Acre War

Acre War
Memorial of the centenary of the Revolution Acriana in Rio Branco, capital of Acre
Date 1899–1903 Location Acre, Brazil Result Brazilian victory; Treaty of Petrópolis
Belligerents
Bolivia Support: United States	Republic of Acre Support: Brazil
Commanders and leaders
José Manuel Pando Federico Román Nicolás Suárez Callaú Bruno Racua	Manuel Ferraz de Campos Sales Francisco de Paula Rodrigues Alves Luis Gálvez Rodríguez de Arias José Plácido de Castro Jefferson José Torres Olímpio da Silveira
Strength
Unknown	Unknown
Casualties and losses
Unknown	Unknown

The Acre War, known in Brazil as Acrean Revolution ("Revolução Acreana" in Portuguese) and in Spanish as La Guerra del Acre ("The War of the Acre") was a border conflict between Bolivia and the First Brazilian Republic over the Acre Region, which was rich in rubber and gold deposits. The conflict had two phases between 1899 and 1903 and ended with a Brazilian victory and the subsequent Treaty of Petrópolis, which ceded Acre to Brazil. The outcome also affected territories disputed with Peru.

The region of Acre possessed rich gold deposits, an abundance of timber resources, principally rubber trees. From the end of the 19th century until the middle of the 20th century, rubber trees were crucial to the automobile and transport industry, as synthetic rubber for the manufacture of tires and other objects was not discovered until around World War II. It is because of this that the war is also referred to as the Rubber War (Guerra del Caucho), as one of the motives that drove Governor Jefferson José Torres of Amazonas (Brazilian state), was a rubber export tax.

The border between Brazil and Bolivia were delimited by the Treaty of Ayacucho. The province of Acre, territory of about five times the size of Belgium, belonged to Bolivia. Embedded in the heart of South America, Acre aroused little interest for its inaccessibility and apparent lack of commercial value. Its population was composed of a small number of Indians without national identity and a handful of Brazilians and Bolivians.

When the price of rubber shot in the late nineteenth century, about 18,000 adventurers and settlers, most of Brazil, went to Acre to exploit the rubber trees. Practically there were no roads, so that the main means of transport were some river steamers, canoes and rafts.

On January 2, 1899, Bolivia set up a customs in Puerto Alonso (today Porto Acre), which upset the Brazilian settlers, who wanted to exit the Bolivian authorities. The lawyer of Dr. José Carvalho led a revolt against the Bolivians on April 30.

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