Rather than an indepth history lesson this will be for now a quick overview of the history of Paraguay.
In Pre Columbian times Paraguay was in common with Brazil and other forested areas of South America thinly populated with by various indgenous groups living the hunter gatherer lifestyle with a small amount of basic agriculture.
Life changed when the Spanish arrived in Asunción bay looking for somewhere to plant a settlement where there were more placid indians after having trouble with the natives in the vicinity of Buenos Aires.
From then on Paraguay became a part of Spanish South America eventualy becoming part of the provience of the Rio de la Plata. The land although lacking mineral wealth and therefore becoming something of a back water did contain peaceful natives and so prospered.
The natives also attracted the attention of the Jesuits who noticing their talents for music and ability to learn craftmanship collected natives from the jungle to build and live in planned religious settlements. They to prospered until expelled for running a state within a state.
Next like all of South America came independence. Arriving in Paraguay in 1811. From then onwards following the expulsion of the Spanish overlords the country was run by a string of dictators.
The first help form Paraguay’s individual character by sealing it off from the world for the duration of his presidency. His successor was more willing to communicate with the outside world importing technology from Europe to modernise the country.
All this was undone however by his son who managed to provoke war with Brazil, Argentina and Uruguay. The war of the triple alliance. Bringing the country to ruin at the loss of a large part of the population. For many years the country was know as a land of women as so much of the male population was lost in the fighting.
Unsurprisingly this lead to many years of political instability although by the 1930s the country was able to fight and defeat Bolivia over the then undefined Chaco border in the Chaco War. Rumors of oil giving both sides the motive to claim as much of the disputed land as possible.
Politics remained turbulant until a civil war in 1946 and a military coup in 1954 bought to power President Stroessner. A hard man of the type then found across South America, ruling the country with the iron fist of a military state. His hold on power lasted longer than that of his contemporaries remaining until he was overthrown in 1989.
Since then democracy has been the way of Paraguay with however the majority of the presidents coming from the party of the old dictator.
In that time the country has on the whole remained quiet and stable with the modernisation of Asunción slowly speading out into the rest of the country as the land moves onwards through the 21st century.
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