Talk:Football War

Both sides lost
How can both sides lose? Either it's inconclusive or one side wins... ugen64 17:11, Aug 31, 2004 (UTC)


 * Answer: Because the ONU (UN) stopped the war in the 4th. Day...The country who opposite a this desicion could be invaded.....Thats why they named it the "100 hours war". -- 168.243.218.1


 * factmonster says that it was the OAS rather than the UN who persuaded Salvador to withdraw. The bellman 12:48, 2004 Dec 17 (UTC)

Playoff match
"A playoff match on June 26 or June 28, 1969" was anonymously changed without citation to "A playoff match on June 27, 1969". Does someone have a citation for this apparently unclear date? -- Jmabel | Talk 19:25, Dec 16, 2004 (UTC)

Ryszard Kapuscinski
Put this in a section called other because it hasn't been used as a reference? --SqueakBox 20:53, Feb 16, 2005 (UTC)

Substantive edit by anon, including some deletion
I don't know a lot about this, so I'm only going to make a process-oriented remark: I'd appreciate comment from a registered user who knows this topic either endorsing User:68.167.204.193's recent edit or indicating if he/she thinks there are issues with it. -- Jmabel | Talk 04:11, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

There's no discussion of the actual war...
Since the article is about the war, it should discuss the actual war. What exactly happened? Who invaded whom? What sort of armament was used? Or was it guards firing over the border at each other for six days? Tempshill 18:37, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

Reverts
I just set up a new section title and had it reverted with rollback. Please explain why that happened here and what your objection to the edit, which I thought made the article look much cleaner, is exactly? SqueakBox 19:49, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Aah, gremlins problem. That expalins it, SqueakBox 19:50, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Length
The intro is longer than the article!

It feels like ridicule or belittling to give the details of the futbal matches more attention than the civilian or military casualties of the actual war. The section, which I cut, could go in the World Football Cup article. --Uncle Ed 19:10, 7 April 2006 (UTC)

I disagree. It is an interesting tidbit of information. I won't restore it, it should be discussed first. takethemud 06:01, 8 April 2006 (UTC)takethemud

Football results

 * June 6 1969, Tegucigalpa: Honduras 1 - 0 El Salvador (0-0 at halftime)
 * June 15 1969, San Salvador: El Salvador 3 - 0 Honduras (HT: 3-0)
 * A playoff match on June 27 1969, Mexico: El Salvador 3 - 2 Honduras after extra time (HT: 1-2, FT: 2-2).

This results of the game was recently deleted as unrelated. Even if it isn't INTEGRAL to the Football War, it is an interesting tidbit of information. I would be in favor of restoring this if others agree it should be restored. takethemud 06:00, 8 April 2006 (UTC)takethemud


 * It should go in whichever article covers football, with perhaps a link from Footbal War and a brief explanation of why somebody decided to nickname these 6 days of battle the "football war". I'm more interested in the origin of the nickname than the results of the match. Is there an article on Football in Central America? --Uncle Ed 02:29, 10 April 2006 (UTC)


 * Ridiculous. Of course the results should go in here. Jooler 07:02, 10 April 2006 (UTC)


 * I'm with takethemud and Jooler. Belongs in the article. - Jmabel | Talk 07:13, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Done. Shame about the result, SqueakBox 14:43, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

Role of the football
Although the actual causes of the war were, undoubtably, not about football, I think the role of the match in triggering the war deserves more comment than "These existing tensions between the two countries were inflamed by rioting during the second qualifying round for the 1970 Football World Cup. On July 14, 1969, the Salvadoran army launched an attack against Honduras."

Epeeist smudge 09:44, 13 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Thank you for your suggestion! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make whatever changes you feel are needed. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the  link at the top. You don't even need to log in! (Although there are some reasons why you might like to…) The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes&mdash;they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills.  New contributors are always welcome. - Jmabel | Talk 00:44, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Market suspension
A recent edit turned "12-year suspension of the Central American Common Market" into "22-year suspension…" Both are uncited, so I have no idea if this is a correction of vandalism. Does someone have a citation. - Jmabel | Talk 05:40, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
 * Based on the Central American Common Market page, it looks like 22-year is correct (The organization collapsed in 1969 with the Football War between Honduras and El Salvador, but was then reinstated in 1991.) Nik42 04:23, 26 September 2006 (UTC)

