ABSTRACT
The struggle between Lima and Buenos Aires entered a new stage after the royalist victory at Huaqui and Goyeneche's occupation of Upper Peru in the latter half of 1811. Now, Upper Peru became the principal theater of war in the southern Andes, the pivot on which the opposing sides set their military strategies. Their reasons remained the same as in 1810. For Viceroy Abascal in Lima, the region was a vital outwork for the defense of royalist Peru and a platform for an assault on revolutionary Buenos Aires; for the governments of Buenos Aires, Upper Peru was equally vital, both for its economic resources and as a bridgehead for war against the viceregal regime in Peru.
