population estimates for Paraguay really vary between 500,000 and 1.3 million?

• Absolutely. Zafiroblue05 17:44, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
• Documentation in Paraguay was rather poor after the independence and Francia's Dictatorship. This coupled with the destruction the war caused led to the loss of information and documentation concerning the country. There is still an on going debate in Paraguay regarding the pre-war and post-war population. The only thing certain is that between 75% to 90% of the population was killed, and that of the survivors only a handful were male. This was due to an order from the allies that no paraguayan male older than 12 was to be left alive. Veritiel (talk) 21:22, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

"In 1864 the Paraguayan army consisted of 37 batallions and 29 regiments, with a total of 35,305 soldiers and 3,306 officers. Paraguay fielded no more than 30,000 to 40,000 troops at any given time, and inducted into service 70,000 to 80,000 during the five-year war, out of a population between 312,000 and 407,000." (Vera Blinn Reber Shippensburg University: A Case of Total War: Paraguay, 1864−1870. Vera Blinn Reber source:(61) Pedro Lorela y Maury to Foreign Minister, 26 Dec. 1865, Archivo General del Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores de España (hereafter cited as AGMEE), Política Paraguay (hereafter cited as PP), Correspondencia respecto a la Guerra del Paraguay (hereafter cited as CGP), 2576; Cuadro del estado general del ejército, 1865, ANA, SH 344 no. 22; Gabriel Carrasco, La población del Paraguay, antes y después de la guerra: rectificación de opiniones generalmente aceptadas, Asunción, Talleres Nacionales de H. Kraus, 1905, p. 6; Reber. ‘Demographics of Paraguay’, pp. 295−96.

Make up your mind

"In fact, Britain can be seen as the power that most benefited from the war: aside from exterminating the Paraguayan threat in South America, even Brazil and Argentina fell into massive debts that continue to this day (Brazil paid all British loans by Getúlio Vargas era)." The parenthetical remark seems to contradict the main sentence; there is no citation for any of this. Does someone know what is going on? - Jmabel | Talk 05:58, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Maps

Considering that the war changed the geography of the region significantly, I think the article could probably benefit from some prewar and postwar maps, if anyone has any. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 172.135.108.179 (talk • contribs) 29 August 2006.

Indeed. —Nightstallion (?) 12:10, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

A map is completely necessary to further understand what the article is trying to explain. For the least if one could try to make a map to sort-of help visualize the situation. Seriously, how large was Paraguay before the war? MarshalN20 14:25, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not think it is that easy. Large portions of territory where not under effective control of any of the states (they were basically inhabited by natives), and since the region was coming from a chaotic process of independence, every country used to draw maps with the uncontrolled regions as own. This happened also with Patagonia (even the independent Buenos Aires province draw maps claiming it) and happen today wit Antarctica. I think a very serious research by scholars would be needed, and even so I don`t think enough data is known for drawing accurate and controversy-free maps. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Domar1973 (talk • contribs) 19:13, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Done, added a map that roughly shows the pre war Paraguayan territory and the post war one along with references of it. Veritiel (talk) 16:52, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Convoluted POV-ish sentence

From the article: "They remembered that Solano López, believing he would have Mitre's support, seized the opportunity to attack Brazil created by Mitre, when he used Argentinian Navy to deny access to River Plate to Brazilian ships in early 1865, thus starting the war." - Jmabel | Talk 16:55, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

External links

Why does a Portuguese-language link about a wargame merit mention in an encyclopedia article about this war? - Jmabel | Talk 01:52, 25 November 2006 (UTC)

Removed cited material

The undoubtedly too strong statement "In recent years such views [that the War of the Triple Alliance was caused by pseudo-colonial influence of the British] have been abandoned in light of the work of writers such as Francisco Doratiotto was removed, but along with it the following footnote was also removed: Mário Maestri, Revista Espaço Acadêmico, Guerra contra o Paraguai: Da Instauração à Restauração Historiográfica, Ano II, No. 2, January 2003. [5].

I'm sure there was some substance here, even if someone overstated their case. Someone may want to look into what should be restored. - Jmabel | Talk 21:24, 28 November 2006 (UTC)

s

I think my last edit was called for?70.74.35.252 11:15, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

Consequences of the war

The first two paragraphs of this section are innacurate. Between 1870 and 1876 Argentine governments had to deal with a long series of civil revolts and Indian attacks and had no intention nor strenght to seize the Chaco by force. Moreover, Argentine president Domingo Faustino Sarmiento proclaimed his famous La victoria no da derechos ("Victory confers no rights") doctrine which summarized his willingness to negotiate with Paraguay in equal terms the territorial disputes.

