hm, in researching the estado novo for my own TL (if interested see Lusophone in signature) I was intrigued by the 1965-1974 period where Caetano had brought in several major enhancements to both the social and economic environment of the country. He had even loosened some of the political controls that had existed under Salazar allowing for several more moderate opposition figures such as Sa Carneiro to emerge. Still there were those within the National Union Party who were more conservative and wanted them stopped or reversed. Those who say the they accepted their fate are oversimplifying it. There was a lot of sides to this.
For the Estado Novo to of been capable of lasting another decade or more the government would of needed to of been more hardline in their dealing with the rumbling and discontent of the military and the aborted uprising in 1972. If the government had punished the munity instead of sending them to their barracks and followed up with a more thorough 'cleaning' of the military officers it might of had a better chance of lasting longer.
As Joao97 and others have mentioned the POD to continue the Estado Novo would of been much sooner. Even a 1950-1960 reforms and modernization (Salazar dying or being incapacitated) could allowed someone like Caetano to emerged that liberalized the economy and modernized the country. What China and even Vietnam has shown us is that people are not completely against Dictatorship. If it can provide economic and security plus modernize the country it could of continued. The huge problem was the colonial war and its drain on both government expenditure and loss of lives.
So in summary with a POD of 1972 onward Estado Novo could of continued on for another 5-10 years but surveillance and security becomes even more oppressive. Spain going democratic would of been another problem.
Hum... I hadn't thought of Portugal going right-wing North Korea for the rest of deace. It is an interesting one indeed, and it may very well be possible if the crack down of political dissent is
really hard.
But there are some feasibility issues. Military purges get harder to execute the further you go down the ranks. While you only have a handful of generals in your country and that makes it rather easy to eliminate all of those who are anti-government, it's unlikely you could do the exact same thing with
all anti-government majors and captains. And since the 1974 revolutionaries came all from the lower ranks, I think it would be rather difficult to keep something like this from happening.
That said, I do think that, with several rounds of purging, violent crackdown of two or so major uprisings and spreading fear among the populace, it should be possible to stabilize the situation in the mainland.
The colonies are a different story, though. I'm pretty sure that the Portuguese forces stationed in Angola, Mozambique and Guinea-Bissau were by far the most embittered against the government (they obviously had the most reasons to be). A lot of revolting officers in 1974 came from their. I very much doubt the efficacy of any purge conducted in the colonies.
Could we maybe see a coup (by Portuguese forces) against the Estado Novo happening in Luanda instead of Lisbon ITTL?