Date
What is "by late m2006" supposed to mean? I'd have presumed "by late 2006" but, since that is still a bit in the future as this was added in early October 2006, that may not be the meaning. - Jmabel | Talk 23:30, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

I see the demarcation was mentioned earlier in the article which is fine, not much happened this year, so deleted my edit addition, SqueakBox 23:52, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

6 days?
The war started on the 14th and ended on the 18th. That makes 5 days doesn't it? Cjohnzen 15:17, 23 March 2007 (UTC)


 * Not neccessarily. Could be as little as 3.01 days. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:14, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

According to the penguin dictionary of international relations it was 5 days, ive changed it back for now.--Talkshowbob (talk) 00:20, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

nonsensical duration
This section makes no sense; other places in the article talk about 4 days, or about a decade; but this part says "many decades", and also refers to the turn of the twentieth century, which, if am not mistaken, was 1900:

''These unkept promises had been made on the night of July 18th, 1969. Many decades later, at the turn of the twentieth century, did the fighting actually cease to exist. El Salvador had refused to withdraw their troops from the occupied territory in Honduras until August 2nd, 1969. On this date, Honduras also guaranteed Salvadoran President Fidel Sanchez Hernandez that he would provide adequate safety for the Salvadorans still living in Honduras.''

Bayle Shanks 05:03, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

Discussing Latin America's penchant (or not) for large land owners
The statement:
 * In Honduras, a large majority of the land was granted to large landowners or big corporations. This was a very popular trend in Latin America and still is to this day.

...has been tagged as disputed (not by me) and supposedly there was a section in here for discussing it. There isn't, but hey, now there is. Wikipedia should stick to the facts. The first sentence is a fact. The second, part-fact, part-opinion. (If the tagger was disputing the factual aspects of land ownership in Latin America, they really ought to take themselves to a history book.) Therefore, I have proposed a rewrite that incorporates the factual aspects together into a single sentence, as follows:
 * In Honduras, as in much of South America, a large majority of the land was owned by large landowners or big corporations.

"Popular trend" isn't strong words. The reference to South America contextualises the land ownership issue as not being exclusive to Honduras. I removed "granted" because it may imply someone did so recently, whereas it has happened over hundreds of years. 58.108.27.47 (talk) 02:57, 27 March 2008 (UTC) user:Aragond

Context
I've cleaned up the section for POV. The text I removed is commented out with notes, as you'll see if you edit it. I'm sure a lot of the material could go back in, as relevant, but just presented with more distance. I think much of the problem re "like an essay" comes down to not using direct quotes from sources.

- Ddawkins73 (talk) 18:16, 14 February 2009 (UTC)

The following is the current edit of the Context section, with hidden comments added by Ddawkins73 on 14 February 2009:
 * " ***inline citations and or direct quotes from sources would be a good idea. And more sources***
 * ***Following may seem controversial, so needs to be *specifically* inline cited and *attributed* to go in:***

These immigrants made the journey to a new land in hopes of decent jobs and escaping their oppressive government. This led to violent nationalism spreading throughout the Honduras state.
 * ***See, the following, really should quote from the book so it is clear where *their* sources are from. This makes the encyclopedia *itself* neutral. Give figures from an independent (monitoring) organization, eg Red Cross or equiv of Amnesty, if possible:***

Hondurans then began targeting Salvadoran immigrants specifically by means of beatings, tortures, and killings.

Although the nickname "Football War" implies that the conflict was due to a football game, the causes of the war go deeper. The roots of the war were issues over land reform in Honduras and immigration and demographic problems in El Salvador. Honduras is more than five times the size of neighbouring El Salvador, even though in 1969, El Salvador had a population that was more than double that of Honduras. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Salvadorans had begun migrating to Honduras in large numbers. By 1969, more than 300,000 Salvadorans were living in Honduras. These Salvadorans made up twenty percent of the peasant population of Honduras. In Honduras, as in much of Central America, a large majority of the land was owned by large landowners or big corporations. The United Fruit Company owned ten percent of the land, making it hard for the average landowners to compete. In 1966, the United Fruit Company banded together with many other large companies to create la Federación Nacional de Agricultores y Ganaderos de Honduras (FENAGH; the National Federation of Farmers and Livestock-Farmers of Honduras). FENAGH was anti-campesino as well as anti-Salvadoran. This group put pressure on the Honduran president, General Lopez Arellano, to protect the property rights of wealthy landowners.


