The aim of this article is not so much to give a detailed account of the brief forty-day war – from January to March this year – between Peru and Ecuador over the Cordillera of the Condor territory, as to set this conflict in the context of international relations in Latin America, and in particular to link it to themes associated with border conflicts. Almost all of the territorial disputes in the Latin American republics since their independence have followed a fairly similar model. But first let us look at the PeruEcuador conflict and then widen the scope of our analysis.
The controversy over the common border between these two countries goes back a long time. It virtually arose at the time of independence and is due to the fact that Peru and Ecuador, like the other republics, inherited the existing borders from the various virreinatos of the Spanish Empire, which were then transformed into administrative and international borders.
And here, as elsewhere, such borders could not be defined clearly because the regions were practically inaccessible and knowledge about them was still as vague as at the time of Spanish colonization.
In this case the controversy is over the so-called Cordillera del Condor: a stretch of seventy-eight kilometres where the border is not clearly set out and where both countries claim an area of 340 sq. km. as their own.
The first open conflict between Peru and Ecuador over this area took place from 1858 to 1861. The subsequent peace treaty of Mapasingue failed to settle the question and the king of Spain was asked to mediate. His rather arbitrary sentence was not accepted by Ecuador.
The dispute continued, therefore, and eventually led to a new conflict in 1941. This war ended with a resounding defeat for Ecuador which had to accept the loss of 174,000 sq. km., that is almost forty per cent of its territory.
The following year, in a very weak position, Ecuador had to accept the conditions imposed by the Rio Protocol, which defined the borders established by the war, with the exception of the seventy-eight square kilometres mentioned above, because there was no reliable map of the area available.
The Protocol took the form of a treaty between the two countries with four other countries acting as guarantors: Argentina, Brazil, Chile and the US. This formula was also to have repercussions on the current settlement to the conflict.
In 1960 Ecuador formally denounced the Protocol, claiming it could not be applied. Since that time the dispute has carried on in various skirmishes to the present day; the only major conflict was in 1981. This year’s war is the most serious conflict since 1941. It must be stressed, however, that Ecuador not only makes claims on the recently disputed territory, but also on the whole area lost in the 1941 conflict: that is the territory to the west of the river Marañón, in the middle of the Amazon Forest.
The Ecuadorian logic is thus that by continuing the conflict with Peru over the Condor area means keeping open the possibility of winning back the lost part of the Amazon Forest. This partly explains why the war was followed with much greater interest in Ecuador than in Peru, but this does not necessarily mean that Quito should personally take a greater blame for a war in which responsibilities are difficult to attribute.
But why did the Rio Protocol fail to mark out a clear border in this region, leaving a dangerous dispute unsettled? The problem is mainly due to a lack of knowledge about this inaccessible region inhabited almost only by tribes of Amerindians (Shuar, Achuara and Aguarunas). The border defined by the Protocol had taken as a reference point the presumed course of the rivers Zamora and Santiago. But the maps used turned out to be inaccurate and the presence of a hitherto unknown river, the Cenepa, further complicated the border question. In fact the Cenepa valley, considered by both sides to be their own territory, was the main battlefield in the recent conflict. There has been some talk of supposed mineral deposits in the area and particularly important gold seams, but there is no reliable information. In any case the possible exploitation of these resources would require such enormous investments that it would probably prove to be unprofitable. There are of course underlying economic motivations in the dispute, but these are of a nationalistic kind, which are only sublimated in the territorial dispute.
After an attempt to intervene by the General Secretary of the Organization of American States (OAE) Cesar Gaviria, the crisis was managed by the Rio Protocol big powers: talks were first held in Brazil and after Ecuador’s failure to accept the initial proposal, the so-called Peace of Itamaraty was signed on 17 February 1995. This treaty established a cease-fire and the withdrawal of the troops to territories not involved in the conflict, watched over by international observers. But the treaty was not respected by either side. Later a second agreement was reached at Montevideo on 1 March 1995 during the swearing-in ceremony of the new Uruguay president Sanguinetti which was attended by both Fujimori the Peruvian Head of State and Durán Bailén, the president of Ecuador. This agreement is currently being implemented, and now the fighting really seems to have stopped and the war stage of the dispute has come to an end.
The toll of human lives lost varies, according to the sources, from 100 to 300. Enormous economic resources have been wasted considering that according to some estimates, one day of war costs around ten million dollars for Peru alone. And this expenditure has to be sustained by economies in dire straits.
But apart from the territorial dispute, what factors led to the escalation in the conflict, which has been viewed as an absurdity by the international community?
Firstly it must be said that it is almost impossible to blame either of the two countries in particular for the outbreak of hostilities. There is no convincing evidence either way and it will be very difficult to cast light on this point.
In the absence of international observers or any kind of impartial witnesses, the only source of information are the reciprocal accusations of border violations by both sides. And since the area is virtually inaccessible, it is almost impossible to make objective sense of the opposing propaganda, which is of little use for the purposes of analysis. The most likely explanation is that neither country is clearly to blame but that both were involved in military manoeuvres in the controversial area at the time of the anniversary of the Rio Protocol (29 January 1942).
Instead of playing down this coincidence, the military authorities of both countries obviously assumed a hostile attitude. The outcome was an unofficial war, even if the objective causes were no more potent than in the past. So rather than individual causes, we must speak of a set of conditions which led to this situation.
We have already mentioned the rather ill-founded economic explanations, and so the conflict must basically be seen to a background of internal politics.
