Portugal was the most successful imperial power

- My response: You cannot pick and choose what elements determine whether a country was the most "Succesful Imperial power". Imperialism by definition, states:im"pe"ri"al"ism noun \im-G2;pir-ē-ə-G6;li-zəm\: a policy or practice by which a country increases its power by gaining control over other areas of the worldThe official definition of the word says "increases its power" yet you are trying to change the definition of the word Imperialism by saying that the greatest imperial power SHOULDNT be judge by power, despite the fact that power is by definition, what Imperialism is all about.I have a lot of problems with what your saying. Mainly, because I already posted a definition of imperialism, and its from Merriam Webster and Oxford dictionary. That one sounds made up, or if it is a real definiiton, it is from a less prestigious site.So, lets stick with my above definition. "A policy of extending one's country over anothers borders through military and economic control" Your definition simply can not work. Imperialism was for practical purposes, and not always power. And reading ahead, it appears all your arguments are based off this weak definition. And is "power" really that subjective? Is their power in having your citizens live a wealthy lifestyle? Is there power in achiving your goals without war? I think there is, and this power should be recognized over subjective military strength.And if you do want to argue this based on sujective military strength, then even you must recognize Portugal's naval prowess. Portugal has historically maintained one of the largest trade and military fleets in the world. And I also checked the definition you placed at the bottom of the round. You lied, as the merriam webster definition fit mine, and had no mention of the definition you posted. I ask the audience to remember this when marking conduct. With that being said, I will now prove to the audience that Portugal was no where near the "most succesful Imperial power":This weakens your case immensly. I already put a map up showing this, but this one actually shows their anachroatic territory.I actually feel quite stupid for forgetting this. Portugal, throughout history, has maintained the largest anachronistic territory in the world. An anarchroistic territory, is a ocean boundary extended to ones emipire. In that map, it shows that Portugal had full naval dominance over three oceans, and to this day, still maintains a third of that anarchous territory... In this picture, ONLY the red is what Portugal owned over their reign from 1415-1999. The audience should know that the Portuguese NEVER owned any where near this amount of territory at any one time. This is only the combination of all the land (red) they owned over their entire existenceActually, this is a blatant lie. Portugal owned almost every one of those territories all the way to the 1800's, and even then, there trading posts never left the country. By the very nature of this argument, you are now required to show me what nations they lost when, because I can assure you that most of these were retained at once for about 400 years. Even in the own maps you've posted, mainly the scramble for Africa one, Portugal was being dominated by France and Great BritainWere they really though? Can France really count Algeria as a valuable possesion? Or Britain can count anything but South Africa valuable?The truth of the matter is, that these lands were grabbed for prestigious purposes only. The actual costs of maintaining them only offset there presense. Furthermore, Britain and France often actually had to tax citizens immensely higher in order to sustain their presense. Now, as I provided earlier, actual success is what the Portugese did. Keep their citizens happy and their colonies strained. How is that failure? [1] And this reminds me about the Treaty of Tordesillas, which you posted at the very beginning of your side of the debate. Sure, they signed a treaty. But that didn't last long, and lost almost all of that land within a short period of time. If Portugal was the greatest Imperial Power of all time, then how come they only had two relatively small pieces of land in Africa and a few small islands by the 1700-1800's?Now let me once again put this into perspective. 400 years of territorial dominance is not exactly a short period of time. And through the 1700's and 1800's, Guinea was the most valuable gold depot, Angola for slaves, Java for Spices, Goa for Spices, Sao Tome for Shippping, Brazil for Coffee, Macau for silk, and Japan for cotton. Portugal litterally had one of the most diverse and stabilized economic complexities. Which made the country immensly wealthy, happy, and prestigious. That is success. What Britain and France did was a show of who had the longer Dck.[2] Portugal was simply not a threatening Imperial Power, and no where near the most succesful. France, Great Britain, and Spain all had stronger militaries, acquired more land, and held it for a longer period of time than Portugal did. Portugal got dominated in the Napoleonic Wars as well, in which many Latin American colonies previously owned by Portugal gained independence. In 1822, Brazil, formerly under Portugal control, also gained indepence as a result of the war.Once again, I have caught you spreading false information. Audience, please note, that Brazil never had a war for independence. The emperor of Brazil,Dom Pedro, was also a member of the Portugese royal family. His father told him to declare independence, if constitutionalists decided to attack Libson, so then at least Brazil could remain safe. He followed this advice, annd declared independence, without any bloodshed. He then let Portugese traders in, and they monopolized every trade route out of Brazil, back to their own country. [3] Now audience, I misread my own character limit, so I must conclude here. Thanks for reading audience, and I hope you can vote for what was truly the most successful. Thanks for the debate Con, good luck.[1] http://memory.loc.gov...;[2] http://www.duyfken.com...;[3] http://www.brazil.org.za...