 * ***An outline of, or a translated quote from,the law itself would be useful here, as it's critical***

In 1962, Honduras successfully enacted a new land reform law. Fully enforced by 1967, this law gave central government and municipal land much occupied illegally by Salvadoran immigrants and redistributed this land to native-born Honduran peoples as specified by the Land Reform Law. The land was taken from both immigrant farmers and squatters regardless of their right to ownership and the status of their immigration. Thousands of Salvadorans were displaced by this law and were forced to emigrate once again. Salvadoran newspapers then heightened the already stressed relationship between the two countries by showing the many supposed atrocities being committed against Salvadorans in Honduras. images of newspaper headlines would be a good idea


 * ***This is POV assessment. "explosive" - a value judgement. Facts and figures that *show* it should be quite findable:***

The social situation in both countries in the run-up to the war was explosive
 * ***Says who. Attribute:***

and their military governments were looking for a convenient cause towards which to direct their nationals' political concerns.
 * ***Attribute:***

National media in both countries encouraged hatred towards citizens of the other, eventually...
 * ***(and use the 3rd party sources' examples from newspapers

Thousands of Salvadoran labourers were expelled from Honduras, including both temporary harvest workers and longer-term settlers. This general rise in tensions ultimately led to a military conflict.
 * ***this,or similar, just needs to go into direct quotes:***

that served to direct the attention of the citizenry of both countries outward rather than in on their own internal affairs,
 * ***interpretation. Attribute to a reliable source and/or simply present figures:***

leaving both armies rearmed, and destroying the Central American economic integration that had been expressed in the Central American Common Market (Mercado Común Centroamericano or MCE), under whose trade rules the richer Salvadoran economy gained much ground relative to Honduras."

In case anybody wants to comment. Scolaire (talk) 14:16, 4 July 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism
Someone changed the number of casualties to "none" for El Salvador, while increasing drastically the number of casualties of Honduras. There were no sources given, and all the other language wikipedias support the former data. I reverted some minutes ago. So, be careful, maybe this vandal returns to again forge statistics in favor of El Salvador. -- 87.159.65.77 (talk) 13:11, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

United Fruit Company
" The United Fruit Company owned ten percent of the land, making it hard for the average landowners to compete."

This sentence makes little sense as it stands. "The average landowner" does not "compete" with a fruit company. GeneCallahan (talk) 16:34, 29 June 2010 (UTC)

El Salvador Mercenaries
According to the information of this website

http://www.acig.org/artman/publish/article_156.shtml

The Mercenaries hired by El Salvador did not do much figthing, choosing to fly away in confrontations. The actual dogfights, if any, were done purely between El Salvador pilots and Honudran pilots. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.246.44.138 (talk) 20:15, 16 August 2010 (UTC)

The information is flawed: At the outset of the Football War, El Salvador enlisted the assistance of several American pilots with P-51 and F4U experience. Bob Love, a Korean war ace, Chuck Lyford, Ben Hall and Lynn Garrison are believed to have flown combat missions but it has never been confirmed. Lynn Garrison had purchased F4U-7 133693 from the French MAAG office when retired from French naval service in 1964. It was registered N693M and was later destroyed in a 1987 crash in San Diego, California.[86]

Your reference mentions Jerry DeLarm and Red Gray who only flew twice while the four mentioned above led their sorties. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Corsair133693 (talk • contribs) 20:31, 31 July 2011 (UTC)

Article Bias
Not really sure how to do this as I have never done anything like this before, but I happened across this page and started reading it. The entire article, particularly the First Shots section, seems to be very biased in favor of El Salvador. For example the sentence, "This is, perhaps, the only good thing coming out from what is considered a defeat of the Honduran forces in general, since the Honduran army did a poor job on the ground and never stood a chance against the ferocious Salvadoran Army force," is just one example of some of the statements that seemed to biased.

