Juan Velasco Alvarado Velasco at its helm as President. Velasco's administration articulated a desire to give justice to the poor through a regime of nationalization known as Peruanismo. Velasco's rule was characterized by left-leaning policies, which aimed to create a strong national industry to increase the international independence of Peru. To that end, he nationalised entire industries, expropriated companies in a wide range of activities from fisheries to mining to telecommunications to power production and consolidated them into single industry-centric government-run entities ("PescaPeru", "MineroPeru", "Petroperú", "SiderPeru","Centromin Peru", "ElectroPeru", "Enapu", "EnatruPeru", "Enafer", "Compañia Peruana de Telefonos", "EntelPeru", "Correos del Peru", etc.), and increased government
Juan Bautista Alvarado Frémont arrived in Monterey at the beginning of 1846. Afraid of foreign aggression, Castro assembled his militia, with Alvarado second in command, but Frémont went north to Oregon instead. An unstable political situation in Mexico strained relations among the Californios and it seemed that civil war would break out between north and south. On July 7, Commodore John D. Sloat occupied Monterey, declaring to the citizenry that the Mexican–American War had begun. Pico, Castro, and Alvarado set aside their differences to focus on the American threat, but by the end of August, Pico and Castro fled to Mexico, and Alvarado