Military history of Spain - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The military history
Military history
Military history is a humanities discipline within the scope of general historical recording of armed conflict in the history of humanity, and its impact on the societies, their cultures, economies and changing intra and international relationships....

of Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

, from the period of the Carthaginian

Carthage

Carthage , implying it was a 'new Tyre') is a major urban centre that has existed for nearly 3,000 years on the Gulf of Tunis, developing from a Phoenician colony of the 1st millennium BC...

conquests over the Phoenicians to the current Afghan War

War in Afghanistan (2001–present)

The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...

spans a period of more than 2200 years, and includes the history of battles fought in the territory of modern Spain, as well as her former and current overseas possessions and territories

Spanish Empire

The Spanish Empire comprised territories and colonies administered directly by Spain in Europe, in America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. It originated during the Age of Exploration and was therefore one of the first global empires. At the time of Habsburgs, Spain reached the peak of its world power....

, and the military history of the people of Spain, regardless of geography.

Spain's early

Classical antiquity

Classical antiquity is a broad term for a long period of cultural history centered on the Mediterranean Sea, comprising the interlocking civilizations of ancient Greece and ancient Rome, collectively known as the Greco-Roman world...

military history emerged from her location on the western fringes of the Mediterranean

Mediterranean Sea

The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant...

, a base for attacks between Rome

Roman Empire

The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....

and Carthage

Carthage

Carthage , implying it was a 'new Tyre') is a major urban centre that has existed for nearly 3,000 years on the Gulf of Tunis, developing from a Phoenician colony of the 1st millennium BC...

. With the fall of the Roman Empire

Roman Empire

, Spain was devastated by successive barbarian invasions, with stability only gradually appearing with the later years of the Visigothic empire. The early Middle Ages

Middle Ages

The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...

for Spain saw the country forming the front line in a battle between Christian

Christian

A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

and Islamic forces in the Mediterranean; the Conquista

Conquista

Conquista may refer to:*La Conquista: Spanish colonization of the Americas*Conquista, Minas Gerais, city in Brazil*Conquista, Andalusia, town in Spain...

and Reconquista

Reconquista

The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...

took several centuries to reach a military resolution. The 16th and 17th centuries marked the peak of Spanish power, the so-called 'Golden Age'

Golden Age

The term Golden Age comes from Greek mythology and legend and refers to the first in a sequence of four or five Ages of Man, in which the Golden Age is first, followed in sequence, by the Silver, Bronze, and Iron Ages, and then the present, a period of decline...

of Spain. Spain acquired a huge empire

Spanish Empire

by defeating the centralised states of the Americas

Spanish colonization of the Americas

Colonial expansion under the Spanish Empire was initiated by the Spanish conquistadores and developed by the Monarchy of Spain through its administrators and missionaries. The motivations for colonial expansion were trade and the spread of the Christian faith through indigenous conversions...

, and colonising the Philippines

Philippines

The Philippines , officially known as the Republic of the Philippines , is a country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam...

. Her tercio

Tercio

The tercio was a Renaissance era military formation made up of a mixed infantry formation of about 3,000 pikemen, swordsmen and arquebusiers or musketeers in a mutually supportive formation. It was also sometimes referred to as the Spanish Square...

units, backed by imperial gold

Gold

Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...

and silver

Silver

Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...

, were dominant in Europe. It was not until the years after the Thirty Years War that Spanish military power began to fade; even then, supported by a reinvigorated navy

Spanish Navy

The Spanish Navy is the maritime branch of the Spanish Armed Forces, one of the oldest active naval forces in the world. The Armada is responsible for notable achievements in world history such as the discovery of Americas, the first world circumnavigation, and the discovery of a maritime path...

, Spain remained a major military player throughout the 18th century, in fierce competition with Britain

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

and France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

on the global stage.

The Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

The Napoleonic Wars were a series of wars declared against Napoleon's French Empire by opposing coalitions that ran from 1803 to 1815. As a continuation of the wars sparked by the French Revolution of 1789, they revolutionised European armies and played out on an unprecedented scale, mainly due to...

changed Spanish military history dramatically; defeated at home, the Peninsula War saw the development of guerrilla warfare

Guerrilla warfare

Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare and refers to conflicts in which a small group of combatants including, but not limited to, armed civilians use military tactics, such as ambushes, sabotage, raids, the element of surprise, and extraordinary mobility to harass a larger and...

against the occupying French forces. The collapse of central Spanish authority resulted in successful wars of independence amongst Spain's American colonies, drastically reducing the size of her empire, and in turn led to a sequence of civil wars in Spain itself, many fought by frustrated veterans of the French and colonial campaigns. Attempts to reassert imperial power during the mid-19th century, enabled by the development of the steam frigate ultimately failed, leading to the catastrophic collapse

Spanish-American War

The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...

of Spain's remaining empire in 1898 at the hands of the rising power of the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. The political tensions that had driven the Carlist Wars

Carlist Wars

The Carlist Wars in Spain were the last major European civil wars in which contenders fought to establish their claim to a throne. Several times during the period from 1833 to 1876 the Carlists — followers of Infante Carlos and his descendants — rallied to the cry of "God, Country, and King" and...

remained unchecked, spilling over once again in the Spanish Civil War

Spanish Civil War

The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...

of 1936-9. Bringing a foretaste of the tactics of the Second World War, several nations used the conflict as a testing ground for new aerial

Aerial warfare

Aerial warfare is the use of military aircraft and other flying machines in warfare, including military airlift of cargo to further the national interests as was demonstrated in the Berlin Airlift...

and armoured warfare

Armoured warfare

Armoured warfare or tank warfare is the use of armoured fighting vehicles in modern warfare. It is a major component of modern methods of war....

tactics. In the post-war period, Spain has increasingly turned away from the last remaining colonial conflicts in Africa

Africa

Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

, and played a growing modern military role within the context of the NATO alliance.

The Classical period: the Rise of Rome

In the classical

Classical antiquity

period, Spain was a mix of Celt

Celt

The Celts were a diverse group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Roman-era Europe who spoke Celtic languages.The earliest archaeological culture commonly accepted as Celtic, or rather Proto-Celtic, was the central European Hallstatt culture , named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt, Austria....

ic and Iberian

Iberians

The Iberians were a set of peoples that Greek and Roman sources identified with that name in the eastern and southern coasts of the Iberian peninsula at least from the 6th century BC...

tribal states, and Greek

Magna Graecia

Magna Græcia is the name of the coastal areas of Southern Italy on the Tarentine Gulf that were extensively colonized by Greek settlers; particularly the Achaean colonies of Tarentum, Crotone, and Sybaris, but also, more loosely, the cities of Cumae and Neapolis to the north...

and Phoenicia

Phoenicia

Phoenicia , was an ancient civilization in Canaan which covered most of the western, coastal part of the Fertile Crescent. Several major Phoenician cities were built on the coastline of the Mediterranean. It was an enterprising maritime trading culture that spread across the Mediterranean from 1550...

n trading ports, with the largest state being the kingdom of Tartessus. With the eruption of war between Carthage

Carthage

Carthage , implying it was a 'new Tyre') is a major urban centre that has existed for nearly 3,000 years on the Gulf of Tunis, developing from a Phoenician colony of the 1st millennium BC...

, a Phoenician colony in North Africa

North Africa

North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...

and the Greeks

Greeks

The Greeks, also known as the Hellenes , are a nation and ethnic group native to Greece, Cyprus and neighboring regions. They also form a significant diaspora, with Greek communities established around the world....

, the Carthaginians begin extending their influence in Iberia, creating the city of New Carthage (Cartagena

Cartagena, Spain

Cartagena is a Spanish city and a major naval station located in the Region of Murcia, by the Mediterranean coast, south-eastern Spain. As of January 2011, it has a population of 218,210 inhabitants being the Region’s second largest municipality and the country’s 6th non-Province capital...

), in hopes of creating a trading empire. Following the First Punic War

First Punic War

The First Punic War was the first of three wars fought between Ancient Carthage and the Roman Republic. For 23 years, the two powers struggled for supremacy in the western Mediterranean Sea, primarily on the Mediterranean island of Sicily and its surrounding waters but also to a lesser extent in...

with Rome

Ancient Rome

Ancient Rome was a thriving civilization that grew on the Italian Peninsula as early as the 8th century BC. Located along the Mediterranean Sea and centered on the city of Rome, it expanded to one of the largest empires in the ancient world....

, in 237 BC

237 BC

Year 237 BC was a year of the pre-Julian Roman calendar. At the time it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Caudinus and Flaccus...

, Hamilcar Barca

Hamilcar Barca

Hamilcar Barca or Barcas was a Carthaginian general and statesman, leader of the Barcid family, and father of Hannibal, Hasdrubal and Mago. He was also father-in-law to Hasdrubal the Fair....

, the famous Carthaginian general, then began the conquest of Turdetania (the successor state of Tartessus) and Gades to provide a springboard for further attacks on Rome. Hamilcar entrusted the conquest and military governance of the region to his son Hasdrubal the Fair

Hasdrubal the Fair

Hasdrubal the Fair was a Carthaginian military leader.He was the brother-in-law of Hannibal and son-in-law of Hamilcar Barca...

- his other son, Hannibal, would march his troops across Hispania with elephants to lead them on Rome in the Second Punic War

Second Punic War

The Second Punic War, also referred to as The Hannibalic War and The War Against Hannibal, lasted from 218 to 201 BC and involved combatants in the western and eastern Mediterranean. This was the second major war between Carthage and the Roman Republic, with the participation of the Berbers on...

. During that war, Rome declared Hispania

Hispania

Another theory holds that the name derives from Ezpanna, the Basque word for "border" or "edge", thus meaning the farthest area or place. Isidore of Sevilla considered Hispania derived from Hispalis....

to be a Roman provincia in 218 BC, beginning a century-long campaign to subdue the people of Iberia to Roman.
After the expulsion of the Carthaginians from Hispania in the Second and Third Punic War

Third Punic War

The Third Punic War was the third and last of the Punic Wars fought between the former Phoenician colony of Carthage, and the Roman Republic...

s, Rome attempted to subdue the native tribes. In the northeasterly province of Hispania Citerior

Hispania Citerior

During the Roman Republic, Hispania Citerior was a region of Hispania roughly occupying the northeastern coast and the Ebro Valley of what is now Spain. Hispania Ulterior was located west of Hispania Citerior—that is, farther away from Rome.-External links:*...

, the Celtiberian Wars

Celtiberian Wars

The Celtiberian Wars or Spanish Wars were a series of three wars lasting, off and on, from 181 to 133 BC. They were fought between the advancing legions of the Roman Republic and the Celtiberian tribes of Hispania Citerior. The First Celtiberian War lasted from 181 to 179...

occupied Roman forces for the better part of the 2nd century. In Hispania Ulterior

Hispania Ulterior

During the Roman Republic, Hispania Ulterior was a region of Hispania roughly located in Baetica and in the Guadalquivir valley of modern Spain and extending to all of Lusitania and Gallaecia...

, the Lusitanian War

Lusitanian War

The Lusitanian War, called the Purinos Polemos , was a war of resistance fought between the advancing legions of the Roman Republic and the Lusitani tribes of Hispania Ulterior from 155 to 139 BC. The Lusitani revolted on two separate occasions and were pacified...

did the same. The resistance of the Lusitani under Viriathus

Viriathus

Viriathus was the most important leader of the Lusitanian people that resisted Roman expansion into the regions of Western Hispania , where the Roman province of Lusitania would be established...

became legendary across the Empire

Roman Empire

. In the troubled final years of the Republic

Roman Republic

The Roman Republic was the period of the ancient Roman civilization where the government operated as a republic. It began with the overthrow of the Roman monarchy, traditionally dated around 508 BC, and its replacement by a government headed by two consuls, elected annually by the citizens and...

