Causes of the '98 DISASTER

After centuries of a huge debacle in all areas, in 1898 the so-called disaster of '98 took place, being the end point of Spanish power over the American colonies, being the end of a long period of colonial independence in the American zone.

The loss of Cuba, the Philippines and Puerto Rico It was the final blow to a Spain in crisis that could never again be a power, and to talk about the reasons that caused this we must talk about the causes of the 98 disaster.

The disaster of '98 is the way in which one of the worst moments in Spain is called, when the loss of colonial territories next to a hard economic, political and social crisis brought a debacle in every possible sense of Spanish society, being for many the turning point that made Spain stop being a great world power.

We could say that, although the date used to refer to this situation is 98, this only started a long period of crisis that would continue for years, being a clear example that from 98 to 23 there were 32 different government presidents in Spain.

The disaster of 98 especially affected the system of The Restorationn, being the political form started with the Constitution of 1876 and which was maintained practically until the Second Republic. The system faltered due to the crisis of 98, causing the growth of nationalisms and especially in Catalonia, the Basque Country and Galicia, labor movements that welcomed the growth of worker power in the rest of Europe, and continued protests over the government.

The disaster of 98 affected all aspects of an already wounded Spain, causing great changes in a short period of time.

The disaster of 98 was the result of numerous events that ended up causing a crisis in all aspects of the Spanish nation, and therefore it is very important to understand the enormous number of causes that led to this disaster. The main causes of the disaster of 98 were the following:

• The Cánovas government He considered that the situation in Spain was very precarious, so he had to flee from any possible confrontation with another country, pursuing a very slow and calm foreign policy.
• The crisis in Spain also encompassed the political issue, changing leaders a lot and not counting on great figures in this area, causing the Spanish political class to commit many failures in management.
• The economic interests of the United States with Cuba, being a very close region and on which they thought they could get a lot of benefit, causing the Americans will increase the tension between Cubans and Spaniards so that the former will become independent and will become from them.
• The 10 years war and the little war had caused enormous tension between the colony and the metropolis, increasing the number of supporters of forced independence.
• Confrontation between political centralism and birth of nationalisms in different European regions, causing strong confrontations and several revolts in the regions with greater economic power.
• Spain Division in the defenders of Catholicism and what they considered that the state should become secular.
• Rise of the military in the main positions of power, causing politics and war to be more and more united and the solution to many problems was war.
• Spain had not participated in the colonial distribution or in the main international markets, so many European powers thought that his weakness it could be exploited to steal colonies.

To conclude this lesson on the causes of the disaster of 98 we must talk about the main of these causes, the Cuban war of independence that brought the loss of Cuba as a colony and therefore it was the final blow to the so-called disaster of 98.

The Cuban War of Independence it was an armed conflict that took place between 1895 and 1898 facing Spain and Cuba, being aided by the military force of the United States. What at first seemed like another conflict between Spain and one of her colonies, changed over the months, due to the more numerous troops on the Cuban island and in the uprising of other colonies such as Puerto Rico or the Philippines.

In the middle of 1898 and, after years of struggle, Spain surrendered and surrendered its three colonies, because these had already been taken by the United States, in what the Americans said was a fight for freedom. With this, Spain lost its last colonies, causing the idea of ​​the great Spanish Empire to disappear forever and a crisis that was called the disaster of 98 arose.