THR

What is the general attitude in Spain towards Franco? I could easily believe that among the elderly population who can remember his era he might be considered as some kind of a strong leader under whose rule the crime-rate was lower and the society was very much simpler than it is now.

Having said that, in areas such as Catalonia and the Basque Country Franco will be disdained forever.

What about the younger generation? What are they taught about Franco?

steviedeluxe

Foreigners always have this quaint image about Catalonia. There's always been a strong ultra right wing element there (probably why there's also a strong anarchist and left wing element too). Look at this clip showing thousands welcoming Sr Bahamonde into Barna.

youtube clip

In reality Spain is umpteen times better off than even 30 years ago. Anyone who knew what the shanty towns on the edges of the cities were like, would be able to tell you.

Cuentame como paso is perhaps a good place to start (even if the main protaganists are very atypical of the Spanish at that time)

betris

yes a man who let hitler practice stuka dive bombing on the civilian population.the guardia who were like the gestapo.spys in every bar.you were frown in jail for speaking out againt him.maney were draged out of jail at random and shot.you were beaten up by the guardia for simple things like buying rice cheaper from the next village,and your rice frown on the floor.if you were told to stop and you didnt you got shot.yes no crime because a spy would tell.he ruled with a iron fist and people conformed because they lived in fear.

jjh

The Spanish Government is in the process, once again, of re-writing the history of Spain, the same way they did after the Moors centuries ago. In Barbarte, here on the Costa de la Luz, which was Franco´s favourite town, they are changing street names and eradicating his emblem on all public buildings in order to try and subliminate all connections with him

I was talking to a member of the military at a party last night and he was saying that Spain is ashamed of that part of its history because it pitted members of families against one another and because of that, it was a very difficult thing to forget.

We had quite a lenghty discussion about how nations have to get over these things. GB, for example, has a lot of historical facts that it should be ashamed of. Not quite the same thing because it isn´t in recent history, but I was talking to him about Henry 8th and about how his reign separated family from family, not through politics I admit, but through religion and in those days they couldn´t be separated. I didnt´get into the Cromwell thing because we then decided to forget about it and continued to have a good time.

betris

the worst about it.when he overthrew a democratic goverment.becuse the minerals like say from the rio tino mines that were british owned.england put a blockade on spain so no food or arms could get get to the people, who were fighting to retain democracy and persuaded other countrys to do the same.so the dictator faschist was helped by the british and hitler to murder the masses who opposed him.even most of the british brigade who came and gave there lives.but the minerals were still getting out as normal.but thats politics for you.

Huevos

Well that's a pretty simple trick to achieve when you have a Ministry of Information (A.K.A. Ministry of Censorship).

Jules Europe

This is certainly true and also a complete disgrace but it is worth bearing in mind the reasons why England along with others put this blockade on Spain. The main reason was to stop what they saw as a far bigger threat. The threat to Europe of the far left of which we talking about Stalinist Russia.

You have to remember at this time Britain like most of Europe saw both Mussolini and Hitler as two very dangerous men and were under the impression that they could be controlled. They also thought that these leaders could also be used to confront what they saw as the growing red terror. This was seen as the real threat at the time and not the rise of the far right.

Now history has shown what a dangerous game they were playing and hepled lead to WW2.

coralsoft

Indeed, the last statue in Madrid of Franco was removed in the middle of the night with little warning a couple of years ago. Previous attempts had generated opposition.

Road names are changed for the sake of it, confusing locals, visitors and tourists.

It's ridiculous that they cannot accept what happened, leaving history and the environment alone. No-one should care what a road is named but changing it is a nuisance. Leaving the name in place is not glorifying or approving what happened but is, if anything, an opportunity to explain.

They're quite happy to parade people who committed equal atrocities as heroes under rewritten histories, whilst many forget that it was Franco's regime that may have facilitated eventual Allied success around the Med by staying out of the war and keeping the Straits open to Allied shipping.

Justlookin

This is yet another example of how a true statement can be slanted to give an entirely different version of history.

Without looking at motive we distort what happened.

Did they really stay out of the war to help the allies?

Relampago

In my opinion, it is sad that Franco was not judged as criminal of war, and later executed. Opinions, there is of all type. A lot of people, like my parents, they lived very well during his command, but I believe that it is because in the second half of his command people lived better than when the dictatorship began. I don't believe that the dictatorship has been good, when many Spaniards emigrated. Also, has been an delay of almost 40 years in relation to Europe. Although I didn't live that period like an adult, I was a baby

We can give " thanks " to United States and Europe that ignored Spain during decades. Franco made what wanted, killing many Spaniards, and at the end, he died in his bed, while United States and Europe ignored us

I say this, because some say that the democracy in Europe is thanks to United States...Whaaaaatttt? But it won't be in the case of Spain, of course. Also, here nor Marshall Plan. We don't receive any help. We don't owe nothing to nobody. Our democracy and our development is merit of us

Jules Europe

Well said, Spain possibly only stayed out of the war due to the ravages of their own civil war. But even then had they been involved on the side of the Axis powers, the Med situation wouldn`t have been that bad given the dominance of both allied sea and air power. Remember the Italian Med fleet was effectively destroyed at the battle of Taranto.

Jules Europe

You are quite right, and democracy in Western Europe was largely thanks to the USA. But in the case of both Spain and Portugal they had to forge their own democracy without outside help and this took years of hard work.

jackytoo

Karma for a bit of common sense

Huevos

Well the US did help Spain quite a lot. 1953 the majority of sanctions against the country were lifted in return for 3 air bases and 12,000 military personal being located on the peninsula. As for for the switch to democracy, after ETA dispatched Carrero Blanco, there wasn't anyone strong enough left to step into Franco's shoes and maintain the dictatorship.

Jules Europe

The USA only helped Spain for military reasons and you yourself have put this above, of course there would have been some related infusion of money as well becuase it was good business for the USA. There only interest was to increase their military prescence in Europe at this time and bases in Spain was a good strategic move for them.

As for Carrero Blanco there is a good chance that he may anyway of gradually led Spain to a some sort of democracy but that is something nobody will know for sure.