An Externalized Modernization

The three adversaries in the War of the Pacific—Chile, which was the winner, and Peru and Bolivia, which lost—were, if not the first states to turn to Europe in order to reorganize their armies, undoubtedly those that emulated the Continent most completely. In Chile, which learned from the Germans, Prussianization left traces that are still visible today. While the officers have stopped wearing the Prussian uniforms and the mustaches and monocles of the Kaiser period, the cadets in the military college still wear the pointed helmet and parade with the goose step. In 1885 the Chilean government decided to hire a German mission to professionalize its army. The victory in the war had revealed weakness in the national military structure and the dangers were far from over. Chile felt surrounded by enemies. Peruvian and Bolivian irredentism disturbed Santiago. Peru had not yet accepted the loss of the province of Tarapacá and the occupation of the ports of Tacna and Arica. Landlocked Bolivia kept an eye fixed on its lost maritime outlet, the port of Antofagasta on the Pacific, while Chile's large Argentine neighbor appeared hostile to the narrow nation confined behind a Cordillera lacking clear boundaries. Colonel Körner, chief of the mission from 1886 until 1910, was to transform an army of veterans of the War of the Pacific into a modern force with a high-level Prussianized officer corps that enjoyed great prestige throughout the conti-

nent. While the Libertador O'Higgins had created the first military school in Latin America immediately after independence (1817), Colonel Körner founded a Colegio Militar in 1886 modeled on the Kriegsakademie with a three-year program of study. The best students were sent to German regiments and even to the imperial guard. More than thirty German officers were working in Chile by the beginning of this century. In 1906 a program of reform of the army's organization and internal regulations was completed that transformed the Chilean military into a veritable reflection of the German army. Colonel Körner, now a general, was a member of the Chilean army, having been named chief of the general staff in 1891. During the confrontation between the nationalist president Balmaceda and the parliamentary oligarchy, Körner and his followers supported the adversaries of the president while the army as a whole remained loyal to him. This has been cited as proof of Körner's antinationalist orientation and predisposition to European interests. It is undeniable that the German mission did much for German industry and for Krupp in particular. Under the influence of Körner the government contracted a large loan in 1898 in order to buy arms; in the course of the arms race that then ensued in the Southern Cone, the Chilean government did not hesitate to pledge the customs revenues of the country to its creditors,^[4]

Almost at the same time, no doubt in response to the Chilean challenge, Peru hired a French military mission. The first team under the command of Captain Paul Clément arrived in Lima in 1896. The French organized and instructed the Peruvians until 1940, with an interruption between 1914 and 1918. In contrast to the Germans in Chile, the French did not become involved in the political life of Peru, but their influence was no less, important. The French army, which at the time emphasized defense and fortifications, was of particular interest to the Peruvians because of desired assistance in the area of military engineering. In reports and instructions that were influenced by their colonial experience, the French gave special emphasis to transportation and communication, the military presence in the population, and their knowledge of the country. Some have argued that French influence was one of the causes of the

"populist" and social orientation of the Peruvian officers, an attitude that was demonstrated in the 1960s.^[5] A direct relationship cannot be proven, but the French influence produced a very different result from that of the Prussian officers in the hostile neighboring republic.

Bolivia, reacting later to the shock of the war, was more eclectic in its choice. A private French military mission reorganized the programs of the Military School and the War College in 1905. Beginning in 1910, however, La Paz imitated Santiago and hired German instructors. The director of the mission, Colonel Hans Kundt, was soon named head of the general staff. With a team of a dozen commissioned and noncommissioned officers from Germany, he initiated a German system of instruction of officers and enlisted men and introduced the regulations of the German army. His initial contract was extended until 1914. In 1921 Kundt, now a general, returned to Bolivia and became a naturalized citizen; subsequently he became deeply involved in the country's political life as one of the principal supporters of the Republican party. That old-style "politicization" of a military notable seems to have interfered with the strengthening of the war machine. When Bolivia faced Paraguay in the Chaco affair (1932–35), Kundt's army was beaten by the Paraguayans just as the old army had been beaten by the Chileans on the Pacific. That defeat and the difficult mixture of young academically trained officers with old-style generals, of veterans with politicians, had a long-term impact on the Bolivian military.

