The reason why I believe Spain is so divided on this and somewhat "meh" on Franco is because Franco's regime never "fell" (Franco went his whole time without even a significant effective opposition. His regime persisted unmolested and just became "life" in Spain. Not even the defeat of the Axis so much as rocked them a little.), it just faded like smoke due to Juan Carlos (who was supposed to keep it going) hitting the Off switch, and even that didnt lead to massive bloodshed. Government just faded from one to the other. Not without bitter resentment and recriminations that they are still just working out in a weird "silence" compared to anything in the U.S.. People by and large just felt that THAT HAPPENED, it wasn't fair or democratic, but it "kept things stable", but we are glad to move on.
The whole idea of the democratic transition was to destroy the regime from the inside, turn Spain into an European democratic country and avoid as much blood as possible. In order to do that it was neccesary that both sides decide get on board, that meant that all the crimes of the Civil War and dictatorship were to be forgotten
Thank you for your comment - I agree with this sentiment; that Franco's regime just kind of faded away without bloodshed, and as such, it's not really a portion of Spanish history that is characterised as a 'rupture' that needs to be confronted, more just a natural transition that people accept and don't really question. Another note though on the last bit, that many Spaniards are glad to have moved on - one of the major regrets I have with this video is being quite one sided on the 'Pacto Del Olvido'. I understand that it has been weaponised by some people to cover up crimes and deny victims closure, but I also failed to point out (other than me saying it was the glue that held Spanish society together in their transition to democracy) its other beneficial aspects. In my opinion, it is a net negative, but I can imagine that if the transition had been more contentious and the pact of forgetting had not been implemented, the state of Spanish politics could have become far more poisonous, vitriolic and resentful. But on balance, I still believe that the 'Pacto Del Olvido' kicks the issue down the road, and makes finding resolutions and a final closure to the Franco era difficult. Would love to hear people's general comments on this.
That's a great point and there might be some truth to that. Look no further than Portugal. We had a revolution initiated by the military but which had much popular support, which gave more foundation and legitimacy to the democracy we have today. There's just one key difference but with a common spirit, the dictatorship was not a result of a full blown civil war, was the result of a ineffective republic with no unanimous goverment rule. And part of the dictatorship reasoning for its begining was precisely that need for stability. There's also a rather curious opposite if you could call that. We did not have a civil war at the begining or a clash of ideals so to say, it was imposed on us. However at the end, the trasition to democracy we faced a first year that was very shaky, from political turmoil to popular unrest, in retrospect is quite a miracle how things didn't end up wrong. My point is, in Spain it was the begining, in Portugal was at the end. But at some point there was a civil/popular clash of ideals for the future of the country.
Small side note on that turmoiled year, I believe only very recently thanks to rise of a open liberal party and decline of the outdated comunist party, the freedom holyday is begining to be suggested that should be another. Not on the revolution day, but on the counter-"revolution" day. Long story short, after the freedom revolution there was a movement of reactionary politians and military that discreetly tried to reinstate a more conservative goverment (the interim goverment itself was publicly deemed too related to the previous power figures), however it was crushed by the revolutionary comunist movement that was an important political force that helped free the country from the dictatorship in the first place, thus it had a great respect within most of the impoverished people which represented most of the country. Following that a more comunist leaning interim goverment was formed. What followed was ever increasing more radical comunist ideals that were being introduced throught the country by these paramilitary groups aligned with the goverment, and a plan for an alleged coup de etat to fully estabilish a communist state. This plan was undone by what was left of moderate forces and politcal actors, which managed to stop this plan as it was unraveling. Only then after being sanitized the extremist forces, elections were held and the first constitutional goverment came to power. This period in history is not well discussed or known about. Most young people may know about the freedom day and assume it was a sea of roses afterwards. The elders don't mention it too much either because after all this years of democracy, that year isn't much in context of the last 45 years of democracy, or because only up until recently the communist party somehow kept having relevance and historical respect on the political scene thanks to the influence it had on taking down the dictatorship in the first place, and thus most of those view that troubled year as just a misunderstanding. There was no bloody standoff in the sense of a civil war and its consequences of it, but the fact there's a taboo from a mere episodical clash of movements and forces that tried to steer the future of the country, seems unproportinal.
@@IMPERIALYT To be honest I find ''el pacto del olvido'' something like Japanese do with their imperial era, it helps with not shaking the box too much but also leaves some things unexplained and uncontested. In my opinion as Spaniard I think that we will truly move on once all the generations who lived under Franco dies and the topic becomes less close to our memories, until that politicians and radicals will keep bringing it on again and again
When we talk about "a war between brothers" it is not figuratively. Many many families had supporters of both sides, brothers and sisters who suddenly saw themselves in the shittiest of situations. Just imagine how something like that tears families apart. If you want something remotely resembling normalcy, you HAD to make something like the forgetting pact. Only the new generatios, unbothered by that burden can start to do the heavy work.
Interesting. As a German I might be a bit naive but I always thought a German approach to Spain's history would help the country not retreat the same mistakes from the past. Many young Spanish people unironically call themselves francos now and it's making me concerned as well as making me fear that the forgetting pact only served to push the confrontation with its own cultural past into the future. Similar to Italy and Mussolini or Russia and Stalin.
@@PuddingXXL thing is, the mistakes were already in the second republic. You don't coup a system just like that. The kids that call themselves francoist, I can guarantee you, have no clue of what francoism is, they have a few ideas of its symbology and what Franco himself said in a few speeches at most, but they often mix it up with Falange and its national-syndicalism. That being said, neither do most foreigners, because they've been told that Franco was a fascist dictator, which wasn't. If I had to make a comparison that you'd understand well, Franco had a similar idea as Bismarck, he prosecuted socialism and its variants, though he applied some socialist policies like public healthcare and education, for example. I'd consider him, from all I've been told, a conservative rather than a fascist, and it's no coincidence that one of the very first things he did was push the Falange veterans and ideologists outside of spheres of influence, something that became ever more noticeable after 1945.
@@staringgasmask what a disgusting way of whitewashing a regime that was still killing people in its last year of existence...yes, in 1975 Franco was still killing political opponents.
@@staringgasmaskFranco was called a fascist because he's part of the fascist trio of 20th c Europe: hitler, Mussolini and him. it's true however that he wasn't a Nazi or a fascista, he had his own flavor. he was a national-catholic, who saw communists and other "undesirables" to be cleansed in the name of god. He had allied himself with the Falange, who were national-syndicalists. People who believed in strong union but who leaned right in every other issue. Plus, as time went on (60s +), his relaxed his grip on the country, which then liberalized and became a regular capitalist country with fascists on the government, while post-war there was an attempt of autocracy in which the govt had quite a big control on the economy
@@macizogalaico that's not really true, he didn't have ideas of "cleansing" or otherwise purging anybody, he had an idea of social interactions, beliefs, and patterns that should be held by the Spanish people, and he saw some groups as enemies of those ideas. If what he wanted was a cleansing, he had them defeated, cornered in the Pyrinees and circled in the Mediterranean. Refugee ships could have been intercepted by Italian navy ships or even by his very own aviation, which were well in range of performing operations over the coast. He could have exterminated countless people, but he let them go, and most of the prisoners weren't executed (though some did get death penalties with an immediate pardon as a symbolical sentence). And while Falange was in the government for a while, it's generally considered that when he removed the party's leadership and placed his own puppets, as well as repressing student movements organized by the SEU (Falange's student union). Honestly, I personally considered Franco considered ways of acting undesirable, and ideologies that endorse them, he let a certain freedom of complaint and expression to workers and business owners, but he was very repressive with students. As always, something can't be described as simply as you put it
I've just got back from a week long holiday in Spain and I was staying in a town where people were thrown off a bridge into a gorge into the guadevin river. I made the mistake a couple years ago in the same place to ask someone about it and they simply laughed it off and quickly walked away. No one talks about it, other than an old man who simply mimed a shooting action and said it was terrible.
people don't know. As simple and absurd as that. I am from a town that is really close to the concentration camp of miranda de ebro, I know that there were concentration camps here in spain and trust me if I say not all spanish people my age knows that.
@@gadeaiglesiassordo716 It's not that simple. Several people, neighbours, friends, were shot in most towns 80 years ago. Their descendants (killers and victims) meet each other in shops and bars today. They are still neighbours, but cannot be to blame for what their grandparents did when most of them weren't even born. Most people just sweep it under the rug, and rightly so. It's brutal to know that Paquita's grandpa ratted on your abuelito Alfredo, so that the falangists (or the republican militias) took him away in a truck, and he was never seen again.
People do talk about it. Openly. I often hear Franco and the civil war mentioned on national radio. They talk about it in the parliament. It's in the newspaper. There are so many myths and falsehoods from outside Spain surrounding this history.
One of the biggest problems with teaching about the Franco era in schools at least in my experience is that those topics are at the end of the history books and a lot of time we never reached the end of the book at school. History is also taught in a very superficial way that doesn't help at all.
yeah. all the way through primary school and highschool i remember that we would always have two or three topics which we simply didn't have time to learn. it's not until Historia de España in post highschool that you actually learn this stuff. and, by that time (around 18 years old) is too late i think
I've told you this before but I'm commenting for the world to see. In France, during the trial of Klaus Barbie, the gestapo chief, torturer and murderer of De Gaulle’s second in command, Le Monde, the famous French newspaper ran a poll "Of the two following words, forgetting or justice, which is the one that best characterises your attitude toward the events of this period of the war and the Occupation". Yosef Yerushalmi, upon learning of the poll wrote “Can it be that the journalists have stumbled across something more important than they perhaps realised ? Is it possible that the antonym of ‘forgetting’ is not ‘remembering’ but ‘justice’?”. This is a thoughtful spirit which your work demonstrates and embraces, thank you for another great success, Imperial.
I'm a university student from Madrid and I'd like to add a tiny note to your video, regarding the Guernica portrait. I can't help but disagree with your interpretation of its place within Spanish society, or in the Reina Sofía museum. I understand there is profound symbolism behind its solitude in the room, or in the modesty with which it's exhibited, and I think that's an extremely pertinent (and frankly impressive) observation. But I'd like point a couple of things about the rest of Madrid's art exhibits before accepting it. In the Prado Museum, 'Las Meninas' by Diego de Velazquez also used to sit alone, in a tiny room in the south wing of the museum. There were no 'monuments' or 'tributes' around it, but I loved that tiny room. The layout was configured to inspire, to present the works of the great masters of our past by arranging them in an intimate rendezvous with the visitor. Most magically, displayed nearby there was a printed notice letting the visitor know just when the lighting would show the work of art to it’s best advantage. I believe that's quite representative of Madrid's art panorama and to quite a large extent, of Spanish culture too. The Prado and the Reina Sofía are not the Louvre. You won't see massive, oak floored, chandelier ridden halls exposing dozens of masterpieces. The Spanish temple to art only has the space and refinement to present to the visitor the very best, and then feels compelled to advise you to the exact hour when the lighting will show their baby to it’s best advantage. It's just a different approach, one more austere, modest, intimate. I don't think the Guernica's current style of display is "understates" or "perfunctory", but it definitely is "repeated across Spain", its just how we roll here.
After reading the comments over the past month or so I realise that I misinterpreted Guernica's placing and prominence. I now see it as you say, as more of a symbolic, and poignant isolation. I suppose I just saw it as fitting in with the wider pattern, instead of a rupture from that pattern - I should have been more nuanced in my assessment of Guernica as a piece of art; I was seduced by the narrative simplicity of it. However, I still do stand by the rest of the argument, that most of Spanish society doesn't confront/do justice to it's traumatic past very thoroughly in a lot of instances.
@@IMPERIALYT I've lived (and taught) in Spain and in Germany and, in my experience, and based general questions of colleagues who teach history, there is most certainly a greater emphasis in Germany on reconciling the past, specifically the events of the Nazi and the Socialist dictatorships. Germans took the route of total exposure in society, if not at a family level, where there might often remain s reticence. I'm now a historical tour guide in n Berlin and, among other things, give educational to German school classes, where they look at some of these topics. Regardless of what some may say about Spanish school kids learning a lot In the last two years of school, German school kids begin earlier, and even those who don't take "a levels "(Germany:Abitur Spain:Bachillerato) are introduced to these topics. My anecdotal impression is that there is overall a greater openness in German society to investigating the strains of the past. That has everything to do with decisions made at the political level.
I think that Guernica as a painting communicates, to use Bojan Zalac’s lens “Genocide as Social Deafh”, social death. Guernica, and what happened there, was the death of a society, the death of Spanish society in the sense that the individual was forgotten and attacked, used for political gain and aim. The painting communicates the chaos, doom and death of what happened at Guernica, and what happens when a society’s value of humanity dies. The chaos of the painting confronts a viewer with the meaning of human society, and in many ways, in my interpretation, is a warning. The simplicity of the presentation of Guernica at the Reina Sofia is impactful because Guernica communicates the feeling of chaos, doom, and death to the audience. The faces of Guernica don’t require an accompanying explanation of the context, only a viewer, because, to me, the painting is ultimately about the human experience of social death. Of course education and awareness and memory of the context that surrounds the painting is needed, but Guernica is, although about the civil war, ultimately, at least to me, a universal tribute to victims of social death. It could be a painting about any massacre / genocide, however it confronts the viewer to consider how they see humanity in the faces of the painting, and therefore to see the humanity lost at Guernica and in genocide and massacres and crimes against humanity. Guernica is not just a memory the past, but when it’s placed before a viewer, it directly implicates the viewer to connect with the faces of the subjects, to understand their experience of chaos and massacre. The doom that the painting portrays, it also instills on the viewer. As I see it, Guernica can stand alone with the viewer, without outside historical explanation (although important), because it is ultimately not about history, but about an individual’s (the viewer’s) relationship with the humanity violated in the past (the painting as a memory), and at risk in the future (the painting as a warning).
