How did Cuba gain independence from Spain?

After decades of rebellion that drained Spain, the United States intervened in 1898. Spain lost the Spanish-American War and gave up Cuba in the Treaty of Paris in December 1898. Cuba became formally independent in 1902.

Who paid for France's war in Vietnam?

By the last years of the First Indochina War, the United States was paying a large share of France's costs. France was defeated at Dien Bien Phu in May 1954 and agreed to leave at the Geneva Conference that year.

Saved because the empire could not pay.

Q: When did Ireland become independent from Britain?

The Anglo-Irish Treaty of 6 December 1921 created the Irish Free State, which came into being in December 1922.

Empires rarely lose because they run out of soldiers. More often they run out of money, and then out of patience. Three countries that won their freedom against empires that could no longer afford to keep them.

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Cuba and a bankrupt Spain

Cuba was one of the last pieces of Spain's American empire, and it fought hard to leave. The Ten Years' War of 1868 to 1878 failed but cost Spain dearly. A new war of independence began in 1895, and Spain poured in some 200,000 soldiers and enormous sums it did not have.

By 1898 Spain was exhausted, and the United States entered the war. The Spanish-American War lasted a few months. In the Treaty of Paris that December, Spain gave up Cuba, and Cuba became formally independent in 1902, though for decades under heavy American influence.

Ireland and a tired Britain

The Irish War of Independence began in 1919. Britain was still paying for the First World War, and fighting a guerrilla war in Ireland was costly in money, in lives and in public opinion at home and abroad. A truce came in July 1921.

The Anglo-Irish Treaty, signed on 6 December 1921, created the Irish Free State, which came into being a year later. Six counties in the north stayed in the United Kingdom as Northern Ireland, and the treaty itself led to a bitter civil war in Ireland.

Vietnam and a France paid for by others

France went back to war in Indochina in 1946, against the Viet Minh. The war dragged on for eight years in the jungle and mountains. It became so expensive that by its last years the United States was covering a large share of the bill.

In May 1954 the French garrison at Dien Bien Phu fell. At the Geneva Conference that summer, France agreed to leave, and Vietnam was divided at the 17th parallel, which set the stage for the next war.

Money is never the whole story

In all three cases, people fought and died for independence, and politics, pressure from other powers and public opinion mattered as much as budgets. But in each one, the empire had reached the point where holding on cost more than it was willing to pay.

1868–1878 Cuba's Ten Years' War
1898 Spanish-American War; Spain gives up Cuba
6 December 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty
7 May 1954 Dien Bien Phu falls
July 1954 Geneva Accords: France leaves Indochina

Sources

The Spanish-American War, 1898, US Department of State, Office of the Historian
Anglo-Irish Treaty, Wikipedia
Dien Bien Phu & the Fall of French Indochina, 1954, Office of the Historian