PLATINEAN COUNTRIES
The Silver River Viceroy was, along with New Granada, one of the two “rebellious” Viceroys. While Peru and the Caribbean were loyalist, and New Spain was split between those wanting independence and those who were loyalist, Silver River had been wishing for liberty long before Benalcazar and his Junta declared independence.
Silver River was a very important Viceroy, with its port Buenos Aires. In the long way from Lima or Guayaquil, around Cape Horn and through the unexplored water of the Patagonia, Buenos Aires was the first safe port after Santiago. After that, there was still a long way from there to New Granada or the Caribbean, which crossed the waters of Portuguese Brazil.
As you can see, the port was very important, but the Spanish government was utterly incompetent when it came to managing it. Buenos Aires quickly became a city filled with pirates, corruption and continuous attacks from other powers, mainly the UK, which wanted to take the port for themselves.
The Criollo ruling classes weren’t pleased. Not only they were not able to hold any political power, but also they came to think of the Crown as useless, corrupt and incompetent. The ideals of liberty came from Europe then, and they were mixed with the ideas from the North, mainly the United States and Colombia. Thus, just like in Colombia, several societies, The Juntas Patrioticas, were created. They mission was achieving independence from the Spanish Empire, but their ideas on how to do so and how the resultant nation would be differed greatly, and that kept them from merging like in Colombia.
In Buenos Aires, the Junta Suprema Platinea was created, led by Juan Rojas, a criollo gentlemen. However, and similar to Benalcazar, he envisioned La Plata as a state with all the Viceroy’s lands, but instead of a federation he proposed a centralized state. In response, two other Juntas were created, one in Chile and another in Paraguay. We’re going to explore the ideologies and motives of each Junta in detail.
The Buenos Aires Juntas followed the Rojism ideology, which, for all practical means, could be considered a variant of the French Isabeyism. Unlike Benalcazarism, influenced by the ideals of the French Revolution and the United States, Rojism was far more influenced by Isabey’s Terror Regime and proposed a Centralized Republic under a Strongman, similar to Garcism ideas in Mexico. The difference comes into organization of the state. Under Rojas’ vision, La Plata would be a Terror Regime where only the Criollos from Buenos Aires and Montevideo would have any rights, with parts like Chile and Paraguay subjected to domination from the central government. In other words, they would be, by all means, colonies. Also, Rojism was by far more militaristic and supported the build of a nation’s armed forces more than it supported the build of the nation itself.
The people from Chile and Paraguay didn’t like this idea. Chile’s Criollos identified themselves more with Benalcazarism, searching for a Democratic Republic with close ties to other democracies and the UK. It also advocated for a powerful Navy instead of focusing in the Army, and shared the nationalistic and non-racist view of Colombia in regard to the natives. Paraguay, on the other hand, was motivated by a sort of nationalism sentiment that wanted to make Paraguay great by all means, military or not. One of the major concerns was the acquisition of land, creating a sort of irredentism that called for the annexation of La Plata’s northern territories, Rio Grande and Uruguay. Finally, these ideals were also fueled with hate towards Buenos Aires Criollos, who were seen as little more than dictators, not better than the Spanish king.
Even with all these differences, it should be noted that Rojas maintained contact with Benalcazar and they often discussed their plans for South America. Nonetheless, they didn’t really trust each other, and Benalcazar purposely hid the exact date his revolution would start. They also had profound disagreement over their respective ideologies and how Peru should be handed.