On an unrelated note, the Prado was the best art museum I ever visited. I like it much better than the Louvre. And I’m Portuguese, so you know I’m not biased lol
The video is not bad, but there are some nuances it doesn't capture quite well. First, people tend to differenciate between the War and the Dictstorship. Even though both are correlated, people tend to think about them as separated terms. It makes sense, we are encompasing four decades of History, and Spain wasn't the same in the forties and in the sixties, for example. So many people who are more "suportive" of the Dictstorship, usually think about the last years, when Franco was older, Spain was booming economicallt, Franco started to be less involved in politics, some political dissidents started to come back. People on the left tend to remember the first years of the Dictstorship, the brutal repression, the economical ruin and the ties with Nazi Germany. Franco mutated during all those decades, so it's difficult to talk about Franco without specifying about the time, what was happening at the moment. Second, one thing the video misses is the economical side of the era. People don't remember that much the repression unless they had family members who suffered it directly, but ALL older people remember the hunger and starvation of the post war era. My grand father and his family could survive because his father was a baker and was able to smuggle bread in the coat, more than the two bars they had assigned. That they he could eat some bread with a boiled egg, abd that's it. Twenty years of and hunger and ruin traumatise a generation more than a war and political repression. Third, the historical argument of "both sides commited attrocities, let's forget about it" was necessary at the moment. When Franco died, most of his stablishment was still in charge. The more reformists side of the Francoist government was out after the terrorist attack against Carrero Blanco, and the more conservative faction was in charge of the government and military. Spanish politicians had to be very careful in the first years of the Transition to democracy (for example, the Communist Party was legalised during the Holy Week, so the most reactionary segments of the population would be involved in the festivities and less inclined to think about the "reds"). The historical was necessary in those years to avoid any unnecessary confrontation, and now historians are starting to critisise the arguments behind it. Third, it is false the Civil War is not taught in school. For the dismay of many, myself included, the whole History of Spain is relegates to a footnote besidea the last two centuries. 19th and 20th century recieve all the attention, while other important times like the Reconquista and the Conquest of America are barely taught. In the last year before going to university, History of Spain is one of the few mandatory subjects for every single student (unlike Maths, for example), and the the II Republic, the Civil War, the Dictstorship and the Transition are extensively covered and taught (I should know, I have taught it). It is true that level of education is not mandatory, but most students reach it. Four and final, in every political negotiation, there is a give and take. There would have not been a peaceful transition to democracy if we started to throw the bodies at each other. Sometimes crimes go unpunished, that's true and that's a shame, but very common in History. If we want to move forward, there has to be forgivness in both sides, and of course one side is gonna have to swallow a lot of shit, but maybe that's the price for a future. Feel free to ask anything. If you ask me, Franco was one of the worst things happened to this country, and maybe if Britain and France had had the balls to support the democratic republic it wouldn't had fallen into the claws of the communists and the left opposition the Republic also faced. Also, Franco ruines this country for twent years, and only in the brink of bankruptcy when he took a step back was the country started to grow back into the modern and prosperous country of today. Also, as a sidenote, Spain is still part of the world, and the tendencies and discourses of the modern left have come to Spain as well. Many people who opose modern feminism, or are againt the mass inmigration of Muslim people, are falling into the traps of the far right and started to romanticise the Francoist era. More and more kids in High School support Franco as a form of being rebelious againt the stablishment (in my time we were punks, now they are "fachas"). That's another whole can of worms, but a new entire generation is starting to support Franco because of reasons way out of the scope of the Dictstorship. Just wanted to point that out as a cautionary tale about how Franco may be seen by the future generations.
Thank you for adding some nuance to this - it's incredibly difficult to fit all of the perspectives in to one video - I struggled to get this one out because of the sheer volume of information, so it was kind of necessary for me to approach it from a more focused perspective.
@@IMPERIALYT I know, I wasn't rebuting your arguments (besides the one about not being taught in school), but providing another perspective from someone from the country AND who has studied the topic deep enough, not just a random Spaniard talking about how he sees the war. The good thing is so many foreign hispanists have written about the subject that you don't have to speak the language to really know about the topic. The Civil War was back then like the War in Ukraine today. I hope I didn't look like an asshole, it's just I am at work with nothing really to do and it distracted me for a while, both the video and writing the comment. Other than that, pretty good video with good producing values.
@@meatiesogarcia6478 I just want to add a note to your comment, not only UK did nothing, but Great Britain and the US did vouch for Francoist Spain during the cold war to maintain their status quo against communism and also making trade agreements (Even more, the US giving money to Franco in exchange of having military bases). It wasn't just a matter that they didn't act but also the fact they were partners after WW2.
@@TasukuMuncha UK "forbid" France from helping the Republic (the French Popular Front wanted to help the Spanish one) but the UK warned France their alliance would end if they did help. At the end of the war, the US wanted to invade Spain to remove Franco from power and establish a western democracy, but it was again UK against it. Not long after, the Cold War started and obviously the US preferred a right wing militaristic dictatorship than a communist regime, but initially they did want to remove Franco from power. The US changed thier views to suit the new situation (I understand why they did it, and I don't hate them for it; they didn't create Franco, they took advantage of what was already there), but the UK twice prevented others from helping Spain. And that's why I do hate them. Everytime I see another drunk angloid jumping from a balcony to the pool and the jump is too short, I cannot avoid to feel a little bit of joyness. I'm joking, but I do blame the UK, and not the US, for a lot of stuff that has happened in the world in the previous century and people like to pin on the USA.
I would like to bring up something about the pact of forgeting. While its primary purpose was to protect those involved in the goverment during the franco years it also has side that often ignored, it also forgave those involved in the civil war in BOTH sides. This was really important for the transition to democracy because it exonerated those exiled during and after the war from crimes commited during the republic and war, (obiously they made it so its whiped the record of those in power in 1975) and allowed them to came back while also empting the prisions. This was fundamental to the peaceful transition to democracy.
I love that you brought this to attention. Too often the victims of the Republic, as my own ancestors, are forgotten, and their stories either ignored or suppressed.
the pact of forgetting was a crude crutch made to survive the pains of reform. instead of going to the hospital, the right keeps affirming that the crutch is good enough. however, medics and doctors know that, sometimes, to cure a poorly healed bone you have to break it first again and put it in the right position. this, of course, is painful. and society doesn't have good anesthetics. but it is necessary if we wish to keep walking
I was born in the basque town of Gernika. I believe that part of the brutality against my town was to strike the historical capital of the Basque people and demoralize us. The irony is very strong in our town. On the one hand, the Spanish government ignores and does little to nothing with respect to dealing with our history. On the other hand, you have the Germans, who bombed Gernika, and in 1999 they "apologized" (by their President but not the Kanzler) and paid for our (amazing) sports center as some kind of reparations.
Ya sabes. es España la guerra civil esta en nuestro adn SIN DIGERIR. El pacto del olvido pudo ser bueno pero ha impedido el poder digerir y elaborar como sociedad la guerra civil y la dictadura posterior. Ni siquiera la podemos estudiar en condiciones en historia por lo superficial que todavia la tenemos y lo poco digerida que la tenemos. Es una especie de herida que queda con postilla pero nunca cicatriza, una cicatriz ya no se puede abrir, una postilla se puede abrir con el minimo esfuerzo, y llevamos con esta postilla desde que murío franco y hay gente que no quiere convertirla en cicatriz
I visited Gernika last year and did the self-guided tour around town starting at the Gernikako Arbola and ending at the Picasso mural. I learned so much about the Basque people and parliament, and so much about the bombing during the war. It was a very moving experience, plus I went on a Monday so I could go to the market. That being said, I left with so many questions about what happened afterwards and what it was like under Franco. The most I heard about him in other parts of Euskadi was a bit at el museo San Telmo in Donostia, which had a decent amount of information, but I still wanted more.
Yeah, it was the President of Germany because they’re the German head of state, the highest diplomatic official the German can produce. That’s not a slight, that’s how it’s supposed to be done
Really interesting topic, thanks for making this, and to Kraut for sharing. I lived in a part of Spain (well, the Canary Islands) which suffered considerably under Franco, the older folk were still divided over Franco's legacy, and genuine Francoists still persisted. I remember using coins with Franco's face still on them. I've explored an abandoned former detention centre, and a mass grave was found nearby. The scars were visible everywhere; in the culture, the land, society, even infrastructure, but ignored by most except the more curious young folk. That was in the 1990's and 2000s, so hardly ancient history. It's interesting to see how things have developed since, despite the frictions.
Thank you for making this. Visiting Spain in 2018 was eye-opening to me for many reasons. This part of Spanish history I never learned in US schools (I did in college later). I encountered those in Spain who had the “let’s forget and move on” attitude and the “we need to acknowledge this” approach.
I lived a year in Erasmus in Sevilla and the traditional vs progressive divide was quite apparent. My flatmate was an anticlerical Republican whereas most people just accept the monarchy as it is. Since I study archaeology and history, some of my classmates told me that there's a conspiracy that the coup attempt in 1975 was orchestrated by the king (as an act of political theater) to legitimize his rule, he even showed me the video of the incident. This summer I did a dig in Catalunya, it was on the Iberian (preroman) period. However, the site was located in Gandesa where there are hills and mountains that served a crucial role in the bloody Battle of the Ebre River took place. One day we went to the site that served as a fort for Franco, where only three years ago they took down his statue. That place is still today is heavy in the local collective memory, apparently gay men would have sex there (especially when the statue was there) as a symbolic gesture against the anti-LGBTQ Francoist regime. Plus in Catalunya, people speak Catalan (as well as Spanish) but their local culture and language was persecuted under Franco and he attempted to wipe out all regionalist cultures by creating a uniform Spanish castillan culture. They have an extra reason to hate the dictatorship.
@@Dario-uj6qo i write you in catalan because I was born in 1981; No es va prohibir la llengua facticament, pero et podien represaliar si la parlaves en públic. No se prohibió en círculos privados pero si te cogían hablando catalán te podían dar una paliza o llevar al calabozo por sospechas de ser contrario al régimen. I'm spanish and catalan from Barcelona
The monarchy had a part in ending the Franco regime and preventing something similar to it from returning afterwards. Maybe that's one of the reasons many people don't hold its restoration under Franco against the institution.
Franco never allowed the monarchy to return while he lived; under him, Spain was a monarchy without a King. That’s probably why people don’t associate the two, which, in a way, protected the legitimacy of the monarchy.
also, after Franco died, a public referendum was held which had two options, regarding the creation of the new government: A: constitutional monarchy B: regular monarchy note that it wasn't monarchy vs republic. thus, monarchy was seen as one of the actors of "reform" and people were still scared about going into a republic, which could make the right rise up in arms again. the general attitude after Franco's death was very much of "just let it be, just let it be. don't go changing too much otherwise things might get bloody again"
@@macizogalaicoo, there was a referendum on the new constitution. A vote of no would’ve simply resulted in the production of a new draft. Also an election had already in held in 1977, so the PSOE and Communist Party had partaken in the writing of the draft constitution… and you think they of all parties would’ve approved of a constitution that concentrated political power in the hands of the monarchy? Are you drunk? High? Generally insane?
@@ARCPolus Even then, it's interesting that it isn't even brought up. Also not brought up in introductory history classes in University unless you specifically go into 20th century European history. The thing is, the Spanish civil war in a world view was VERY important cause it was the precursor to WWII not only in Franco's army winning due to a big part of obtaining German supplies, resources and men, but also the fact that the future Allies eventually just "gave up" on helping which allowed Germany to essentially use the civil war as a sort of testing ground. Sprinkle in the different political viewpoints even within the Spanish government and around Europe and you get a brutal civil war
I moved to Spain in 2021 and have been faced with a lot of the attitudes, trauma and hush-hush about that era. Thanks for this video. One note I’d like to make is that Guernica isn’t really “cast out there on its own” like it’s isolated in the museum. They make a really big deal about it in the main modern art museum of Madrid and there is a large room or civil war propaganda posters and other civil war exhibits before and around the Guernica room - which is the most crowded room despite it’s one piece.
I believe it has become very "hush-hush" only recently. I moved back in 2014 and have experienced an enormous amount of talking about the era. From Falangists bars, the Valley of the Fallen debates, literal neo-falangist/neo-republican clashes and so much more. But in recent years it has been slowly declining towards a "taboo" topic.
@@JeffTheFunnyCSGO just like worldwide, extreme conservadurism is gaining a lot of young followers and strength, and in Spain, the battle horse of the right has always revolved around Franco. Before the 2008 crisis, spaniards looked at the future with the hopes of modernising after very prosperous 20 years in the EU, however after that, politicians have been taking advantage of people's frustration in order to revive ideas only the craziest thought.