I am sorry that I am not more helpful, but I have never done anything like this before. I figured it would be best to try and bring it to the attention of those who are more knowledgeable on the subject. The only reason I bothered was that the article was given a high rating which did not seem appropriate. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.54.177.9 (talk) 05:31, 8 July 2011 (UTC)

Urban legend
Somebody has written: "Urban legend, popularized by Kapuscinski, states that immediately following the match an eighteen-year old Salvadoran girl Amelia Bolaños shot herself in the heart..." He/she follows up by saying "Bolanos' suicide occurred almost a year later...and contemporary accounts say that she shot herself in the...right temple". Looks impressive, except the "contemporary account" (singular) is a Sports Illustrated article on the 1970 World Cup itself, and the reference to Bolanos is a throwaway remark, obviously just a story the sports writer has (mis)heard. Kapuscinski, on the other hand, researched his book, which was about events in El Salvador and Honduras; he wasn't relying on hearsay. In the absence of a reliable source saying that the Bolanos story is "urban legend", I am reverting. Scolaire (talk) 15:29, 29 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Kapuscinski's "reasearch" can, at times, be made up from the cloth. I tried to find anything verifying that too-good-to-be-believed account of Kapuscinski's, but got only the Sports Illustrated account, which was written at an earlier date than Kapuscinski's factitious story. Not only that, but he didn't get the names of the players in the Honduran team right, as I soon found out. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.192.83.171 (talk) 00:08, 26 May 2012 (UTC)


 * Hmm! I see your point. Any reference to an 8 June 1969 date seems to be written in exactly the same terms (shot herself through the heart, El Salvador president and national football team walking behind her coffin), suggesting they all come from a common source. On the other hand, here is a book that says she "committed suicide the day that the El Salvador football team lost its first game in the World Cup in Mexico in 1970" (that would be the Belgium game, not the Mexico game).
 * Unfortunately, we cannot say that because Kapuściński's journalistic standards have been criticised, therefore he made this story up: that is called synthesis. As I said above, we would need a reliable source saying that the Bolanos story is urban legend. Perhaps the best thing would be simply to remove the information from the article, linking to this discussion in the edit summary. If anybody subsequently tried to add it again they could likewise be referred to this discussion. Scolaire (talk) 08:32, 28 May 2012 (UTC)

Four-day war?
The "First shots" section says, "Late in the afternoon of 14 July 1969, concerted military action began." The "Cease fire" section says, "A cease-fire was arranged on the night of 18 July; it took full effect only on 20 July." That is six full days, 50% more than the "four-day" or "100 hour" war spoken of in the first sentence of the lead. Can somebody explain the discrepancy? Scolaire (talk) 17:46, 29 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Fixed it myself. --Scolaire (talk) 10:14, 16 January 2013 (UTC)

Subjective comment without a reference:
"FENAGH was anti-campesino as well as anti-Salvadoran."

While this may be true in the author's opinion, I have no reference to go on, and it smacks of sloppy journalism. I suggest deleting it. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Troydickers (talk • contribs) 21:00, 6 February 2015 (UTC


 * The source cited at the end of the paragraph is the source for the whole thing. Searching on Google Books for Federación Nacional de Agricultores y Ganaderos de Honduras anti-campesino I got this result from The war of the dispossessed: "...los grandes terratenientes se organizaron para formar un grupo anticampesino, anti-colono ilegal y sobre todo anti-salvadoreño en 1966. Este grupo era la Federación Nacional de Agricultores y Ganaderos de Honduras, la cual era generalmente abreviada..." which Google Translate translates as "...large landowners were organized to form an anti-peasant (anti-campesino), anti-illegal settler and especially anti-Salvador group in 1966. This group was the Federación Nacional de Agricultores y Ganaderos de Honduras, which was usually abbreviated..." Scolaire (talk) 22:34, 6 February 2015 (UTC)

Amelia Bolaños
"Amelia Bolanos" redirects to the Buildup section, but it doesn't actually say anything about her.Pyromilke (talk) 00:13, 30 April 2021 (UTC)

Dubious
The account of the air war says that Capt. Fernando Soto shot down Capt. Guillermo Reynaldo Cortez, ‘who died when his Corsair exploded.’ However Cortez’ article states he was merely wounded and died when his plane crashed; the source there is his biography. How should this be resolved? Xyl 54 (talk) 23:00, 28 July 2022 (UTC)

Amelia Bolanos 2
Per the comment two posts up, and per, I have nominated Amelia Bolanos for deletion. The discussion is at  -- Scolaire (talk) 12:14, 21 July 2023 (UTC)