, Quintus Sertorius

Quintus Sertorius

Quintus Sertorius was a Roman statesman and general, born in Nursia, in Sabine territory. His brilliance as a military commander was shown most clearly in his battles against Rome for control of Hispania...

held most of Iberia as a de facto independent sovereign against the partisans of Sulla. His attitude towards the natives and his military reforms - he was a partisan of Marius - secured him the loyalty of the populace and the army and his general success until his assassination. The Spanish Era

Spanish era

The Spanish era, Hispanic era or Caesar era refers to the dating system used in Hispania until the 14th century, when the Anno Domini system was adopted. It began with year one in what is 38 BC, probably the date of a new tax imposed by the Roman Republic on the subdued population of Iberia....

, a dating system predominant in Iberia until the close of the Middle Ages

Middle Ages

, began in 38 BC

38 BC

Year 38 BC was either a common year starting on Sunday or Monday or a leap year starting on Saturday, Sunday or Monday of the Julian calendar and a common year starting on Sunday of the Proleptic Julian calendar...

. The last region of Hispania to be subjected was the northwest, finally being conquered in the Cantabrian Wars

Cantabrian Wars

The Cantabrian Wars occurred during the Roman conquest of the modern provinces of Cantabria, Asturias and León, against the Asturs and the Cantabri. They were the final stage of the conquest of Hispania.-Antecedents:...

, which ended in 19 BC

19 BC

Year 19 BC was either a common year starting on Thursday, Friday or Saturday or a leap year starting on Thursday or Friday of the Julian calendar and a common year starting on Wednesday of the Proleptic Julian calendar...

.

Under Roman rule, Hispania contributed, like the rest of empire, to the Roman military, providing both legionaries

Legionary

The Roman legionary was a professional soldier of the Roman army after the Marian reforms of 107 BC. Legionaries had to be Roman citizens under the age of 45. They enlisted in a legion for twenty-five years of service, a change from the early practice of enlisting only for a campaign...

, and auxiliary forces

Auxiliaries (Roman military)

Auxiliaries formed the standing non-citizen corps of the Roman army of the Principate , alongside the citizen legions...

, in particular alae

Ala (Roman military)

An Ala was the term used during the mid- Roman Republic to denote a military formation composed of conscripts from the socii, Rome's Italian military allies. A normal consular army during this period consisted of 2 legions, composed of Roman citizens only, and 2 allied alae...

cavalry

Cavalry

Cavalry or horsemen were soldiers or warriors who fought mounted on horseback. Cavalry were historically the third oldest and the most mobile of the combat arms...

. Hispania also shaped Roman military affairs more subtely. The famous Roman infantry sword, the Gladius

Gladius

Gladius was the Latin word for sword, and is used to represent the primary sword of Ancient Roman soldiers. Early ancient Roman swords were similar to those used by the Greeks. From the 3rd century BC, the Romans adopted swords similar to those used by the Celtiberians and others during the early...

, stemmed directly or indirectly from the Spanish development of the Gladius Hispaniensis; with minor alterations, this would form the standard Roman weapon for several centuries. Hispania also provided several of Rome's more famous military Emperors, including Trajan

Trajan

Trajan , was Roman Emperor from 98 to 117 AD. Born into a non-patrician family in the province of Hispania Baetica, in Spain Trajan rose to prominence during the reign of emperor Domitian. Serving as a legatus legionis in Hispania Tarraconensis, in Spain, in 89 Trajan supported the emperor against...

, Hadrian

Hadrian

Hadrian , was Roman Emperor from 117 to 138. He is best known for building Hadrian's Wall, which marked the northern limit of Roman Britain. In Rome, he re-built the Pantheon and constructed the Temple of Venus and Roma. In addition to being emperor, Hadrian was a humanist and was philhellene in...

and Marcus Aurelius.

The collapse of Rome and barbarian invasions

During the third through 6th centuries AD, the Roman Empire was beset by numerous barbarian invaders, mostly Germanic

Germanic peoples

The Germanic peoples are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.Originating about 1800 BCE from the Corded Ware Culture on the North...

, who migrated through her borders and began warring and settling in her territories. While the Vandals

Vandals

The Vandals were an East Germanic tribe that entered the late Roman Empire during the 5th century. The Vandals under king Genseric entered Africa in 429 and by 439 established a kingdom which included the Roman Africa province, besides the islands of Sicily, Corsica, Sardinia and the Balearics....

and Alans

Alans

The Alans, or the Alani, occasionally termed Alauni or Halani, were a group of Sarmatian tribes, nomadic pastoralists of the 1st millennium AD who spoke an Eastern Iranian language which derived from Scytho-Sarmatian and which in turn evolved into modern Ossetian.-Name:The various forms of Alan —...

were fighting each other for supremacy in southern Gaul

Gaul

Gaul was a region of Western Europe during the Iron Age and Roman era, encompassing present day France, Luxembourg and Belgium, most of Switzerland, the western part of Northern Italy, as well as the parts of the Netherlands and Germany on the left bank of the Rhine. The Gauls were the speakers of...

, the confederation of the Suevi crossed the Pyrenees

Pyrenees

The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...

and passing through Vasconia

Vasconia

Vasconia is an historical name derived from the ancient tribe of the Vascones and used in different times, specially in the Middle Ages, to refer to the Basque territories...

, entered Gallaecia

Gallaecia

Gallaecia or Callaecia, also known as Hispania Gallaecia, was the name of a Roman province and an early Mediaeval kingdom that comprised a territory in the north-west of Hispania...

in 409. The Vandals soon followed the Suevi example, with the Alan

Alan

-People :*Alan , the given name*alan , female Tibetan singer active in Japan*Alan , Mexican boy band singer*Alan , aka Gato Eveready, who wrestles in Asistencia Asesoría y Administración...

s close behind. The Alans settled in Lusitania

Lusitania

Lusitania or Hispania Lusitania was an ancient Roman province including approximately all of modern Portugal south of the Douro river and part of modern Spain . It was named after the Lusitani or Lusitanian people...

and Carthaginiensis and the Siling Vandals

Silingi

The Silings or Silingi supposedly were an East Germanic tribe, probably part of the larger Vandal group. According to most scholars, examples Jerzy Strzelczyk, Norman Davies, Jerzy Krasuski, Andrzej Kokowski, Henryk Łowmiański, the Silingi may have lived in Silesia...

in Baetica, while the Asding Vandals

Hasdingi

The Hasdingi were the southern tribes of the Vandals, an East Germanic tribe. They lived in areas of today's southern Poland, Slovakia and Hungary...

vied with the Suevi for Gallaecia. The Visigoths crossed the Pyrenees to expand their kingdom in 416. They pushed the Vandals and Alans south, defeating and killing the Alan king Attaces

Attaces

Addac or Attaces was king of the western Alans in Hispania . In 409, the Alans settled in the provinces of Lusitania and Carthaginiensis: Alani Lusitaniam et Carthaginiensem provincias, et Wandali cognomine Silingi Baeticam sortiuntur...

in 426 and forcing the two tribes to amalgamate and retreat across the Straits of Gibraltar into Africa. For almost thirty years, Spain was the location for vicious tribal conflicts.

The first barbarians to settle were the Suevi

Suebi

The Suebi or Suevi were a group of Germanic peoples who were first mentioned by Julius Caesar in connection with Ariovistus' campaign, c...

, whose king Hermeric

Hermeric

Hermeric was the Suevic King of Galicia from perhaps as early as 406 and certainly no later than 419 until his retirement in 438. He was a pagan and an enemy of the Roman Empire throughout his life...

, a former foederatus
Foederati
Foederatus is a Latin term whose definition and usage drifted in the time between the early Roman Republic and the end of the Western Roman Empire...

of Rome, ratified a peace with the local Hispano-Roman population in 438. Weary of fighting, Hermeric abdicated in favour of his son Rechila

Rechila

Rechila was the Suevic King of Galicia from 438 until his death. There are few primary sources for his life, but Hydatius was a contemporary Christian chronicler in Galicia....

. As the Visigothic kingdom expanded into Iberia, expelling the Vandals and Alans, the Suevi expanded their own realm as far south as Mérida

Mérida, Spain

Mérida is the capital of the autonomous community of Extremadura, western central Spain. It has a population of 57,127 . The Archaeological Ensemble of Mérida is a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1993.- Climate :...

. In 456, the new Catholic king, Rechiar

Rechiar

Rechiar or Rechiarius was the Suevic King of Galicia from 448 until his death. He was the first Catholic Germanic king in Europe and one of the most innovative and belligerent of the Suevi monarchs...

, died in battle with the Visigoth king Theodoric II

Theodoric II

Theodoric II was King of Visigoths from 453 to 466.Theoderic II, son of Theodoric I, obtained the throne by killing his elder brother Thorismund...

and the Suevi kingdom began to retreat under Gothic pressure. Beset by internal political conflict, the Suevi capitulated to the Visigoths in 585. Some resistance was maintained for a few years, but soon the last of Suevi resistance was erased.

The Visigoths consolidated a kingdom spanning most of Iberia and Gaul. For the next two centuries, they warred not only amongst themselves in a sequence of succession crises - which followed the election of a new king after every royal death, but also against the Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire

The Byzantine Empire was the Eastern Roman Empire during the periods of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, centred on the capital of Constantinople. Known simply as the Roman Empire or Romania to its inhabitants and neighbours, the Empire was the direct continuation of the Ancient Roman State...

, which was trying to regain lost territory in the south, the Arian

Arianism

Arianism is the theological teaching attributed to Arius , a Christian presbyter from Alexandria, Egypt, concerning the relationship of the entities of the Trinity and the precise nature of the Son of God as being a subordinate entity to God the Father...

Suevi trying to preserve their hold on Gallaecia, and the Franks

Franks

The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...

pushing south against them from Gaul. The Visigoth military structure was highly decentralised - the great territorial magnates, the duces
Dux
Dux is Latin for leader and later for Duke and its variant forms ....

(dukes), maintained their own armies, as in all the great Germanic kingdoms of Europe at the time. These armies rarely cooperated in campaigns. At the Battle of Vouillé

Battle of Vouillé

The Battle of Vouillé or Vouglé was fought in the northern marches of Visigothic territory, at Vouillé, Vienne near Poitiers , in the spring of 507 between the Franks commanded by Clovis and the Visigoths of Alaric II, the conqueror of Spain.Clovis and Anastasius I of the Byzantine Empire agreed...

in 507, the Franks under Clovis I

Clovis I

Clovis Leuthwig was the first King of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler, changing the leadership from a group of royal chieftains, to rule by kings, ensuring that the kingship was held by his heirs. He was also the first Catholic King to rule over Gaul . He was the son...

wrested control of Aquitaine

Aquitaine

Aquitaine , archaic Guyenne/Guienne , is one of the 27 regions of France, in the south-western part of metropolitan France, along the Atlantic Ocean and the Pyrenees mountain range on the border with Spain. It comprises the 5 departments of Dordogne, :Lot et Garonne, :Pyrénées-Atlantiques, Landes...

from the Visigoths. The Visigoths lost all of their territory north of the Pyrenees except the province of Gallia Narbonensis

Gallia Narbonensis

Gallia Narbonensis was a Roman province located in what is now Languedoc and Provence, in southern France. It was also known as Gallia Transalpina , which was originally a designation for that part of Gaul lying across the Alps from Italia and it contained a western region known as Septimania...

. The first half of the 6th century was largely a failure for the Visigoths. They failed to hold onto their Gallic possessions, they failed to oust the Suevi, and they failed to repulse the Byzantine Empire

Byzantine Empire

when it first endeavoured to reassert control over its Iberian provinces, taking advantage of a local rebellion. In 554, Granada and southernmost Hispania Baetica

Hispania Baetica

Hispania Baetica was one of three Imperial Roman provinces in Hispania, . Hispania Baetica was bordered to the west by Lusitania, and to the northeast by Hispania Tarraconensis. Baetica was part of Al-Andalus under the Moors in the 8th century and approximately corresponds to modern Andalucia...

were taken from the Byzantines; under the last Arian king, Leovigild, the Suevi kingdom was annexed in 585 and the war of reconquest against the remainder of the Byzantine territories was begun, finally being completed under King Suintila

Suintila

Suintila was Visigothic King of Hispania, Septimania and Galicia from 621 to 631. There was a new peace in the Kingdom of the Visigoths. As a direct result, by 624 the king was able to retake those lands that had been under the control of Byzantium...

in 624. The Visigoths faced no serious external threat from then on until the sudden Moorish invasion of 711.

