 In April 1896, Chile ordered another armored cruiser, O 'Higgins, and six torpedo boats. Naval historian Robert Scheina states that Argentina replied in the same month with San Martín, a near-sister ship to Garibaldi which was under construction in Italy. However, he notes that the small time lapse between the orders makes it difficult or impossible to know if this, the opposite, or either are true. As historian Jonathan Grant writes, the Argentines may have moved first to secure a definite, if momentarily tenuous, advantage over the Chilean Navy. In May 1898, the Chilean government found that the Argentines were planning on acquiring one, then two, Garibaldi-class cruisers. With tensions extremely high and war seemingly imminent, the two countries agreed to submit their boundary disputes to the British, which led to the Cordillera of the Andes Boundary Case 1902 (Argentina, Chile). They also signed pacts which led to the resolution of the Puna de Atacama dispute. As the former arbitration took much time, the naval arms race, though it slacked during the time of eased tension which came with the agreements, continued.
