1939 – Festival of Sarrià.
Francisco Franco is not commonly talked about when discussing Europe's fascist and nationalistic past. Although a contentious area of debate for those on the Iberian Peninsula, Franco is not talked about enough when Europe's fascist history is brought up in the rest of the world. He gets overshadowed by Italy and Germany's troubled past, even though he ruled Spain for nearly 36 years through the most violent measures. Franco took power in 1939 after a nearly three year civil war (1936-1939) that claimed 500,000 lives, and is often referred to as the prelude to World War ll. His success in the war came in large part from the support of Hitler and Mussolini against his leftist enemies in the Second Spanish Republic. So who is Franco, and how did he rule Spain for so long?
Born in 1892, Franco found his place in the military. He quickly rose through the ranks and became a well respected general in the Spanish Army and the youngest general in all of Europe at the time. This was achieved through putting down Colonial Moroccan rebels in the Rif War, as he was known as an Africanista ,or soldiers who fought in the African colonies and had actual military experience and merit rather than aristocratic prestige. He did not start the Spanish Civil war, and neither was he deeply embedded with the parties that started it. After the death of two leading generals he found himself at the front of the nationalist cause and he managed the position with his utmost ability as there was an onslaught of success in the civil war under his command and violent suppression. What was key in his success in the war was his aligning with Hitler and Mussolini, he received ten of thousands of soldiers from the fascist leaders and access to high end technology. One of the most memorable inflictions from foreign support was the bombing of Guernica (1937) by the German Condor Legion.
It had devastating effects in flattening the city and was fundamental in capturing the north-eastern region of the Basque country. This was the first time air power was used to bomb civilian infrastructure in history. It aided Germans in developing their iconic "BlitzKrieg" tactic that was used to take over Poland and France with speed.
This was only the start of Franco's brutalities, towards the end of the war and well after it he continued his white terror campaign. He made anyone who associated or sympathized with the Second Republic an enemy of the state to be eliminated. Franco used the Falange (ultra-fascist militant groups) as the strong arm to brutalize his enemies. They formed firing squads executing as many people as they could and they clamped down on women. Franco was a deeply religious man and he aligned himself with the Catholic Church and its most radical supporters; the Republicans and leftists gave women a lot more rights and privileges that undermined the church. The women who used these rights were labeled as "red women'' and faced an onslaught of ruthless punishments. When a city was captured, these women were branded on their breast and forced to take laxatives to march around the city naked while defecating themselves.
After the Civil War, Franco set up large military show trails that charged groups as large as 60 people at once. Nearly every single person who was brought to the trials were charged and punished with the worst kinds of treatment, after the civil war 50,000 people were executed. If not executed, an arguably worse fate was faced. Nearly 1 million people were prisoned in overcrowded camps and a portion were even sent to concentration camps in Germany. In some small regions and towns nearly 50% of the male population was brought to trial. These prisoners were practically used as slave labor to build up Spanish infrastructure and were sold and rented out to corporations to work their factories. Franco even made them build the iconic Valley of the Fallen for the atonement of Spain's sins; in which he would be later buried.
To this day Francisco Franco is contentious in Spanish politics and as a global figure for conservative movements. Its important to look at Spain's past in order to not get a clouded view of conservative authoritative leaders. To this day mass graves and torture sites still get uncovered, raising the death toll of his terror. After his death, his cabinet and the new government made sure to destroy all the evidence they could, and avoid talking about Franco in order to preserve a level of stability in the country. This has caused people to forget a lot of atrocities of something that still plagues the country to this day. In 2015, Aqualand (a waterpark) in Malaga was discovered to be an old concentration camp where prisoners were executed. There was even evidence to suggest that the prisoners there were used to additionally build the Malaga Airport. As the far right rises in Spain and through-out Europe it's a crucial time to look into the atrocities that unchecked power can create.
Sources Used:
Gómez, Alberto. “Historian Finds Documents That Confirm There Was a Concentration Camp in Torremolinos.” Sur in English, Sur in English, 18 May 2018, www.surinenglish.com/local/201805/18/historian-finds-documents-that-20180518094446-v.html.
McGann Paul, Host, "Franco Part 4: The Cold War and the President", Real Dictators Podcast, Spotify, June 2021, https://www.noiser.com/realdictators/episodes.
Preston, Paul. The Spanish Civil War: Reaction, Revolution and Revenge. William Collins, 2016.
Ried, Micheal. “Franco’s Ghost Fails to Scare Spain Away from the Hard Right.” Financial Times, 14 July 2023, www.ft.com/content/aab5e65f-9b15-47bb-b7fc-1c362cb03f66.
Todd, Allan, et al. European States in the Interwar Years (1918-1939). 2nd ed., Cambridge University Press, 2016.
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