Islamic conquest and Reconquista

For almost seven hundred years, Spain was the battleground for the opposing forces of the Islamic Caliphate

Caliphate

The term caliphate, "dominion of a caliph " , refers to the first system of government established in Islam and represented the political unity of the Muslim Ummah...

and Western Christian

Christian

forces. Both Muslims and Christian were motivated by religious conviction, which inspired the warfare. The initial Islamic invasion of Iberia

Umayyad conquest of Hispania

The Umayyad conquest of Hispania is the initial Islamic Ummayad Caliphate's conquest, between 711 and 718, of the Christian Visigothic Kingdom of Hispania, centered in the Iberian Peninsula, which was known to them under the Arabic name al-Andalus....

was sudden and unexpected. The varied Moorish tribes of Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

united under the leadership of Arab

Arab

Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...

generals sent by the reigning Umayyad

Umayyad

The Umayyad Caliphate was the second of the four major Arab caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. It was ruled by the Umayyad dynasty, whose name derives from Umayya ibn Abd Shams, the great-grandfather of the first Umayyad caliph. Although the Umayyad family originally came from the...

caliph

Caliph

The Caliph is the head of state in a Caliphate, and the title for the ruler of the Islamic Ummah, an Islamic community ruled by the Shari'ah. It is a transcribed version of the Arabic word which means "successor" or "representative"...

and crossed the Straits of Gibraltar in 711 under the leadership of the Berber

Berber people

Berbers are the indigenous peoples of North Africa west of the Nile Valley. They are continuously distributed from the Atlantic to the Siwa oasis, in Egypt, and from the Mediterranean to the Niger River. Historically they spoke the Berber language or varieties of it, which together form a branch...

Tariq ibn Ziyad. Tariq won a swift victory at the Guadalete

Battle of Guadalete

The Battle of Guadalete was fought in 711 or 712 at an unidentified location between the Christian Visigoths of Hispania under their king, Roderic, and an invading force of Muslim Arabs and Berbers under Ṭāriq ibn Ziyad. The battle was significant as the culmination of a series of Arab-Berber...

and defeated and killed the reigning Gothic king, Roderic

Roderic

Ruderic was the Visigothic King of Hispania for a brief period between 710 and 712. He is famous in legend as "the last king of the Goths"...

. In a campaign lasting eight years, the whole of Iberia was subjected to Umayyad authority, except for the Asturias

Asturias

The Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community of the Kingdom of Spain, coextensive with the former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...

mountain range in the far northwest and the pockets of resistance in Navarre

Navarre

Navarre , officially the Chartered Community of Navarre is an autonomous community in northern Spain, bordering the Basque Country, La Rioja, and Aragon in Spain and Aquitaine in France...

. The Islamic offensive ultimately paused after the losses it suffered in Frankland and in the Asturias

Asturias

The Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community of the Kingdom of Spain, coextensive with the former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...

, where battles such as those at Tours

Battle of Tours

The Battle of Tours , also called the Battle of Poitiers and in Battle of the Court of the Martyrs, was fought in an area between the cities of Poitiers and Tours, located in north-central France, near the village of Moussais-la-Bataille, about northeast of Poitiers...

and Covadonga

Battle of Covadonga

The Battle of Covadonga was the first major victory by a Christian military force in Iberia following the Muslim Moors' conquest of that region in 711...

showed some of the potential weaknesses of the Arab methods of warfare.

The Islamic conquest was only very slowly undone, over the course of seven centuries in what the Christians of Spain called the Reconquista
Reconquista
The Reconquista was a period of almost 800 years in the Middle Ages during which several Christian kingdoms succeeded in retaking the Muslim-controlled areas of the Iberian Peninsula broadly known as Al-Andalus...

. Three main forces were involved in this process, the Visigothic holdouts in the Asturias

Asturias

The Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community of the Kingdom of Spain, coextensive with the former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...

, the holdouts in Navarre and the Pyrenees, and the Franks of Aquitaine. The Reconquista

Reconquista

, as a concerted effort to remove the Muslims from the territories they held, commenced in the reign of Alfonso I

Alfonso I of Asturias

Alfonso I , called the Catholic , was the King of Asturias from 739 to his death in 757.He was son of Duke Peter of Cantabria and held many lands in that region. He may have been the hereditary chief of the Basques, but this is uncertain...

(739 – 757). Alfonso led an offensive into the valley of the Duero and left the region depopulated, the so-called "Desert of the Duero." For the next century, this prevented any serious Islamic incursions into the Christian territories of the north. During the late eighth and early 9th centuries, the Franks under their Carolingian

Carolingian

The Carolingian dynasty was a Frankish noble family with origins in the Arnulfing and Pippinid clans of the 7th century AD. The name "Carolingian", Medieval Latin karolingi, an altered form of an unattested Old High German *karling, kerling The Carolingian dynasty (known variously as the...

rulers took up the cause of reconquest along the Mediterranean littoral. By 797, Charlemagne

Charlemagne

Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...

's son, Louis the Pious

Louis the Pious

Louis the Pious , also called the Fair, and the Debonaire, was the King of Aquitaine from 781. He was also King of the Franks and co-Emperor with his father, Charlemagne, from 813...

, captured Barcelona

Barcelona

Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...

, establishing a clear bulwark against future invasions. The Basques extended their kingdom as far as Nájera

Nájera

Nájera is a small town located in the "Rioja Alta" region of La Rioja, Spain on the river Najerilla. Nájera is a stopping point on the Way of St James.-History:...

, and a widespread repoblación
Repoblación
The Repoblación was the ninth-century repopulating of a large region between the River Duero and the Cantabrian Cordillera which had been depopulated in the early years of the Reconquista....

of the depopulated areas began, extending Christian borders southwards.

Despite a resurgence during the 10th century, the Caliphate of Córdoba

Caliphate of Córdoba

The Caliphate of Córdoba ruled the Iberian peninsula and part of North Africa, from the city of Córdoba, from 929 to 1031. This period was characterized by remarkable success in trade and culture; many of the masterpieces of Islamic Iberia were constructed in this period, including the famous...

's attempts to reverse the Reconquista

Reconquista

failed, and by the 11th century, Christian Iberia was united under Sancho the Great, the King of Navarre, whilst the caliphate was divided and engulfed by civil war, the period of the taifa
Taifa
In the history of the Iberian Peninsula, a taifa was an independent Muslim-ruled principality, usually an emirate or petty kingdom, though there was one oligarchy, of which a number formed in the Al-Andalus after the final collapse of the Umayyad Caliphate of Córdoba in 1031.-Rise:The origins of...

s. The 11th century saw the development of a concept of Christian holy war, to be waged against Islam with the purpose of recapturing long lost territories - the Crusade

Crusades

The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...

. Crusading, under other names, also took place in Spain; Franks and Normans

Normans

The Normans were the people who gave their name to Normandy, a region in northern France. They were descended from Norse Viking conquerors of the territory and the native population of Frankish and Gallo-Roman stock...

and even Papal troops took to Spain in increasing numbers to join the locals in their fight against "the Moor." The last threat of the 11th century came in the form of the Almoravids

Almoravids

The Almoravids were a Berber dynasty of Morocco, who formed an empire in the 11th-century that stretched over the western Maghreb and Al-Andalus. Their capital was Marrakesh, a city which they founded in 1062 C.E...

, who with their well disciplined forces first established a hegemony over Morocco

Morocco

and then extended it over al-Andalus. While the Reconquista paused in the west, to the east Alfonso the Battler

Alfonso the Battler

Alfonso I , called the Battler or the Warrior , was the king of Aragon and Navarre from 1104 until his death in 1134. He was the second son of King Sancho Ramírez and successor of his brother Peter I...

, the King of Aragon, redoubled efforts to retake the valley of the Ebro

Ebro

The Ebro or Ebre is one of the most important rivers in the Iberian Peninsula. It is the biggest river by discharge volume in Spain.The Ebro flows through the following cities:*Reinosa in Cantabria.*Miranda de Ebro in Castile and León....

. In 1212, the Reconquistadores gained a decisive victory over the Almohads at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa

Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa

The Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa, known in Arab history as the Battle of Al-Uqab , took place on 16 July 1212 and was an important turning point in the Reconquista and in the medieval history of Spain...

. Shortly after the battle, the Castilians retook Baeza

Baeza

Baeza is a town of approximately 16,200 inhabitants in Andalusia, Spain, in the province of Jaén, perched on a cliff in the Loma de Baeza, a mountain range between the river Guadalquivir on the south and its tributary the Guadalimar on the north. It is chiefly known today as having many of the...

and, then, Úbeda

Úbeda

Úbeda is a town in the province of Jaén in Spain's autonomous community of Andalusia, with some 35,600 inhabitants. Both this city and the neighboring city of Baeza benefited from extensive patronage in the early 16th century resulting in the construction of a series of Renaissance style palaces...

, major fortified cities near the battlefield, and gateways to invade Andalucia. Thereafter, Ferdinand III of Castile

Ferdinand III of Castile

Saint Ferdinand III, T.O.S.F., was the King of Castile from 1217 and León from 1230. He was the son of Alfonso IX of León and Berenguela of Castile. Through his second marriage he was also Count of Aumale. He finished the work done by his maternal grandfather Alfonso VIII and consolidated the...

retook Córdoba

Córdoba, Spain

-History:The first trace of human presence in the area are remains of a Neanderthal Man, dating to c. 32,000 BC. In the 8th century BC, during the ancient Tartessos period, a pre-urban settlement existed. The population gradually learned copper and silver metallurgy...

in 1236, Jaén

Jaén, Spain

Jaén is a city in south-central Spain, the name is derived from the Arabic word Jayyan, . It is the capital of the province of Jaén. It is located in the autonomous community of Andalusia....

in 1246, and Seville

Seville

Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...

in 1248; then he took Arcos

Arcos

-Portugal:* Arcos , a civil parish in the municipality of Anadia* Arcos , a civil parish in the municipality of Braga* Arcos , a civil parish in the municipality of Estremoz...

, Medina-Sidonia

Medina-Sidonia

Medina-Sidonia is a city and municipality in the province of Cádiz in the autonomous community of Andalusia, southern Spain. It is considered by some to be the oldest city in Europe, used as a military defense location due to its elevated location. Locals are known as Asidonenses...

, Jerez and Cádiz, effectively bringing the bulk of the reconquista

Reconquista

to a conclusion.

Unification of Castile and Aragon

Late medieval Spain was divided into the three Christian kingdoms of Navarre

Navarre

Navarre , officially the Chartered Community of Navarre is an autonomous community in northern Spain, bordering the Basque Country, La Rioja, and Aragon in Spain and Aquitaine in France...

, Castile

Crown of Castile

The Crown of Castile was a medieval and modern state in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and parliaments of the kingdoms of Castile and León upon the accession of the then King Ferdinand III of Castile to the vacant Leonese throne...

and Aragon

Aragon

Aragon is a modern autonomous community in Spain, coextensive with the medieval Kingdom of Aragon. Located in northeastern Spain, the Aragonese autonomous community comprises three provinces : Huesca, Zaragoza, and Teruel. Its capital is Zaragoza...

, alongside the small, last remaining Islamic state of Granada

Granada

Granada is a city and the capital of the province of Granada, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Granada is located at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, at the confluence of three rivers, the Beiro, the Darro and the Genil. It sits at an elevation of 738 metres above sea...

. The civil wars and conflicts of the late 14th and early 15th century would result in the unification of the Christian kingdoms; combined with advances in naval technology, this would pave the way for the rise of Spain as a dominant European power.

