Spain Moves Further Right
ALAN, RAY
DEMOCRATS DESPAIR AS Spain Moves Further Right BY RAY ALAN Madrid Normally, Spanish democrats are surprisingly optimistic people. Like the Jews who for two millennia said, "Next year in...
...Most agreed, thus insuring the Fuerza Nueva an income of at least $170,000 a year...
...In the '60s: "Franco is dying...
...Whenever possible, he attends the mass celebrated in a Madrid church every year "for the soul of Adolf Hitler, defender of Western civilization...
...Since they are liberating France, which surrendered to fascism, they can't possibly overlook our nation, which resisted for more than two years...
...Less hidebound ministers like Jose Maria Lopez de Letona (industry) and Lopez Bravo are carefully cultivating a reputation for orthodoxy...
...As he sees it, Spain's enemies are "both Marxism and capitalism...
...Since Spain attracts many German industrialists and investors, Foreign Minister Walter Scheel recently paid an official visit to Madrid...
...Yet today many Spanish democrats are gloomy...
...His friends include General Iniesta, General Garcia Rebull (Falangist captain-general of Madrid) and General Nogueras Marquez (the new captain-general of Catalonia...
...Like the Jews who for two millennia said, "Next year in Jerusalem," they have a touching faith in the future...
...Sir Alec Douglas-Home, Britain's Foreign Secretary and an old boy of the Chamberlain school, will gladly support Spain's European aspirations if the regime calls off its harrassment of Gibraltar...
...The Cabinet is planning to abolish the direct election of those members of the Cortes who represent heads of families (one-fifth of the total, the remainder being selected by official bodies...
...Afterward, 400 officers of the Guardia Civil sent Pinar messages of support...
...With the start of the '70s, the hoped-for panacea became "Europe...
...Right-wing ministers have squashed the government's plan for "associations" that would allow the expression of different points of view within the official Movimiento...
...Only drugs keep him going...
...Enlightened American opinion won't allow it...
...Two years ago, Pinar asked 1,000 "patriots" to contribute 1,000 pesetas a month for the establishment of "action groups" of "students, workers, and priests...
...Membership in the European Economic Community (EEC) is desirable if only for economic reasons: Germany and France are among Spain's most important trading partners, and now that Britain-a vital export market for Spanish wines and fruit-is to join, continued exclusion would be a disaster...
...The style setters in the Cabinet are ultraconservatives like Admiral Luis Carrero Blanco (vice-president), Alfredo Sanchez Bella (information), Antonio Maria Oriol y Urquijo (justice), and Gonzalo Fernandez de la Mora (public works and "doctrine...
...Pinar was the mentor of the officers who organized the "spontaneous" demonstrations of loyalty to Franco and the Army in December 1970...
...It publishes a polished weekly magazine and possesses a bustling modern headquarters in the center of Madrid...
...By Ray Alan, a regular NL contributor, is the author of Spanish Quest...
...Several have added that a new "Crusade" will be launched, if necessary, to rid Spain of dissidents...
...By next year the dictatorship will have collapsed...
...This post is widely regarded as more important than that of the chief of the general staff, presently occupied by the relatively liberal General Diez Alegria who, as his brother officers say, commands only orderlies and typists...
...An Andalusian newspaper editor picked up his office phone not long ago and heard himself speaking...
...Spanish democrats have, therefore, been among the keenest campaigners for EEC membership, confident that pressure from the Community will oblige the government that succeeds Franco to liberalize the regime...
...In the '50s: 'The United States can't go on supporting Franco...
...Franco personally appointed Pinar to the national council of the Movimiento and the Cortes...
...While it is tempting to laugh at such fears, official spokesmen from General Franco on down insist that the Army will insure the continuity of the regime...
...No fewer than 11 ministers braved a cold February breeze to attend General Iniesta's toma de posesion (taking-over ceremony...
...On the fringes of the regime, the Right-wing movement Fuerza Nueva has become increasingly active...
...He dismisses Picasso as "a Left-wing pornographer who has insulted our Chief of State" and says he understands the Right-wing students (believed to be his followers) who attacked art shops last winter and destroyed several Picasso etchings...
...He also led the main anti-British demonstration during Sir Alec's February visit to Madrid...
...Conceivably, French, German and British advocacy of the Spanish regime could overcome Belgian and Dutch objections...
...What would happen, they ask, if the bogy decided to go into business on its own account...
...The seesaw is firmly tilted to the Right...
...The secret police are taking a closer interest than ever in their movements and telephone calls...
...Many people, including some officials, are uneasy about the Fuerza Nueva...
...And another senior publicist of the regime said: "The alternative to the present government is not liberal democracy but an alliance between Bias Pinar and the Army...
...Although a few reforms-notably freedom of religion for Protestants-have been introduced to impress the EEC, most of the highly publicized "liberalization" measures have proved deceptive...
...A devout Catholic, he opposes religious freedom, describing it as the "freedom to propagate error...
...In the mid-1940s they used to say: "Next year the Allies will liberate Spain...
...this time he did not...
...Even a conservative Monarchist daily reported its apprehension of "a possible Saint Bartholomew's night...
...The government's control of TV and radio remains absolute, and restraints on the press have actually been tightened...
...Iniesta, the most intelligent Falangist general, will be one of Spain's most powerful men after Franco dies...
...we defeated them in 1939 but they have crept back, taking advantage of political and economic liberalization, the European movement and progressive trends in art and literature...
...Spain's index of political significance is as simple as that-and informed opinion was duly impressed...
...A few weeks ago several liberal artists and intellectuals found on their doors fluorescent yellow discs, the size of a penny, bearing a black cross...
...On his last trip here he received a delegation representing the democratic opposition...
...The police have never been tougher or more confident of the total backing of their officers...
...Within the EEC, France favors admitting Spain on near-racist grounds, hoping to offset somewhat the influence of the Community's new "Nordic" members...
...Lopez Bravo recently declared that external pressure to democratize Spain "would lead to results contrary to those hoped for...
...Even so, the tribunal that handles political offenses is overburdened and another one is being set up...
...One of the major political events of last winter was the appointment of General Carlos Iniesta Cano as director-general of the Guardia Civil, the leather-hatted, leather-skinned gendarmerie that has its own intelligence network and is represented in even the smallest village...
...Spanish democrats have their personal worries, too...
...Spanish Foreign Minister Gregorio Lopez Bravo, who considers Gibraltar a bore, is visiting London this month at Sir Alec's invitation to formalize a deal along these lines...
...Its critics are now being fined without trial-and jailed, also without trial, if they cannot afford to pay...
...One has the impression that the government considers the Fuerza Nueva a useful bogy for intimidating Spanish democrats and impressing the EEC with the dangers of keeping Spain out in the cold...
...Something had gone wrong with a police tape recorder, and it played back to him three of his conversations from the previous day...
...But Belgian, Dutch and German spokesmen have maintained from time to time that this country cannot be admitted so long as it remains a dictatorship...
...Sanchez Bella declared several months ago that "there are too many liberties in Spain," and the regime is pruning them...
...Six workers have been shot in demonstrations in a little over a year...
...A Right-wing Falangist who is as anti-American as he is anti-Communist, Iniesta advocates "iron discipline" and "severe execution of our laws," and castigates those who use "the absurd term 'civil war' to describe our glorious Crusade...
...Don Bias Pinar, a handsome spellbinder who is described by one of his many female admirers as "something like the archangel Michael," is its leader...
Vol. 55 • July 1972 • No. 14
