The Dutch–Portuguese War (; ) was a global armed conflict involving Dutch forces, in the form of the Dutch East India Company and the Dutch West India Company, as well as their allies against the Iberian Union, and after 1640, the Portuguese Empire. Beginning in 1602, the conflict primarily involved the Dutch companies invading Portuguese colonies in the Americas, Africa, and the East Indies. The war can be thought of as an extension of the Eighty Years' War being fought in Europe at the time between Spain and the Netherlands, as Portugal was in a dynastic union with the Spanish Crown after the War of the Portuguese Succession, for most of the conflict. However, the conflict had little to do with the war in Europe and served mainly as a way for the Dutch to gain an overseas empire and control trade at the cost of the Portuguese. English forces also assisted the Dutch at certain points in the war (though in later decades, English and Dutch would become fierce rivals). Because of the commodity at the center of the conflict, this war would be nicknamed the Spice War. The outcome was that Portugal successfully repelled Dutch attempts to secure Brazil and Angola while the Dutch were the victors in the Cape of Good Hope and the East Indies, with the exception of Macau which the Portuguese retained, capturing Malacca, Ceylon, the Malabar Coast, and the Moluccas. English ambitions also greatly benefited from the long-standing war between their two main rivals in the Far East (beginning in the late 18th to early 19th century Malacca, Ceylon, and Malabar would become British possessions). Portuguese resentment at Spain, which was perceived as having prioritized its own colonies and neglected the defense of the Portuguese ones, was a major contributing factor to Portugal shaking off Spanish rule in the Portuguese Restoration War, conducted simultaneously with the later stages of the war with the Dutch. Introduction The war lasted from 1602 to 1663, and the main participants were the Kingdom of Portugal and the Republic of the Seven United Provinces. Following the 1580 Iberian Union, Portugal was throughout most of the period under Habsburg rule, and the Habsburg Philip II of Spain was battling the Dutch Revolt. Prior to the union of the Portuguese and Spanish Crowns, Portuguese merchants used the Low Countries as a base for the sale of their spices in northern