In 1941, the day after Pearl Harbor, Costa Rica declared war on Germany and Japan, a largely symbolic gesture since they had no navy or troops of any quantity to send overseas. President Rafael Angel Calderón, a liberal who had previously instituted a social security system, labor code and other social guarantees, confiscated the property of German ancestry families in Costa Rica.

He cited the 1944 U-Boat torpedoing of a United Fruit merchant ship (the San Pablo) in Limón as his reason. It was a serious political blunder because many of these families had been living there for generations and were part of the financially powerful coffee elite. The action set the stage for a Civil War four years later, a war that would claim the life of one in every 300 Ticos.