History
The Marina de Guerra del Perú was established on October 8, 1821 by the government of general José de San Martín. Its first actions were undertaken during the War of Independence (1821–1824) using captured Spanish warships. Shortly afterwards it was engaged in the war against the Gran Colombia (1828–1829) during which it conducted a blockade against the seaport of Guayaquil and then helped with the occupation of this city by Peruvian forces. It saw further action during the wars of the Peru-Bolivian Confederacy (1836–1839) and during the Chincha Islands War with Spain (1866). The breakout of the War of the Pacific (1879–1883) caught the Peruvian Navy unprepared and with inferior forces in comparison with the Chilean Navy. Even so, hit-and-run tactics carried out by Peruvian Admiral Miguel Grau, commander of the ironclad Huáscar, delayed the Chilean advance by six months until his death and defeat at the Battle of Angamos.
After the war, the Peruvian Navy had to be rebuilt from the ground up. In 1900 the force amounted to only one cruiser of 1,700 tons displacement, a screw-driven steamer, and ten smaller ships - the latter described by a contemporary British publication as "of no real value". The lengthy process of expansion and rebuilding started in 1907 with the acquisition in the United Kingdom of the protected cruisers Almirante Grau and Coronel Bolognesi, followed by the arrival of two submarines, Ferré and Palacios, from France in 1911. During the Presidency of Augusto B. Leguía (1919–1930) a Navy Ministry was established as well as a Navy Aviation Corps, both in 1920. Border conflicts with Colombia in 1911 and 1932 and a war with Ecuador in 1941 saw Peruvian warships involved in some skirmishes in support of the Army. The attack on Pearl Harbor brought World War II to the Pacific and even though Peru did not declare war on the Axis until 1945, its Navy was involved in patrol missions against possible threats by the Imperial Japanese Navy from early 1942 up to mid-1945. During the 1970s and the first half of the 1980s the Peruvian Navy carried out a major buildup programme which allowed it to take advantage over its traditional rival, the Chilean Navy. This proved to be temporary because the economic crisis of the second half of the 1980s forced the decommissioning of several warships and resulted in a general lack of funds for maintenance. The economic upturn of the 1990s and 2000s has permitted some improvement although at a reduced force level compared to the early 1980s.
Read more about this topic: Peruvian Navy
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