The view is controvertial. Some people (e.g. Halperin Donghi) has argued that the war lead to the consolidation of the state (rather than "modernization" as was previously claimed in the article). Indeed the central effective govt was quite recent. I added a reference to a site from CEMA university: it is in spanish but is quite serious, shows different scholar views and quote numerous references. And is a quite stable resource: it's been there for many years. On the other hand, as argentinian I know the Sarmiento's quote, but I am a litle skeptic about it and its meaning (the first paragraph is not mine).Daniel Omar Badagnani (talk) 20:13, 19 March 2008 (UTC)

Right at the end of this section is the line, "Some even go so far as to claim Britain instigated the entire conflict." There is no citation for this so I have marked it as requiring citation. It strikes me as a rather bold statement to make without backing it up. If serious scholars or historians are making this claim then there really ought to be a reference to say who they are. I notice that there is a reference at the start of the article that such claims were made in the 60s and 70s but do not know whether such claims are still in vogue with historians of this period in South American history. IrishPete (talk) 04:41, 21 April 2008 (UTC) The most important (or, at least, popular) proponent in Brazil of the British as instigators was Júlio José Chiavenato, em especial "A Guerra do Paraguai", Brasiliense, (1986 in the version I have, but actually first published in the lete 70s or esrly eighties). He especializes in popular history rewrites (no archival research)from a extreme left-wing point of view. At the time, the book caused quite a stir as it went against the official historiography during the miliary regime. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.121.179.62 (talk) 21:26, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Bloodiest?

"and was by some measures the bloodiest war in the history of the Americas"

What about the American Civil War??? Compare the casualty boxes of both. 09:08, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

In absolute numbers, more people died in the American Civil War. But Paraguay lost almost 60% of its population and 90% of male population. Also, Paraguay had a population of 525,000 and the Triple Alliance sent over 150,000 soldiers. That is more than one soldier for each four people in Paraguay. Italo Tasso (talk) 10:07, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

 :: What about the Mexican revolution 1910-1919? (1 million killed.)

ANOTHER PROBLEM WITH BLOODIEST

The word "bloodiest" for me suggests deaths in which the body sheds blood/ deaths in battle (Per Webster on line >bloody is applied especially to things that are actually covered with blood<)

Yet per the article >The high rates of mortality, however, were not the result of the armed conflict in itself.< The article explicitly states that Brazilian soldiers died primarily from bad food, ill health, typhoid and further that many more Paraguayians civilians died than soldiers, suggesting that more Paraguaians died because of war conditions than because of direct contact with bullets or metal blades. So about another word or phrase to replace "bloodiest" ... (jon_petrie@yahoo.com) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 154.20.37.93 (talk) 04:08, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

OK changed end of first sentence that formerly employed "bloodiest" now >>and caused more deaths than any other South American war.<< Kits2 (talk) 06:29, 28 March 2008 (UTC)

Contradiction

This article implies that the Chaco War, between Paraguay and Bolivia, was beneficial to Paraguay:

It took decades for Paraguay, and the Chaco War, to recover from the chaos and demographic imbalance in which it had been placed ...

But the Chaco War article says:

The war was a disaster for both sides.

Well, which is it? --208.76.104.133 (talk) 08:10, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

fixed.Ekem (talk) 23:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

Question regarding the objectivity of Wikipedia's categorization of this page.

Can someone explain to me why this article is classified under the Project Brazil page? How can a war that was fought by four nations be classified entirely under one? Its as if we decided to include World War 2 solely under the Germany project page. Mariscal8 (talk) 06:38, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

By the way, there is no discussion regarding the occupation and ransacking of Asuncion. I will add these facts to the page. Mariscal8 (talk) 06:38, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Argentine expansionism?

"The government of Buenos Aires intended to reconstruct the territory of the old Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata, enclosing Paraguay and Uruguay. It carried out diverse attempts to do so during the first half of the 19th century, without success — many times due to Brazilian intervention. Fearing excessive Argentine control, Brazil favored a balance of power in the region, helping Paraguay and Uruguay retain their sovereignty."

I don't think this is anywhere near to be true: The Argentines embarked in freeing Uruguay up from Brazil in the Argentina-Brazil war (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Argentina-Brazil_War). It was very evident that Brazil wanted to merely seize all the territory on the East Bank of the Uruguay river, mainly to reap the economical benefits of using the Rio de la Plata ports (Montevideo). Moreover, the United Provinces of Rio de la Plata did not pursue any sort of integrationalism in order to go back to the former colonial status quo of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata: Most of the territory that Argentina "lost" has never been claimed back.

