Qualla: Battle of Gondra https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra en-us © 2026 Bendyline Wed, 08 Jul 2026 02:39:58 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: Battle of Gondra https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra Battle of Gondra: Introduction https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra/ They dug with bayonets, tin cans flattened into shovels, and burlap sacks to haul out the dirt. Above them, only a few dozen meters away, Bolivian soldiers slept under mosquito netting, unaware that the ground beneath the no-man's-land was being hollowed out beneath their feet. For weeks in the spring of 1933, exhausted Paraguayan troops at Fort Gondra, many sick with malaria and stripped to the waist in the heat, pushed a tunnel under the trenches toward the enemy rear. On the morning of 10 May, with a light drizzle falling, they came up behind the Bolivian lines and the war turned, for a few hours, into something out of a fable.

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]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/e/v/7/battle-of-gondra-wp/6ev7-battle-of-gondra-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Battle of Gondra: The Green Hell https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra/ The Chaco Boreal is a vast, flat scrubland of thorn forest and seasonal swamp, baking and waterless for much of the year. Both Paraguay and Bolivia believed oil lay beneath it, and from 1932 to 1935 they fought one of the bloodiest wars in the history of the Americas to control i...

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]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/e/v/7/battle-of-gondra-wp/6ev7-battle-of-gondra-the-green-hell.mp3 0:06 2 full Battle of Gondra: The Tunnel https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra/ The idea belonged to a corporal, Bernabé Mendoza Duré, who proposed digging beneath the enemy line. His commander, Lieutenant Colonel Rafael Franco, approved it on 28 April 1933. With almost nothing in the way of tools, a special detachment worked in secret, shoring up the roof s...

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]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/e/v/7/battle-of-gondra-wp/6ev7-battle-of-gondra-the-tunnel.mp3 0:06 3 full Battle of Gondra: The Encirclement https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra/ The famous tunnel raid set the stage, but the larger Battle of Gondra came two months later, from 11 to 15 July 1933, in the immediate aftermath of the Paraguayan victory at the Second Battle of Nanawa. The Paraguayan 1st Division, known as the Iron Division, pushed through dense...

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]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/e/v/7/battle-of-gondra-wp/6ev7-battle-of-gondra-the-encirclement.mp3 0:06 4 full Battle of Gondra: What the Map Doesn't Show https://qualla.com/battle-of-gondra/ On 15 July, the Bolivians withdrew from the pocket without further harassment, carrying out even their heavy equipment. The Paraguayan advance stalled against a fresh blocking position the Bolivian 3rd Pérez regiment had thrown up at Campo Vía, a dry creek bed six kilometers west...

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]]> Sun, 21 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/e/v/7/battle-of-gondra-wp/6ev7-battle-of-gondra-what-the-map-doesnt-show.mp3 0:06 5 full