The forthcoming presidential elections of 9 April may well have influenced the attitude of the Peruvian government, given the close relation between the government and the armed forces. Although this may not have caused the conflict, propaganda uses were certainly made of it.
As we pointed out in the previous article on Peru published in the previous issue of this review, the development of a belligerent attitude by Peru may be linked to the diminishing of the internal threat from Sendero Luminoso. For the first time after many years the Peruvian army was able to mobilize huge forces and crack troops in an external conflict. This then may be another of the conditions that played a part in the escalation of the conflict.
As regards Ecuador, president Sixto Durán Bailén was at a nadir in terms of popularity before the wave of nationalist fervour stirred up by the war. Much more keenly felt at Quito than in Lima, the war certainly worked to his favour in terms of internal political balances.
Although Bailén denies being in a difficult position with the army, it is very likelv that he benefited from the crisis both in terms of his popular image and his relations with the armed forces, a key institution in the Ecuadorian political system.
The reason why the war was more keenly felt in Ecuador than in Peru may be explained by the historical roots of the conflict. Since the 1941 war and the consequent loss of territory, Peru has been Ecuador’s number one enemy. Peru, on the other hand, considers Chile to be its major enemy since during the Pacific war Chile conquered signifiant tracts of Peruvian territory. Thus the dispute with Ecuador is seen to be less important and does not play a key role in the collective national values. The settlement to the conflict is the most logical outcome possible. Hostilities have ceased (in military terms, despite Peruvian superiority, neither were capable of an outright victory) and the agreement was reached in the framework of the legal tools established by the Rio Protocol. This is the premise for more thorough talks, which in the presence of international observers should lay the basis for a lasting settlement.
It must be stressed that on this occasion inter-American diplomacy has been successful, and the conflict was settled in the framework of the 1941 treaty without any direct involvement of the United States.
As we said earlier, the conflict of the Cordillera del Condor must be seen in the line of Latin American wars basically caused by border disputes. Ideological or political conflicts have played little part in the contrasts between Latin American countries. Moreover, the Latin American republics were not seriously involved in the two world wars. The border disputes which have caused inter-American wars have in general had infinitely smaller repercussions in terms of loss of human life and material resources than in Europe over the period from 1820 to the present day (i.e. since Latin American independenсe).
The numerous border disputes may be explained by the fact that, once the Bolivar utopia of a single Latin American state had failed, many countries came into being with pre-existing administrative borders often very ill-defined because of a lack of accurate geographical information. This was followed by a general lack of interest at the level of provincial authorities in these regions (why bother delimiting inaccessible areas which only belonged to the state anyway?).
The Latin American republics almost all came into being during the same period and as the outcome of similar processes There is no great diversification at the root of Latin American nationalism. Territorial disputes thus became the main focus for national feeling in Latin America. An emphasis on the concept of a ‘virtual’ territory coincided with nationalist claims. This then became part of the national collective values and was the cause of many conflicts.
Without going into detail, we should like to mention some of these wars. The most important was probably the Pacific war of 1883, which led to Chile taking possession of the Peruvian province of Tarapaca and the Bolivian coastal region of Antofagasta, thus depriving Bolivia of any access to the ocean. The main twentieth-century conflicts were the Chaco war between and Bolivia and Paraguay, the Tacna-Arica conflict between Chile and Peru, the Leticia war between Peru and Columbia, the 1941 war between Peru and Ecuador and the El Salvador-Honduras war of 1969. Almost half of the current Latin American borders are the outcome of a war or an agreement between unequal parties. Disputes continue over almost 3,000 kilometres of borders (seven per cent of the total) and over around 600,000 sq. km. of territory (three per cent of the total). Some disputes have been settled peacefully, such as the Chile-Argentine conflict over the Desierto Lagoon in Patagonia, which was handed over to Argentina in 1994 by common consent, and the conflict over the Reagle Canal, settled in 1978 with Vatican mediation.
A sentence of September 1992 issued by the International Court of Justice put an end to the Honduras-El Salvador conflict, which had caused the 1969 war (the so-called ‘football’ war). But many disputes are stillunsettled:
- Columbia and Venezuela still do not agree over the respective territorial waters in the oil-rich Gulf of Maracaibo. even though a bilateral commission was formed in 1990 to settle the issue.
- Bolivia has never accepted the loss of its access to the Pacific and makes claims over territories lost in the 1883 war. Although relations between Peru and Chile have improved, the dispute over the province of Tarapaca still drags on.
- Guatemala only very belatedly recognized the independence of neighbouring Belize in 1990 and still claims many parts of its territory.
- The Argentine-Paraguay border delimited by the river Pilcomayo is still unclear.
- French Guiana and Surinam are still at loggerheads over 5,000 kilometres around the river Maroní.
- Surinam and Guyana make claims over 15,000 kilometres of tropical forest; while a further 30,000 sq. km. are being argued over by Guyana and Venezuela.
- Nicaragua claims the Caribbean archipelago of San Andrés, at present Colombian territory.
There are therefore many unsettled issues. But what are the chances that these disputes may escalate into open conflict? Given that the economic interests at stake are very low, in most cases war is only a remote possibility. It must also be borne in mind that, although in the past multilateral inter-American diplomacy has not obtained very brilliant results in settling international disputes, at present in the sub-continent there is a move towards economic integration and common development rather than confrontation. In this context, and given that all Latin American countries now have democratic systems, territorial disputes should gradually diminish.