A big reason why the fascists won is because the Republicans splintered and fell to infighting; many factions were quite undemocratic, and held each other in far greater contempt than their supposed common enemies. I recommend Orwell's Homage to Catalonia for a great look into this side of the fight. To put it simply, it is possible that a Republican victory would have heralded a democratic and free Spanish society, but it isn't terribly likely.
I agree - the republicans were also no saints. But just using this comment to clarify something - this video was not supposed to be an evaluation of "what side was worse" or "which side would have been better for Spain", more just an overview of why the Franco era and the Civil War is such a difficult topic for Spaniards and why it still isn't fully confronted. Ultimately it is the Franco era that is taboo and lacks closure, not the Republican dimension of the Civil War (for the most part). Just seeing a lot of comments on why I didn't more extensively cover the Republican crimes and deficiencies and thought I should clear things up.
One of the myths impossed by the regime was the inevitability of the civil war, like it was meant to happen anyway. Another one is the simplification of the enemy, where the republic is summarized as the communist party imposing itself with soviet aid in the last year of the war. Neither are true and we need to remember that just a couple of years prior there was a Catholic-Liberal coalition in the government. At the end is like blaming Hitler’s crimes on the instability and problems of the Weimar republic.
@@IMPERIALYTright, but I see no debate in which side was the correct one. Franco was inspired by fascists regimes as documented by the UN in 1946 or in the “Manifiesto de Lausana” by Juan Carlos father. The republicans had the suport of most intellectuals. Their cause was identified with antifascism and freedom. However, unfortunately, Franco was not only helped by the rest of the dictatorships in Europe, but the also received help by american and british companies. Capitalism is always a better friend of fascism than it is of those who were fighting against it (anticapitalists, as the main reason why the fascist sublevation started was by the threat that an imminent socialist revolution meant for the oligarchies).
Man I'm glad someone else has noticed that post-Fascist states make major progressive strides fllowing the end of Fascistic regimes. Be it with or without cultural outlets to address the trauma of the old regimes, there seems to be an active effort by the electorates of these states to never permit such regimes to occur once again.
Random Indonesian watching our anti-corruption institutions weakened, Islamic fundamentalism's increasing visibility in politics, and more censorship measures being added: ah if only it were all post fascist states...
@@GuyShōtō as a Spaniard, our main right wing party was founded by one of Franco's ministers, and they share most of his ideology. The *second* right wing party is even worse, and they're becoming increasingly popular. Not only that, we can still elect a Falange member as mayor, even though they're currently too minor to go to the main elections. Many older people say we were better off under Franco, and more and more younger people are starting to believe it.
This is the third time I’ve watched this video, the script is very powerful and haunting. I visited Spain back in May and went to the art history museum of Madrid which was art that depicted the history of Madrid from the 16th century through 19th century. The thing I noticed was there was nothing on Madrid during the Spanish Civil War and the Franco Regime and I knew it had something to do with the Pact of Forgetting.
Oh come on... stop it. There's documentaries about Franco and Hitler almost everyday on Equipo de investigación on la sexta. Politics also won't stop mentioning Franco and left people will can someone fascist for just breathing lol
Well, the Spanish Civil War and the dictatorship happened in the 20th century, not sure how much of it you were expecting to see in a museum depicting history from the 16th to the 19th centuries.
I feel there's been a topic missing, which is the nonconversion of most of the powers, being: political (this was stated as parties were founded by franco's "ministers"), but every other power was too, justice and judges, police and army generals and the head of the state (the king) apointed by the dictator even skipping his father on the successory line, the economic powers, cultural references and ingeneral elites... all those that thrived during the dictatorship and amassed power of any kind remained untouch and unchallenged. To all that, another very important point is that when there was the "transition" to democracy there was an attempt to cup again (some say selforganized, but regardless) that also shaped any potential discussion to "let's accept what we are given, or the others will come" (which was already a thought because of the unchange of power, but was made more explicitly a thread)
You may not know, but there have been heavy efforts to remove Francoist influence from the army. Mainly pre-retiring the eldest officers that made their career under Franco. The National Police was completely rebuilt, uniforms, equipment, training, functions, and officers as well. The Justice was also completely rebuilt with a new constitution, no longer had the government a final say, and judges could and would get punished if they intentionally fail in their ruling due to ideological bias. On top of that, there is a democratically (sort of) elected chamber of judges, more tied to the government than actual democracy, but that's unrelated to this topic. And parties, well, Franco's ministers were pretty much all of the right wing politicians in Spain at the moment, from more liberal-leaning guys to hard traditionalists, they weren't all authoritarian, had they all been, the transition wouldn't have ever happened. Not to mention the PCE was still controlled by people well known for murdering dissenters and opponents during the Civil War. Not just dictatorship supporters, actual people behind murders and executions.
@@staringgasmask lol, you may not know, your narrative sounds super cool, there is only one problem, which is that it doesn't add up to reality in which all the powers were kept and mantained by the same names same families same traditions same head of state ... There was a change into some kind of democracy, in which the concerns about separation of powers were disregarded and even stated as intended, some changes on structure, but at the end you can't make up new judges and officers and the state literally killed and pushed out any discent and supressed any other ideology, so same people same powers, and to finish same king that was apointed by the dictator was the head of state, but yes, full renewal and everything new and shiny.
@@staringgasmask Judges are not remotely democratic. Politicians place them themselves, how will the judges later go against them? It is a rigged system, far from democracy, the partisan-state doesn't fit it either.
In the Topography of Terror museum in Berlin I heard a similar story from a tour guide about Germany after WW2. For a generation, Germans really did not want to confront the Nazi era of their history. They didn't want to point fingers or prosecute the vast majority of Nazi war criminals, or really think about what had happened. It wasn't until the next generation who did not grow up in that time came to positions of power that Germany really started to address its past.
more or less our case. The problem is that now there is a political party that trully wants to make things that difficult. Remember PP are DIRECTLY BORN from the francoist stablishment (take manuel fraga as an example) and then you have Vox who are intelectual heirs of franco's memory. I just hope that we could TRULY talk in as soon as possible. there are still people alive that lived during war times and I would like to see this solved when they died. (the civil war was during years 36 to 39)
And how has that gone for Germany? Most Germans I’ve met travelling say they’re sad they were born German because of the history. Perhaps Spain’s silent approach isn’t so bad when acknowledgment and reconciliation lead to self hatred and shame for crimes from 4-5 generations ago.
@@isaac6077 It's going worse. People don't know about Franco repression post Spanish civil war. The conservative party was created by 7 Franco ministers. Spain is the place of the world with most colective tombs with Vietnam. We still have streets with names of the sublevated band while we have none dedicated to the republicans that fought agains them...
@@gadeaiglesiassordo716 problem about the republic except the liberal side and maybe the anarchists they were outright communists and the red terror could have been just as bad as franco if they had won the civil war
What an amazing video with stunning visuals. The way the assets are combined into a cohesive picture with textures and glows is truly inspiring. These videos will be evergreen.
Excellent and well argued exploration of a little discussed topic. I've lived in Spain and interviewed Republican refugees in the UK - the echoes of the civil war are everywhere. Its an ooen wound that won't be healed until it's aknowledged and tended to.
I just saw this and I am happy to see a video about the Francoist regime and it's effects on modern Spain. As a Filipino, I've never knew what happened under the Franco regime. Because of this video, it changed that. Thank you for making this video.
Great video on a topic so often overlooked when disvussing Europe's history (together with the Salazar era in Portugal). Subscribed the second the video was over and gonna binge your other videos soon!
There isn’t much to discuss with Salazar, not nearly on the same level as with Franco. Our dictatorship was relatively tame (for a dictatorship), and didn’t kill hundreds of thousands of people in bloody reprisals.
Excellent coverage of the Franco regime and post-Franco Espana. I love this country and have been visiting for now 30 yrs and have a close friend living in the south. Since the 90's Spain has grown and changed, specially post EU and Euro transitions which were very painful but ultimately brought Spain into the First World. Up into the 2000's I would regularly see Franco memorabilia in the streets, especially in Madrid and across Andalucía, the old were very much still pro-Franco, the young were mostly lost or forging their lives in the new democracy in which they found themselves. I remember going to my friend's wife's graduation back in the 90's outside Malaga: There countless young women were graduating, and only a fraction of young men. Two decades earlier, there were no women in the universities and it was all men. However, this new generation of women weren't looking to outshine the men, no, they were only just getting educated, with no real ambitions of using that education to further themselves in their lives. Catholicism still has a deep hold on Spain in an entirely socio-cultural grip, hardly religious at all.
as a baque person, i can't emphasise enough how much franco and his era impact current political and social life within Spain. Especially the basque country
Le tenéis como un hombre del saco pero la realidad es que el batua ya se estaba cocinando en el 1965 y las gau eskolak estaban operativas en iglesias en los 50. También en el 55 Barandiarán regresó del exilio y estuvo enseñando literatura vasca en Salamanca. Koldo Mitxelena también estaba enseñando en Salamanca bajo Franco. No había razón para demasiada represión: el PNV se rindió sin apenas batalla, ahorrando vidas a ambos bandos. El euskera no era idioma oficial y es verdad que inmediatamente de la guerra las autoridades estaban muy nerviosas y esto daba lugar a palizas. De lo que no se habla tanto es por ejemplo del apoyo de las iglesias vascas al terrorismo.
As an American, I know very little about the modern history of Spain, so I appreciate this video making me aware of an issue I didn't know existed. Thank you. God be with you out there everybody. ✝️
As Spaniard, Franco has been written by left by the nightmare or the worst part of spanish history. But Franco was a consecuence of the polarising of Spanish politics. You Will never see in USA a democratic party agreeing with far-left and anarchist political parties in order to form a coalition. You Will never see that leader of that coalition trying to kill opposition leaders. The right has no choice than agreed with Far-right to try to compete them. Franco became a general of the right side, because he could join all right leaning parties. Even that the far-right has less support by Spaniards. The influence of Hitler make him to chose the far-right at start to fight communist threat. The issue of the return of democracy was the agree of moderates in both sides. The Far-right and Far-left parties did everything to boycott the transition including killings. At the end, one part of the communist has to Accept the rules that moderate parties did by consensus, accept to be part of Constitucional Parlamentary Monarchy. The Far-right once they understand that they were a total minority at the politics they surrendered their violent campaign. This consensus has been accepted until Pedro Sanchez arrived to power . The actual prime minister even losing elections Accepts everything in order to stay power, even that is illegal and unconstitucional he does. He is polarising the spanish politics. With one differencd, at the second republic the violent increased a lot. However, the actual majority spanish people are moderate and is against to come back to black history. The majority want Sánchez out.
Woah dude I wonder how doesnt this channel has like hundreds of thousands of subscribers, the quality of the content, narration, subtitles(!!!), editing and animation is awe inspiring! Congrats on the hard work, you'll soon reap all the rewards!
Good job at presenting our present issues with Franco's past. I know I'm late to this video, but I'd like to add that the attitude of apathy and forget was carefully orchestrated by Franco's regime. It lasted for more than 30 years and it never fully got away. This meant that during the span of two generations the regime utilised terror just as the Inquisition used to do. They caused a massive shock through cruel civil war and repression so nobody would speak on the matter.Thus, Spanish population do not talk because the fear of consequences was interiorized even after the dictatorship finished. Just to give you an example, my great-grandfather was close to the socialist party right before the war, but due to the Civil War and Franco's regime, he stopped getting interested in politics, so only his wife and close family members knew about his past (my grandfather was born at the start of the war). After the 'dictatorship's downfall', it was announced on the news that the amnesty laws would give monetarial compensation to past republican soldiers. My great-grandfather, believing that he would receive money (he wasn't elegible because he never fought), announced my mother (who was around 20 at the time) that the government would give him money. Right inmediatly after hearing him, his wife (my great-grandmother) pulled my great-grandfather from the living room and started to reprimand him for talking. After that event, my great-grandmother (knowing that my mother was a left-leaning activist) would never let my great-grandfather sit alone with her just to make sure he didn't tell anything. To this day, nobody in my family is sure what our great-grandfather did. We think he never affiliated himself to PSOE or UGT in 1936, but he heard illegal radios (such as Radio Pirenaica) in the 1940s. But these are all assumptions...
While I agree with the general thesis, I think there's some points that are overdone, like how Guernica, one of the most famous paintings in Spain and the world, is "hanging without fanfare alone in a museum". It's got one wall and a whole room to itself BECAUSE it's the most relevant painting in Reina Sofia museum. Every single Spanish child and teenager would recognise it and tell you that it's Picasso's Guernica, or at least they know it and have seen it. It's got prime billing in school curricula and in most places where art is taught or shown. There is much about Franco's regime which is not discussed, but there is also a lot of celebration of the people who fought francoism and those who participated in its dissolution (regardless of their previous participation in the regime, which should be discussed more).
Surely part of the reason why political stability is considered so paramount in Spain is because there are credible regional separatist movements in the country that would be greatly emboldened by mass questioning of the government's legitimacy, right?
True. Every independence movement in Spain right now has a very clear "we want to separate from the Spanish government because it still has fascist traces and fascist politicians". However, the issue would be more easily solved not by looking the other way but by, you know, fighting fascism. If our government right now was explicitly anti-fascist I would mind being a spanish citizen. However, it is not, so i mind
Amazing content! Not only visually very attractive, but the story and it'smain points are very well expressed, which is specially remarkable when covering such a complex topic (I am a spaniard myself). Congrats on such a great work! You are creating a top YT channel!
