Plácido de Castro e Rio Branco: a guerra irregular e a diplomacia na definição da fronteira norte do Brasil

• Autor(a) principal: Almeida, Vítor Hugo de Araújo
• Data de Publicação: 2010
• Tipo de documento: Trabalho de conclusão de curso
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Repositório Universitário da Ânima (RUNA)
• Texto Completo: https://repositorio.animaeducacao.com.br/handle/ANIMA/11905
• topic: Revolução Acreana; Guerra irregular; Diplomacia; Geopolítica

This paper refers to a research of unconventional warfare and diplomatic efforts that Plácido de Castro and Rio Branco have done inside the disputes for the Acre territory, taken place on the beginning of the Twentieth Century. The literature survey was essentially pure, theoretical, explanatory and qualitative. Its general purpose was to understand a supposed connection between "the book and the sword" in that particular passage of the Brazilian Military History, in order to make the role of irregular warfare associated with the systematic use of diplomacy visible to the historical-scientific world. The unconventional warfare was a major trend of the last century, but it would achieve its most value throughout and after the World War II. In Brazil, Plácido de Castro inaugurates this kind of doing business, not anymore with a goal of expelling invaders colonialists, but to ensure a real right over territories whose ownership was not fully or precisely defined. Recruiting tappers, obtaining supplies, political and financial support by rubber growers, structuring a real insurrection, Plácido fought alongside other Brazilians and reaffirmed by arms and blood the Brazilian possession of the region. Complicating factors as the presence of exogamous interests from out of South America, the interference of the Bolivian Syndicate; previous national guidance in accepting the Bolivian possession of the disputed territory, the Peruvian interference on the issue, finally, a range of specificities turned the diplomatic arbitration into an impossible solution and forced Paranhos Júnior to show up his virtues of a statesman, allied to others related to a lawyer, an historian and a geographer. After months of fighting and negotiations to sign the Treaty of Petrópolis, Brazil has gained an area of nearly 200,000 square kilometers in exchange for small territorial, cash and business compensations. The survey did show, in its conclusion, it is possible to interpret the actions undertaken by Plácido and Rio Branco, as the combination, even with imperfect contours, of the concepts proposed by Joseph Nye of hard and soft power (smart power). Geopolitically speaking, Brazil would deserve Acre because its location, configuration of its main rivers and tributaries and its population, whose presence in the region facilitated the employment of the principle of uti possedetis already solidified at that time.