Castile, a medium sized kingdom with a strong maritime tradition, was plunged into civil war following the death of Alfonso XI in 1349; the conflict between Pedro of Castile

Pedro of Castile

Peter , sometimes called "the Cruel" or "the Lawful" , was the king of Castile and León from 1350 to 1369. He was the son of Alfonso XI of Castile and Maria of Portugal, daughter of Afonso IV of Portugal...

and Henry II of Castile became bound up with the wider politics of the Hundred Years War. With France

France

supporting Henry and his descendants, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

exploited opportunities to destabilise the regime. Attempts by John I

John I of Castile

John I was the king of Crown of Castile, was the son of Henry II and of his wife Juana Manuel of Castile, daughter of Juan Manuel, Prince of Villena, head of a younger branch of the royal house of Castile...

, Henry's son, to unify Castile and Portugal, resulted in a Portuguese uprising and the intervention of the English John of Gaunt, claiming the Castilian throne by right of marriage. Not until 1387 was the civil war finally concluded, with John of Gaunt accepting a cash settlement. Aragon, a smaller kingdom but with widespread claims to lands across the Mediterranean

Mediterranean Sea

, also saw internal clashes over dynastic inheritance; Peter IV

Peter IV

Peter IV may refer to:*Pope Peter IV of Alexandria *Patriarch Peter IV of Alexandria *Peter IV of Ravenna *Peter IV of Bulgaria *Peter IV of Aragon...

fought a harsh campaign against his nobles from 1346-9 over his daughter's right to inherit the throne.

The threat of internal stability remained until the marriage of Queen Isabella I

Isabella I of Castile

Isabella I was Queen of Castile and León. She and her husband Ferdinand II of Aragon brought stability to both kingdoms that became the basis for the unification of Spain. Later the two laid the foundations for the political unification of Spain under their grandson, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor...

of Castile

Crown of Castile

and King Ferdinand II

Ferdinand II of Aragon

Ferdinand the Catholic was King of Aragon , Sicily , Naples , Valencia, Sardinia, and Navarre, Count of Barcelona, jure uxoris King of Castile and then regent of that country also from 1508 to his death, in the name of...

of Aragon

Crown of Aragon

The Crown of Aragon Corona d'Aragón Corona d'Aragó Corona Aragonum controlling a large portion of the present-day eastern Spain and southeastern France, as well as some of the major islands and mainland possessions stretching across the Mediterranean as far as Greece...

in 1469. The two monarchs were promptly challenged by Joan of Castile but were swiftly successful. Isabella would go on to establish the Hermandad
Hermandad
Hermandad, literally "brotherhood" in Spanish, was a peacekeeping association of armed individuals, which became characteristic of municipal life in medieval Spain, especially in Castile....

militia

Militia

The term militia is commonly used today to refer to a military force composed of ordinary citizens to provide defense, emergency law enforcement, or paramilitary service, in times of emergency without being paid a regular salary or committed to a fixed term of service. It is a polyseme with...

system, which would provide her with a royal counterbalance to any future challenge from the nobility. The two monarchs proceeded to conquer the Kingdom of Granada, the last Arab-Muslim state in the Iberian peninsula, which was completed by 1492. In that same year, the Alhambra Decree

Alhambra decree

The Alhambra Decree was an edict issued on 31 March 1492 by the joint Catholic Monarchs of Spain ordering the expulsion of Jews from the Kingdom of Spain and its territories and possessions by 31 July of that year.The edict was formally revoked on 16 December 1968, following the Second...

was issued, expelling all Jews

Jews

The Jews , also known as the Jewish people, are a nation and ethnoreligious group originating in the Israelites or Hebrews of the Ancient Near East. The Jewish ethnicity, nationality, and religion are strongly interrelated, as Judaism is the traditional faith of the Jewish nation...

from both Castile and Aragon. Now unified, Spain now enjoyed relative internal stability; rights and lands across the Mediterranean; and a strong tradition of sea-faring in both the Atlantic and Mediterranean, which it would maximise in the coming decades.

The conquest of the Americas and the beginnings of empire

After Christopher Colombus's successful navigation to the New World

New World

The New World is one of the names used for the Western Hemisphere, specifically America and sometimes Oceania . The term originated in the late 15th century, when America had been recently discovered by European explorers, expanding the geographical horizon of the people of the European middle...

under Spanish patronage, Spanish forces rapidly began to occupy much of the new territories, rapidly taking the Bahamas and defeating the local Arawak

Arawak language

Arawak is the eponymous language of the Arawakan language family. The term is often used to cover the closely related Taino language of the Caribbean islands. The ethnonym Lokono may be used more specifically....

speaking indigenous groups. The efforts of Ferdinand Magellan

Ferdinand Magellan

Ferdinand Magellan was a Portuguese explorer. He was born in Sabrosa, in northern Portugal, and served King Charles I of Spain in search of a westward route to the "Spice Islands" ....

, reaching the island of Limasawa in 1521, led to the subsequent establishment of the colony of the Philippines

Philippines

under Miguel López de Legazpi

Miguel López de Legazpi

Miguel López de Legazpi , also known as El Adelantado and El Viejo , was a Spanish conquistador who established one of the first European settlements in the East Indies and the Pacific Islands in 1565. He is the first Governor-General in the Philippines...

which was to become an essential Spanish military base in the Pacific. The challenge of the Barbary Pirates encouraged defensive and punitive expeditions across the Mediterranean, resulting in the conquest of various outposts in North Africa, including Melilla

Melilla

Melilla is a autonomous city of Spain and an exclave on the north coast of Morocco. Melilla, along with the Spanish exclave Ceuta, is one of the two Spanish territories located in mainland Africa...

in 1497, Mazalquivir in 1505, Oran

Oran

Oran is a major city on the northwestern Mediterranean coast of Algeria, and the second largest city of the country.It is the capital of the Oran Province . The city has a population of 759,645 , while the metropolitan area has a population of approximately 1,500,000, making it the second largest...

in 1509, Algiers

Algiers

' is the capital and largest city of Algeria. According to the 1998 census, the population of the city proper was 1,519,570 and that of the urban agglomeration was 2,135,630. In 2009, the population was about 3,500,000...

in 1510, Tripoli

Tripoli

Tripoli is the capital and largest city in Libya. It is also known as Western Tripoli , to distinguish it from Tripoli, Lebanon. It is affectionately called The Mermaid of the Mediterranean , describing its turquoise waters and its whitewashed buildings. Tripoli is a Greek name that means "Three...

in 1511 and the smaller Plazas de Soberania

Plazas de soberanía

The plazas de soberanía or sovereign territories, referred to in English as Spanish North Africa or simply Spanish Africa, are the current Spanish territories in continental North Africa bordering Morocco, except the autonomous cities of Ceuta and Melilla.After the Reconquista, forces of the...

.

The most dramatic impact of Spanish military power, however, lay in the defeat of the American empires

Spanish colonization of the Americas

of the Aztec

Aztec

The Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the late post-classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Aztec is the...

s and Incas. From 1519-21, a coalition army of Spanish soldiers and Tlaxcalan

Tlaxcala (Nahua state)

Tlaxcala was a pre-Columbian city state of central Mexico.Tlaxcala was a confederation of four altepetl — Ocotelolco, Quiahuiztlan, Tepeticpac and Tizatlan — which each took turns providing a ruler for Tlaxcala as a whole.-History:Tlaxcala was never conquered by the Aztec empire, but was...

warriors led by Hernán Cortés

Hernán Cortés

Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marquis of the Valley of Oaxaca was a Spanish Conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the rule of the King of Castile in the early 16th century...

and Xicotencatl the Younger defeated the Aztec

Aztec

Empire; in 1532, Francisco Pizarro

Francisco Pizarro

Francisco Pizarro González, Marquess was a Spanish conquistador, conqueror of the Incan Empire, and founder of Lima, the modern-day capital of the Republic of Peru.-Early life:...

and his brothers Gonzalo

Gonzalo Pizarro

Gonzalo Pizarro y Alonso was a Spanish conquistador and younger paternal half-brother of Francisco Pizarro, the conqueror of the Inca Empire...

and Hernando

Hernándo Pizarro

Hernando Pizarro y de Vargas was a Spanish conquistador and one of the Pizarro brothers who ruled over Peru...

invaded and occupied

Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire

The Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire was one of the most important campaigns in the Spanish colonization of the Americas. This historic process of military conquest was made by Spanish conquistadores and their native allies....

the Inca Empire from their base in Panama

Panama

Panama , officially the Republic of Panama , is the southernmost country of Central America. Situated on the isthmus connecting North and South America, it is bordered by Costa Rica to the northwest, Colombia to the southeast, the Caribbean Sea to the north and the Pacific Ocean to the south. The...

. Both wars in which very small numbers of Spanish soldiers - the conquistadors - who were mostly veterans of Spain's European or North African campaigns, were backed by local allies and defeated well established empires, shared many similarities. The highly proficient conquistadors benefited from their access to cavalry

Cavalry

Cavalry or horsemen were soldiers or warriors who fought mounted on horseback. Cavalry were historically the third oldest and the most mobile of the combat arms...

, steel

Steel

Steel is an alloy that consists mostly of iron and has a carbon content between 0.2% and 2.1% by weight, depending on the grade. Carbon is the most common alloying material for iron, but various other alloying elements are used, such as manganese, chromium, vanadium, and tungsten...

sword

Sword

A sword is a bladed weapon used primarily for cutting or thrusting. The precise definition of the term varies with the historical epoch or the geographical region under consideration...

s, helmets

Combat helmet

A combat helmet or battle helmet is a type of personal armor designed specifically to protect the head during combat. Helmets are among the oldest forms of personal protective equipment and are known to have been worn by the Akkadians/Sumerians in the 23rd century BC, Mycenaean Greeks since 17th...

and armour, not to mention small cannon

Cannon

A cannon is any piece of artillery that uses gunpowder or other usually explosive-based propellents to launch a projectile. Cannon vary in caliber, range, mobility, rate of fire, angle of fire, and firepower; different forms of cannon combine and balance these attributes in varying degrees,...

, none of which were familiar to local forces. The Spanish also benefited from their immunity to many common European diseases which were to decimate their local enemies.

The Spanish were to fair less well against the less centralised societies of southern Chile, however, particularly once local forces began to adapt to, or actually adopt similar military technologies. Although Pedro de Valdivia

Pedro de Valdivia

Pedro Gutiérrez de Valdivia or Valdiva was a Spanish conquistador and the first royal governor of Chile. After serving with the Spanish army in Italy and Flanders, he was sent to South America in 1534, where he served as lieutenant under Francisco Pizarro in Peru, acting as his second in command...

was able to successfully invade Chile

Conquest of Chile

The Conquest of Chile is a period in Chilean historiography that starts with the arrival of Pedro de Valdivia to Chile in 1541 and ends with the death of Martín García Óñez de Loyola, in the Battle of Curalaba in 1598 or alternatively with the Destruction of the Seven Cities. This was the period...

in 1540, the first great rebellion of the Arauco wars

Arauco War

The Arauco War was a conflict between colonial Spaniards and the Mapuche people in what is now the Araucanía and Biobío regions of modern Chile...

was to begin only 1553 later, marking the beginning of a conflict that would last until the 19th century. Spanish forces, operating at huge distances from their European or even Caribbean centres of power, were frequently available in small numbers; Valdivia had great difficulty in recruiting even the 150 Spanish soldiers he used to invade Chile, and the frequent reversals during the Arauco wars led to losses that often took several years to replace. As time progressed, the advantages of the Spanish began to increasingly centre on their access to early modern firearms, especially the musket

Musket

A musket is a muzzle-loaded, smooth bore long gun, fired from the shoulder. Muskets were designed for use by infantry. A soldier armed with a musket had the designation musketman or musketeer....

, rather than the technologies that had won them their early successes.

The 16th and 17th centuries, Spain's 'Golden Age'

During the 16th century, Habsburg Spain

Habsburg Spain

Habsburg Spain refers to the history of Spain over the 16th and 17th centuries , when Spain was ruled by the major branch of the Habsburg dynasty...

saw a steady growth in Spanish military power. The Italian Wars

Italian Wars

The Italian Wars, often referred to as the Great Italian Wars or the Great Wars of Italy and sometimes as the Habsburg–Valois Wars, were a series of conflicts from 1494 to 1559 that involved, at various times, most of the city-states of Italy, the Papal States, most of the major states of Western...

