The Argentine army, far better equipped and organized than its opposition but at a large disadvantage in terms of land and manpower, decided that the time was right for a 'preemptive' invasion of Brazil.
While slow to organize and respond, the Brazilian army nonetheless began to mobilize defensively in May, which Carlés described as an act of aggression, stoking fears of an attack by the northern behemoth. The Axis' veteran jungle fighters, weathered from the conflicts in Paraguay and Bolivia, prepared an offensive into the Brazilian heartland itself. The best units of the Argentine army, supported by Juan Peron's newly-expanded armored brigades, were massed on the border of Uruguay and Brazil's southern states, which had quickly become a focus for 'liberation' and annexation in Carlés and the LPA's propaganda machine as well.
The Buenos Aires - Lima Axis was quickly officialized in January of 1940, transparently in opposition to Brazil. Argentine nationalists and military planners came to a swift conclusion: For the nationalist goals of the state to be achieved, the annexation of Uruguay was necessary, and in order to seize Uruguay, Brazil would need to be dismantled once and for all. The South American giant signed the Montevideo Treaty in 1939, officially integrating the two republics into a tightly-knit defensive military alliance. To the north, the liberal democratic republic of Brazil struggled in the wake of economic catastrophe, yet had chosen to remain neutral geopolitically - with one significant exception: the republic of Uruguay. While Carlés had significantly expanded his nation’s borders in the wars of the 1930s, the extremists of the military and LPA clamored for yet greater glory. British-Canadian diplomats, mixing promises with thinly-veiled threats and some gunboat diplomacy, eventually succeeded in pressuring the Panamanian military government into accepting membership in the Entente, securing the Canal for the Exiles.Īrgentine artillerymen prepare to fire on a Brazilian position during the Axis' offensive into southern Brazil and Uruguay. Panama, having proclaimed its independence and secured control of the vital Canal in the absence of its American overlords, became the center of international attention overnight. Meanwhile, as great powers scrambled to secure their zones of influence in the aftermath of the US collapse, the Panama Canal Crisis erupted. A brief and nearly bloodless war with Bolivia secured Argentina’s claimed territories there, while Carlés was careful to maintain close ties with his fellow rightist authoritarians in Peru. The defeated nations’ arms and infrastructure were immediately put to use by the Argentine war machine, while LPA paramilitaries spread throughout the newly annexed territories to enact a campaign of terror against ‘potential dissidents’. Chile and Paraguay were quickly absorbed into the Argentine state, fulfilling the first of its dictator’s promises of territorial expansion and military glory. Argentine officers in Patagonia, pictured in the German-style military dress of Carlés' army, in the process of planning their final thrusts to destroy the FOP's militias.īy the end of 1938, against all odds, Carlés’ ultranationalist regime found itself the victor.
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