Since you used Guernica a lot as red wire, it might have been great not to gloss over the fact Picasso was a known rapist, and had taken a long time to accept the comission for Guernica from the republic of Spain. He has been influenced into this by his mistress, with whom he was very violent. Apart from that point, I reaaly appreciated the video. I'm from french, where anyone with a spanish sounding last name has a huge probability of being there because of the Franco regime violence. The lack of recognition extends its trauma to the whole diaspora of spanish republicans and their family.
Late but it might be because Guernica was a event used by the Republican propaganda machine to demonize the Nationalists. While the events that happened there were horrible the truth is that this was happening across the entire nation both sides committing atrocities especially after the NKVD got control of the Republican’s police force.
The Guernica analogy is weak. I have seen the painting in person. I didn't see it as "hidden away". I see it as one of the symbols of Spain. And honestly it is still a sore wound. Not many countries want their wounds to blister in the sun.
going to disagree on with the conclusions made on the monarchy. i'm not spainish but juan carlos I handed power to the parliamentarians and by extension the people in 1977 after franco's death, going against what the francoists wanted. if it wasn't for the monarch's role spain probably wouldn't have ever transitioned to a democracy without violence
the Borbón monarchy are absolute cowards. Juan Carlos had no interest in being an actual king, he just chickened out in order to have an easier job. I am Spanish and the monarchy did nothing but sign some papers and get taxpayer money and still, today, continues to do the same
@@macizogalaico You massively undervalue the role of the monarchy in Spain. It doesn’t just “sign papers”. The king’s position as commander of the armed forces is a vital safeguard, as shown by 23F in 1981. The king’s intervention was the singular ac which stopped the coup’s success. Secondly is the king’s political role. He doesn’t govern, he doesn’t make policy, but he plays an active role as an advisor to the government. He cautions them, and as laid out in the constitution acts as “moderator of the state institutions”. As a neutral and nonpartisan figure, it is he who facilitates coalition negotiations after elections, and determines who is most likely to get a majority in the Cortes.
The video is insanely well made and the explains the topic in a way that anyone that doesn’t know much about the topic totally knows what’s going on at the end. I don’t get why you don’t have more subscribers, I hope the algorithm promotes this video a lot, it’s sooo good!
I'm Spanish and I don't agree with the message of this video. The Civil War was not authoritarianism v democracy, it was two halves of the country caught between worse and worst situations. The remaining political groups of the II Republic became far-left authoritarians as well and regularly engaged in Stalinist tactics incluidng Soviet-style torture camps and prisons. The regime that emerged was ultranationalist and anti-communist, but that's very long in the past, there's been more than 40 years of democracy now. The insistence on this propagandistic "historical memory" is nothing more than populist demagoguery and revanchism of a very small group of leftist elites descended from leaders and top figures of the II Republic. We all know what happened, we're not dumb, we have grandparents and extended families on both sides, and by large Spaniards say "no" to their insistence on replaying the same hatred that tore the country apart when their only real belief is that Franco should've lost so we had become a Soviet satellite instead.
LIke, for instance, the leader of the left-of-center-left party Podemos that you mentioned is the son of a convicted far-left terrorist. The Socialist party (PSOE)'s largest faction was a marxist revolutionary party during the II Republic (POUM adjacent), they tried to block the legislation for women to be allowed the vote (because the first democratic elections in the II Republic resulted in a large right-wing majority thanks to the female vote)... engaged in political assassination, intimidation, and coup attempts. Nobody wants this kind of "historical memory" because historical memory is just propaganda for the far-leftists. They dig up bones of Francoist repression, but leave victims of Red Terror out because they're entirely one-sided and the goal is revenge not truth. It is a politics of resentment.
Idk man, I think there’s serious value in reconsidering the past once the pain and hurt of the past has passed, and upon which room for unbiased introspection opens up. As for the civil war, yes. While in the beginning the old democratic forces of Spain may have held sway in the anti-nationalist coalition in the first few parts of the civil war, the government’s over-reliance on communist militias and the infiltration of the intelligence agencies by the Soviets would lead to tragedies such as the one you described, as well as others and other political repressions such as the action against the anarchists and the anti-Stalinist communist POUM.
@@thomashale2096 I'm all for that, what I disagree with is that it's the spirit of our current 'historical memory' and 'democratic memory' legislation and the associated press bubble. I have a lot of sympathy for the families but not for the politicians
I agree completely. The war was not "anti-facists vs those that wanted to vanguard its rise" the republic had been abusing power, and leaning heavily into Stalinist practices and authoritarianism. They also were staunchly against the Catholic Church. So it involved so many layers. Religious, many people didn't like Franco but supported him due to faith, political, many would rather gamble with the rebels than potentially slide into a authoritarian Stalinist regime, historical, many monarchists, etc etc. the introduction is a complete oversimplification of what actually happened.
I have to say this video confuses me. As you pointed out yourself, the 'forget and move on' strategy seems to be working- contemporary Spain has successfully dismantled many essential components of the legacy of Francoism. So what would demanding justice for long dead and soon-to-be-dead people accomplish at the risk of destabilizing a rapidly progressing society? Societies are not individual biological persons and they do not actually have 'traumas'- they have political and economic and cultural structures. The point of 'forgetting' isn't actually to 'repress' anything, it is to force individuals in the society to distance their political, class, and cultural identities from fascism and to prevent them from passing fascistic identities down generationally. In theory if this taboo is enforced for long enough, and reinforced with the right material changes to society, then it will push Francoism into irrelevance, the same way nobody today wants to avenge the honor of the Guelphs or Ghibellines or has strong opinions on whether Mithradates VI was a swell guy or not.
Your take on the presentation of Picasso's Guernica is completely wrong. It's displayed in its own room with all signs in the museum telling you where it is. it is surrounded by original Picasso sketches of Guernica and there are always guards on duty, and I believe photography is typically prohibited. You present it as if it's just another painting in the museum shoved off to one side, which couldn't be further from the truth. Great video as always though.
I've said it many other videos about the topic and I feel obliged to say it again: Franco's regime was not Falangist, Franco's regime was Francoist. What you in the video describe as "Franco's Falange Party" is a political movement which preceded Franco's rise to power by many years and had nothing to do with Franco in its material and ideological inception. The FE de las JONS (the official name of the Falange) was founded by José Antonio Primo de Rivera, Ramiro Ledesma and Onésimo Redondo. All of them died during the war and had no say in the shape the Falange took under Franco's leadership, but those who were under their guidance and remained - such as the provisional leader of the Falange during José Antonio's absence during the war, Manuel Hedilla - were absolutely opposed. Manuel Hedilla rose up in rebellion against Franco when he received the order that the Falange would be merging with the Carlists (a monarchist conservative movement completely opposed to the revolutionary republicanism of the Falange) into FET y de las JONS. Franco only imprisoned Hedilla because the Falangist minister and close friend of José Antonio, Serrano Suñer, intervened on his behalf. Franco's dictatorship did not impose any of the policies Falangism/Nationasyndicalism defended and only used Falangist imagery and symbolism to gain popularity among the "Nationalist Faction", a disguise it quickly dropped once it was no longer useful. Franco reestablished the monarchy and imposed a neoliberal economy on Spain, something the basic tenants of Falangism are absolutely opposed to. Modern Falangist go out of their way to distance themselves from Franco and denounce him as a traitor and a monarchist. Francoist Spain was not Falangist, it was Francoist: an ideology that had the definition Franco wanted to impose on it at any given moment.
I’m an American and I’ve never heard of Franco or anything of Spanish history past the colonial period. I’m so grieved by this video, but it makes me want to learn more about Spain history past my current knowledge.
trying to forget the past is a bad thing im from the philipines a former spanish colony alot of people are now trying to forget about the previous dictatorship which only led the son of the dictator securing the presidency currently
We should point out that the civil war wasn't a Democracy vs Authoritarianism fight. It was the result of a spark that provoke the implossion of a democratic system in which 4 different authoritarian factions (falangists, communists, socialists, and monarchists), that were swore enemies but were living together under the democratic scaffoldig of the spanish republic, suddenly, started fighting for dominance. No matter who started it, It was bound to happen at some point down the road. Most parties saw Democracy as a decadent system that have to be overcome, and the new republic, as a mere tool to transition to a totalitarian state under their sole rule. The coup was doomed to fail at the third day, since the "strong man", General Sanjurjo, died in a plane crash when he was flying from Portugal, where he was exiled, to take command of the insurrection. The politicians in the republican side were elected, yes, but their agendas were authoritarian, and each of them played their cards while the original coup d'état was taking place, and in many ways saw this as an opportunity to seize absolute power, and pursue their own authoritarian plans. We have to bear in mind this was the time of mass ideologies spread by radio waves, and there were thousands of radicalized individuals willing to build a new world on the ashes of the old one. Political parties were very popular back then, many of their members and associates carrying guns and knifes, getting involved in riots, violent strikes, and gun fights in public demonstrations promoted by their pollitical adversaries. There were political asassinations carried by all parties. None of the them really believed in democracy. Even the traditional Liberal and Conservative factions, both monarchy supporters that would rather preffer to be appointed by the king than to be elected, were happy to support General Sanjurjo's insurrection, since the original intent of his coup was the return to monarchy. . In this context, the republican side never had a fast, unified, and sensible response supported by all parties, like negociate with the rebels a honourable end to the coup, right after the death of Sanjurjo. Instead, they gave the rebels time to regroup, and to rebuild their chain of command, ascending General Franco to second in command under General Mola, the new rebel, boss. At this point. Falange, the fascist party, decided to support the rebelion, aiming to displace the traditionalists and catholic militants in the army from the political decission making process, and pursue their own agenda by riding on the back of the insurrection.The socialists saw the coup as an oportunity to seize "special powers" for their government, that were used to arrest political opponents and to ban the traditional and catholic parties from congress, while the communists consulted with their overlords in Moscow, and decided that war was good for their Interests. They just needed to create a popular militia, independent from the Republican Army, and controlled by Moscow, and use the war to, eventually, start a revolution and of course, to seize absolute power...So, with everything in place, the spanish civil war started.
I had to pause this video because of the disgusting lie that "Guernica" is displayed in an isolated and deserted hall at Reina Sofía Museum. Couldn't be farther from truth; it is well displayed, together with its historical context in a room paked with hundreds of visitors all the time. I've witnessed it, nobody told me. So, if the authors of this video took such a liberty to strengthen their position, what other inaccuracies did they commit purposefully?
@Brandenburg-Poznan The truth is that Franco winning was the best outcome. If the Republic had won, we would have been invaded by Hitler during ww2 and the economy would have never recovered, because Catalonia and Basque country would likely be independent. The EU wouldn't have let Spain in either for being communist.
I was born in Madrid in 1962. My grandparents came from a village in Lugo (Galicia region, NW Spain), from a family that established a small factory, a forge for iron & steel tools for farming (locksmiths I guess is the right term in English). They were just humble hardworking people, not big landowners. Around the time just prior to the civil war, their biggest fear were some people in the area that had convincedly adopted the ideology of the Marxist parties at the time (Socialists, Comunists, Anarchists...), since some of them were actually threatening with the expropriation of bussiness & properties, if the Spanish Republic succeeded on establishing a Leftist Government (Frente Popular). For my family, as for many other Spaniards, the alternative was simple : Do we want to become Fascist Italy (or Nazi Germany), or Stalin's Russia? I can understand that when the war started, many working class people had already taken the side of the Republic (the Left, let's say). But many other Spaniards (rich and not so rich), found in the new far Right wing parties (like fascist Falange), the counterbalance against the risk of becoming a socialist regime. Was the Franco government that came after the war an intolerant fascist dictatorship? It is hard to deny that. Could Spain have become a Socialist Republic (like the dictatorships in the Slavic countries under Russia's Warshaw Pact), if the Republican army had won the war? Quite possible.
The fears of small businesses and other sectors certainly were legitimate, but I believe a closer look at the events in the years before and during the civil war may point to a different interpretation. The Frente Popular represented many different political and economic perspectives, expropriation and collectivisation among them. However, it was Franco's coup, coupled with infighting within the Frente and the refusal of Great Britain, France and the United States to assist the Second Republic in its fight against the Franco-Nazi-Fascists, that gave room for the expropriation and collectivisation elements within the Frente to rise to prominence. Left to work out differences without the Franco coup, the different parties within the Frente (center right to left) would have had to find solutions without any one perspective able to impose its entire philosophy on the other Frente members. That's how democracy works, messy and complicated with all sides making compromises it doesn't like.
Things could have probably developed very differently if the dynamics in the new Republic prior to Franco’s coup, hadn’t polarized towards both extremes left and right after the fall of the monarchy, and yes, if the western democracies had been more supportive of Spain’s moderate parties. But it seems that the fate here is to continue calling to remember our recent past, to restart that sort of polarization. This time, the Socialist party under Pedro Sánchez wants to organize a number of events in 2025 to commemorate the end of General Franco’s era in 1976, etc. For many people that sort of retrospective exercise seem’s more of a distraction maneuver, that instead of looking towards the future will just reiterate the sort of left-right polarization that leads towards national confrontation.
Your high quality of priduction, both in visuals but also the script is 10/10. I have heard about the same thing before but in the first seconds you really got me thinking. It is enticing and interactive.
