20 - Latin America

Summary

The First World War has long been considered a non-event in the history of contemporary Latin America, far from the main theatres of military operations. To the first level of analysis of Latin American neutrality in 1914 were added economic considerations of prime importance for the profitable investing nations, mostly exporters of raw materials and importers of manufactured products, structurally dependent on the outside world. More evident in the southern cone of South America and Brazil than in the rest of Latin America, and fundamentally urban, the mobilisation of the communities of European origin during the Great War remained constant from the end of 1914 to the Armistice in November 1918, even, in some cases, into the 1920s, and played a decisive role in the gradual involvement of the Latin American societies in the conflict.