Decolonization of the Americas was during the official Mexican-American War from 1846 to 1848. In 1898, in the Greater Antilles, the United States won the Spanish–American War and occupied Cuba and Puerto Rico, ending Spanish territorial control in the Americas. Unlike the Spanish, the Portuguese did not divide their colonial territory in the Americas. The captaincies they created were subdued to a centralized administration in Salvador which reported directly to the Crown in Lisbon. Therefore, it is not common to refer to "Portuguese America" (like Spanish America, Dutch America, etc.), but rather to Brazil, as a unified colony since its very beginnings. As a
The empire on which the sun never sets and vast territories in the Americas. The phrase gained added resonance during the reign of Charles's son, Philip II of Spain, when the Philippines and several other island chains in the Pacific were obtained by Spain. When King Henry of Portugal died, Philip II pressed his claim to the Portuguese throne and was recognised as Philip I of Portugal in 1581. He then reigned over all his father's possessions in Europe, Africa and the Americas (except the Holy Roman Empire) and Asia and the Portuguese Empire, which itself included territories in the Americas, in the North and the Sub-Saharan Africa,