Argentina had has, indeed, an expansionits actitud during the XIX century. The problem was that the country, living a no ending civil war, lost many time in internal fighting. The reconstruction of the territories of the Viceroyalty was used to claim the ownership of the Patagonia. But, the country never when to far as to start a war in order to conquer territories from other conuntries, in fact, Argentina enter this war only when provocated. So, Argentina expanded during the XIX and XX century, but mostly in the territories that where under the indians control and, more or less, respected the other conutries territories. The original pretensions of Argentina where lost when Paraguay got it's independence in 1811, when Belgrano and other argentinan generals where push back from the Alto Peru during the independence war and from Uruguay when the posibilities of starting a new war against Brasil (without the support from England) where to real. After that, there where little to no expansion to the nort. This war, correct me if I'm wrong, the last expansion of argentina to the North and after that the frontier takes almost it's current form. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 158.35.225.228 (talk) 19:50, 12 November 2008 (UTC)

Mistakes about the aftermath of the War

Argentina did not became the wealthiest country in Latin America after the conflict. Brazil would keep it´s place as the wealthiest latin american nation until the end of the monarchy in 1889 (19 years after the war.)

Brazil´s GDP was worth US$ 11 billion in 1889 while Argentina´s GDP was worth US$ 7 billions (in 1990 value) according to Angus Maddison in "FAUSTO, Boris. Brasil e Argentina: Um ensaio de história comparada (1850-2002). São Paulo: Editoria 34. 2004".

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I´ll put in here a translation of the 1st chapter of the second volume fo the biograph of Pedro II written by Heitor Lyra (LYRA, Heitor. História de dom Pedro II: Fastígio (1870-1880). São Paulo: Itatiaia, 1877) that it is still considered the best one about the second emperor:

"The end of the War of the Triple Alliance marks the apogee of the imperial regimen in Brazil. It is the golden age of the Monarchy. The Empire, can be said, reaches its full maturity." pg.9

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Another piece:

"We firmed, in the Exterior, a concept that we never had before. The stability of our institutions, its conservative nature, the internal peace, the joust nomination of our politicians, the refinement of our society and, over all, the unmistakeble, respectable personality in all directions of Dom Pedro II, everything concurred to give us a reputation in the international community, with the exception of the United States of America, that no other country of America could enjoy." pg.9

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According to Roderick J. Barman in "Princess Isabel of Brazil: Gender and power in the Nineteenth Century" (2002), Brazil was passing through a moment of great economic prosperity in 1889.

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Emperor Pedro II would keep himself as the most beloved man by the brazilian population until the end of the monarchy and even after his death two years later (CARVALHO, José Murilo de. D. Pedro II: ser ou não ser. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2007 and DORATIOTO, Francisco. General Osorio. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2008).

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The War of the Triple Alliance had consequence in the end of the monarchy because the Brazilian Army was influenced by the argentinian and uruguayan armies:

"The permanence for more than five years, of the army and the volunteers, later restituted to the civil society, in the Republics of the Plata region, it was harmful to us without a doubt. Those countries were then a school of despotism and caudillism" pg.71 (FERREIRA, Oliveiros S. Vida e morte do Partido Fardado. São Paulo: FERNAC, 2000)

Obs.: Caudillism comes from Caudillo, a common spanish-american figure that is usually a millitary who is unsubordinate and is always conspirating or trying to make coups d´Etat.

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What happened is that as long the old monarchist and millitary were alive, like the Duke of Caxias, Osorio (Marquiss of Herval), the marquiss of Tamandaré, marshall Polidoro, marshall Sampaio, Admiral Barroso, the younger generation would behave. After their deaths (Osorio died in 1879 and Caxias in 1880), the Army started to became unsubordinate and rebellious. They believed that they had no obligation to accept orders from civilians (something that the old generation did) and they could try to act in politics, even if by the force of the arms. This coupled with the growing uninterest of Pedro II of keeping alive the monarchy, led to its downfall. So, the War of the Triple Alliance had long range consequences and not imediate.

I hope I helped a little bit.--Lecen (talk) 13:18, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

Polygamy

This anonymous, unsummarized edit removed the sentence "After the war, the Catholic church temporarily allowed polygamy to help repopulate the country." I believe the sentence was accurate, but it's not cited for, and I don't know about this with certainty, so I'm not restoring at this time. It would be useful if someone would restore it with citation so that it would be easy to "defend" it in the future. - Jmabel | Talk 22:08, 23 September 2008 (UTC)

I would think the church just looked the other way, which is different from allowing it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 148.87.19.194 (talk) 00:19, 8 June 2011 (UTC)

The people scarred?

