abstractSoccer is a beautiful sport which is introduced to many Hispanics in their youth, it brings so much to the table, discipline, joy, rage, happiness, anger, every emotion in the book. However even a beautiful game can be misused and abused by the wrong poeple, in the worst case scenario, used to tear people apart and bring about violence and chaos. My paper analyzes how and why that worst case happened between El Salvador and Honduras and how the lack of resources, corruption and media led it to become the Soccer War. ‘Football is all about passion, it’s about fighting for the shirt, for your team, and for the supporters’ - Jürgen Klopp Klopp is the manager of one of the best teams in the world, Liverpool, which is located in England. He holds quite the resume winning the Premier League, which is the top soccer league in England, as well as the Champions League which is a yearly tournament where all the best soccer teams from around Europe compete for the opportunity to become crowned as the Champions of Europe. He certainly knows the ins and outs of football and the impact that it can have on the world. Soccer had an impact on the relationship between Honduras and El Salvador, which are some of the most soccer-enthusiastic and prideful nations in the world. They will fight for what they believe in, they will fight for their country. That is especially true when it comes to playing soccer, all these feelings of pride for one's nation come full force on the soccer field. However, those feelings took a turn for the worse, in the summer of 1969. Tensions were high between the two countries as they played three games against each other to qualify for the 1970 World Cup. They split the first two games, with each getting a victory thus it all came down to one final game to qualify, which El Salvador won. After that, everything worsened. Relations between the two countries were broken. The famous “Soccer War” began. Despite it lasting four days and about 100 hours or so, which is how it got the nickname the “100 Hour War,” the impact was massive with more than 4,000 casualties. It was much more than conflict over a single soccer match, the entirety of Central America felt it. Perhaps they were destined to fight one another given their proximity. When big players such as the media, or the government strip the people of their land and pit them against one another, it makes conflict very difficult to avoid. The golden opportunity of a first-time World Cup appearance for both countries didn’t help ease the tension between both countries either. Given all the past issues such as land, immigration, government exploitation, and how the media aggravated everything tenfold, it created an environment where war was all but inevitable. One issue that has always plagued Honduras and El Salvador relations above anything else is land and the ensuing immigration, both would prefer to expand and gain more land than they currently have, but they are unable to do that since their opposition is quite literally in their way from expanding and therefore stopping them from doing so. In El Salvador, land is everything - it is a means to make the lives of the common people better. However, there isn’t much to go around because well it is “almost totally surrounded by Honduras, has no Atlantic coast” (Rouquié and Vale 92). Meanwhile “Honduras borders the Pacific only along a small section of the Gulf of Fonseca – about 150 kilometers, as opposed to 900 kilometers along the Atlantic coast.” Surprisingly “there is not a single port;” in Honduras; therefore, “La Union, in El Salvador, serves as its maritime outlet” (Rouquié and Vale 23). At the time, El Salvador and Honduras had to rely on one another because of the limitations of their lands and coastlines. One doesn’t have access to the Atlantic, one of the major oceans for trade and exportation of goods, while the other for lack of resources doesn’t have a seaport to which they can conduct international business. It would spell for a tense and fragile relationship due to the immense importance land is for trading, which both countries rely on. This isn’t an exaggeration - “El Salvador is the smallest of the five nations” with a size of “20,000 km2” while Honduras is “112,000 km2” (Stone 455-56). This massive size difference presented a fruitful opportunity for many Salvadorans trying to make a better life for themselves and their families elsewhere. There were many families in need because another issue El Salvador had was overpopulation due to an absence of prenatal care and resources. With work already being scarce due to spatial limitations, a growing population meant that everyone was trying to find work and provide for their families, making everything 10 times harder than it already was. The overpopulation crisis caused a mass migration of Salvadoran immigrants to Honduras, which didn’t sit well with the Honduran Government or the local Hondurans who thought their land was being invaded (Garcia 68). It would stand to reason that perhaps if there weren’t such limitations and restrictions on natural resources, then perhaps the mass migrations would’ve never occurred. The delicate relationship would’ve been much more manageable, but that wasn’t how history was written. These issues were further exacerbated by the involvement or lack thereof, of their respective governments which were either incapable or unwilling to find a solution. Governments and those in high positions with power and influence have their agendas and goals in mind when running a country. The Salvadoran and Honduran governments were no different, they constantly approved legislation and enacted laws, most of the time at the expense of the less fortunate. These actions helped further the flame, tensions, and violence that eventually broke into an all-out war. The rationale behind such actions is that “Salvadoran and Honduran military leaders (Fidel Sánchez Hernández and Oswaldo Lopez Arellano) faced major sources of internal opposition to their policies during the late 1960s; this made an external enemy an attractive source of domestic unity” (Ropp 297). For example, when the “Honduran government, while holding vast expanses of unoccupied and uncultivated land” (Rouquié and Vale 33) made the conscious choice to exploit the less fortunate to maintain their power and their land, leaving the common people to fight amongst themselves for the little available land. What President Arellano and company chose to do was they “initiated a program to deport Salvadoreans as criminals and undocumented persons and to evict those who had squatted upon public lands” (L. T. G. 292). This new program not only allowed for the deportation of Salvadoran immigrants, but it also gave pride to the Honduran people. They were given a scapegoat to pin their problems. The blame was put upon the Salvadoran immigrants intruding on their land, no one bothered to look at President Arellano’s shortcomings and failures. This didn’t bode well with El Salvador at all; the treatment and deportation of the Salvadoran immigrants fleeing Honduras would become the main issue of discussion leading up to the games in 