I think this is very similar to what has happened in the Philippines. I think the Philippines has failed in remembering, confronting and facing the events of the Ferdinand Marcos regime and the Martial Law era. There is this Historical Amnesia plaguing Philippine society. This made Filipinos vulnerable to historical denial and revisionism.
what do you recommend for me if i want to dive into philippine's history from this period in time? like books, movies, docs etc. (in english) bc i found it a bit hard to find stuff cheers 🇧🇷🤝
I happen to study on that street shown, "Calle Federico García Lorca". The former name of the "Del Fresno" plaza was "De La Gesta"(militar campaign), a reference to the civil war. It is a generally conservative city so we had to wait until the late 2010s for the application of the '07 Historic memory law by a progressive mayor. Even then the next (conservative, of course) and current mayor attempted their removal and would have probably gotten away with it if it wasn't the only conservative city on an overwhelmingly progressive region, whose government blocked the attempt. The mayor usually cited "caos to citizens and local stores by changing addresses" (funny considering he caused much more caos trying to reinstall some but not all streets) and "changing heroes from one side of the conflict to the other", equating authoritarian generals with assassinated intellectuals and activists. Why would they oppose such benign and democratic measures? To distract. Like most culture wars. They pretend that progressives are using this issues to hide their lack of ability to solve Spaniards' "real" (as if this were imaginary) problems such as inflation, for which their solutions are just as good as the progressives' solutions or even worse, yet that is irrelevant. All that matters is to yell that everything"red" is bad by default and hope that by election year (2023) the people have forgotten whether the sitting central government improved things or not.
12:05 the part about the names reminded me of the fact that most places in Spain have a "Constitution street", which sounds odd, until you realize they used to be "Generalísimo street" or something similar. IIRC, there are still some places that haven't changed the names.
As a spaniard, I have to clear some things up. Firstly, the republicans who committed atrocities against that priest in the photo was a child molester who had abused children at his school, and it is a very famous picture. As for everything else, the truth is everyone in Spain is just trying to move on. The Franco regime was harsh, yes, but the times were also very harsh. You can't say that the british or the french governments and oppositions were any better than both sides on the spanish civil war at the time. This is a very "Western" view on the whole subject, talking about how everything done was wrong and everything is black and white. Good men fought hard on both sides for their ideals, and all thought they were doing what was best for Spain. It's still a very touchy subject in Spain, and Guernica is an example of that. Even my mother, a staunch republican, had to admit that while franco was in charge, it was safer, and more stable, and there were jobs for spaniards. just because we didnt fit the western idea of a stable country didn't mean we weren't one. I fact, the franco regime was much more stable than even thatcher's regime in the 80s. To conclude, not everything is what it seems, and foreigners really need to stop making videos on the spanish civil war, not even one of them get it right.
Another important point of the memory of the regime (and one of the limitations of liberal democracies when engaging with fascism as a concept) is the extent to which the present day Spanish economic elite are direct descendants of those who supported, funded, and profited off Franco's dictatorship in its plunder of Spain. Almost all big Spanish companies have their hands soiled with the blood the regime shed. The whole war started to crush social movements, communism and anarchism, to discipline the working class back into submission when for the first time in its history the Spanish working class looked like it could shape its future with its own hands, and for 40 years they systematically exploited the Spanish people and nation for profit, while eventually sharing a bit of the wealth with the nascent middle class as part of its social pact. It is really difficult to aknowledge your past when your present ruling class was born from its bloodshed.
As a Catalan, I agree with most of the video except for the chapter “Compensating for the past”. Spain has a progressive façade, but at its core, the judges, politicians and state media are remnants of Franco's regime. Point in case, in the last municipal elections a few weeks back the far-right won decisively. Parties like Vox, who hold views akin to those from the dictatorship and are supported by people displaying Francoist paraphernalia, or the PP whose integrants have close links to the regime's officials, are getting voted more than ever. The truth is that fascism was never defeated in Spain; it is, in fact, very much present still.
Franco was a monster….but I think it’s foolish not to contextualize his actions against the sentiments, political movements, and traditional Spanish beliefs….but most importantly this piece doesn’t even mention communism, or their push to eliminate religion in Spain, or their numerous atrocities. These things do not excuse Franco or his rule…but they help explain why many who opposed him similarly want to move on. To explain history and not fall into the guilt trap is a difficult task.
This is a huge aspect that is often not spoken of. The "Republicans" werent exactly good people and by the time they lost the civil war they certainly were not. People always harp on Franco for the attrocities he commited, but no one ever speaks of the fact that the Republicans would have dont the exact same thing.
Well as of 2023 religion has been almost eradicated, the majority of Spanish people are not Catholic any more and those who are are only in paper with a tiny minority ~15% being actively religious. Thank God the progressive ideas of the left won at the end. Coming from a religious country it's shocking to me how Spain became one of the most irreligious countries in the world while before was one of the most religious, originating the Spanish inquisition.
@@ComradeHellas Because Franco did not finish the Job. By 1960 there were MANY socialists professors in important universities. Late Stage Franco's ministers were bureocrats and opportunists. They selled Sahara to Marroc the day after Franco died.
Your entire discussion around Gernica feels strange. Guernica is hardly ignored, in fact discussing it was part of my history assignments as a Spanish high school students. It is also a massively recognizable piece that every Spanish person has heard about, comparable in fame to giants of pop culture. And it is exposed in the Reina Sofia, which as good as you can get in Spain for a piece of modern art as far as I know. What about this feels like Guernica is being ignored? Also, minor complaints, it's "Miranda de Ebro" not Erbo, and it's pronounced GerNIca, not GERnica. The latter felt somewhat disrespectful somehow given the topic? But I get pronunciation is hard. Not to come across as too negative, I praise your audiovisual design, worthy of the highest production values. And the way you treated the content seems respectful, if imblanaced, I appreciate it
Oh yeah, I remember The Guernica being the center piece of one of my primary school Cultural Week "Semana Cultural" all students had to study the art piece, paint a mural together and put up texts defining and explaining it, I even have a plywood painting we did that week depicting part of Picasso's Guernica in my parents house.
Regarding the issue of "collective trauma and historical consciousness in the context of violent social and political divisions"; there are some parallels in several European countries where effective 'amnesties' came into being at the end of periods of violent repression. France - Vichy regime Germany - reunification after communism Portugal - post dictatorship Spain - post dictatorship Italy - post dictatorship
Why don’t they talk about the belligerence of the republicans towards Catholics and the untold horrors they unleashed on the populist of Spain that led up to the civil war? 🤔
In Spain we think that we live in an oposite way that we used to under Franco's regime, and also that's good to react and condemn everything that happened on that period, but we're still slaves of the fear, ignorance, reaction and conformity, promoted from the goverment and the official speech to justify their "legitimacy". And that's the main element that reamins from Franco's regime and the rest of Spain's history, that the spanish society has allways been submissibe ans manipulable by anyone who had the power, and that blinds us when it comes to knowing the facts and the truths that have marked the present of our nation. The Spanish nation has never been free and it won't be untill we start to being honest with ourselves and start to reivindicate the truth, freedom and independence.
The same is happening here in Argentina, Javier Milei administration has a lot of so called "revisionist" intellectuals (like Agustin Laje or Nicolas Marquez) and Milei himself calls the 1976 Dictatorship an era with "excesses" as if dissapearing thousands of people, torturing them and throwing them away to the Rio de la Plata is a simple excess. Its scary how far right politics are growing in the 21 century
It's a very complex topic to cover in a 20-minute video, but I appreciate you taking the time to talk about it. Twenty years ago, Franco was somewhat surpassed by the majority of Spaniards, in 1992 the Olympic Games were held in Barcelona, later Spain entered the euro zone, the economy was going from strength to strength and it was a country with great international relevance, both for better or for worse... there was no apparent reason to worry about that, everything was going well, it was not until the crisis of 2008 that this problem of collective conscience resurfaced, previously the Historical Memory Law was ratified, but most of the population did not see it as a problem, although it received criticism alleging that "it brought back ancient dead from a forgotten era" and the crisis simply brought the creation of new political formations that adopted historical confrontation as part of their agenda, you know, politicians. Today this has become the day-to-day of political life in Spain, there is not a congress session where the dead of a war that occurred almost a century ago or the dark past of some party are not mentioned, be it Whether from the left or the right, Franco's exhumation was seen by a large majority of Spaniards as a direct attack on reconciliation and a perfectly executed political propaganda maneuver (it was an event that was broadcast on all the country's television channels). Many saw it as a great act of historical responsibility and justice for the victims of a regime that ended three generations ago. This, added to the modern progressive ideas that have permeated the spanish society, has brought a new wave of nostalgia for Francoism in the younger generations of the country, although it sounds like an oxymoron, when I went to high school, speaking well of Franco was almost a crime, today you can see kids praising the Franco regime because it's cool, it makes them look rebellious and some even raise their arm. I personally blame all this on the politicians, there are very few left with a true sense of state and almost all of them are more concerned with keeping their seat in the congress of deputies than with governing and trying to improve the situation in the country, and they don't care about dividing 47 million people in order to achieve it, it feels like a big step backwards because what seemed like it was going to be a prosperous and advanced country ended up becoming a victim of its past. It's almost tragic.
I have been to see Guernica in the Reina Sofia, and I have to disagree eith you that it's understated or perfunctory or anything of that sort. Guernica has several rooms dedicated to it, with early sketches and ideas even out on the walls in the outside, and then that whole hall devoid of anything except the massive painting. It's so large that you can't even see the whole thing through the door opposite. I'm not even into art (we went on a school trip), but the Reina Sofia makes a STATEMENT with Guernica. And they advertise it as well.
I think it's safe for me to say that you've put so much passion on this video. This is the first video I've watched from your channel (Kraut recommended you) and subscribed right away at the end. Watching your other videos covering Soyuz, Orban, and Dugan's Russia, and enjoying it! Keep up the good work and stay passionate!
Your introduction reminds me of what Carlos Ruiz Zafón writes about post war Barcelona in The Shadow of the Wind. The child protagonist feels the ghost of what happened, but none of the adults will talk. Descansa en paz, Ruiz Zafón.
God this was good & worth the wait. I know how much work you put into this project & this truly is brilliant on its own merits. Plus the topic of Francoism seems to be broadly overlooked by so many. It's bad how many people are unaware of it & how his regime has left a lasting impact on Spanish society.
My girlfriend has a degree in Spanish so I'm not gonna lie, she influenced me heavily and enlightened me on the topic - and I found it interesting enough to research it further and make it into a video.
Having just watched this, you have beautifully organized this into a coherent and visually immersive video. The Franco regime definitely needs to be shown because of the points you have indicated, hopefully Spain disassembles its pact of forgetting.
You don't live in Spain and it shows. Neither the republicans were that good nor Franco was that bad. There's an irrational hate for dictatorships that simply isn't present. Franco wasn't as brutal as you believe, especially in comparison to the other dictatorships of the time, from Hitler to Pinochet. Both in Portugal and in Spain the dictators weren't murderous psychotic bastards out for blood, they were respected by many and tolerated by most. You're tlaking about putting one of these pseudo politicians that are talking about renovation while sending my country to the shithole and stealing money like few thieves ever have because you think the system is a fraud without even having lived in here.
from an spanish pov, pact of forgetting its what keeps the society peaceful for most people,challenge its like reopening wounds and casting the agressor/victim role into the descendants. I think most people have seem infighting in villages over the retire of 'fascistic' monuments due to past allegiances. Most dont want to return to that level of animosity, so its not easy.
My brother in Christ, there are also those of us who descend from the victims of communist crimes, and who think more fondly of the short man under the great cross. It’s a shame we weren’t even acknowledged, but by this point, hardly a surprise.
I did note that the republicans committed war crimes here 4:21 - but I suppose I should have added a minute explicitly looking at the crimes of the left-leaning side of the civil war for the sake of balance, this was an oversight on my part since I didn't reallly want to make the video about the civil war, more Spanish colllective conciousness so I didn't want to spend too long discussing the civil war itself. It was more a context building excercise, but yes, I should also have discussed purported republican crimes.
Great video, I have been looking for something like this for weeks since I saw Kraut mention this. Volume of the background music was a bit too loud though, it was hard to even hear what was being said sometimes.
Ah damn, I'm sorry about that - it's sometimes hard to balance audio for every device. I edit with a high-dynamic range headset so I sometimes underestimat how audible some elements of the video can be.
The Pact of Forgetting feels almost like the inverse of the denazification and decommunization you saw after fall of the Reich, and the fall of the Warsaw Pact. How do you constructively deal with a regime in which a majority of the population was in some way complicit? How many people would not have to face trial, and be thrown into prison? Whether they be active militant collaborationists, propaganda workers, informants, or even local government officials. How do we arrive at a response that will both satisfy the initial justice-seeking lust, the want for post-collapse normalcy, AND secure future cohesion?
The majority were not for the Nationalists. The common working man and lower classes sided with the Republic. It was the elites and zealously religious that supported Franco.