(1494–1559) resulted in an ultimate Spanish victory, and control over northern Italy. The wars also transformed the battlefield, evolving from a primarily pike- and halberd-wielding force to a more flexible arrangement of arquebus

Arquebus

The arquebus , or "hook tube", is an early muzzle-loaded firearm used in the 15th to 17th centuries. The word was originally modeled on the German hakenbüchse; this produced haquebute...

iers, pikemen, and other troops. This evolution was epitomised in the form of the Spanish tercio

Tercio

infantry formation, which made a strength out of Spain's inability to field large cavalry forces. Habsburg Spain came to enjoy an axis of allied and neutral territories from Naples

Naples

Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...

through Milan

Milan

Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

and northwards to the Netherlands

Netherlands

The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

, a route for reinforcements that came to be called the Spanish Road

Spanish Road

The "Spanish Road" was a military supply/trade route used from 1567–1620, which stretched from Northern Italy to the Low Countries. It crossed through relatively neutral territory, and was therefore Europe's most preferred military route...

. Backed by huge financial resources drawn from the Americas, Spain could afford to mount lengthy campaigns against her key enemies, such as Protestant England during the Anglo-Spanish War

Anglo-Spanish War (1585)

The Anglo–Spanish War was an intermittent conflict between the kingdoms of Spain and England that was never formally declared. The war was punctuated by widely separated battles, and began with England's military expedition in 1585 to the Netherlands under the command of the Earl of Leicester in...

(1585–1604), marked by the failure of the Spanish Armada

Spanish Armada

This article refers to the Battle of Gravelines, for the modern navy of Spain, see Spanish NavyThe Spanish Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England under the command of the Duke of Medina Sidonia in 1588, with the intention of overthrowing Elizabeth I of England to stop English...

, and the long running Spanish challenge to the Dutch revolt

Dutch Revolt

The Dutch Revolt or the Revolt of the Netherlands This article adopts 1568 as the starting date of the war, as this was the year of the first battles between armies. However, since there is a long period of Protestant vs...

(1568–1609). The Spanish Army grew in size from around 20,000 in the 1470s, to around 300,000 by the 1630s, requiring the recruitment of soldiers from across Europe. With such numbers involved, even Spain had trouble funding her huge wars - the non-payment of troops led to regular mutinies and events such as the Sack of Antwerp

Sack of Antwerp

The sack of Antwerp or the Spanish Fury at Antwerp was an episode of the Eighty Years' War.On 4 November 1576, Spanish tercios began the sack of Antwerp, leading to three days of horror among the population of the city, which was the cultural, economic and financial center of the Netherlands. The...

(1576), when unpaid tercio

Tercio

units looted the Dutch city.

In the east, Habsburg Spain fought alongside other Christian allies against the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

, taking part in numerous naval campaigns over the period. This naval competition culminated in the Spanish victory at the battle of Lepanto

Battle of Lepanto (1571)

The Battle of Lepanto took place on 7 October 1571 when a fleet of the Holy League, a coalition of Catholic maritime states, decisively defeated the main fleet of the Ottoman Empire in five hours of fighting on the northern edge of the Gulf of Patras, off western Greece...

in 1571, the last naval battle in the Mediterranean to see the large scale use of galleys by both sides. In the Atlantic, Spain and other nations had developed the galleon

Galleon

A galleon was a large, multi-decked sailing ship used primarily by European states from the 16th to 18th centuries. Whether used for war or commerce, they were generally armed with the demi-culverin type of cannon.-Etymology:...

for naval warfare, using them in convoys to link her possessions in the Philippines

Philippines

, the Americas and Europe. The Manila galleons sailed

Sailing

Sailing is the propulsion of a vehicle and the control of its movement with large foils called sails. By changing the rigging, rudder, and sometimes the keel or centre board, a sailor manages the force of the wind on the sails in order to move the boat relative to its surrounding medium and...

once or twice per year across the Pacific Ocean

Pacific Ocean

The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.At 165.2 million square kilometres in area, this largest division of the World...

, whilst the Spanish treasure fleet

Spanish treasure fleet

The Spanish treasure fleets was a convoy system adopted by the Spanish Empire from 1566 to 1790...

s linked Mexico back to Europe.

The Thirty Years War (1618–1648) drew in Spain alongside most other European nations. Spain entered the conflict with a strong position, but the ongoing fighting gradually eroded her advantages; first Dutch, then Swedish innovations had made the tercio

Tercio

an increasingly obsolete formation, having less flexibility and fire power

Fire power

Firepower is the military capability to direct force at an enemy. It is not to be confused with the concept of rate of fire, which describes cycling of the firing mechanism in a weapon system. It involves the whole range of potential weapons...

than more modern equivalents. French entry to the war in the 1630s put additional pressure on Spain, with the French finally eliminating many of Spain's most experienced forces at the battle of Rocroi

Battle of Rocroi

The Battle of Rocroi was fought on 19 May 1643, late in the Thirty Years' War. It resulted in a victory of the French army under the Duc d'Enghien, against the Spanish army under General Francisco de Melo.-Prelude:...

in 1643. By the signing of the Peace of Westphalia

Peace of Westphalia

The Peace of Westphalia was a series of peace treaties signed between May and October of 1648 in Osnabrück and Münster. These treaties ended the Thirty Years' War in the Holy Roman Empire, and the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Dutch Republic, with Spain formally recognizing the...

in 1648, which brought an end to most of the fighting, Spain was clearly exhausted. Politics too had begun to count against Spain. While Spain was fighting in France, Portugal — which had been under personal union with Spain for 60 years — acclaimed John IV of Braganza

John IV of Portugal

|-|John IV was the King of Portugal and the Algarves from 1640 to his death. He was the grandson of Catherine, Duchess of Braganza, who had in 1580 claimed the Portuguese crown and sparked the struggle for the throne of Portugal. John was nicknamed John the Restorer...

as king in 1640. Spain was forced to accept the independence of the Dutch Republic

Dutch Republic

The Dutch Republic — officially known as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands , the Republic of the United Netherlands, or the Republic of the Seven United Provinces — was a republic in Europe existing from 1581 to 1795, preceding the Batavian Republic and ultimately...

in 1648, another sign of her diminishing power. By the second half of the century, the much reduced Spanish army was infamous for being poorly equipped and rarely paid. For the remainder of the century, France continued to grow in relative power under Louis XIV. If the Franco-Spanish war (1635–59) ended ambiguously, despite Spanish concessions, the following War of Devolution

War of Devolution

The War of Devolution saw Louis XIV's French armies overrun the Habsburg-controlled Spanish Netherlands and the Franche-Comté, but forced to give most of it back by a Triple Alliance of England, Sweden, and the Dutch Republic in the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle.-Background:Louis's claims to the...

(1667-8) was to remove any doubt as to the ascendancy of France to military dominance in Europe.

European rivalry in the 18th century

The centre of Spanish military power shifted dramatically in the early 18th century. The War of the Spanish Succession

War of the Spanish Succession

The War of the Spanish Succession was fought among several European powers, including a divided Spain, over the possible unification of the Kingdoms of Spain and France under one Bourbon monarch. As France and Spain were among the most powerful states of Europe, such a unification would have...

(1701–1714) confirmed Philip

Philip V of Spain

Philip V was King of Spain from 15 November 1700 to 15 January 1724, when he abdicated in favor of his son Louis, and from 6 September 1724, when he assumed the throne again upon his son's death, to his death.Before his reign, Philip occupied an exalted place in the royal family of France as a...

as King Philip V of Spain at the Peace of Utrecht, but in the process Philip lost the Spanish Netherlands, Naples

Naples

, Milan

Milan

, Sardinia

Sardinia

Sardinia is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea . It is an autonomous region of Italy, and the nearest land masses are the French island of Corsica, the Italian Peninsula, Sicily, Tunisia and the Spanish Balearic Islands.The name Sardinia is from the pre-Roman noun *sard[],...

, Sicily

Sicily

Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...

, parts of Milan

Milan

, Gibraltar

Gibraltar

Gibraltar is a British overseas territory located on the southern end of the Iberian Peninsula at the entrance of the Mediterranean. A peninsula with an area of , it has a northern border with Andalusia, Spain. The Rock of Gibraltar is the major landmark of the region...

and Minorca

Minorca

Min Orca or Menorca is one of the Balearic Islands located in the Mediterranean Sea belonging to Spain. It takes its name from being smaller than the nearby island of Majorca....

to the victorious alliance. Spain responded by modernising its army and navy, including through the work of Cardinal Alberoni, in an attempt both to regain its military position in the Mediterranean and to reintroduce a degree of parity with France

Early Modern France

Kingdom of France is the early modern period of French history from the end of the 15th century to the end of the 18th century...

, the predominant European land power. Spain's defeat by France in the War of the Quadruple Alliance

War of the Quadruple Alliance

The War of the Quadruple Alliance was a result of the ambitions of King Philip V of Spain, his wife, Elisabeth Farnese, and his chief minister Giulio Alberoni to retake territories in Italy and to claim the French throne. It saw the defeat of Spain by an alliance of Britain, France, Austria , and...

(1718–1720) confirmed her junior status for the coming decades, whilst the successful deployment of the Britain's Royal Navy

Royal Navy

The Royal Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Founded in the 16th century, it is the oldest service branch and is known as the Senior Service...

into the Mediterraean, exploiting the fortress of Gibraltar

Gibraltar

, gained in 1704, would place Spain at a significant naval disadvantage for many years.

Globally, Spain remained an important naval and military power, depending on critical sea lanes stretching from Spain through the Caribbean and South America, and westwards towards Manila and the Far East. The 18th century saw an ongoing struggle between the growing naval power of Great Britain

Great Britain

Great Britain or Britain is an island situated to the northwest of Continental Europe. It is the ninth largest island in the world, and the largest European island, as well as the largest of the British Isles...

and imperial Spain for control of these vital and lucrative trade links. The number of Spanish galleons

Spanish treasure fleet

The Spanish treasure fleets was a convoy system adopted by the Spanish Empire from 1566 to 1790...

deploying across the Atlantic sea routes increased significantly in the first half of the century, undoing some the decline of the late 17th century. Britain used the exclusive right

Asiento

The Asiento in the history of slavery refers to the permission given by the Spanish government to other countries to sell people as slaves to the Spanish colonies, between the years 1543 and 1834...

to non-Spanish slave trading in Spanish America for thirty years which she had gained at the end of the War of the Spanish Succession

War of the Spanish Succession

as an excuse for increased military intervention, such as during the War of Jenkin's Ear (1739–1748). During the War of the Austrian Succession

War of the Austrian Succession

The War of the Austrian Succession – including King George's War in North America, the Anglo-Spanish War of Jenkins' Ear, and two of the three Silesian wars – involved most of the powers of Europe over the question of Maria Theresa's succession to the realms of the House of Habsburg.The...

(1740–1748) Britain attempted to leverage its existing island bases along the Spanish Main

Spanish Main

In the days of the Spanish New World Empire, the mainland of the American continent enclosing the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico was referred to as the Spanish Main. It included present-day Florida, the east shore of the Gulf of Mexico in Texas, Mexico, Central America and the north coast of...

and the Spanish West Indies

Spanish West Indies

The Spanish West Indies was the contemporary name for the Spanish colonies in the Caribbean...

, briefly occupied Havana

British expedition against Cuba

The Battle of Havana was a military action from March to August 1762, as part of the Seven Years' War. British forces besieged and captured the city of Havana, which at the time was an important Spanish naval base in the Caribbean, and dealt a serious blow to the Spanish navy...

and Manila

Battle of Manila (1762)

The Battle of Manila was fought during the Seven Years' War , from September 24, 1762 to October 6, 1762, between the Kingdom of Great Britain and the Kingdom of Spain in and around Manila, the capital of the Philippines, a Spanish colony at that time.-Prelude:British troops stationed in India were...

