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Most scholars of the subject also draw a dis-
tinction between terrorism and “guerrilla
warfare,” which is essentially an irregular
form of conventional warfare directed by
nonuniformed forces of opposition against
uniformed soldiers, police, and government
representatives. As its name (literally trans-
lated as “little war”) implies, guerrilla war-
fare has a particular place in Spanish history,
having been most famously employed dur-
ing the P ENINSULAR W AR of 1808-14, when
forces loyal to F ERDINAND VII attacked indi-
viduals and small groups supporting the
French-imposed regime of J OSEPH I. Such
combatants, properly called guerrilleros, are
commonly, though incorrectly, referred to
in English as “guerrillas.”
Terrorism, in its most commonly under-
stood form, was a particular tactic of Span-
ish anarchists during the late 19th and early
20th centuries in their effort to destabilize
and potentially bring down what they con-
sidered a corrupt and unjust sociopolitical
system. The widespread violence employed
by both sides in the S PANISH CIVIL WAR of
1936-39, for all its brutality, is not gener-
ally classified as terrorism but rather as an
extension of what often degenerated into
class warfare. Repressive tactics employed
by the regime of F RANCISCO F RANCO during
the period 1939-75 are sometimes consid-
ered to have been a form of state terrorism,
particularly by those who apply that term
to the fascist regimes of Adolf Hitler in Ger-
many and Benito Mussolini in Italy.
Beginning approximately in 1969
extreme nationalists in Spain's B ASQUE
PROVINCES began asserting their demands
for independence by attacking Spanish gov-
ernment officials, a process which (acciden-
tally or deliberately) often involved civilian
bystanders. By 1999 well over 800 deaths
and numerous injuries as well as serious
property damage had resulted from Basque
terrorism. In 2006 the principal terrorist
organization, known as ETA (Euskadi Ta
Askatasuna, or Basque Homeland and Lib-
erty) reached a temporary cease-fire agree-
ment with the Spanish government, which
it had continued to oppose, even after the
establishment of democracy in 1975 (see
B ASQUE NATIONALISM ) .
On March 11, 2004, bomb explosions in
M ADRID 's main railroad station and on sev-
eral suburban train lines killed nearly 200
passengers. The attacks were initially attrib-
uted by the authorities to ETA. When evi-
dence emerged that a new terrorist force had
appeared in the form of militant Islamists
(angered by Spain's support for the U.S. inva-
sion of Iraq) the government of Prime Minis-
ter J OSÉ M ARÍA A ZNAR was widely accused of
duplicity and defeated in the general election
scheduled for the same week. While ETA ter-
rorism would presumably remain a threat,
Spain would henceforth be confronted by a
new dimension of this phenomenon.
Tetuán, campaign of (1859)
The main formal military operation of the
Spanish army between 1814 and 1898, this
Moroccan campaign grew out of repeated
attacks by local militants along the borders
of Spanish enclaves in North Africa. Despite
agreements between the M ADRID govern-
ment and that of the sultans of M OROCCO
concluded during the 1840s, the central
authorities of the sultanate seemed incapa-
ble of restraining their subjects in the dis-
puted areas. By 1859 many in Spain believed
that antagonistic elements in Morocco were
secretly inciting the border incidents. A ris-
ing tide of indignation and patriotic fervor
 
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