While it could be an enlightening metaphor in other contexts, it seems rather unencyclopedic for this article to state, "The Paraguayan people had been profoundly scarred, since López ordered troops to kill any combatant, including officers, who manifested signs of cowardice" (emphasis added). Besides, not only was scarred substituted for scared in this edit, but the meaning was pretty much the same even before this earlier one, so the former looks like an overzealous spelling correction. Splibubay (talk) 11:29, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

Translation from Spanish

This edit, while adapting to English the second paragraph in the lead section, taken from the Spanish version (second paragraph there, too), introduced two notable distortions in meaning:

• "La visión alternativa pone el acento en la agresiva política del mariscal Solano López respecto de los asuntos rioplatenses" means the alternate view underlines Solano López's aggressive policy towards River Plate matters, issues or affairs, not the region's inhabitants, even though the word chosen in the original translation—subjects—can invite this interpretation.
• "Comenzó a fines de 1864 con las acciones bélicas entre Brasil y Paraguay; a partir de 1865 ya puede hablarse de «Guerra de la Triple Alianza»" states nothing as to whether the war has been called "the War of the Triple Alliance" (la Guerra de la Triple Alianza) right since 1865—it only asserts this name can be properly used to refer to the war as it unfolded from that time onwards. Splibubay (talk) 11:29, 16 May 2010 (UTC)

What caused the high death toll?

The article insinuates that Lopez killed his own men 'talking of surrender' and cholera is why Paraguay lost 90% of their population. But if I recall, this article said two years ago that the high mortality rate was due to Paraguay's refusal to surrender, and a long guerrilla war with the Brazilians occupying Paraguay. The article seems chopped down; considering what it was before. It doesn't really describe the war in any detail, other than there were a few major battles and Lopez died a painful death. Any comments? --IronMaidenRocks (talk) 09:30, 30 October 2010 (UTC)

IMHO, this (interesting!) article needs to be totally rewritten. Regards, DPdH (talk) 09:50, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Absence of Argentina and Uruguay

This article centers mainly on the Brazil-Paraguay struggle, but says nothing about Argentinian and Uruguayan intervention of the war, the invasion of Corrientes in Argentina, the role of Mitre in the war, some important battles like Tuyutí, which was the bloodiest battle in South America, which destroyed most of Paraguay's cavalry and forced López to take a defensive stand. It lacks details on Asuncion's pillage, in which Argentina refused to participate, at least oficially; and Argentina's position towards the end of the war. I'm Argentinian and I find this quite incomplete. Still, I don't know enough of the war in detail as to write an article, and specially in a NPOV. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 186.22.126.70 (talk) 20:22, 10 December 2010 (UTC)

Agree, the article is totally focused on Brazil's actions and nothing is said about its allies. I'd like to help rewriting this; however I don't have verifiable sources at hand, and (although interested in it) I'm not an expert in South American history. Can anyone please help?
Thanks & regards, DPdH (talk) 09:44, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Hardly believe that will ever happen. I'm the only Brazilian editor who is working on Brazilian-history related articles now and the Argentine editors do not pay much attention to this one. I never heard of any Uruguayan or Paraguayan editor in here, but I might be mistaken. --Lecen (talk) 15:04, 13 December 2010 (UTC)

Requested move

The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: all moved. I also moved Women in the Paraguayan War (non-admin closure). Jenks24 (talk) 17:50, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

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• War of the Triple Alliance → Paraguayan War
• List of battles of the War of the Triple Alliance → List of battles of the Paraguayan War
• Triple Alliance War casualties → Paraguayan War casualties

– Straight to the point: the name "Paraguayan War" (16,100 results [6]) is far more used in English written sources than "War of the Triple Alliance" (6,080 results [7]). Lecen (talk) 15:49, 20 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support as nominator. --Lecen (talk) 16:02, 20 September 2011 (UTC)
• Support. ~16,000 vs. 6,000 hits on Google Books; 1,700 vs. 1,000 on Google Scholar. Neutrality^talk 20:26, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
• Oppose, I've never heard this term before, despite studying the history of the period. Nyttend (talk) 22:48, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

If you never heard then you certainly never studied the history of the period. Countless are the books with the name itself in their titles ([8], [9], [10], [11], etc...). --Lecen (talk) 23:08, 21 September 2011 (UTC)

• Support. Seems to be a simple case of choosing the more common name of two reasonable alternatives. Good Ol’factory ^(talk) 23:43, 21 September 2011 (UTC)
• Support, mainly on account of the ambiguity of Triple Alliance. All of these various Triple Alliances were engaged in a war with someone! Andrewa (talk) 14:53, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
• Support.--Cúchullain ^t/c 15:14, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page. No further edits should be made to this section.

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War of the Triple Alliance v Paraguayan War

I'm surprised the title has been changed to fit a mainly Brazilian POV name. In any case, the google hits I get for "Paraguayan War" are 71,500, whereas the "War of the Triple Alliance" receives almost 4x the amount of hits 274,000. Based on this evidence, the page should be returned to its former NPOV and most common English title of "War of the Triple Alliance". Best regards.--MarshalN20 | ^Talk 23:38, 23 October 2011 (UTC)