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I'm aware that many people here aren't very familiar with the history of Paraguay. But before 1870, Paraguay was the Prussia of South America. Paraguay had a phenomonal military for it's size in matters of both quantity and quality. It had infrastructure surpassing that of it's larger neighbors and in addition the country was almost entirely self sufficient. How ever, this all ended when the bloodiest war in South American history, the Paraguyan War(Also known as the War of the Triple Alliance and the Great War). Paraguay, eager to find allies in the region appealled to Uruguay but after Brazil installed a puppet regime in Uruguay, Paraguay declared war on Brazil and after assessing Argentine military strength they also declared on Argentina after being denied military access and support which Dictator Lopez expected. From 1864 1870 the war raged on and as much as 70% of the Male population of Paraguay was killed. The country was torn apart and then crippled with territorial concessions. Despite having a stronger military than either Brazil or Argentina at the outbreak of the war, there was no way Paraguay could've competed with them both on the long term. That in addition to a handful of decisive losses and insubordination on the part of Captain Meza, which gave the Triple Alliance Naval Superiority lead to a crushing defeat for Paraguay.


But what if things went different-- how could it have gone differently? And what would have been the effects?
My general ideas were if Paraguay ignored Uruguay entirely and instead chose to invade Argentina who was relatively weak at the time so Paraguay could secure control of disputed territories like Argentine Formosa. Either that or they avoid declaring on Argentina and instead choosing to only fight the Brazilians.

TLDR: What would have happend if Paraguay hadn't lost the Paraguayan War? How could they have won it?
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