Conquest of the Desert

The Conquest of the Desert or Campagne of the Desert was a discussed campaign of the Argentinian government , carried out by the army under the orders of the future general chair Julio Argentino Roca, in order to obtain the total domination on the areas of the south of the Pampa and on the Eastern Patagonie, hitherto under domination of the nation mapuche.

Already its name was a whole program, implying that for Europeans it was about a desert or that Indien was equivalent to Nothing .

A recent polemic usually summarized by Civilization or Genocide? , raises the question to know if the Conquest of the Desert were started to exterminate the aboriginals or rather to subdue the violent one groups of Indians who refused to let themselves assimilate by civilization.

Antecedents

The arrival of the Spanish colonists on banks of the Río of Plata and the foundation of the town of Buenos Aires in 1536 almost immediately brought the first confrontations between Spaniards and Indians primarily the tribes known as Pampas.

The area around Buenos Aires was withdrawn to the natives who were dispossessed by it, to be used for the breeding of cattle, which naturally made disappear the local fauna whose Indians nourished themselves. The aboriginals answered while stealing cows and horses in the farms. To avoid that the Spanish colonists built forts and defended their grounds against the frequent Indian attacks called malones.

The boundary line between the territories of the farms and the grounds wild progressed slowly starting from Buenos Aires towards the west and the south. At the end of the XVIIIe century the small river called Río Salado became the border between two civilizations. Many Indians gave up their tribe to work in the Spanish farms and mixed with those. It is the origin of the Gaúcho S fruit of the fusion of the two races.

After independence in 1816, Argentina openly showed its intention to occupy the grounds of the Ranquel S and the Mapuches. The offensives coordinated of Martín Rodríguez in 1823 and of Manual Juan of Rosas in 1833, since the province of Buenos Aires, and other Argentinas armies since the area of the Cuyo, had like objective to conquer new territories with the hands of the Ranquel S and Mapuches, causing heavy losses among the latter.

In second half of the XIXe century, so much Argentina which Chile planned the total conquest of the territories inhabited by Mapuches.

In 1872 the chief Ranquel Calfucurá, with an army of 6.000 combatants, attacked the towns of General Alvear, Veinticinco of Mayo and Nueve de Julio, all three located in province of Buenos Aires. It resulted an enormous slaughter from it making 300 died at the Argentinian Creoles and 200.000 shot down heads from cattle. The fact was described like an immediate antecedent of the campaigns undertaken by the general Julio Argentino Roca known under the name of Conquista del Desierto .

The countryside of Alsina

In 1875, Adolfo Alsina, Minister for the war under the president Nicolás Avellaneda, presented to the government a plan that later it described as intended for to populate the desert and not to destroy the Indians . The first step was to inter-connect Buenos Aires and the frontier forts by means of telegraph lines.

Then one signed a peace treaty with cacic the Juan Jose Catriel, peace which was to be broken a little later following an attack conducted by this last in common with Namuncurá against Tres Streams, Tandil, Azul and other localities and farms, attacks even more fatal than that of 1872.

Alsina answered by attacking the natives, forcing them to fold up itself, leaving forts on its road towards the south to protect the conquered territories. Finally to avoid the transport of the concealed cattle, it built the long Tranchée of Alsina 374 kilometers, which was used as limit for the not conquered territories.

The natives continued their attacks and the collection of bovines stolen in the farms of the province of Buenos Aires and the south of that of Mendoza, but they had difficulties in escaping with the animals, which made their walk slow, and had to face the units of patrouillage which continued them.

Many natives who not only suffered from the hunger, but also the revenge on the white men, decided to be linked with firm-estancias to work for them exchanges food and of refuge of it, but the others resisted.

After the death of Alsina in 1877, Julio Argentino Roca was named new Minister for the War and continued his work.

The countryside of Roca

Roca, contrary to Alsina, believed that the only solution against the threat caused by native-born people was to destroy them, to subject them or expel them.

At the end of 1878, it launched its first offensive to clean the zone located between the trench of Alsina and the Río Negro by means of attacks systematic and supported against the indigenes establishments.

In 1879, with 6.000 soldiers equipped with new rifles, the second offensive started, reaching Choele Choel in two months. The locality was delivered peacefully by the local natives. Started from various points, the companies of the south travelled their until Río Negro and with the Neuquén, northern affluent of Río Negro. Together the two rivers made a natural border from the Andes to the Atlantic.

A great number of civil establishments were consequently created in the basin of these two rivers, like in that of the Río Colorado. By sea, some establishments were set up in the basin of the Río Santa Cruz, mainly by Welsh colonists.

The final countryside

Roca succeeded Nicolás Avellaneda like chair of Argentina in 1880. He believed that he was urgent and imperative to conquer the territories located at the south of Río Negro, and ordered the countryside of 1881 under the command of colonel Conrado Villegas.

In one year this last conquered the territory of the current province of Neuquén (It reached thus the Río Limay). The countryside continued in spite of the resistance of the indigenous populations living more to the south. The last battle was delivered the October 18th 1884. It was about the last rebellious group which included/understood more than 3.000 members, under the command cacic Inacayal and Foyel. They went two months later in the current province of Chubut.

References

Random links: