the first political event that shaped the future country of argentina was the creation of the viceroyalty of the río de la plata. so far, the territories in it were neglected provinces of the viceroyalty of peru: as the la plata basin did not have any precious metals or organized indigenous populations to exploit, all ships commerced with peru and mexico instead. the viceroyalty sought to complement the existing trade routes with new ones, entering south america though the río de la plata. the new system would not work as expected, as spain soon diverted most of its resources to the napoleonic wars. trade with the americas was lowered, and when britain got a clear naval supremacy with the battle of trafalgar, it almost ended.