In spite of an abundance of circumstantial evidence, those who claimed that Chile and
Peru were on the brink of war failed to provide a compelling motive, perhaps because there
was no discrete and distinctive aim, issue or event that could explain the rising tensions
between the two countries. Perhaps we should say that the aims, issues and events singled
out as explanatory variables were not entirely convincing. The negotiations between
Bolivia and Chile addressing Bolivia’s claim of a sovereign access to the Pacific ocean, are
a case in point
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. It was argued that in August of 1975, the Peruvian government was
prepared for a preemptive strike against Chile, designed to prevent the transfer of land to
Bolivia. This land had once belonged to Peru; presumably, the Peruvian army had never
resigned itself to its loss. It was argued that the request for a compensation from Bolivia of
an extension of territory equal to the land and sea area to be relinquished by Chile, could
allow this country to launch an enveloping attack on the western slope of Peru’s Andean
region
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.
Even if we indulge in an analysis of counterfactuals, the negotiations over Bolivia’s land-
locked status could provide the immediate but not the underlying cause of an hypothetical
for Bolivian interests, in October of that year the Centro de Estudios Nacionales de La Paz (Center
of National Studies from La Paz, linked to the Bolivian army), advised the military regime to
prepare the country for an “imminent” war between Chile and Peru. A few days later, Bolivian
Defense Minister, General Bernal, declared that “Bolivia has taken the appropriate measures to
cope with the arms race between Chile and Peru”.
Calderón, Filomeno and Pease 1975, pp. 1015 and 1023.
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Before the War of the Pacific, Chile and Peru had no common borders. Peru’s
southernmost
province of Arica was situated next to the Bolivian province of Antofagasta, on the South Pacific
coast. After the war, Chile took control not only of both provinces, but also of the Peruvian
province of Tacna, situated next to Arica. Later on, through the approval of the “Lima Treaty” in
1929, Tacna returned to Peru in exchange for Peru’s recognition of Chile’s sovereignty over Arica.
Since Antofagasta was its only outlet to the Pacific, after the war Bolivia became a
mediterranean country. Ever since, the recovery of a sovereign access to the Pacific ocean has been
the guiding principle of Bolivia’s foreign policy. In 1974, Bolivia and Chile started negotiations on
the issue, based on the premise that Bolivia could eventually obtain sovereign access to the Pacific
through the northern fringe of the Arica province. However, the Complementary Protocol of the
Lima Treaty specified that Chile could not alienate territory that had previously belonged to Peru
without its consent. Thus, Peru had the final word in any agreement between Bolivia and Chile that
involved territorial concessions in that area.
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Although, to my knowledge, none of them ever put it in writing, several renowned
Peruvian
scholars used to mention in public events their private conversations with key policy makers of the
military regime, in which they conveyed those ideas. I will refer soon to my own interview with
General Mercado Jarrín on this issue.
Convention