Well, denazification was possible because of Germany’s defeat & occupation, after having started WW2, invaded all of Europe, & killed millions of people based on their lineages (“race”). Decommunisation was more like an emanciaption from the “Soviet” (“Moscovite”) occupation, rule & political controle, & there still are legal Communist parties in almost every European country. Decommunisaion doesn’t seem to have fully happened everywhere in Europe. Spain was non-belligerent in WW2, & then wasn’t occupied by foreigners. Franco died at age 82, after 36 to 39 years of “reign” (depending if you count the civil war years). He didn’t invented any significant symbol for his regime (just regular monarchist-traditionalist feudal symbolism) & was more obsessed with the “Christian civilisation” than with any concept of Master-Race. Besides, since the 50s & 60s Franco was an ally (or collaborator if you want) of the Pentagone for its anti-communism, having several American bases in his territory (still the case), & normalising diplomatic relations with the neighbours from then on. Economy was growing. When King Juan-Carlos I “inherited” the country, he made it transition to a constitutional, parliamentary, “officially a-confessional”, & highly decentralised kingdom (kinda like Belgium…). Some of the people in administration, justice, etc, were already generationally replaced by those who grow up after the civil war, & some of them were already questioning the regime from the inside, being surrounded by “the Free world”. There is a known song that exeplifies the mentality in 1976 (1st year of King Juan-Carlos rule) called “Freedom without wrath” / “Libertad sin ira”.
@@johnathanmay9143 false. The middle class supported them, and JONS started as a workers' union, Ramiro Ledesma left Falange after he was discontented with it becoming less of a worker party, but the proletariat was still a large part of their lines. Plus, the largest economical elites sided with the republic, most industrial owners sided with the republic, Franco had the army and the church, talking about which, was neutral until the anarchists started outright murdering them. Saying Franco had the elites is outright a lie, especially considering the largest industrial centres were all under control of the Republic when the war broke out. Unless you consider "elites" some bank directors, who were indeed targeted by the revolutionaries and generally supported the CEDA (Not FE-JONS), elites were mainly Republican
@@johnathanmay9143 You're the clueless one here, I am from spain, talked with people who lived it, read books from people who lived it that will never be translated because they're niche biographies or adaptations of guys who lived it. And it wasn't an elite vs lower and middle classes thing. Don't tell me what happened in my country
I am really glad to see this video presentation as it’s the only one that deals directly with the impact on the Spanish society today post dictatorship. I know the Franco era is contentious and bitter still, and what he doesn’t talk about and what I think contributes to the lack of closure is that there are still many people in Spain, who very much like Franco, if not idolize him, so it’s not at all agreed among the people that they’re all victims. I don’t think some of them feel like they are. They are also quick to point out that the communists and other “rebels” were just as violent to those that supported Franco and to Catholic priests and nuns. In war, violence happens, and very gruesome violence can happen, and it happened on both sides. But after the war the human rights, abuses, reign of terror and repression was strictly on the shoulders of Franco and his supporters, and that needs to be confronted., I also disagree with his assessment of the masterpiece by Picasso, “Guernica“. It is in the second most prestigious, art museum in the country after the Prado, and it is placed where it is as a sacred space, 21:55 not to hide it. I think the Majority of people who attend that museum for the first time do so knowing and wanting to see this masterpiece. It is not downplayed by the museum certainly. I’m glad to see that Almodovar, complete, the most well-known spanish Director Worldwide, has taken this on, and now is a part of his body of work, because in that 70s and 80s his movies seem to really tap into the reaction side of wanting to Express rebellion and freedom , the taboo celebrated, to counter those many years of repression, rather than really dealing with the trauma. His movies tended to be outrageously funny with outrageous characters, distracting from the true outrage of what they went through. by the way, although the Portuguese dictator ship was probably not as extremely violent, the city of Lisbon doesn’t have the museum dedicated to looking at the impact on the country and its people and its marriage with the Catholic Church. Excellent museum in the middle of Lisbon, which I recommend highly. I live in Lisbon and at times I pick up on Lil clues having to do with the character of the Portuguese, their norms and policies and bureaucratic dysfunction that I see is related to vestiges of authoritarian rule, but the regime seems to be really discussed. And like the one gentleman noted, when they’re dictatorship ended, they went back to a Republic. They did not want to go back to moNArchy, and it is not even seriously discussed here. but the other time I saw the impact of Franco was in my conversation with a Spanish attorney, and I happen to use the word dictator, but not in the context of their history, and it was the only time that his facial expression notably changed as soon as I used that word.
18:41 the monarchy is not a Falangist thing, the monarchy has been around for centuries. Confrontation of history is important but it shouldn’t steamroll to become a cancel culture movement that could cause rupture in society and used for political gain.
What makes it extra funny to equate falangism with the monarchy is that the falangists - the actual ones like Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera - were staunch republicans who absolutely despised the monarchy. Franco only formally restored the monarchy in 1947 as a concession to the Carlists and alfonists within his coalition, but refused to crown a king because, in truth, Franco didn’t really care about the monarchy. The only reason he named Juan Carlos as his successor in 1969 was that he saw that there were no other viable successors, and that without a viable successor Spain might descend into a new civil war between his own generals. Juan Carlos, of course, dismantled Francosim barely before Franco’s body was cold and issued in the transition to democracy. To tie the monarchy of today’s Spain with the Franco regime is ridiculous
What I find amusing is that the people who lived through the regime want to forget and continue with their lives. Its only the politicians who make their living with these types of endless debates and use these topics to distract the people from the real serios problems that affect Spain nowadays ( Crisis, Unemployment, Debt...) and the modernday youtubers and tictokers, who try to talk about controversial topics to gain viewers and likes, who talk about and don´t want to forget what happened during the regime.
Describing the “Republican” forces as centrist is a lie. Many of my ancestors fought in the nationalist side and still supported democracy. Many people forget (or ignore) that Spain had a democracy well before the republic from the 1880s to about the 1920s. It wasn’t a perfect democracy but it was improving. The republic brought chaos to anybody that was not a radical. During the civil war, the republic forces detained my great grandparent because they had donated money to the monarchy’s exile. They were interred in concentration camps and their children were about to be exiled to Russia. The English amabassador saved my great grandfather from execution a couple times and stopped the deportation of my grandfather and his siblings to Russia. When Franco won the war and decided to stay, my great grandparents expressed their disapproval. They thought he should reinstate the parliamentary democracy that had existed before the republic and lost a lot of their possessions for it. And now here we are. A foreigner with superficial understanding of Spain making videos about how Spain has “buried” its past.
Spanish here. Before making a video about a "silence pact" you should try to ask people from "the other side" instead of accepting one side story. "The pact of forgetting" is a theory that any spanish that doesnt want to speak about the war as a good vs bad conflict is a fascist. My grandfather was leftist, and executed innocent people at gunpoint before the war, but I bet those who ask to rise up questions about the regime will at the same time make their own silence about the reasons the war started in the first place.
The reason why I believe Spain is so divided on this and somewhat "meh" on Franco is because Franco's regime never "fell" (Franco went his whole time without even a significant effective opposition. His regime persisted unmolested and just became "life" in Spain. Not even the defeat of the Axis so much as rocked them a little.), it just faded like smoke due to Juan Carlos (who was supposed to keep it going) hitting the Off switch, and even that didnt lead to massive bloodshed. Government just faded from one to the other. Not without bitter resentment and recriminations that they are still just working out in a weird "silence" compared to anything in the U.S.. People by and large just felt that THAT HAPPENED, it wasn't fair or democratic, but it "kept things stable", but we are glad to move on.
The whole idea of the democratic transition was to destroy the regime from the inside, turn Spain into an European democratic country and avoid as much blood as possible.
In order to do that it was neccesary that both sides decide get on board, that meant that all the crimes of the Civil War and dictatorship were to be forgotten
Thank you for your comment - I agree with this sentiment; that Franco's regime just kind of faded away without bloodshed, and as such, it's not really a portion of Spanish history that is characterised as a 'rupture' that needs to be confronted, more just a natural transition that people accept and don't really question.
Another note though on the last bit, that many Spaniards are glad to have moved on - one of the major regrets I have with this video is being quite one sided on the 'Pacto Del Olvido'. I understand that it has been weaponised by some people to cover up crimes and deny victims closure, but I also failed to point out (other than me saying it was the glue that held Spanish society together in their transition to democracy) its other beneficial aspects. In my opinion, it is a net negative, but I can imagine that if the transition had been more contentious and the pact of forgetting had not been implemented, the state of Spanish politics could have become far more poisonous, vitriolic and resentful. But on balance, I still believe that the 'Pacto Del Olvido' kicks the issue down the road, and makes finding resolutions and a final closure to the Franco era difficult. Would love to hear people's general comments on this.
That's a great point and there might be some truth to that. Look no further than Portugal. We had a revolution initiated by the military but which had much popular support, which gave more foundation and legitimacy to the democracy we have today. There's just one key difference but with a common spirit, the dictatorship was not a result of a full blown civil war, was the result of a ineffective republic with no unanimous goverment rule. And part of the dictatorship reasoning for its begining was precisely that need for stability. There's also a rather curious opposite if you could call that. We did not have a civil war at the begining or a clash of ideals so to say, it was imposed on us. However at the end, the trasition to democracy we faced a first year that was very shaky, from political turmoil to popular unrest, in retrospect is quite a miracle how things didn't end up wrong. My point is, in Spain it was the begining, in Portugal was at the end. But at some point there was a civil/popular clash of ideals for the future of the country.
Small side note on that turmoiled year, I believe only very recently thanks to rise of a open liberal party and decline of the outdated comunist party, the freedom holyday is begining to be suggested that should be another. Not on the revolution day, but on the counter-"revolution" day. Long story short, after the freedom revolution there was a movement of reactionary politians and military that discreetly tried to reinstate a more conservative goverment (the interim goverment itself was publicly deemed too related to the previous power figures), however it was crushed by the revolutionary comunist movement that was an important political force that helped free the country from the dictatorship in the first place, thus it had a great respect within most of the impoverished people which represented most of the country. Following that a more comunist leaning interim goverment was formed. What followed was ever increasing more radical comunist ideals that were being introduced throught the country by these paramilitary groups aligned with the goverment, and a plan for an alleged coup de etat to fully estabilish a communist state. This plan was undone by what was left of moderate forces and politcal actors, which managed to stop this plan as it was unraveling. Only then after being sanitized the extremist forces, elections were held and the first constitutional goverment came to power. This period in history is not well discussed or known about. Most young people may know about the freedom day and assume it was a sea of roses afterwards. The elders don't mention it too much either because after all this years of democracy, that year isn't much in context of the last 45 years of democracy, or because only up until recently the communist party somehow kept having relevance and historical respect on the political scene thanks to the influence it had on taking down the dictatorship in the first place, and thus most of those view that troubled year as just a misunderstanding. There was no bloody standoff in the sense of a civil war and its consequences of it, but the fact there's a taboo from a mere episodical clash of movements and forces that tried to steer the future of the country, seems unproportinal.
@@IMPERIALYT To be honest I find ''el pacto del olvido'' something like Japanese do with their imperial era, it helps with not shaking the box too much but also leaves some things unexplained and uncontested. In my opinion as Spaniard I think that we will truly move on once all the generations who lived under Franco dies and the topic becomes less close to our memories, until that politicians and radicals will keep bringing it on again and again
This is a very important topic, one that few people cover on youtube. I am very happy you made this.
Just here to thank for sharing this, else I'll no doubt be unable to find this channel!
@@rasiah2415 same
well now i have more channels to binge watch, thanks kraut
Good recommendation for this channel I saw on yours enjoyed and subscribed to this one too :)
It seems I got this in my feed thanks to you.
When we talk about "a war between brothers" it is not figuratively. Many many families had supporters of both sides, brothers and sisters who suddenly saw themselves in the shittiest of situations. Just imagine how something like that tears families apart. If you want something remotely resembling normalcy, you HAD to make something like the forgetting pact. Only the new generatios, unbothered by that burden can start to do the heavy work.
Interesting. As a German I might be a bit naive but I always thought a German approach to Spain's history would help the country not retreat the same mistakes from the past.
Many young Spanish people unironically call themselves francos now and it's making me concerned as well as making me fear that the forgetting pact only served to push the confrontation with its own cultural past into the future. Similar to Italy and Mussolini or Russia and Stalin.
@@PuddingXXL thing is, the mistakes were already in the second republic. You don't coup a system just like that.
The kids that call themselves francoist, I can guarantee you, have no clue of what francoism is, they have a few ideas of its symbology and what Franco himself said in a few speeches at most, but they often mix it up with Falange and its national-syndicalism.
That being said, neither do most foreigners, because they've been told that Franco was a fascist dictator, which wasn't. If I had to make a comparison that you'd understand well, Franco had a similar idea as Bismarck, he prosecuted socialism and its variants, though he applied some socialist policies like public healthcare and education, for example. I'd consider him, from all I've been told, a conservative rather than a fascist, and it's no coincidence that one of the very first things he did was push the Falange veterans and ideologists outside of spheres of influence, something that became ever more noticeable after 1945.
@@staringgasmask what a disgusting way of whitewashing a regime that was still killing people in its last year of existence...yes, in 1975 Franco was still killing political opponents.
@@staringgasmaskFranco was called a fascist because he's part of the fascist trio of 20th c Europe: hitler, Mussolini and him. it's true however that he wasn't a Nazi or a fascista, he had his own flavor.
he was a national-catholic, who saw communists and other "undesirables" to be cleansed in the name of god. He had allied himself with the Falange, who were national-syndicalists. People who believed in strong union but who leaned right in every other issue.