, but practical and strategic considerations led to their return to Spain in exchange for Florida; which was then lost to revitalized Spanish forces during the American revolutionary war. Both Spain and Britain made extensive use of privateers throughout the war, the Spanish exploiting fully the British prejudice against using the convoy

Convoy

A convoy is a group of vehicles, typically motor vehicles or ships, traveling together for mutual support and protection. Often, a convoy is organized with armed defensive support, though it may also be used in a non-military sense, for example when driving through remote areas.-Age of Sail:Naval...

system to protect its expensive merchant assets in times of war. The war of Austrian succession was still seen as positive for Spain, as the kingdom did recover the territories lost after the war of Spanish succession, in Italy.

The huge distances involved in warfare between European powers in the Americas usually counted in favour of the defenders; major attacks on Spanish possessions, such as the amphibious assault launched against the strategically vital Cartagena de Indias by the British in 1741 ended in disaster for the overstretched attackers. Nonetheless, Spain's involvement

Spain in the American Revolutionary War

Spain actively supported the Thirteen Colonies throughout the American Revolutionary War, beginning in 1776 by jointly funding Roderigue Hortalez and Company, a trading company that provided critical military supplies, through financing the final Siege of Yorktown in 1781 with a collection of gold...

in the American Revolutionary War

American Revolutionary War

The American Revolutionary War , the American War of Independence, or simply the Revolutionary War, began as a war between the Kingdom of Great Britain and thirteen British colonies in North America, and ended in a global war between several European great powers.The war was the result of the...

(1779–83) was a relative success, and underlined the global resources that Spain still had at her disposal and the opportunities for taking on Britain at the right moment. Spain entered the war after the Battle of Saratoga

Battle of Saratoga

The Battles of Saratoga conclusively decided the fate of British General John Burgoyne's army in the American War of Independence and are generally regarded as a turning point in the war. The battles were fought eighteen days apart on the same ground, south of Saratoga, New York...

, with the aim, as in the Seven Years War, of recovering Gibraltar

Gibraltar

and Minorca

Minorca

Min Orca or Menorca is one of the Balearic Islands located in the Mediterranean Sea belonging to Spain. It takes its name from being smaller than the nearby island of Majorca....

from the British, and thereby reestablishing control over the western Mediterranean. Spain's successful defence of the Louisiana Territory

Louisiana Territory

The Territory of Louisiana or Louisiana Territory was an organized incorporated territory of the United States that existed from July 4, 1805 until June 4, 1812, when it was renamed to Missouri Territory...

, her invasion of Minorca in 1781

Invasion of Minorca, 1781

The Franco-Spanish conquest of Minorca from its British defenders in February 1782, after the Siege of Fort St. Philip lasting over five months, was an important step in the achievement of Spain's aims in its alliance with France against Britain during the American War of Independence...

, whilst seizing West Florida

West Florida

West Florida was a region on the north shore of the Gulf of Mexico, which underwent several boundary and sovereignty changes during its history. West Florida was first established in 1763 by the British government; as its name suggests it largely consisted of the western portion of the region...

from the British, showed her continuing strength in the New World, although the British defence of Gilbratar

Great Siege of Gibraltar

The Great Siege of Gibraltar was an unsuccessful attempt by Spain and France to capture Gibraltar from the British during the American War of Independence. This was the largest action fought during the war in terms of numbers, particularly the Grand Assault of 18 September 1782...

by sea prevented Spain of achieving all her war goals.

The Napoleonic Wars and the loss of the Americas

The Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

were to have a tremendous impact on Spanish military history, both within Spain itself and across her American colonies. French

First French Empire

The First French Empire , also known as the Greater French Empire or Napoleonic Empire, was the empire of Napoleon I of France...

armies invaded Spain and in 1808, rapidly deposing the Spanish king. Spain's subsequent liberation struggle marked one of the first national wars

Total war

Total war is a war in which a belligerent engages in the complete mobilization of fully available resources and population.In the mid-19th century, "total war" was identified by scholars as a separate class of warfare...

and the emergence of large-scale guerrillas

Guerrilla warfare

, from which the English language

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

borrowed the word. While the French occupation destroyed the Spanish administration, which fragmented into quarrelling provincial juntas

Junta (Peninsular War)

In the Napoleonic era, junta was the name chosen by several local administrations formed in Spain during the Peninsular War as a patriotic alternative to the official administration toppled by the French invaders...

(in 1810, a reconstituted national government

Cádiz Cortes

The Cádiz Cortes were sessions of the national legislative body which met in the safe haven of Cádiz during the French occupation of Spain during the Napoleonic Wars...

fortified itself in Cádiz

Siege of Cádiz

The Siege of Cádiz was a siege of the large Spanish naval base of Cádiz by a French army from February 5, 1810 to August 24, 1812 during the Peninsular War. Following the occupation of Madrid on March 23, 1808, Cádiz became the Spanish seat of power, and was targeted by 60,000 French troops under...

) and proved unable to recruit, train, or equip effective armies, Napoleon's

Napoleon I of France

Napoleon Bonaparte was a French military and political leader during the latter stages of the French Revolution.As Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815...

failure to pacify the people of Spain allowed Spanish

Spanish Army

The Spanish Army is the terrestrial army of the Spanish Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is one of the oldest active armies - dating back to the 15th century.-Introduction:...

, British

British Army

The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

and Portuguese

Portuguese Army

The Portuguese Army is the ground branch of the Portuguese Armed Forces which, in co-operation with other branches of the Portuguese military, is charged with the defence of Portugal...

forces to secure Portugal and engage French forces on the frontiers while Spanish guerrilleros wore down the occupiers. Acting in concert, regular and irregular

Irregular warfare

Irregular warfare is warfare in which one or more combatants are irregular military rather than regular forces. Guerrilla warfare is a form of irregular warfare, and so is asymmetric warfare....

allied forces prevented Napoleon's marshals from subduing the rebellious Spanish provinces. The Spanish navy, put to sea in support of France during the War of the Third Coalition in 1805, suffered terrible losses at the Battle of Trafalgar

Battle of Trafalgar

The Battle of Trafalgar was a sea battle fought between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of the French Navy and Spanish Navy, during the War of the Third Coalition of the Napoleonic Wars ....

, having been weakened by yellow fever

Yellow fever

Yellow fever is an acute viral hemorrhagic disease. The virus is a 40 to 50 nm enveloped RNA virus with positive sense of the Flaviviridae family....

in the preceding years; in many ways this marked the nadir of Spanish naval history.

The events in mainland Spain had extensive consequences for her empire. Spain's colonies in the Americas had shown an increasing independence in the years running up to the Peninsular War

Peninsular War

The Peninsular War was a war between France and the allied powers of Spain, the United Kingdom, and Portugal for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars. The war began when French and Spanish armies crossed Spain and invaded Portugal in 1807. Then, in 1808, France turned on its...

; British attempts to invade the Río de la Plata

British invasions of the Río de la Plata

The British invasions of the Río de la Plata were a series of unsuccessful British attempts to seize control of the Spanish colonies located around the La Plata Basin in South America . The invasions took place between 1806 and 1807, as part of the Napoleonic Wars, when Spain was an ally of...

in 1806-7, for example, had been rebuffed by well organised local militia. The occupation of the Spanish homeland, however, resulted in first a sequence of uprisings in support of the imprisoned king, and then a struggle for independence that increasingly formed a series of civil wars across the Spanish dominions in the America. The conflict started in 1808, with junta

Junta (Peninsular War)

s established in Mexico

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

and Montevideo

Montevideo

Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...

in reaction to the events of the Peninsular War

Peninsular War

. The conflict, lasting twenty years, was far from one sided. Patriot forces were often underequipped, largely peasant militia armies commanded by amateur officers; Royalist forces, partially supported from Spain over huge sea distances, were frequently able to gain the upper hand. The Spanish navy was easily able to dominate the local, coastal navies of her colonies. Campaigning across the huge distances of South America, frequently in winter conditions with minimal supplies, resulted in terrible privation. Ultimately, Royalist exhaustion and growing political maturity amongst the new states resulted in the creation of a chain of newly independent countries stretching from Argentina

Argentina

Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...

and Chile

Chile

Chile ,officially the Republic of Chile , is a country in South America occupying a long, narrow coastal strip between the Andes mountains to the east and the Pacific Ocean to the west. It borders Peru to the north, Bolivia to the northeast, Argentina to the east, and the Drake Passage in the far...

in the south to Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

in the north. Only Cuba

Cuba

The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...

and Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...

remained under Spanish rule

Spain under the Restoration

The Restoration was the name given to the period that began on December 29, 1874 after the First Spanish Republic ended with the restoration of Alfonso XII to the throne after a coup d'état by Martinez Campos, and ended on April 14, 1931 with the proclamation of the Second Spanish Republic.After...

19th century Carlist Wars and the final days of empire

In the aftermath of the Napoleonic Wars

Napoleonic Wars

, Spain's military found itself involved in an increasing number of internal conflicts, distracting military attention from other priorities, and continuing to undermine the Spanish economy. The first of these, the Trienio Liberal (1820-3) involved a revolt by soldiers against King Ferdinand VII while they were being embarked for a campaign in America. France intervened militarily to support the monarchy, restoring order, but this was short-lived. When Ferdinand died in 1833, his fourth wife Maria Cristina became Queen regent on behalf of their infant daughter Isabella II. This splintered the country into two factions known as the Cristinos - the supporters of the Queen regent - and the Carlists

Carlism

Carlism is a traditionalist and legitimist political movement in Spain seeking the establishment of a separate line of the Bourbon family on the Spanish throne. This line descended from Infante Carlos, Count of Molina , and was founded due to dispute over the succession laws and widespread...

, the supporters of Carlos V

Infante Carlos, Count of Molina

The Infante Carlos of Spain was the second surviving son of King Charles IV of Spain and of his wife, Maria Luisa of Parma. As Carlos V he was the first of the Carlist claimants to the throne of Spain...

, who had rejected the Pragmatic Sanction of 1830

Pragmatic Sanction of 1830

The Pragmatic Sanction of 1830 , issued March 29, 1830 by King Ferdinand VII of Spain, ratified a Decree of 1789 by Charles IV of Spain, which had replaced the semi-Salic system established by Philip V of Spain with the mixed succession system that predated the Bourbon monarchy .When Philip V,...

that abolished the Salic Law

Salic law

Salic law was a body of traditional law codified for governing the Salian Franks in the early Middle Ages during the reign of King Clovis I in the 6th century...

. The First Carlist War

First Carlist War

The First Carlist War was a civil war in Spain from 1833-1839.-Historical background:At the beginning of the 18th century, Philip V, the first Bourbon king of Spain, promulgated the Salic Law, which declared illegal the inheritance of the Spanish crown by women...

lasted over seven years and the fighting spanned most of the country at one time or another, although the main conflict centered on the Carlist homelands of the Basque Country

Basque Country (historical territory)

The Basque Country is the name given to the home of the Basque people in the western Pyrenees that spans the border between France and Spain on the Atlantic coast....

and Aragon

Aragon

. Many of the military officers involved had served in the Peninsular War

Peninsular War

a few years before. The Second Carlist War

Second Carlist War

The Second Carlist War, or the War of the Matiners or Madrugadores , was a short civil war fought primarily in Catalonia by the Carlists under General Ramón Cabrera against the forces of the government of Isabella II...

was a minor Catalonia

Catalonia

Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...

n uprising in support of Carlos VI

Infante Carlos, Count of Montemolin

Infante Carlos, Conde de Montemolín was the Carlist claimant to the throne of Spain under the name Carlos VI after his father's abdication in 1845, when he took the title of Count of Montemolín.-Biography:...

, lasting from 1846 to 1849. The Third Carlist War

Third Carlist War

The Third Carlist War was the last Carlist War in Spain. It is very often referred to as the Second Carlist War, as the 'second' had been small in scale and almost trivial in political consequence....

began after Queen Isabella II was overthrown by a conspiracy of liberal generals in 1868, and left Spain in some disgrace; four years later, the latest Carlist pretender, Carlos VII

Carlos, Duke of Madrid

Infante Carlos María de los Dolores Juan Isidro José Francisco Quirin Antonio Miguel Gabriel Rafael de Borbón y Austria-Este, Duke of Madrid was the senior member of the House of Bourbon from 1887 until his death...

