"Will Scalp for Food": Unofficial Indigenous Troops and the Chaco War from Below

Between 1932 and 1935, Bolivia and Paraguay fought a brutal war over the sparsely populated Chaco territory. Although indigenous peoples participated actively in the conflict, historians have until recently largely ignored the many native contributions. Only Bolivia formally employed Indian troops, but both armies used their languages for secret code communications, native people as spies and guides, and indigenous women for prostitution. Caught between the crossfire, the Chaco indigenous people used the war to find food, earn handouts and secure weapons. Natives capitalized on the fray by digging trenches, carting freight, burying bodies, and especially by selling scalps to the highest bidder. When reimbursed, natives usually received only old bread, mate tea, broken weapons, or trinkets. This paper uses interviews with native elders and archival research to argue that when seen from below, the contending nations took advantage of the conflict to appropriate native lands, historical legacies and especially labor as they determined national borders. The people on the bottom paid part of the war's costs without receiving fair remuneration.