Plus, as time went on (60s +), his relaxed his grip on the country, which then liberalized and became a regular capitalist country with fascists on the government, while post-war there was an attempt of autocracy in which the govt had quite a big control on the economy
@@macizogalaico that's not really true, he didn't have ideas of "cleansing" or otherwise purging anybody, he had an idea of social interactions, beliefs, and patterns that should be held by the Spanish people, and he saw some groups as enemies of those ideas.
If what he wanted was a cleansing, he had them defeated, cornered in the Pyrinees and circled in the Mediterranean. Refugee ships could have been intercepted by Italian navy ships or even by his very own aviation, which were well in range of performing operations over the coast.
He could have exterminated countless people, but he let them go, and most of the prisoners weren't executed (though some did get death penalties with an immediate pardon as a symbolical sentence).
And while Falange was in the government for a while, it's generally considered that when he removed the party's leadership and placed his own puppets, as well as repressing student movements organized by the SEU (Falange's student union).
Honestly, I personally considered Franco considered ways of acting undesirable, and ideologies that endorse them, he let a certain freedom of complaint and expression to workers and business owners, but he was very repressive with students. As always, something can't be described as simply as you put it
I've just got back from a week long holiday in Spain and I was staying in a town where people were thrown off a bridge into a gorge into the guadevin river. I made the mistake a couple years ago in the same place to ask someone about it and they simply laughed it off and quickly walked away. No one talks about it, other than an old man who simply mimed a shooting action and said it was terrible.
people don't know. As simple and absurd as that. I am from a town that is really close to the concentration camp of miranda de ebro, I know that there were concentration camps here in spain and trust me if I say not all spanish people my age knows that.
@@gadeaiglesiassordo716 It's not that simple. Several people, neighbours, friends, were shot in most towns 80 years ago. Their descendants (killers and victims) meet each other in shops and bars today. They are still neighbours, but cannot be to blame for what their grandparents did when most of them weren't even born.
Most people just sweep it under the rug, and rightly so. It's brutal to know that Paquita's grandpa ratted on your abuelito Alfredo, so that the falangists (or the republican militias) took him away in a truck, and he was never seen again.
I’ve been to Ronda
nice to hear that. My thanks to those geezers
People do talk about it. Openly. I often hear Franco and the civil war mentioned on national radio. They talk about it in the parliament. It's in the newspaper. There are so many myths and falsehoods from outside Spain surrounding this history.
One of the biggest problems with teaching about the Franco era in schools at least in my experience is that those topics are at the end of the history books and a lot of time we never reached the end of the book at school. History is also taught in a very superficial way that doesn't help at all.
yeah. all the way through primary school and highschool i remember that we would always have two or three topics which we simply didn't have time to learn. it's not until Historia de España in post highschool that you actually learn this stuff. and, by that time (around 18 years old) is too late i think
Revisionist history by those in power
He fought against lgbtqa communist homos
Absolutely. I learned all this stuff in detail much later in university and just because there was a history class.
That's a very good point. Many schools just never have time to reach that topic. I'm a high school history teacher and can confirm that this is so.
I've told you this before but I'm commenting for the world to see. In France, during the trial of Klaus Barbie, the gestapo chief, torturer and murderer of De Gaulle’s second in command, Le Monde, the famous French newspaper ran a poll "Of the two following words, forgetting or justice, which is the one that best characterises your attitude toward the events of this period of the war and the Occupation". Yosef Yerushalmi, upon learning of the poll wrote “Can it be that the journalists have stumbled across something more important than they perhaps realised ? Is it possible that the antonym of ‘forgetting’ is not ‘remembering’ but ‘justice’?”.
This is a thoughtful spirit which your work demonstrates and embraces, thank you for another great success, Imperial.
I'm a university student from Madrid and I'd like to add a tiny note to your video, regarding the Guernica portrait. I can't help but disagree with your interpretation of its place within Spanish society, or in the Reina Sofía museum. I understand there is profound symbolism behind its solitude in the room, or in the modesty with which it's exhibited, and I think that's an extremely pertinent (and frankly impressive) observation. But I'd like point a couple of things about the rest of Madrid's art exhibits before accepting it.
In the Prado Museum, 'Las Meninas' by Diego de Velazquez also used to sit alone, in a tiny room in the south wing of the museum. There were no 'monuments' or 'tributes' around it, but I loved that tiny room. The layout was configured to inspire, to present the works of the great masters of our past by arranging them in an intimate rendezvous with the visitor. Most magically, displayed nearby there was a printed notice letting the visitor know just when the lighting would show the work of art to it’s best advantage. I believe that's quite representative of Madrid's art panorama and to quite a large extent, of Spanish culture too.
The Prado and the Reina Sofía are not the Louvre. You won't see massive, oak floored, chandelier ridden halls exposing dozens of masterpieces. The Spanish temple to art only has the space and refinement to present to the visitor the very best, and then feels compelled to advise you to the exact hour when the lighting will show their baby to it’s best advantage. It's just a different approach, one more austere, modest, intimate. I don't think the Guernica's current style of display is "understates" or "perfunctory", but it definitely is "repeated across Spain", its just how we roll here.
After reading the comments over the past month or so I realise that I misinterpreted Guernica's placing and prominence. I now see it as you say, as more of a symbolic, and poignant isolation. I suppose I just saw it as fitting in with the wider pattern, instead of a rupture from that pattern - I should have been more nuanced in my assessment of Guernica as a piece of art; I was seduced by the narrative simplicity of it. However, I still do stand by the rest of the argument, that most of Spanish society doesn't confront/do justice to it's traumatic past very thoroughly in a lot of instances.
@@IMPERIALYT I've lived (and taught) in Spain and in Germany and, in my experience, and based general questions of colleagues who teach history, there is most certainly a greater emphasis in Germany on reconciling the past, specifically the events of the Nazi and the Socialist dictatorships. Germans took the route of total exposure in society, if not at a family level, where there might often remain s reticence. I'm now a historical tour guide in n Berlin and, among other things, give educational to German school classes, where they look at some of these topics. Regardless of what some may say about Spanish school kids learning a lot In the last two years of school, German school kids begin earlier, and even those who don't take "a levels "(Germany:Abitur Spain:Bachillerato) are introduced to these topics. My anecdotal impression is that there is overall a greater openness in German society to investigating the strains of the past. That has everything to do with decisions made at the political level.
I think that Guernica as a painting communicates, to use Bojan Zalac’s lens “Genocide as Social Deafh”, social death. Guernica, and what happened there, was the death of a society, the death of Spanish society in the sense that the individual was forgotten and attacked, used for political gain and aim. The painting communicates the chaos, doom and death of what happened at Guernica, and what happens when a society’s value of humanity dies. The chaos of the painting confronts a viewer with the meaning of human society, and in many ways, in my interpretation, is a warning. The simplicity of the presentation of Guernica at the Reina Sofia is impactful because Guernica communicates the feeling of chaos, doom, and death to the audience. The faces of Guernica don’t require an accompanying explanation of the context, only a viewer, because, to me, the painting is ultimately about the human experience of social death. Of course education and awareness and memory of the context that surrounds the painting is needed, but Guernica is, although about the civil war, ultimately, at least to me, a universal tribute to victims of social death. It could be a painting about any massacre / genocide, however it confronts the viewer to consider how they see humanity in the faces of the painting, and therefore to see the humanity lost at Guernica and in genocide and massacres and crimes against humanity. Guernica is not just a memory the past, but when it’s placed before a viewer, it directly implicates the viewer to connect with the faces of the subjects, to understand their experience of chaos and massacre. The doom that the painting portrays, it also instills on the viewer. As I see it, Guernica can stand alone with the viewer, without outside historical explanation (although important), because it is ultimately not about history, but about an individual’s (the viewer’s) relationship with the humanity violated in the past (the painting as a memory), and at risk in the future (the painting as a warning).
On an unrelated note, the Prado was the best art museum I ever visited. I like it much better than the Louvre.
And I’m Portuguese, so you know I’m not biased lol
@@IMPERIALYT
Your video is totally fucked up. The painting pseudo180iq interpretation is just the surface.
The video is not bad, but there are some nuances it doesn't capture quite well.
First, people tend to differenciate between the War and the Dictstorship. Even though both are correlated, people tend to think about them as separated terms. It makes sense, we are encompasing four decades of History, and Spain wasn't the same in the forties and in the sixties, for example.
So many people who are more "suportive" of the Dictstorship, usually think about the last years, when Franco was older, Spain was booming economicallt, Franco started to be less involved in politics, some political dissidents started to come back. People on the left tend to remember the first years of the Dictstorship, the brutal repression, the economical ruin and the ties with Nazi Germany. Franco mutated during all those decades, so it's difficult to talk about Franco without specifying about the time, what was happening at the moment.
Second, one thing the video misses is the economical side of the era. People don't remember that much the repression unless they had family members who suffered it directly, but ALL older people remember the hunger and starvation of the post war era. My grand father and his family could survive because his father was a baker and was able to smuggle bread in the coat, more than the two bars they had assigned. That they he could eat some bread with a boiled egg, abd that's it. Twenty years of and hunger and ruin traumatise a generation more than a war and political repression.
Third, the historical argument of "both sides commited attrocities, let's forget about it" was necessary at the moment. When Franco died, most of his stablishment was still in charge. The more reformists side of the Francoist government was out after the terrorist attack against Carrero Blanco, and the more conservative faction was in charge of the government and military. Spanish politicians had to be very careful in the first years of the Transition to democracy (for example, the Communist Party was legalised during the Holy Week, so the most reactionary segments of the population would be involved in the festivities and less inclined to think about the "reds"). The historical was necessary in those years to avoid any unnecessary confrontation, and now historians are starting to critisise the arguments behind it.
Third, it is false the Civil War is not taught in school. For the dismay of many, myself included, the whole History of Spain is relegates to a footnote besidea the last two centuries. 19th and 20th century recieve all the attention, while other important times like the Reconquista and the Conquest of America are barely taught. In the last year before going to university, History of Spain is one of the few mandatory subjects for every single student (unlike Maths, for example), and the the II Republic, the Civil War, the Dictstorship and the Transition are extensively covered and taught (I should know, I have taught it). It is true that level of education is not mandatory, but most students reach it.
Four and final, in every political negotiation, there is a give and take. There would have not been a peaceful transition to democracy if we started to throw the bodies at each other. Sometimes crimes go unpunished, that's true and that's a shame, but very common in History. If we want to move forward, there has to be forgivness in both sides, and of course one side is gonna have to swallow a lot of shit, but maybe that's the price for a future.
Feel free to ask anything. If you ask me, Franco was one of the worst things happened to this country, and maybe if Britain and France had had the balls to support the democratic republic it wouldn't had fallen into the claws of the communists and the left opposition the Republic also faced. Also, Franco ruines this country for twent years, and only in the brink of bankruptcy when he took a step back was the country started to grow back into the modern and prosperous country of today.
Also, as a sidenote, Spain is still part of the world, and the tendencies and discourses of the modern left have come to Spain as well. Many people who opose modern feminism, or are againt the mass inmigration of Muslim people, are falling into the traps of the far right and started to romanticise the Francoist era. More and more kids in High School support Franco as a form of being rebelious againt the stablishment (in my time we were punks, now they are "fachas"). That's another whole can of worms, but a new entire generation is starting to support Franco because of reasons way out of the scope of the Dictstorship. Just wanted to point that out as a cautionary tale about how Franco may be seen by the future generations.
Thank you for adding some nuance to this - it's incredibly difficult to fit all of the perspectives in to one video - I struggled to get this one out because of the sheer volume of information, so it was kind of necessary for me to approach it from a more focused perspective.
@@IMPERIALYT I know, I wasn't rebuting your arguments (besides the one about not being taught in school), but providing another perspective from someone from the country AND who has studied the topic deep enough, not just a random Spaniard talking about how he sees the war. The good thing is so many foreign hispanists have written about the subject that you don't have to speak the language to really know about the topic. The Civil War was back then like the War in Ukraine today.
I hope I didn't look like an asshole, it's just I am at work with nothing really to do and it distracted me for a while, both the video and writing the comment. Other than that, pretty good video with good producing values.
@@meatiesogarcia6478 of course not you came off very respectful - again, thank you for your thoughtful comment
@@meatiesogarcia6478 I just want to add a note to your comment, not only UK did nothing, but Great Britain and the US did vouch for Francoist Spain during the cold war to maintain their status quo against communism and also making trade agreements (Even more, the US giving money to Franco in exchange of having military bases). It wasn't just a matter that they didn't act but also the fact they were partners after WW2.
@@TasukuMuncha UK "forbid" France from helping the Republic (the French Popular Front wanted to help the Spanish one) but the UK warned France their alliance would end if they did help.
At the end of the war, the US wanted to invade Spain to remove Franco from power and establish a western democracy, but it was again UK against it. Not long after, the Cold War started and obviously the US preferred a right wing militaristic dictatorship than a communist regime, but initially they did want to remove Franco from power.
The US changed thier views to suit the new situation (I understand why they did it, and I don't hate them for it; they didn't create Franco, they took advantage of what was already there), but the UK twice prevented others from helping Spain.
And that's why I do hate them. Everytime I see another drunk angloid jumping from a balcony to the pool and the jump is too short, I cannot avoid to feel a little bit of joyness.
