Earlier quoted context omitted.
From Spain's perspective that's a distinction without a difference. If sometime in the past 300 years the British government had formally incorporated Gibraltar into the UK the way Hawaii is a part of the US or French Guiana is part of France, would Spain's complaints about British sovereignty over Gibraltar, and periodic attempts to regain the territory, be any less frequent? I think not.
As long as we are talking (de)colonization, the distinction makes all the difference. The difference in the treatment of a land and its people as equals to the rest of the country's citizens and states is what makes Hawaiians regular Americans and Ceuties regular Spaniards, and what keeps Llanitos from being British _citizens_. To answer your question: yeah, if Gibraltar was a self-sufficient state within the UK (ins…
https://www.gibraltar.gov.gi/press-releases/gibraltar-retain...