, decided that only force of arms could win him the throne. This Third Carlist War lasted until 1876.

Under Isabella II of Spain

Isabella II of Spain

Isabella II was the only female monarch of Spain in modern times. She came to the throne as an infant, but her succession was disputed by the Carlists, who refused to recognise a female sovereign, leading to the Carlist Wars. After a troubled reign, she was deposed in the Glorious Revolution of...

, there were several, ultimately unsuccessful, attempts to reassert Spanish military influence around the world, often in partnership with France

Second French Empire

The Second French Empire or French Empire was the Imperial Bonapartist regime of Napoleon III from 1852 to 1870, between the Second Republic and the Third Republic, in France.-Rule of Napoleon III:...

. In 1848 Spain intervened to support Pope Pius IX

Pope Pius IX

Blessed Pope Pius IX , born Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti, was the longest-reigning elected Pope in the history of the Catholic Church, serving from 16 June 1846 until his death, a period of nearly 32 years. During his pontificate, he convened the First Vatican Council in 1869, which decreed papal...

against local republic

Republic

A republic is a form of government in which the people, or some significant portion of them, have supreme control over the government and where offices of state are elected or chosen by elected people. In modern times, a common simplified definition of a republic is a government where the head of...

an opposition. In February 1849, five warships, including the frigates steamed to Gaeta from Barcelona

Barcelona

Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...

, three more from Cadiz

Cádiz

Cadiz is a city and port in southwestern Spain. It is the capital of the homonymous province, one of eight which make up the autonomous community of Andalusia....

following in May. In total, 4,000 Spanish soldiers were deployed in Gaeta and placed at the Pope's disposition. This marked the Spanish Army

Spanish Army

's first expeditionary venture into Italy since the War of the Austrian Succession

War of the Austrian Succession

a hundred years prior. In partnership with the French, Spanish columns secured the region. In 1858 Spain joined with France to intervene in Cochin China, donating 300 Filipino troops to the invasion. Spain joined an allied expedition in support of the French intervention in Mexico

French intervention in Mexico

The French intervention in Mexico , also known as The Maximilian Affair, War of the French Intervention, and The Franco-Mexican War, was an invasion of Mexico by an expeditionary force sent by the Second French Empire, supported in the beginning by the United Kingdom and the Kingdom of Spain...

. In 1859, Spain fought a short war with Morocco, resulting in a stronger Spanish position in North Africa. By the 1860s, Spain had built up a very large navy again, and in 1864 Spain intervened along the South American cost, seizing the guano

Guano

Guano is the excrement of seabirds, cave dwelling bats, and seals. Guano manure is an effective fertilizer due to its high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen and also its lack of odor. It was an important source of nitrates for gunpowder...

-rich Chincha Islands

Chincha Islands

The Chincha Islands are a group of three small islands 21 km off the southwest coast of Peru, to which they belong, near the town of Pisco,...

from its former colony of Peru

Peru

Peru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean....

. Although the new Spanish steam frigates were superior to local vessels, the huge distances and lack of land support ultimately concluded with Spain handing back the islands at the end of the Chincha Islands War

Chincha Islands War

The Chincha Islands War was a series of coastal and naval battles between Spain and its former colonies of Peru and Chile from 1864 to 1866, that began with Spain's seizure of the guano-rich Chincha Islands, part of a series of attempts by Isabel II of Spain to reassert her country's lost...

. An attempt to recolonise Santo Domingo

Dominican Restoration War

The Dominican Restoration War was a guerrilla war between 1863 and 1865 in the Dominican Republic between nationalists and Spain, who had recolonized the country 17 years after its independence...

similarly failed by 1865 in the face of fierce guerrilla resistance.

Spain faced a sequence of challenges across her colonies in the second half of the century that would result in a total defeat of empire at the hands of the growing power of the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. Spain's colony of Cuba

Cuba

rebelled in 1868, leading to a sequence of brutal guerrilla insurgencies and retaliations, through the Ten Years' War

Ten Years' War

The Ten Years' War , also known as the Great War and the War of '68, began on October 10, 1868 when sugar mill owner Carlos Manuel de Céspedes and his followers proclaimed Cuba's independence from Spain...

(1868–1878), the Little War

Little War (Cuba)

The Little War or Small War , was the second of three conflicts in the Cuban War of Independence. It followed the Ten Years' War of 1868–1878 and preceded the War of '95, itself sometimes called the Cuban War of Independence, which bled into the Spanish-American War, ultimately resulting in...

(1879–1880) and finally the Cuban War of Independence

Cuban War of Independence

Cuban War of Independence was the last of three liberation wars that Cuba fought against Spain, the other two being the Ten Years' War and the Little War...

(1895–1898). Spain, although militarily occupied with the Carlist troubles at home, put increasing resources into the conflict, slowly taking the upper hand, and assisted by American sales of modern weaponry. By 1898, however, increasing U.S. political interests in Cuba were encouraging a more interventionist policy. The sinking of the USS Maine

USS Maine (ACR-1)

USS Maine was the United States Navy's second commissioned pre-dreadnought battleship, although she was originally classified as an armored cruiser. She is best known for her catastrophic loss in Havana harbor. Maine had been sent to Havana, Cuba to protect U.S. interests during the Cuban revolt...

in Havana

Havana

Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...

harbour provided the trigger for the Spanish-American War

Spanish-American War

The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...

, in which Spain's aging navy fared disastrously. Cuba

Cuba

gained its independence and Spain lost its remaining New World colony, Puerto Rico

Puerto Rico

, which together with Guam

Guam

Guam is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of 16 Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United...

and the Philippines

Philippines

it ceded to the United States for 20 million dollars. In 1899, Spain sold its remaining Pacific islands — the Northern Mariana Islands

Northern Mariana Islands

The Northern Mariana Islands, officially the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands , is a commonwealth in political union with the United States, occupying a strategic region of the western Pacific Ocean. It consists of 15 islands about three-quarters of the way from Hawaii to the Philippines...

, Caroline Islands

Caroline Islands

The Caroline Islands are a widely scattered archipelago of tiny islands in the western Pacific Ocean, to the north of New Guinea. Politically they are divided between the Federated States of Micronesia in the eastern part of the group, and Palau at the extreme western end...

and Palau

Palau

Palau , officially the Republic of Palau , is an island nation in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Philippines and south of Tokyo. In 1978, after three decades as being part of the United Nations trusteeship, Palau chose independence instead of becoming part of the Federated States of Micronesia, a...

— to Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, reducing Spain's colonial possessions to Spanish Morocco

Spanish Morocco

The Spanish protectorate of Morocco was the area of Morocco under colonial rule by the Spanish Empire, established by the Treaty of Fez in 1912 and ending in 1956, when both France and Spain recognized Moroccan independence.-Territorial borders:...

, the Spanish Sahara

Spanish Sahara

Spanish Sahara was the name used for the modern territory of Western Sahara when it was ruled as a territory by Spain between 1884 and 1975...

and Spanish Guinea

Spanish Guinea

Spanish Guinea was an African colony of Spain that became the independent nation of Equatorial Guinea.-History:The Portuguese explorer, Fernão do Pó, seeking a route to India, is credited with having discovered the island of Bioko in 1472. He called it Formosa , but it quickly took on the name of...

, all in Africa.

Early 20th century and the Civil War

Although Spain remained neutral

Spain in World War I

Spain remained neutral throughout World War I between 28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918, but despite domestic economic difficulties, it was considered "one of the most important neutral countries in Europe by 1915". Spain had enjoyed neutrality during the political difficulties of pre-war Europe, and...

during the First World War

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

(1914–18), despite suffering considerable economic losses to German submarines, she was militarily active elsewhere during the early part of the 20th century, attempting to strengthen her position in North Africa. Despite successes in the late 19th century, the first Rif War (1893-4) around Mellila

Mellilä

Mellilä is a former municipality of Finland. It was merged to the town of Loimaa on 1 January 2009.It is located in the province of Western Finland and is part of the Finland Proper region. The municipality had a population of 1,254 and covered an area of 110.62 km² of which 0.10 km² is...

had also shown the potential weakness of the Spanish position along the coast. The second Rif War

Rif War (1909)

The Second Melillan campaign was a conflict in 1909 and 1910 in Morocco around Melilla. The fighting involved local Rifains and the Spanish Army.- Prelude :...

(1909–10) was initially a fiasco for the under-equipped and undertrained Spanish, until heavy artillery

Artillery

Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons...

was brought in; in the aftermath of the war, Spain began to raise units of local Regulares

Regulares

The Fuerzas Regulares Indígenas , known simply as the Regulares , were the volunteer infantry and cavalry units of the Spanish Army recruited in Spanish Morocco. They consisted of Moroccans officered by Spaniards...

. The third Rif War

Rif War (1920)

The Rif War, also called the Second Moroccan War, was fought between Spain and the Moroccan Rif Berbers.-Rifian forces:...

(1920–1926) also began badly for the Spanish, especially after the disaster of Annual (1921), resulting in various changes to the Spanish approach. Working in alliance with French

France

forces in the region, Spain created the Spanish Legion

Spanish Legion

The Spanish Legion , formerly Spanish Foreign Legion, is an elite unit of the Spanish Army and Spain's Rapid Reaction Force. Founded as the Tercio de Extranjeros , it was originally intended as a Spanish equivalent of the French Foreign Legion, but in practice it recruited almost exclusively...

along similar lines to the French Foreign Legion

French Foreign Legion

The French Foreign Legion is a unique military service wing of the French Army established in 1831. The foreign legion was exclusively created for foreign nationals willing to serve in the French Armed Forces...

to provide additional experienced forces. Spain also became the first country to deploy chemical weapons by air

Chemical weapons in the Rif War

During the Third Rif War in Spanish Morocco between 1921 and 1927, the Spanish Army of Africa dropped chemical warfare agents in an attempt to put down the Riffian Berber rebellion led by guerrilla leader Abd el-Krim....

, dropping mustard gas from aircraft.
The Spanish Civil War

Spanish Civil War

(1936-9) began after an attempted coup d'état
Coup d'état
A coup d'état state, literally: strike/blow of state)—also known as a coup, putsch, and overthrow—is the sudden, extrajudicial deposition of a government, usually by a small group of the existing state establishment—typically the military—to replace the deposed government with another body; either...

by parts of the Spanish Army

Spanish Army

against the government of the Second Spanish Republic

Second Spanish Republic

The Second Spanish Republic was the government of Spain between April 14 1931, and its destruction by a military rebellion, led by General Francisco Franco....

. The ensuing Civil War devastated Spain, ending with the victory of the rebels and the founding of a dictatorship

Dictatorship

A dictatorship is defined as an autocratic form of government in which the government is ruled by an individual, the dictator. It has three possible meanings:...

led by Generalissimo

Generalissimo

Generalissimo and Generalissimus are military ranks of the highest degree, superior to Field Marshal and other five-star ranks.-Usage:...

Francisco Franco

Francisco Franco y Bahamonde was a Spanish general, dictator and head of state of Spain from October 1936 , and de facto regent of the nominally restored Kingdom of Spain from 1947 until his death in November, 1975...

, the leader of the Nationalist army.

The civil war was marked by the extensive involvement of international units

Foreign involvement in the Spanish Civil War

The Spanish Civil War had large numbers of non-Spanish citizens participating in combat and advisory positions. Foreign governments contributed varying amounts of financial assistance and military aid to Nationalist forces led by Generalísimo Francisco Franco and those fighting on behalf of the...

. Many joined the Republic

Republic

an side under the banner of the International Brigades

International Brigades

The International Brigades were military units made up of volunteers from different countries, who traveled to Spain to defend the Second Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War between 1936 and 1939....

. The Nationalists enjoyed support from Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany

Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...

and Fascist Italy

Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)

The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...

