HISTORICAL DICTIONARY A–Z - Spain and Portugal: A Reference Guide from the Renaissance to the Present - page 197

apparatus that caused the death, torture,
or imprisonment of thousands. By creating
the “Spanish State” with himself as El Cau-
dillo (the Leader), he reduced the monar-
chists, conservative Catholics, and even
the army from the status of wartime part-
ners to that of supporting players. The
F ALANGE E SPAÑOLA , a right-wing party that
he had selected as his political instrument,
became the nucleus of the National Move-
ment that supplanted all other parties.
Chauvinistic rhetoric and historical distor-
tions formed an official doctrine of Span-
ishness that justified the total elimination
of regional autonomy.
Having received substantial military and
financial assistance from Germany and Italy
during the civil war, Franco was expected
to return the favors during their conflict
with the Allies. Despite much oratory and
diplomatic maneuvering, however, Franco
preserved his country's neutrality and
enhanced his reputation for cunning and
obfuscation. Adolf Hitler declared he would
rather have three or four teeth pulled than
go through any more negotiations with the
El Caudillo. The Spanish “volunteers” who
were sent to take part in the great anti-Bol-
shevik assault on Soviet communism were
withdrawn as soon as Russia began to drive
the Germans back. A few years of ostracism
by the victors added to the economic stress
that Spain was already enduring but per-
mitted Franco to consolidate his grip on the
country while awaiting the opportunities
that the cold war would soon bring.
Between 1950 and 1965 Franco gradu-
ally led Spain out of international isolation
and into a situation that permitted both the
easing of its economic woes and the relax-
ation of its domestic despotism. After per-
suading Washington that he was a natural

ally in the confrontation with Moscow, he
secured the establishment of U.S. bases in
his territory, with all the financial benefits
and personal prestige this guaranteed. By
1955 he had gained admission to the United
Nations, despite the antagonism of govern-
ments that found the Franco of the 1950s
just as odious as the militarist of the 1930s
and the tyrant of the 1940s.
For all his authoritarian methods Franco
had never fully embraced the fascist doc-
trines of his ertstwhile friends. His ideology,
if it could be so designated, was a mixture
of Catholicism and Spanish nationalism
with historical fantasy and personal ego-
tism. After borrowing the Nazi concept of
autarky (economic self-sufficiency) and
nearly wrecking Spain with its heedless
application during the 1940s, he reverted to
the pragmatism that had come to his rescue
during earlier crises in his career. In the late
1950s Spain began to experience the stimu-
lus of foreign investment conjoined with
the remissions sent home by millions of
Spaniards working abroad. Commentators
spoke of an economic “boom,” and M ADRID
took on an unaccustomed air of prosperity.
“Moderate” voices began to be heard in the
Councils of State recommending a relax-
ation of the dictatorship. Franco played
these advisers off against the hard-liners
while preserving the ultimate power for
himself. At the same time he began arrang-
ing for a succession that would preserve his
vision of Spain once he was gone.
During the last 10 years of his rule,
Franco permitted an increasing amount of
“reform” that led to greater freedom in the
daily routines of Spanish life without
abandoning the essentially undemocratic
character of the Spanish state. He gave
growing prominence to Prince J UAN C ARLOS