Daniel Domingo Salamanca Urey (8 July 1869 – 17 July 1935) was a
Bolivian
Bolivian may refer to:
* Something of, or related to Bolivia
** Bolivian people
** Demographics of Bolivia
** Culture of Bolivia
* SS ''Bolivian'', a British-built standard cargo ship
A cargo ship or freighter is a merchant ship that carries ...
politician who served as the 33rd
president of Bolivia
The president of Bolivia ( es, Presidente de Bolivia), officially known as the president of the Plurinational State of Bolivia ( es, Presidente del Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia), is head of state and head of government of Bolivia and the ca ...
from 1931 to 1934 until he was overthrown in a ''
coup d'état
A coup d'état (; French for 'stroke of state'), also known as a coup or overthrow, is a seizure and removal of a government and its powers. Typically, it is an illegal seizure of power by a political faction, politician, cult, rebel group, m ...
'' on November 27, 1934, during the country's disastrous
Chaco War
The Chaco War ( es, link=no, Guerra del Chaco, gn, Cháko Ñorairõ[Paraguay
Paraguay (; ), officially the Republic of Paraguay ( es, República del Paraguay, links=no; gn, Tavakuairetã Paraguái, links=si), is a landlocked country in South America. It is bordered by Argentina to the south and southwest, Brazil to th ...](_blank)
.
Political career
Born in
Cochabamba
Cochabamba ( ay, Quchapampa; qu, Quchapampa) is a city and municipality in central Bolivia in a valley in the Andes mountain range. It is the capital of the Cochabamba Department and the fourth largest city in Bolivia, with a population of 63 ...
, Salamanca studied law, before being elected to Bolivia's
Chamber of Deputies
The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures.
Description
Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon R ...
in 1899 for the Liberal Party. Two years later, President
José Manuel Pando
José Manuel Inocencio Pando Solares (27 December 1849 – 17 June 1917) was a Bolivian soldier, politician and explorer. He was also the 25th President of Bolivia from 1899 to 1904. During his government, the Acre War (1899-1903) began, in wh ...
appointed him Finance Minister. Salamanca eventually split with the Liberals, however, and helped to found the new Republican Party, running unsuccessfully for Vice-President in 1917. Following the split of a faction opposed to the growing (some would say ruthless) ambitions of Republican leader
Bautista Saavedra
Bautista Saavedra Mallea (30 August 1870 in Sorata – 1 May 1939) was a Bolivian lawyer and politician who served as the 29th president of Bolivia from 1921 to 1925. Prior to that, he was part of a governing junta from 1920 to 1921.
As le ...
, the ascetic, professorial Salamanca founded, with a number of other men including Juan Maria Escalier, the so-called Genuine Republican Party (''Partido Republicano Genuino''). Salamanca himself ran for president on the ''Genuino'' ticket in the elections of 1925, but lost to Saavedra's handpicked successor,
Hernando Siles.
Shaken by his defeats, Salamanca retired from politics and dedicated himself to teaching law. In the aftermath of the military overthrow of
Hernando Siles in 1930, largely as a result of the
Great Depression
The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
, Salamanca was asked to head a Republicano Genuino-Liberal coalition, with him at the head of the ticket and Liberal leader
José Luis Tejada as his vice-presidential running mate. Salamanca was elected and took office in March 1931.
Presidency
Immediately upon assuming office, Salamanca introduced an unpopular austerity program and clamped down on political opposition to his government. In what was likely a measure to avert public attention to the economic problems still facing the country, he also revived hostilities with Paraguay in the disputed
Chaco region. Indeed, Salamanca had been for a long time one of the "hawks" in Bolivian politics, advocating firmness against Paraguay in the territorial dispute. Upon taking office, his motto became "We must stand firm in the Chaco." Given that the parched region of the Gran Chaco (largely uninhabited) had been under dispute between Bolivia and Paraguay ever since the creation of both republics, each proceeded to establish a line of small garrisons (''fortines''), simply to establish a national presence and press their claims. Sporadic battles would occur, but cooler heads tended to prevail, especially because neither Bolivia nor Paraguay (the only landlocked and poorest countries in South America) could afford a full-scale war over the Chaco. Neither, however, relinquished much in their claim to the entire Chaco region either.
All of this changed when oil was found on the foothills of the Andes, deep in Bolivian territory. It was then widely assumed that the nearby Chaco also contained oil, possibly in vast quantities. In addition, the explosive economic and political situation prompted President Salamanca to use the dispute to shore up national unity and distract attention from his government's shortcomings. He ordered a stepped-up effort at establishing more fortines wherever Paraguay wasn't established already. A Bolivian army exploration unit was sent deep into the Chaco early in 1932, whereupon they chanced to find a large lake in the middle of the desert-like scrubland. It was a perfect location for a permanent garrison. Unfortunately, the lake—named Pitiantuta by the Paraguayans—turned out to be occupied by the Paraguayan military. Upon the arrival of the Bolivian expedition, a battle ensued and the Paraguayan troops fled. This, in essence, started the disastrous Chaco War (1932–1935).