, with several new technologies being trialled as a result. The Nationalist side conducted aerial bombing of cities

Aerial bombing of cities

A species of strategic bombing, the aerial bombing of cities began in 1915 during World War I, grew to a vast scale in World War II, and continues to the present day. The development of aerial bombardment marked an increased capacity of armed forces to deliver explosive weapons in populated areas...

in Republican territory, carried out mainly by the Luftwaffe

Luftwaffe

Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....

volunteers of the Condor Legion

Condor Legion

The Condor Legion was a unit composed of volunteers from the German Air Force and from the German Army which served with the Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War of July 1936 to March 1939. The Condor Legion developed methods of terror bombing which were used widely in the Second World War...

and the Italian air force

Regia Aeronautica

The Italian Royal Air Force was the name of the air force of the Kingdom of Italy. It was established as a service independent of the Royal Italian Army from 1923 until 1946...

volunteers of the Corpo Truppe Volontarie
Corpo Truppe Volontarie
The Corps of Volunteer Troops was an Italian expeditionary force which was sent to Spain to support General Francisco Franco and the Spanish Nationalist forces during the Spanish Civil War...

- the most notorious example of this tactic of terror bombings was the bombing of Guernica

Bombing of Guernica

The bombing of Guernica was an aerial attack on the Basque town of Guernica, Spain, causing widespread destruction and civilian deaths, during the Spanish Civil War...

. The first combat use of the Stuka
Junkers Ju 87
The Junkers Ju 87 or Stuka was a two-man German ground-attack aircraft...

occurred during the conflict. The civil war influenced European military thinking on the alleged supremacy of the bomber

Bomber

A bomber is a military aircraft designed to attack ground and sea targets, by dropping bombs on them, or – in recent years – by launching cruise missiles at them.-Classifications of bombers:...

. Armoured warfare

Armoured warfare

Armoured warfare or tank warfare is the use of armoured fighting vehicles in modern warfare. It is a major component of modern methods of war....

was also trialled by Nationalist supporters; German volunteers first used armor in live field conditions in the form of the Panzer Battalion 88, a force built around three companies of PzKpfw I tanks

Panzer I

The Panzer I was a light tank produced in Germany in the 1930s. The name is short for the German ' , abbreviated . The tank's official German ordnance inventory designation was SdKfz 101 .Design of the Panzer I began in 1932 and mass production in 1934...

that functioned as a training cadre for Nationalists. Weakened and politically still fragile, Spain remained neutral

Spain in World War II

The Spanish State under General Franco was officially non-belligerent during World War II. This status, although not recognised by international law, was intended to express the regime's sympathy and material support for the Axis Powers, to which Spain offered considerable material, economic, and...

during the Second World War (1939–45).

The Post-war period

In the post-war period, Spain was initially still heavily influenced by events in North Africa, particularly surrounding its colony of Western Sahara

Spanish Sahara

Spanish Sahara was the name used for the modern territory of Western Sahara when it was ruled as a territory by Spain between 1884 and 1975...

The first of these conflicts, the Ifni War

Ifni War

The Ifni War, sometimes called the Forgotten War in Spain , was a series of armed incursions into Spanish West Africa by Moroccan insurgents and Sahrawi rebels that began in October 1957 and culminated with the abortive siege of Sidi Ifni.The war, which may be seen as part of the general movement...

(1956-8) saw Spanish forces, including Spain's first paratroop unit, clash with the Moroccan Liberation Army, a Moroccan state backed insurgency movement. In 1958, a joint French-Spanish offensive, using massively superior European air power, crushed the revolt. In the 1970s, the rise of another insurgency movement, Polisario, resulted in the Western Sahara War

Western Sahara War

The Western Sahara War was an armed conflict primarily between the Polisario Front and Morocco, the conflict erupted after the withdrawal of Spain from the Spanish Sahara in accordance with the Madrid Accords by which it gave administrative control of the territory to Morocco and Mauritania...

(1973–1991), with Spain withdrawing from its colony in 1975 and transferring its support in the continuing conflict to Morocco.

From the 1950s onwards, however, Spain began to build increasingly close links with the U.S. armed forces. The Spanish Air Force

Spanish Air Force

-The early stages:Hot air balloons had been used with military purposes in Spain as far back as 1896. In 1905, with the help of Alfredo Kindelán, Leonardo Torres y Quevedo directed the construction of the first Spanish dirigible in the Army Military Aerostatics Service, created in 1896 and located...

received its first jets, such as the F-86 Sabre

F-86 Sabre

The North American F-86 Sabre was a transonic jet fighter aircraft. Produced by North American Aviation, the Sabre is best known as America's first swept wing fighter which could counter the similarly-winged Soviet MiG-15 in high speed dogfights over the skies of the Korean War...

and Lockheed T-33, from America, whilst the equipment of the Spanish military was again modernised in the 1970s to prepare for Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

's membership of NATO in 1982. Spain sent a small medical unit to the Vietnam War

Vietnam War

The Vietnam War was a Cold War-era military conflict that occurred in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. This war followed the First Indochina War and was fought between North Vietnam, supported by its communist allies, and the government of...

, with Spain lending airpower to the NATO efforts during the Bosnian War

Bosnian War

The Bosnian War or the War in Bosnia and Herzegovina was an international armed conflict that took place in Bosnia and Herzegovina between April 1992 and December 1995. The war involved several sides...

and the Kosovo War

Kosovo War

The term Kosovo War or Kosovo conflict was two sequential, and at times parallel, armed conflicts in Kosovo province, then part of FR Yugoslav Republic of Serbia; from early 1998 to 1999, there was an armed conflict initiated by the ethnic Albanian "Kosovo Liberation Army" , who sought independence...

. Most recently, Spain has participated in both the conflicts in Afghanistan

War in Afghanistan (2001–present)

The War in Afghanistan began on October 7, 2001, as the armed forces of the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, and the Afghan United Front launched Operation Enduring Freedom...

and Iraq.

Spanish military cultural legacy

Historically, the Spanish adapted a great deal of military terms from the Arabic of their Muslim rivals. Subsequently many Spanish military terms have been adopted in English

English language

and other languages.

Spanish term	Original language	Original meaning	Modern English term	Notes
alcaide	Arabic kaid Kaid A kaid or caïd was a title in the Norman kingdom of Sicily. It applied to palatine officials and members of the curia, usually to those who were Muslims or converts from Islam, often eunuchs, but sometimes to others...	master, leader		Medieval Spanish military commander or castellan Castellan A castellan was the governor or captain of a castle. The word stems from the Latin Castellanus, derived from castellum "castle". Also known as a constable.-Duties:... .
alcazaba Alcazaba An alcazaba , alcáçova or alcassaba is a Moorish fortification in Spain and Portugal. The word derives from the Arabic word القصبة , a walled-fortification in a city....	Arabic al-casbah	walled citadel Citadel A citadel is a fortress for protecting a town, sometimes incorporating a castle. The term derives from the same Latin root as the word "city", civis, meaning citizen....
alcázar Alcázar An alcázar , alcácer or alcàsser is a type of castle in Spain and Portugal. The term derives from the Arabic word القصر meaning "fort, castle or palace"; and the Arabic word is derived from the Latin word, 'castrum', meaning an army camp or fort...	Arabic al-qasr	castle Castle A castle is a type of fortified structure built in Europe and the Middle East during the Middle Ages by European nobility. Scholars debate the scope of the word castle, but usually consider it to be the private fortified residence of a lord or noble... or palace		Could refer to a residence, citadel, or hilltop fortress.
alférez Alférez Alférez is a junior officer rank also used in Spain, Argentina, Chile and Uruguay. The variant Alferes is used in Portugal and was formerly also used in Brazil. A naval variant, Frigate Alférez, is used in Spain, Dominican Republic and Peru. "Alférez" is often translated as ensign...	Arabic			Used in medieval Castile-León and Navarre to denote the standard-bearer and commander of the royal military household. In modern usage in Spain and Equatorial Guinea, a second lieutenant Second Lieutenant Second lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer military rank in many armed forces.- United Kingdom and Commonwealth :The rank second lieutenant was introduced throughout the British Army in 1871 to replace the rank of ensign , although it had long been used in the Royal Artillery, Royal... .
almirante	Arabic amir Emir Emir , meaning "commander", "general", or "prince"; also transliterated as Amir, Aamir or Ameer) is a title of high office, used throughout the Muslim world... -al-bahr	commander of the seas	admiral Admiral Admiral is the rank, or part of the name of the ranks, of the highest naval officers. It is usually considered a full admiral and above vice admiral and below admiral of the fleet . It is usually abbreviated to "Adm" or "ADM"...	Adopted in Latin Latin Latin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. It, along with most European languages, is a descendant of the ancient Proto-Indo-European language. Although it is considered a dead language, a number of scholars and members of the Christian clergy speak it fluently, and... isation (ammiratus) by the Siculo-Normans and later brought to Spain by the Catalans after Sicily became part of the Aragonese Crown.
armada Armada Armada is the Spanish and Portuguese word for naval fleet, or an adjective meaning 'armed'; Armáda is the Czech and Slovak for armed forces...	Spanish	armed (fem.), later navy, fleet	armada	Came into English usage after the defeat of the Great Armada in 1588.
caballero villano	Spanish	"commoner knight"		A villein who owned a horse and armour and owed cavalry service.
coronel	Spanish or Italian (colonnello), ultimately Latin (columnella)	diminutive of colonna/columna (column)	colonel Colonel Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...	Rank popularised by the tercios.
flotilla Flotilla A flotilla , or naval flotilla, is a formation of small warships that may be part of a larger fleet. A flotilla is usually composed of a homogeneous group of the same class of warship, such as frigates, destroyers, torpedo boats, submarines, gunboats, or minesweepers...	Diminutive of Spanish flota, from French flotte	(little) fleet	flotilla
granada	Spanish	pomegranate Pomegranate The pomegranate , Punica granatum, is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub or small tree growing between five and eight meters tall.Native to the area of modern day Iran, the pomegranate has been cultivated in the Caucasus since ancient times. From there it spread to Asian areas such as the Caucasus as...	grenade Grenade A grenade is a small explosive device that is projected a safe distance away by its user. Soldiers called grenadiers specialize in the use of grenades. The term hand grenade refers any grenade designed to be hand thrown. Grenade Launchers are firearms designed to fire explosive projectile grenades...
guerrilla	Spanish	diminutive of guerra (war)	guerrilla
Quinta Columna	Spanish	fifth column	Fifth Column Fifth Column Fifth Column was a Canadian all-women experimental post-punk band from Toronto, which came about during the early 1980s. They took the name Fifth Column after a military manoeuvre by Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War, in which nationalist insurrectionists within besieged Republican...	First used during the Spanish Civil War Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939... by Emilio Mola Emilio Mola Emilio Mola y Vidal, 1st Duke of Mola, Grandee of Spain was a Spanish Nationalist commander during the Spanish Civil War. He is best-known for having coined the term "fifth column".-Early life:... at the siege of Madrid in reference to his supporters within the city.
tercio Tercio The tercio was a Renaissance era military formation made up of a mixed infantry formation of about 3,000 pikemen, swordsmen and arquebusiers or musketeers in a mutually supportive formation. It was also sometimes referred to as the Spanish Square...	Spanish	third		Infantry unit developed by Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba Gonzalo Fernández de Córdoba known as The Great Captain, Duke of Terranova and Santangelo, Andria, Montalto and Sessa, also known as Gonzalo de Córdoba, Italian: Gonsalvo or Consalvo Ernandes di Cordova was a Spanish general fighting in the times of the Conquest of Granada and the Italian Wars... during the Italian Wars Italian Wars The Italian Wars, often referred to as the Great Italian Wars or the Great Wars of Italy and sometimes as the Habsburg–Valois Wars, were a series of conflicts from 1494 to 1559 that involved, at various times, most of the city-states of Italy, the Papal States, most of the major states of Western... .

The Classical period: the Rise of Rome

The collapse of Rome and barbarian invasions

Islamic conquest and Reconquista

Unification of Castile and Aragon

The conquest of the Americas and the beginnings of empire

The 16th and 17th centuries, Spain's 'Golden Age'

European rivalry in the 18th century

The Napoleonic Wars and the loss of the Americas

19th century Carlist Wars and the final days of empire

Early 20th century and the Civil War

The Post-war period

Spanish military cultural legacy

See also