In cosmopolitan Argentina, which had attempted very early to professionalize its officer corps, eclecticism at the beginning dominated the choice of foreign connections. The Military College, which was responsible for the formation of officers and was created by Sarmiento in 1869, had as its first directors an Austro-Hungarian colonel and a French cavalry commander. The French army was the model for the Argentine army until 1904, but the armament of the old army was German Krupp cannons and Mauser rifles after 1884. In 1900 the prestige of the Imperial General Staff carried the day, and the Superior War School was created under German patronage. The teaching staff was made up of German officers, and the school,

which certified members of the General Staff, remained until the eve of the Second World War a bastion of the German military tradition. For the Argentine admirers of the German military machine who continued after 1914–18 to analyze the 1870 war from the German side, it was as if Germany had not lost World War I.

The process of Germanization was completed after 1904 when Argentine officers were sent en masse for training in the regiments of the (German) Imperial Army. A Brazilian military attaché claimed in 1921 that "half the Argentine officers have gone through German schools or the German army."^[6] The influence of the Offizier Korps penetrated Argentine military society profoundly. Half of the twelve books published between 1918 and 1930 by the Officers' Library series of official military texts were translated from German. Admiration for the German model was unbounded. Thus, few of the Argentine officers thought in 1914 that the most formidable war machine that had ever existed could be beaten. It is reported that General José Uriburu, who in 1930 would become the first military president of modern Argentina and had kept since his training in the Kaiser's guard the evocative nickname of "von Pepe," pointed to the map during the war and announced to the Military Club that the victory of the imperial armies was inevitable. This is why the few isolated voices that denounced the danger inherent in a mechanical imitation of the German model were justifiably disturbed.^[7]

In Brazil it was the officers who tried to strengthen the national army. Some civilians did not share the fears of the regional oligarchies that a strong army could be the instrument of the central government. The poor performance of the army in the face of the peasant revolt of Canudos, and the distrust of Argentina, Brazil's traditional rival in the subcontinent, argued for a reorganization and an effort to modernize the equipment of the military. In order to accomplish this it was necessary to call upon Europe. The Germans and French could not have asked for anything better: from the end of the century the two countries competed to furnish cannons to Brazil. A French mission was hired by the state of São Paulo in 1906 to reorganize and train the Public Force so that it became a formidable local

army. Nevertheless, thanks to clever propaganda, the Germans generally dominated. From 1905 to 1912 thirty Brazilian officers were sent to the German army for instruction, and in 1908 Marshal Hermes da Fonseca, the minister of war and the most prestigious and influential Brazilian general, was the guest of the imperial government. He participated in the grand maneuvers and agreed to open negotiations concerning the establishment of a German military mission. However, in 1910 the same marshal visited France and buried the German proposal, but without agreeing to a French mission. The competition between the two nations was for high stakes: the orders for the war industry included the rearming of the artillery, a program of coastal defense, and the creation of an air force.

Those who had been trained in the German army formed a "home mission" that instructed the cadets in the military school according to the German model. The oldest officers, whose promotion had owed more to political patronage than to their education or military capacity, were hostile to all foreign missions. They feared innovation for career reasons and did not always feel capable of adapting themselves to a European model. Nevertheless, the victory of arms was decisive between France and Germany, and in 1919 a French mission was hired. Directed by General Maurice Gustave Gamelin, it was to transform the Brazilian army from top to bottom, and to last until 1939.

