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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Portugal
Index
The military has played a major role in the development
of
Portugal throughout the country's history. During the
Middle
Ages, the armed forces drove the Moors out of the country
and
resisted Spanish attempts to end Portugal's newly won
independence. During the Renaissance, Portuguese
navigators and
explorers established settlements and trade routes around
the
world, and the armed forces played an important role in
establishing and maintaining the greatest empire then
known
(see Maritime Expansion
, ch. 1).
The glories of conquest and riches of trade were short
lived.
A military disaster took place when King Sebastião led his
poorly
prepared army to defeat against the Moors in Morocco in
1578.
Portugal was left leaderless without a legitimate heir,
and the
country soon came under the rule of Philip II of Spain,
who had a
valid claim to the throne. Although Spain did not actually
occupy
Portugal, it involved Portugal in its numerous dynastic
and
religious wars. As a result, Portugal lost most of its
navy when
it joined the Spanish Armada against Portugal's former
ally,
England. Portugal also lost much of its empire in the Far
East to
the Dutch
(see Imperial Decline
, ch. 1).
After Portugal threw off Spanish domination in 1640, it
created a permanent army of 4,000 cavalrymen and 20,000
infantrymen, based on a conscription system covering all
ablebodied men. Portugal renewed its alliance with England and
was
subsequently drawn into many European wars in the
seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries. Portugal was occupied by Napoleon's
troops
in 1807. British forces came to Portugal's aid, driving
the
French out of the country and then, using Portugal as a
base of
operations, out of Spain in 1813. During the middle and
late
nineteenth century, the army was instrumental in the
exploration
and effective occupation of Angola and Mozambique.
A military revolt ended the Portuguese monarchy in
1910.
Portugal attempted to maintain neutrality during World War
I but
was drawn into the conflict both in Europe and in Africa
and
fought on the side of the Allies. After Germany declared
war on
Portugal in March 1916, some 200,000 men were conscripted.
An
expeditionary force of two divisions saw service in
France,
sustaining heavy casualties at the Battle of Lys in April
1918.
Other troops clashed with the German East African colonial
army
in Mozambique.
The First Republic (1910-26) had a precarious existence
marked by a rapid turnover of governments, coup attempts,
and
plots. Eventually, in 1926, the mounting social disorder
and
discontent over the civilian governments' interference in
military matters precipitated an unopposed military
takeover.
Disagreement among the military factions over the goals of
their
intervention brought only further instability. By 1928,
however,
a new military-civilian cabinet was in place under a
nonpartisan
president, General Óscar Fragoso Carmona. The civilian
minister
of finance, António de Oliveira Salazar, became the most
powerful
figure in the government. In 1932, Salazar was appointed
prime
minister, bringing the military dictatorship to an end.
Data as of January 1993
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