When the Colombian Independence War started in 1785, Rojas wasn’t prepared yet. He intended to rebel first and “liberate” both Chile and Paraguay, effectively annexing them. This wasn’t possible as Benalcazar had maintained contact with Chile’s Revolutionary Leader, Hurtado, too, and informed him of the revolution date so he could be ready. By 1786 Chile, Paraguay and La Plata had started their independence wars. Chile was the shortest, and soon all the Capitanacy fell to Patriotic Control. Hurtado would then attack Charkas, but he lacked the manpower and organization to do any significant offensive. In the meantime, Paraguay fell to Patriotic control as well and a Republic was created. Rojas was not happy with this result, since he was Paraguay as a part of his State, but knowing that moving troops and annexing Paraguay when the Spanish were still a threat wasn’t a wise move, that it would raise tensions with Colombia and Chile and finally dealt a morale blow to a supposed Libertador Army, he left the Republic alone for the moment. Once La Plata’s territories fell to Rojas’ control, then the Race to Uruguay started, with both Juntas wanting to annex the province before the other. Platinean operations against Charkas started too, and that forced Peru to withdraw some troops from the Colombian front.
The Race to Uruguay would finish after Montevideo fell to Platinean troops, but the northern half of the province was kept under Paraguayan occupation. Deciding that defeating Peru was a more pressing matter, Rojas and Paraguay’s President, Ortega, agreed that the question could be resolved latter. Talks with Hurtado’s Chile were also held, trying to create a united Platinean army to reach Lima before Lebrun, but they failed as Chile was a sympathizer of Colombia.
El Ejercito Platineo attacked and occupied Charkas around 1788, and then the Race to Lima started. The elites there, who already knew that victory was hopeless, decided to continue fighting to the bitter end in the reasoning that if they can force a stalemate they may gain independence as a Republic, instead of a Platinean or Colombian puppet. The advance to Lima would be hard and bloody, with the defensive terrain of the Andes allowing Peru to achieve various tactical victories against both Ejercitos Libertadores, but those battles were overall major strategic failures. The Peruvians had to keep retreating due to low supplies and manpower problems. Even with all this, they were able to inflict heavy causalities in both the Colombian and Platinean armies, which didn’t seem to care thanks to their manpower advantage. In such a desesperate situation, Croix finally agreed to use Native and Indian troops as well. Those two groups of people were still bitter over the successes and crimes commited against them after Tupac Amaru’s rebellion, and especially thanks to the Purge. They also liked Benalcazar, who promised to end the huasipungo system and abolish slavery. A conspiration would start, and in the Piura Talks the Indigena peoples would agree to revolt in the northern front. The conspirator would take place around December 1788, and it allowed Lebrun to break thought Peru’s mountains.
Croix was shocked to see this happening and couldn’t respond properly until Lebrun was very near Lima. He then proceeded with his final stance, a destructive battle using the Andes as defense. The strategy would be a success, with Lebrun being defeated and having to march his decimated army back. The southern armies decided that he was too near victory, and moved to the offensive as well, with Rojas deciding to use his manpower superiority in the form of man wave attacks. They would fail, nonetheless, as Croix was able to use Lebrun’s strategy to stop mountain offensives.
The next Colombian operation would start in July 1789, this time aimed at destroying as much as possible of the Peruvian army rather than capturing Lima. This was because Benalcazar thought that the Royalist couldn’t hold too much and were near a socioeconomic disaster. He was right, but the offensive didn’t go as he planned with a Colombian retreat with heavy causalities taking place. Nonetheless, it did succeed in its objective of decimating the Peruvian armies since they had a huge number of death soldiers as well, soldiers they couldn’t replace. Also, the popular opinion of the war became negative as Peru was being practically destroyed and the tired people only wanted peace, not caring if it was as a colony or as a Republic.
Under these entire factors, the southern front finally collapsed and the Platineans were able to start an offensive towards Lima. Deciding that live under Colombian influence would be better for Peru, Croix directed his army to defend southern Peru and organized the Lima talks with Lebrun. The Colombian General would accept Croix surrender in exchange of guaranteeing his survival and offering protection to Peru. This was in January 1790.
Lebrun then proceeded to march his army to Lima since he knew that Rojas would assault the city if left without protection. A month later Rojas, Hurtado, Benalcazar and Ortega would arrive to the city and, since Mexico had achieved its independence as well, declared that America was finally free from Spain. However, this was not the end as the Cucuta Conference to draw the continent’s border had still to take place.