Arms purchases from France allowed Brazil to close the enormous distance between the Brazilian military and the forces of industrial countries. However, it was in the domain of organization, education, and careers that the French influence was particularly marked. The distribution of units throughout the country in the manner of a police force was followed by the formation of large units that could be easily maneuvered and coordinated by a general staff along the lines of a French plan. The officers, who up to that time had received a very theoretical education, now were exposed to a solid military curriculum under the guidance of French instructors at all levels, as well as in the military school beginning in 1924. A series of practical schools and auxiliary services was created. As a result of the French updating, the old army, modernized French-style, underwent a veritable revolution; this was especially marked in

the area of advancement, which from that time was strictly codified by law and removed from local political influence. Merit and professional accomplishment governed all careers.

The French impact was profound and lasting. In 1937 every member of the infantry High Command had been educated by the French as were all the successive ministers of war from 1934 until 1960. General Goes Monteiro, who dominated the military scene from 1930 to 1946, had ranked first in the advanced course organized in Rio de Janeiro by the mission in 1921. The Brazilian disciples of the French army did not lack opportunities to recall the debt that they felt toward their instructors and their admiration for the prestigious officers who commanded the mission. Thus, the image of General Gamelin is very different in Brazil from his image in France, where he is known as chief of the general staff that directed the "debacle." In 1926 a Brazilian military journal stated, "He was the founder of our military doctrine. He established its principles in our basic regulations and he familiarized us with genuine knowledge of it through the superb practical and theoretical lessons that he taught us on maneuvers and in the lecture halls."^[8] Again in 1940 General Gaspar Dutra, the minister of war, declared in a speech given during the Third Region maneuvers in the presence of President Vargas, "I remember the great maneuvers of 1922. They were headed by the exceptional figure of General Gamelin, a universally admired name today that we always mention with nostalgia and veneration."^[9]

The Gallicism of these admirers of the army of Foch and Petain impressed contemporaries. Parallel to the Argentine "von Pepe" and just as real is the caricature of a Francophile general that appears in a scene in one of the novels of Jorge Amado. A self-important old fogey and a candidate for the Brazilian Academy, he had been a distinguished student of the professors in the French mission, and invincible in military maneuvers. The general, Waldomiro Moreira, nicknamed "Maginot line" by his enemies, wrote in the press that during the Second World War Hitler's Panzer Divisionen "had no respect for the established rules of military science, and every evening the Panzer Divisionen contradicted his predictions of each morning."^[10]

If we leave aside—to return to them in a future chapter—

the neocolonial armies created by the United States, we find the same efforts to learn from Europe in nearly every country under different conditions and with different parameters depending on the level of development, the geopolitical situation, and the degree to which a national state had been established. Obviously not all countries hired expensive military missions. We should mention in this context the curious phenomenon of "second-hand" Prussianization carried out by the Chilean army in several countries of the continent. In Ecuador, Colombia, El Salvador, and Venezuela, Chilean military missions were called upon to reorganize and to "Europeanize" the national army. In Colombia a team of Chilean officers created the first military school worthy of the name in 1907. The same thing happened in Venezuela, but at the same time officer candidates went for study to Peru, and in 1920 a French mission established the air force and instructed the infantry.

The foreign presence was not without its problems for the host armies. First of all, the European missions aroused genuine resistance from officers who favored a different military influence—the pro-Germans in Brazil, for example. Also, the old officers of the earlier army were not happy about returning to school or having subordinates more knowledgeable than they were, and especially about allowing foreigners to come into direct contact with the internal mechanisms that guaranteed their power in the institution. The "missionaries," on the other hand, wanted to transform and regulate everything, indeed to exercise direct command so as to implement their reforms more effectively. There is no other way to explain the complete integration of the German missions in Chile and Bolivia. General Gamelin complained about the head of the infantry general staff that he "does not support our tutelage [sic] " and "dreams of a French military mission that is completely subordinated."^[11] The responsibilities of a foreign mission were not limited to the transfer of technology and expert consultation; other functions, such as defense, the preparations and the development of military doctrine, related to the area of politics. Also, there were frequent conflicts and the admiration for the mentor army was not without a certain impatience on the part of its disciples. This is one of the paradoxes of externally oriented

modernization that was perhaps too quickly forgotten when the armies of the continent changed masters.