There was also limited action in South America where Spain and Portugal had been arguing for 300 years over the delineation of borders in the Río de la Plata region. These had been fixed by the First Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1777 and the 1778 Treaty of El Pardo but war in Europe gave both sides an excuse to improve their positions. A Spanish attempt to seize Mato Grosso in modern Brazil was repulsed while the Portuguese captured the Misiones Orientales, allocated to Spain in 1778. Although not referenced in the Treaty of Badajoz, this territory has been part of Brazil since independence from Portugal in 1822.
