Question

conclusion of popular struggles and movement in Chile .

Answer 1

Chile’s struggle for independence is known as the period in which Chile became a separate country from Spain. It usually covers the years 1808–1830, and it is much related to events in Europe and in other regions of South America, especially Peru and the area of the Río de la Plata. As in most parts of the American continent, the French invasion of Spain and the abdication of Fernando VII in 1808 provoked a political crisis in Chile that began to be resolved when, after ousting governor Francisco García Carrasco, the Santiago elites created an administrative junta on 18 September 1810 that claimed to govern the territory on behalf of the imprisoned king but declared its autonomy from the political bodies in Spain. Although the change of government in Chile was less violent and less radical than elsewhere, differences between political factions aiming to control the juntista movement in the period 1811–1812 provoked frictions between supporters of José Miguel Carrera (military chief of Santiago) and followers of Juan Martínez de Rozas and Bernardo O’Higgins (leaders of Concepción). But when the Peruvian viceroy, José Fernando de Abascal, decided to intervene militarily in Chile in late 1812, in order to stop the radicalism of the Chilean autonomists, differences between Carrera and O’Higgins subsided and gave way to a conflict between Chilean-formed armies representing the interests and goals of insurgents and royalists. The counterrevolutionary program envisioned by the absolutists in Spain and supported in Spanish America by officials like Abascal triumphed in late 1814, thus forcing the Chilean insurgents to escape to the province of Cuyo, on the other side of the Cordillera. In Mendoza, Bernardo O’Higgins sealed an alliance with José de San Martín and the so-called Logia Lautaro to re-conquer Chile and to attempt an attack on Lima, the center of the counterrevolution. The Central Valley of Chile was re-conquered from the royalists in April 1818 in the battle of Maipú, an event comparable in importance to the declaration of Chilean Independence on 12 February 1818. However, the south of the country remained in the hands of the royalists until well into the 1820s. San Martín’s Army of Peru, meanwhile, set sail from Chile in mid-1820. Formed by men from the Army of the Andes and the Army of Chile, they secured Peru’s Independence in July 1821, although the military conflict lasted until December 1824, when the battle of Ayacucho determined the fate of all of Spanish South America. This war brought about two important consequences for Chile: first, it allowed the military to become the most powerful political figures of the period; second, it provoked a series of public debates on whether the new Spanish American states should adopt a republican form of government or follow the European monarchical example. Beyond that period, discussions focused on the role of the state and individuals in shaping the new republic.