Editing Decolonization (section)

=====Portugal=====
[[File:Sempreatentos...aoperigo!.jpg|thumb|right|210px|[[Portuguese Army]] special ''[[caçadores]]'' advancing in the African jungle in the early 1960s, during the [[Angolan War of Independence]]]]
As a result of its pioneering [[Portuguese discoveries|discoveries]], [[Portugal]] had a large and particularly long-lasting colonial empire which had begun in 1415 with the [[conquest of Ceuta]] and ended only in 1999 with the handover of [[Portuguese Macau]] to China. In 1822, Portugal [[Independence of Brazil|lost control of Brazil]], its largest colony.

From 1933 to 1974, [[Estado Novo (Portugal)|Portugal was an authoritarian state]] (ruled by [[António de Oliveira Salazar]]). The regime was fiercely determined to maintain the country's colonial possessions at all costs and to aggressively suppress any insurgencies. In 1961, [[Annexation of Goa|India annexed Goa]] and by the same year nationalist forces had begun organizing in Portugal. Revolts (preceding the [[Portuguese Colonial War]]) spread to [[Portuguese Angola|Angola]], [[Portuguese Guinea|Guinea Bissau]] and [[Portuguese Mozambique|Mozambique]].<ref>John P. Cann, ''Counterinsurgency in Africa: The Portuguese Way of War 1961–74'' Solihull, UK (Helion Studies in Military History, No. 12), 2012.</ref> [[Lisbon]] escalated its effort in the war: for instance, it increased the number of natives in the colonial army and built strategic hamlets. Portugal sent another 300,000 European settlers into Angola and Mozambique before 1974. That year, [[Carnation Revolution|a left-wing revolution]] inside Portugal overthrew the existing regime and encouraged pro-Soviet elements to attempt to seize control in the colonies. The result was a very long and extremely difficult multi-party [[Angolan Civil War|Civil War in Angola]], and lesser insurrections in Mozambique.<ref>Norrie MacQueen,  ''The Decolonisation of Portuguese Africa: Metropolitan Revolution and the Dissolution of Empire''</ref>