India Beats Back Portugal in Forgotten War

At dawn on Dec. 18, 1961, squadrons of Indian Air Force bombers crossed a border, bombed an airfield and a communications site. Paratroopers, tanks and artillery crossed that same border on the ground, intent on seizing territory. But the ground they invaded wasn’t Pakistani or Chinese. Rather, it nominally belonged to Portugal — and had for more than 400 years.

The Portuguese seized the province of Goa, along with the smaller enclave of Daman and the Island of Diu to the northwest, during the colonialism of the 1500s. Taking advantage of the weakness of the fragmented Indian states, Portugal not only grabbed these territories but held onto them in the subsequent wars between England and France for control of India.

Perhaps more surprisingly, the Portuguese retained that control throughout the period of the British Empire and the Raj.

 

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