El Salvador in the 70s-80s was a warlike place. How does a patriotic young Salvadoran do his bit without getting himself killed in all the foolishness. Hm….. check your mailbox. So slip on your smoking jacket, fill your pipe, take your first sip of your adult beverage, and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
Stamps that honor a countries military service also have the unsaid second job of military recruiting. This stamp is perhaps the most effective example of that I have ever seen. This ship makes no pretense whatever of being a warship. It is a patrol craft whose most important job is to show the flag. It’s summertime and the living is easy. Beats fighting your neighbor over footballs and land reform or gearing up for an endless left-right civil war. Join the Navy!
Todays stamp is issue A210, a 50 Centavo airmail stamp issued by El Salvador on May 7th, 1970. It was part of a 5 stamp issue in various denominations that honored the armed services. There is an overprinted version of this stamp from 1971 that celebrates the 20th anniversary of the El Salvadoran Navy.
El Salvador and Honduras were and still are desperately poor countries as can be seen by the recent mass migration north out of both countries. What more graphic indictment could there be of a failed state. In 1970 Salvador had a much higher population while Honduras had a much greater land mass. The 1960s saw a migration with Salvadorans squatting on Honduran land becoming over 20 percent of Honduras’s population. In 1962, Honduras passed a land reform plan that intended to evict the Salvadorans and return the land to the large banana growers. This greatly angered El Salvador.
Into this anger came football (soccer). In a three game qualifier, Honduras faced El Salvador. Honduras won the first match in Tegucigalpa. There was much violence in the stands and it shocked the country how many locals were not for the home team. There was then a second match in San Salvador won by El Salvador and again marker by anti Honduran violence. El Salvador broke diplomatic relations with Honduras after Salvadoran peasants began to be forcibly evicted from Honduras by citizens without the government lifting a finger to stop it, land reform being the law of the land. El Salvador won the third match in Mexico City and attacked Honduras. The armies fought on the ground but the interesting fighting was in the air where ancient American F4 Corsairs piston fighters handed out freely and stupidly by America to both air forces fought each other. America through the Pan American Union, see https://the-philatelist.com/2019/01/08/el-savador-1940-celebrating-the-pan-american-union-a-league-of-nations-that-actually-worked/ .quickly put a halt to the war after 100 hours and finally started an arms embargo. This was the last war where piston engine fighters fought each other. Both countries amazingly enough found some money in their pockets and bought out of date French jets from Israel, Oragons for Salvador and Super Mysteres for Honduras. Advantage Honduras.
The patrol boat on the stamp was given second hand by the British. In the 80s they were replaced by American made patrol boats that previously served as service craft for offshore oil platforms. That sounds a little less yacht like=fail. The Navy also uses an ex USA coast guard cutter given in 2002. It was built in 1942! The Navy has 870 personnel and has ordered bigger, new build!, Chilean patrol boats. We will see if they can actually pay for them at delivery time.
Well my drink is empty and I will pour another to toast the sailors of both El Salvador and Honduras. Just remember if you see a boat in the drug trade, sail the other way, that way the living will always be easy. Wait, you already knew that. Come again tomorrow for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.