The new country soon amassed a great amount of debt and after seventeen years of independence, President Pedro Santana asked Spain to make Santo Domingo a Spanish colony again. Spain agreed and Santo Domingo returned as a colony in 1863. This action was supported by the cattlemen of the south while the northern elites opposed it. As soon as Spain regained the colony, a guerrilla war broke out known as the Dominican Restoration War where rebels fought against Spanish forces to regain independence from Spain. The rebels burned and looted property and raped and murdered Spaniards; the Spanish shot or hung those they suspected of being or helping the rebels. In most areas the fighting involved blocking roads and access to rivers, avoiding open spaces, and hand-to-hand combat; in larger towns, the rebels devised trenches to face off with regiments of as many as 5,000 soldiers, led by Spanish and Dominican generals alike. The rebels employed scorched-earth tactics, burning Santiago and Puerto Plata to the ground. The damage to Santiago and Puerto Plata was estimated at $5,000,000.