The quick escalation of the war only exacerbated already severe economic problems in Bolivia (and in Paraguay), while causing many thousands of casualties. To make matters worse, Salamanca had very poor relations with the Bolivian high command from the beginning of the conflict, when he demoted a Bolivian general and placed the German
Hans Kundt
Hans Kundt (28 February 1869, Neustrelitz, Grand Duchy of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Mecklenburg-Strelitz – 30 August 1939, Lugano, Switzerland) was a German military officer from a family of military officers. He was the primary military figur ...
at the head of the country's armed forces at war. Kundt had led a military mission to Bolivia prior to
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
. A string of devastating defeats on the southern front of the war at the hands of the Paraguayans, who knew the terrain much better than the Bolivians (most of whom hailed from the
Altiplano
The Altiplano (Spanish for "high plain"), Collao (Quechua and Aymara: Qullaw, meaning "place of the Qulla") or Andean Plateau, in west-central South America, is the most extensive high plateau on Earth outside Tibet. The plateau is located at the ...
Highlands) precipitated Kundt's replacement by General
Enrique Peñaranda
Enrique Peñaranda del Castillo (15 November 1892 – 22 December 1969) was a Bolivian general who served as the 38th president of Bolivia from 1940 until his overthrow in 1943. He previously served as commander-in-chief of the country's armed ...
at the end of 1933. Salamanca's relationship with the general only got worse, as the mercurial president (then in his mid 60s) tended to blame the military leadership for the continuing setbacks on the field. Things came to a head when Salamanca decided to replace Peñaranda and a number of his increasingly mutinous commandants.
Coup
On 27 November 1934, the Bolivian generals deposed Salamanca while he visited their headquarters at
Villamontes
Villamontes (or: ''Villa Montes'') is a town in the Tarija Department in south-eastern Bolivia. Also it is called the benemerita town (well-deserving of the mother country) due to its importance during the Chaco War in the 1930s.
Location
''Vi ...
to explain the reasons for the changes. Peñaranda and his coconspirators (Colonel
Toro, Major
Busch, and others) in the end decided to keep democratic appearances intact, and replaced Salamanca with his Vice President, the decidedly more pliable
José Luis Tejada of the Liberal Party. It has been alleged that Tejada was in on the plot itself.
The elderly and sickly Salamanca at that point was allowed to "retire" to his native Cochabamba, where he died of
stomach cancer
Stomach cancer, also known as gastric cancer, is a cancer that develops from the lining of the stomach. Most cases of stomach cancers are gastric carcinomas, which can be divided into a number of subtypes, including gastric adenocarcinomas. Lymph ...
less than a year later on July 1935, only days after the establishment of the cease-fire. A highly controversial figure, he was blamed by many for the war, while others respected him enormously as a man who did all he could to maintain his country's foothold on the Chaco without resorting to warfare but was betrayed by a mutinous and incompetent military high command. The rather dour, intellectual Salamanca is perhaps best remembered by two celebrated phrases of his: musing upon one of the many disastrous losses of his armies, he is reported to have said "I gave them everything they asked for – weapons, trucks, whatever they wanted; the one and only thing I could not give them was brains." He is also supposed to have remarked dryly to Peñaranda, upon the encirclement of the house where he was staying at Villamontes during the coup: "Congratulations General; you just completed your first and only successful military siege of the entire war."
See also
*
History of Bolivia
After the fall of Tiwanaku Empire, the many Aymara Lake Titicaca was conquered by the Inca Empire. Prior to the Spanish conquest, the Andean province of Qullasuyu was a part of the Inca empire, while the northern and eastern lowlands were inhabi ...
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Salamanca, Daniel
1869 births
1935 deaths
20th-century Bolivian politicians
20th-century Bolivian lawyers
19th-century Bolivian lawyers
Candidates in the May 1925 Bolivian presidential election
Candidates in the December 1925 Bolivian presidential election
Candidates in the 1931 Bolivian presidential election
Deaths from cancer in Bolivia
Deaths from stomach cancer
Finance ministers of Bolivia
Leaders ousted by a coup
Liberal Party (Bolivia) politicians
Members of the Chamber of Deputies (Bolivia)
People from Cochabamba
People of the Chaco War
Presidents of Bolivia
Republican Party (Bolivia) politicians