1969. However, El Salvador had a similar situation as well. In fact, “The scarcity of land is further heightened by the fact that much of El Salvador's arable land is controlled by the "14 Families" - a small, tightly knit group of wealthy aristocrats” (L.T.G. 292). While not the government, it is still people in this case families with high influence and power, who use their power for their benefit at the expense of the innocent, who have to look elsewhere for salvation. Similar to Honduras turning the attention toward Salvadoran migrants, President Sanchez made a “call for 'National Unity' when the war against Honduras came” that would deter “the opposition and momentarily avoid attacks from his military opponents” (Garcia 69). While the innocent were feeling the impact of war and violence, their respective governments used this time of tragedy to their advantage. Although perhaps not their initial intent, spinning the war as something they could use to further their political agenda and retain power was too grand of an opportunity to think about. It could be that the common people realized that their best interest wasn’t fighting one another, but rather fighting the institutions that put them on this path. Such media campaigns were very successful. An example was when “Anti-Salvadoran feelings became prevalent in Honduras, where slogans such as ‘Hondureño, toma un leño y mata a un Salvadoreño’ (Honduran, pick up a log and kill a Salvadoran) started to appear and ‘a small exodus’ of Salvadorans began in May” (Desplat). This small media campaign encouraged an untenable, miserable situation. This dynamic of exploitation and politicization of mass destruction and tragedy isn’t anything new. Yet, in the case of Honduras and El Salvador, it is further worsened by the fact that the common people were easily impressionable and subject to influence. This came especially true when media outlets reported about the conflict. Media/propaganda prey on people's emotions; they want to get rid of logic and rational thoughts and simply come up with the best headline or stories that will draw in viewership. Emotions are very powerful and can become dangerous if left unchecked, leaving open doors to manipulation. Thousands fled, and they weren’t let go quietly, there were thousands of “unsubstantiated reports by the Salvadoran mass media of atrocities committed against the emigrants, producing a rising tide of hatred and bitterness between the two countries” (L.T.G. 292-93). Once the Salvadoran media grabbed hold of these atrocities, they made a conscious choice to send it out for people to hear as soon as possible. They chose to ignore due diligence and didn’t seem to make any effort to ensure that the reports and sources were credible; they had their headline story and they were going to run with it. When the news reports reached the Salvadoran population, they created mass emotions of passion, fear, and hatred. This combination of emotions mixed with the environment of the games spelled disaster, because '[soccer] is centered on the ideas of deprivation and frustration, which propaganda can easily fuel for a national cause' (Barrett). The fight to protect their country and their fellow Salvadoran countrymen had reached the tipping point. The conflict had become so intense that “fans kept the opposing side’s team awake all night before World Cup qualifying matches in hostile territory.
Losses were attributed to the interference of overzealous fans, and a firmly held sense of national pride that fueled antagonism both on and off the field” (Dowd 106). The soccer field became another battleground thanks to the media’s involvement, what was once a joyful and passionate game was twisted into something much darker. The games were the last straw before an all-out war broke out. It was do or die for both Honduras and El Salvador - they became symbols for the decades of struggle between the two countries. The main use of the media, which was to dehumanize the other side to justify retaliation in the form of violence, succeeded, and, therefore, only made matters that much worse, leading to a point where resolution became all but impossible. The “Soccer War” was the culmination of decades of struggle. Made worse by faulty media reporting on land, and immigration, while the respective governments were content with blaming the other, rather than finding a peaceful solution. Feelings of fear, anger, and hatred fueled this long rocky relationship. Soccer coach, Jürgen Klopp spoke of fighting for your country as a form of pride, something you could be proud of and tell stories. Given their intense and connected history, there is little room for error when it comes to the relationship between Honduras and El Salvador. That much is clear. The common people have a strong bond with one another and will fight to protect their country, and land from those whom they believe will do them harm. It created an environment between Honduras and El Salvador where beautiful sentiment was manipulated for political gain and to encourage violence, between two groups of people. The Soccer War is a demonstration of emotional and political manipulation that over a long period was too much to bear and took not only land but the lives of many. The resentment and bitterness between the two countries continue. Works Cited Barrett, Lindsey, et al. “The Soccer War.” Soccer Politics / The Politics of Football, 24 Oct. 2013, sites.duke.edu/wcwp/research-projects/the-soccer-war/#background. Desplat, Dr Juliette. “World Cup Fever at Its Worst: The 1969 Football War.” World Cup Fever at Its Worst: The 1969 Football War, The National Archives, 20 July 2018, blog.nationalarchives.gov.uk/world-cup-fever-worst-1969-football-war/. Dowd, Shannon E. Stasis: Border Wars in 20th and 21st Century Latin American Literature and Film, University of Michigan, United States -- Michigan, 2017. ProQuest, https://libproxy.csun.edu/login?url=https://www.proquest.com/dissertations-theses/stasis-border-wars-20-sup-th-21-st-century-latin/docview/1989754898/se-2. García, O. “La Memoria de la Mal llamada ‘Guerra del Fútbol’”. Iberoamericana – Nordic Journal of Latin American and Caribbean Studies, vol. 48, no. 1, 2019, p. 67–76.DOI: https://doi.org/10.16993/iberoamericana.420 L. T. G. “A Microcosmic View of the OAS: The Honduras-El Salvador Conflict.” Virginia Law Review, vol. 57, no. 2, 1971, pp. 291–314. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/1072103. Ropp, Steve C. The Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 62, no. 2, 1982, pp. 296–97. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2514999. Rouquié, Alain, and Michel Vale. “HONDURAS – EL SALVADOR, THE WAR OF ONE HUNDRED HOURS: A CASE OF REGIONAL ‘DISINTEGRATION.’” International Journal of Politics, vol. 3, no. 3, 1973, pp. 17–51. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/27868774. Stone, Samuel. “Production and Politics in Central America’s Convulsions.” Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 15, no. 2, 1983, pp. 453–69. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/155887. Comments are closed.
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