Why Portuguese America is just one huge country and Spanish America is a fractal made up of many nations?

Very few people know why Portuguese America is only one huge country and why ("whereas" may be better than "and why" - I will explain below) Spanish America is a fractal made up of several nations.

The independence of Spanish America  started to be independent began at the time of the Napoleonic wars. Napoleon invaded Spain and took control over it. Spanish control over its parts of territory in America became weak, which facilitated their indepency independence. On the other hand, when Napoleon invaded Portugal, D. Joao VI fled to Brazil in order to avoid being captured and ruled the Portuguese Empire from there here. He was the first monarch to put his feet set foot on the Americas. With Because of his presence, Brazilian territory was kept almost intact. 

D. João VI left Brazil in 1818 with his son, D. Pedro, which who later (1822) proclaimed our independency independence from Portugal (we had an indepency war a War of Independence too, just like USA). USA was the first country to recognise our independency independence in 1825 after our first constitution was estabilished.

I haven't seen "a fractal" used like this - usually it is for maths or art. I have suggested "made up of" but I don't know if that is what you meant :)

"Started" makes sense, but I think "began" is better - a bit more formal.

I think you have said "here" because you are in Brazil, but the reader has just heard that the king has left for Brazil so he should rule from "there" - I hope this makes sense.

"set foot" is the expression we use eg His mother said, "I do not want you to set foot inside this house ever again" :(

"With" is OK, but if you use "because of" it implies that it was due to the fact that he was there so it may be a better choice for you here. "With" can also indicate this but it is less clear.

Now I will try and explain the difference between "and why" and "whereas" :

"Whereas" is "used to make a statement that describes how two people, groups, etc., are different," which is what I think you are doing. ie we use it when we are comparing things.

eg "I want to tell you why he is so short WHEREAS his twin is so tall."

versus "I want to tell you why he is so short AND WHY I like chocolate."

In the second sentence, the two ideas are not connected at all and I am not making comparisons. I just want to explain two things to you. In the first sentence I am comparing the height of the twins.

In your entry, you are comparing Portuguese America and Spanish America "about the same thing", not just telling us two different things about them eg "I want to tell you why there are no elephants in Portuguese America AND WHY they eat paella in Spanish America" These two statements have nothing to so with each other so we would use "and why".


I hope I haven't confused you; your english is very good and I don't mean to be picky; I just imagine that you are looking to learn these sorts of nuances. My apologies if not :)