Argentina Republic
Government: Democratic Republic,
Ruler: Hip lito Yrigoyen
Area: 1.1mil SQ
Population: 7 million
Military: 23,000 men split into ten divisions, Four battleships,
Three Battle cruisers, Four light cruisers, and eight torpedo boats.
Europeans first arrived in Argentina in 1502, and it was another ten years before the first contact
with natives were made when Portuguese explorer Joao de Lisboa explored the estuary in Rio De Le
Plata. In 1573 the first permanent settlement was made, Corboda with a permanent settlement being
made in Buenos Aries seven years later. This region was under the Viceroyalty of Peru with
it's capital in Lima. This state had loose control stretching from Panama to Patagonia. The control
that the government in Lima had over this massive territory was extremely limited, and they couldn't
enforce much outside of the main cities even when the Viceroyalty was split into four administrative
zones. When the town of Callao was labeled as the only port allowed to be used for shipments,
the loose control allowed massive contraband trade to start in the Rio Plata estuary ports,
with a good amount of goods going through the cities of Buenos Aries, Montevideo, and Asuncion.
In 1776 the Spanish raised the status of the region with the establishment of the Rio De
Le Plata Viceroyalty that encompassed all of Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay, and much of Bolivia
with Buneous Aries being the capital. It allowed the city to flourish as the exports became a mix
of precious metals as well as leather goods and other food products. At the start of the
19th century, the local support towards Spain gradually fell with the lack of ships coming
from the homeland, nearly stopping after the battle of Trafalgar in 1805. The following
year the British tried to invade Buenos Aires and tried again in 1807, but were defeated both times
by the Viceroy. Those victories, achieved without help from the mainland, boosted the
confidence of the city. Once the Peninsular war started and the Spanish king had been captured,
many viewed that the American people should rule themselves. This led to many attempts to remove
the main royalist power base in the Viceroyalty which finally seceded in the May Revolution of
1810. I would encourage you to read up on the aftermath of Argentinians war for independence
as it is rather interesting and has much more detail then I'm able to go into for this episode.
Looking at the election of 1880 you had Julio Roca who was a very well respected individual that won
the presidency, Roca was able to establish a large web of inter-alliances and installed many
measures that allowed him to have near absolute control over the political landscape. Under his
presidency, the economic focus went from one of extensive farming to one of industrial agriculture
which was helped by a large flood of European immigrants and investment from European powers,
while this didn't allow the nation to fully industrialize, it allowed its economy to rapidly
expand and build up a large middle class. After his presidency, the effects of the Long Depression
took a hard effect on the nations economy which caused the Civics Union party to stage a failed
coup against the then president Miguel Celman, while this failed, it heavily weakened the Civic
Union which later split into two separate parties and caused Celman to resign. Roca was thus able to
win the presidency again and keep unrest down by the use of police and military forces to suppress
any protest. In 1910, Roque S enz Pe a won the election and instituted a series of reforms
that gradually crippled the old oligarchy who had massive control over the political
landscape. This allowed Hip lito Irigoyen the father of the poor to be elected in 1916.
Irigoyen detested the Anglophile cattle barons and the Francophile intellectuals and he also
despised the many Argentines who looked to Italy as their mother country. He saw
no reason to have his country go to war when the sale of her war materials was much more
prosperous and able to do on an enormous scale. The majority of the population supported him but
there were great pressures on him to join the Allies, especially from the Conservative forces,
who still held a majority within parliament. When Wilson called on all remaining neutral states
to follow the U.S. example and break relations with Germany, the Argentine government excused
itself on the ground that it was distant from the scene of conflict. However, German U-boats had
sunk two Argentine ships and the reaction was mass anti-German demonstrations in Buenos Aires. German
Foreign Minister realized that support for Germany in the Americas was rapidly declining, so he
offered to apologize and to have the Argentine flag saluted. When two more Argentine ships were
sunk Argentina presented an ultimatum to Berlin. The German response was slow and unsatisfactory:
it would, if a German investigation proved that the Germans were at fault, make reparations.
In Sep-1918 Argentina did agree to sell surplus wheat to Britain and France. This
was a popular move with the pro-Ally population and was a solution to the problem of mounting
surpluses in Argentina. Irigoyen's unpopular neutrality paid off as Argentina emerged as
a prosperous nation without any debts for the first time in its history.
The Latin American nations that had declared war or broken relations with Germany were invited
to the Paris Peace Conference however, they were little more than onlookers.
Being denied a voice in arranging the peace settlement, they threw their support behind
Wilson's "grand project" of a League of Nations. Ten Latin American nations became
charter members and six others were invited to sign the League Covenant. Eventually all
of the Latin American nations became members, at least for a time. What most appealed to the
Latin Americans, aside from the idealism and the prestige, was Article X of the Covenant,
guaranteeing the political and territorial integrity of its members. This would serve,
they hoped, as protection against the United States but that proved wrong.