Football War - Sometimes people take sports too seriously

Would you go to war with another country over sports?

Well, it has already happened. The Football War (Spanish: La guerra del fútbol; colloquial: Soccer War or the Hundred Hours' War also known as 100 Hour War) was a brief war fought between El Salvador and Honduras. 

In 1969, El Salvador declared war on Honduras after the deciding match for the 1970 World Cup qualification. Why? There are many reasons, most of which point back to one theme, tension. These three matches would lead to a 100 hour long war, with casualties in the thousands.

Politics and Sports

As you may know, El Salvador and Honduras are Central American countries that are big football fanatics. By size, Honduras has a bigger area than El Salvador. In fact, it is more than 5 times bigger. Also, in 1969, El Salvador had over a million more citizens than Honduras (Bandini & Dart, 2007). This became a big problem for the El Salvadoran government. Most of the El Salvadoran population consisted of farmers and many of them were poor. This forced many farmers to move to Honduras.

Latin America - Honduras and El Salvador fought war in 1969

According to OverSimplified, in 1963, the Honduras population held a violent coup and overthrew the government and replaced the president with Oswaldo López Arellano (“Football War--Mini Wars #2”). Even though the public and military wanted him to be president, Arellano was a bit doubtful of himself. He held an election in which he won against the opposing party. As a result, the opposing party blamed him for bribing people and for letting the rich, American banana companies take all of the Honduran’s bananas for low prices. Arellano needed to blame someone else, so he blamed the economy on the Salvadoran immigrants.

Football fans cause trouble

With tensions building, the first football match was held in the capital of Honduras (Bandini & Dart, 2007). The night before the game, Honduras fans made a huge ruckus at the hotel where the Salvadoran team stayed the night. In the game, the Honduras team won with a late overtime goal. Afterwards, a Salvadoran girl, Amelia Bolaños, was so upset that her team lost that she committed suicide. The El Salvador government displayed a photo of her on newspapers to make the public believe as strongly as she did.

After this match, the Honduran population started to terrorize the Salvadoran immigrants. The people of El Salvador were mad at what was happening to their people. The second match was held in El Salvador, but this time, the tables were turned. Salvadoran fans made loud noises outside the hotel where the Honduras team was staying. The Honduras team got no sleep at all and were blown away at the game the next day. To make things worse, the Salvadorans raised a dirty, old rag instead of the Honduras flag at the match. During the game, the stands became riotous as the Salvadorans started to attack Honduran fans who came to support their team. The Honduras team barely escaped the mob in their bullet-proof van. According to Oversimplified, the Honduras coach reportedly told his team that they were lucky to lose.

The final match was played in Mexico City, Mexico. The air was filled with tension. This was the qualifying game. Who would go on to the World Cup? It was a close game. By the end of regular time, the teams were tied, two each. El Salvador pulled away with a late night win in extra time. Back in Honduras, the Hondurans started to harass the Salvadoran immigrants. The Hondurans even threw the Salvadorans off their land and set fire to their homes. This was too much for El Salvador to take. They could not handle the Honduras people hurting their people. Many immigrants returned to El Salvador.

Declaration of war

On July 14, 1969, with an unmanageable refugee crisis on their hands and their people in trouble, El Salvador broke all diplomatic ties with Honduras and declared war. Both of the countries were using World War Ⅱ era planes. On the first day, El Salvador sent planes to air raid Toncontin International Airport in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. This prevented the Honduran Air Force from flying. Then they began to march along two major roads with their superior army.

On day two, the Salvadorans were rapidly approaching the Honduras capital. In a sort of panic, the Organization of American States came together and unanimously voted that war between Honduras and El Salvador should not continue. Subsequently, the OAS went to El Salvador and asked them to stop invading Honduras. El Salvador rejected the request saying that they would continue until Honduras stopped terrorizing the immigrants (Football War--Mini Wars #2.

On the third day, Honduras got their Air Force into the skies, and with aid from neighboring country, Nicaragua, they carried out raids on the Cutuco Oil Facility, Acajutla Port and Ilopango Airbase. This weakened the supply lines for the El Salvador infantry.

War ends after 100 hours

After three days at war, the two sides were caught in a stalemate, and the war was no longer favorable for El Salvador. When the OAS came back to ask El Salvador to stop and ensured the safety or their people, El Salvador accepted and ceasefire was organized on July 18. Then the OAS asked the El Salvadoran government to withdraw troops from Honduras. When the Salvadorans refused, the OAS threatened to sanction them. El Salvador relented and withdrew all of their troops by August 2, 1969.

No one really gained anything

About 6000 people died and 15000 were injured. The economy of both countries were heavily impacted by the war. The war also left some land and border disputes, like the Gulf of Fonseca, some of which are still a cause of tension to this day.

Citations

1. The Football War--Mini Wars #2 , YouTube, www.youtube.com/watch?v=W12vb_Crf00.

2. Bandini, Nicky, and James Dart. “Knowledge: Has Football Ever Started a War?”

3. The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 21 Feb. 2007, www.theguardian.com/football/2007/feb/21/theknowledge.sport.

4. BBC - https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-48673853