I'm joking, but I do blame the UK, and not the US, for a lot of stuff that has happened in the world in the previous century and people like to pin on the USA.
I would like to bring up something about the pact of forgeting. While its primary purpose was to protect those involved in the goverment during the franco years it also has side that often ignored, it also forgave those involved in the civil war in BOTH sides. This was really important for the transition to democracy because it exonerated those exiled during and after the war from crimes commited during the republic and war, (obiously they made it so its whiped the record of those in power in 1975) and allowed them to came back while also empting the prisions. This was fundamental to the peaceful transition to democracy.
I love that you brought this to attention. Too often the victims of the Republic, as my own ancestors, are forgotten, and their stories either ignored or suppressed.
Thank you. These people aren’t advocating for closure, they’re advocating for revenge.
the pact of forgetting was a crude crutch made to survive the pains of reform. instead of going to the hospital, the right keeps affirming that the crutch is good enough.
however, medics and doctors know that, sometimes, to cure a poorly healed bone you have to break it first again and put it in the right position.
this, of course, is painful. and society doesn't have good anesthetics. but it is necessary if we wish to keep walking
@@feastguy101
(🤔…) (?!)…
@@Sedgewise47 yes?
I was born in the basque town of Gernika. I believe that part of the brutality against my town was to strike the historical capital of the Basque people and demoralize us.
The irony is very strong in our town. On the one hand, the Spanish government ignores and does little to nothing with respect to dealing with our history. On the other hand, you have the Germans, who bombed Gernika, and in 1999 they "apologized" (by their President but not the Kanzler) and paid for our (amazing) sports center as some kind of reparations.
VIVA LA LEGION CÓNDOR
Guernica la quemaron los rojos en retirada porque tenía mucha industria que no querían que usasen los Cruzados
Ya sabes. es España la guerra civil esta en nuestro adn SIN DIGERIR. El pacto del olvido pudo ser bueno pero ha impedido el poder digerir y elaborar como sociedad la guerra civil y la dictadura posterior. Ni siquiera la podemos estudiar en condiciones en historia por lo superficial que todavia la tenemos y lo poco digerida que la tenemos. Es una especie de herida que queda con postilla pero nunca cicatriza, una cicatriz ya no se puede abrir, una postilla se puede abrir con el minimo esfuerzo, y llevamos con esta postilla desde que murío franco y hay gente que no quiere convertirla en cicatriz
I visited Gernika last year and did the self-guided tour around town starting at the Gernikako Arbola and ending at the Picasso mural. I learned so much about the Basque people and parliament, and so much about the bombing during the war. It was a very moving experience, plus I went on a Monday so I could go to the market.
That being said, I left with so many questions about what happened afterwards and what it was like under Franco. The most I heard about him in other parts of Euskadi was a bit at el museo San Telmo in Donostia, which had a decent amount of information, but I still wanted more.
Yeah, it was the President of Germany because they’re the German head of state, the highest diplomatic official the German can produce. That’s not a slight, that’s how it’s supposed to be done
@@Edmonton-of2ec Better than nothing, I still think the Bundeskanzler/in would have been nicer
Really interesting topic, thanks for making this, and to Kraut for sharing.
I lived in a part of Spain (well, the Canary Islands) which suffered considerably under Franco, the older folk were still divided over Franco's legacy, and genuine Francoists still persisted. I remember using coins with Franco's face still on them. I've explored an abandoned former detention centre, and a mass grave was found nearby. The scars were visible everywhere; in the culture, the land, society, even infrastructure, but ignored by most except the more curious young folk.
That was in the 1990's and 2000s, so hardly ancient history.
It's interesting to see how things have developed since, despite the frictions.
Solo queda VOX
Bro why are you lying😂😂 the Euro is the currency of Spain and trust me they have no pictures of Franco on any euro coins😂😂
Thank you for making this. Visiting Spain in 2018 was eye-opening to me for many reasons. This part of Spanish history I never learned in US schools (I did in college later).
I encountered those in Spain who had the “let’s forget and move on” attitude and the “we need to acknowledge this” approach.
Yes, the "lets move on camp" and the "Not even my grandparents were there but I want to milk this forever" camp
I lived a year in Erasmus in Sevilla and the traditional vs progressive divide was quite apparent. My flatmate was an anticlerical Republican whereas most people just accept the monarchy as it is. Since I study archaeology and history, some of my classmates told me that there's a conspiracy that the coup attempt in 1975 was orchestrated by the king (as an act of political theater) to legitimize his rule, he even showed me the video of the incident.
This summer I did a dig in Catalunya, it was on the Iberian (preroman) period. However, the site was located in Gandesa where there are hills and mountains that served a crucial role in the bloody Battle of the Ebre River took place. One day we went to the site that served as a fort for Franco, where only three years ago they took down his statue.
That place is still today is heavy in the local collective memory, apparently gay men would have sex there (especially when the statue was there) as a symbolic gesture against the anti-LGBTQ Francoist regime.
Plus in Catalunya, people speak Catalan (as well as Spanish) but their local culture and language was persecuted under Franco and he attempted to wipe out all regionalist cultures by creating a uniform Spanish castillan culture. They have an extra reason to hate the dictatorship.
It’s why I call “Spanish language” the Castilian language. “French” is Parisian.
I don't know much about the lgtb thing, but it is false that he wanted to erase catalonian, in fact he seemed to protect and promote it
He wanted to erase Catalan language, i promise you
@@xavierpenalvergrau6046 that's simply not true
@@Dario-uj6qo i write you in catalan because I was born in 1981;
No es va prohibir la llengua facticament, pero et podien represaliar si la parlaves en públic.
No se prohibió en círculos privados pero si te cogían hablando catalán te podían dar una paliza o llevar al calabozo por sospechas de ser contrario al régimen.
I'm spanish and catalan from Barcelona
I'm so glad I found your channel! Your visual presentation of topics concerning geopolitics and historical events is unique and so well put together.
The monarchy had a part in ending the Franco regime and preventing something similar to it from returning afterwards.
Maybe that's one of the reasons many people don't hold its restoration under Franco against the institution.
Franco never allowed the monarchy to return while he lived; under him, Spain was a monarchy without a King. That’s probably why people don’t associate the two, which, in a way, protected the legitimacy of the monarchy.
also, after Franco died, a public referendum was held which had two options, regarding the creation of the new government:
A: constitutional monarchy
B: regular monarchy
note that it wasn't monarchy vs republic. thus, monarchy was seen as one of the actors of "reform" and people were still scared about going into a republic, which could make the right rise up in arms again.
the general attitude after Franco's death was very much of "just let it be, just let it be. don't go changing too much otherwise things might get bloody again"
@@macizogalaicoo, there was a referendum on the new constitution. A vote of no would’ve simply resulted in the production of a new draft. Also an election had already in held in 1977, so the PSOE and Communist Party had partaken in the writing of the draft constitution… and you think they of all parties would’ve approved of a constitution that concentrated political power in the hands of the monarchy? Are you drunk? High? Generally insane?
@@T7M7P7L7R 🤓🤓🤓🤓🤓
@@xeixi3789 QUE VIVA FRANCISCO FRANCO !
the Franco era isn't even really taught in history when I was a kid learning European history. it's kinda forgotten sweeped under the rug
Because everyone focuses on the World Wars instead, and the truth is that the regimes of Hitler and Stalin were 100x worse than Franco
@@ARCPolus Even then, it's interesting that it isn't even brought up. Also not brought up in introductory history classes in University unless you specifically go into 20th century European history. The thing is, the Spanish civil war in a world view was VERY important cause it was the precursor to WWII not only in Franco's army winning due to a big part of obtaining German supplies, resources and men, but also the fact that the future Allies eventually just "gave up" on helping which allowed Germany to essentially use the civil war as a sort of testing ground. Sprinkle in the different political viewpoints even within the Spanish government and around Europe and you get a brutal civil war
I moved to Spain in 2021 and have been faced with a lot of the attitudes, trauma and hush-hush about that era.
Thanks for this video.
One note I’d like to make is that Guernica isn’t really “cast out there on its own” like it’s isolated in the museum. They make a really big deal about it in the main modern art museum of Madrid and there is a large room or civil war propaganda posters and other civil war exhibits before and around the Guernica room - which is the most crowded room despite it’s one piece.
I believe it has become very "hush-hush" only recently. I moved back in 2014 and have experienced an enormous amount of talking about the era. From Falangists bars, the Valley of the Fallen debates, literal neo-falangist/neo-republican clashes and so much more. But in recent years it has been slowly declining towards a "taboo" topic.
Spain mourns his loss.
@@JeffTheFunnyCSGO just like worldwide, extreme conservadurism is gaining a lot of young followers and strength, and in Spain, the battle horse of the right has always revolved around Franco.
Before the 2008 crisis, spaniards looked at the future with the hopes of modernising after very prosperous 20 years in the EU, however after that, politicians have been taking advantage of people's frustration in order to revive ideas only the craziest thought.
A big reason why the fascists won is because the Republicans splintered and fell to infighting; many factions were quite undemocratic, and held each other in far greater contempt than their supposed common enemies. I recommend Orwell's Homage to Catalonia for a great look into this side of the fight.
To put it simply, it is possible that a Republican victory would have heralded a democratic and free Spanish society, but it isn't terribly likely.
I agree - the republicans were also no saints. But just using this comment to clarify something - this video was not supposed to be an evaluation of "what side was worse" or "which side would have been better for Spain", more just an overview of why the Franco era and the Civil War is such a difficult topic for Spaniards and why it still isn't fully confronted. Ultimately it is the Franco era that is taboo and lacks closure, not the Republican dimension of the Civil War (for the most part). Just seeing a lot of comments on why I didn't more extensively cover the Republican crimes and deficiencies and thought I should clear things up.
One of the myths impossed by the regime was the inevitability of the civil war, like it was meant to happen anyway.
Another one is the simplification of the enemy, where the republic is summarized as the communist party imposing itself with soviet aid in the last year of the war. Neither are true and we need to remember that just a couple of years prior there was a Catholic-Liberal coalition in the government.
At the end is like blaming Hitler’s crimes on the instability and problems of the Weimar republic.
@@IMPERIALYT Could you cover Northern Ireland from 1921 to 1998, Irish civil war or the Irish war of independence?
the nationalist won! not the fascist! dummy
@@IMPERIALYTright, but I see no debate in which side was the correct one. Franco was inspired by fascists regimes as documented by the UN in 1946 or in the “Manifiesto de Lausana” by Juan Carlos father. The republicans had the suport of most intellectuals. Their cause was identified with antifascism and freedom. However, unfortunately, Franco was not only helped by the rest of the dictatorships in Europe, but the also received help by american and british companies. Capitalism is always a better friend of fascism than it is of those who were fighting against it (anticapitalists, as the main reason why the fascist sublevation started was by the threat that an imminent socialist revolution meant for the oligarchies).
Man I'm glad someone else has noticed that post-Fascist states make major progressive strides fllowing the end of Fascistic regimes. Be it with or without cultural outlets to address the trauma of the old regimes, there seems to be an active effort by the electorates of these states to never permit such regimes to occur once again.
Random Indonesian watching our anti-corruption institutions weakened, Islamic fundamentalism's increasing visibility in politics, and more censorship measures being added: ah if only it were all post fascist states...
.......uh.....yeah.....No! That's not I've been witnessing.
@@juniorjames7076 Portugal, Germany, Spain, Austria and Chile tell a drastically different story just to name drop a few examples.
@@GuyShōtō as a Spaniard, our main right wing party was founded by one of Franco's ministers, and they share most of his ideology. The *second* right wing party is even worse, and they're becoming increasingly popular. Not only that, we can still elect a Falange member as mayor, even though they're currently too minor to go to the main elections. Many older people say we were better off under Franco, and more and more younger people are starting to believe it.
Yeah Spain doesn't really have much of those never letting the regime occur again efforts to be fair
This is the third time I’ve watched this video, the script is very powerful and haunting. I visited Spain back in May and went to the art history museum of Madrid which was art that depicted the history of Madrid from the 16th century through 19th century. The thing I noticed was there was nothing on Madrid during the Spanish Civil War and the Franco Regime and I knew it had something to do with the Pact of Forgetting.
@@DiotimaMantinea-ub6yr un comentario muy acertado
that's because it is on the reina sofía museum not in el prado
Oh come on... stop it. There's documentaries about Franco and Hitler almost everyday on Equipo de investigación on la sexta. Politics also won't stop mentioning Franco and left people will can someone fascist for just breathing lol
Bro Guernica is literally Picassos most famous piece
Well, the Spanish Civil War and the dictatorship happened in the 20th century, not sure how much of it you were expecting to see in a museum depicting history from the 16th to the 19th centuries.
I feel there's been a topic missing, which is the nonconversion of most of the powers, being: political (this was stated as parties were founded by franco's "ministers"), but every other power was too, justice and judges, police and army generals and the head of the state (the king) apointed by the dictator even skipping his father on the successory line, the economic powers, cultural references and ingeneral elites... all those that thrived during the dictatorship and amassed power of any kind remained untouch and unchallenged.
To all that, another very important point is that when there was the "transition" to democracy there was an attempt to cup again (some say selforganized, but regardless) that also shaped any potential discussion to "let's accept what we are given, or the others will come" (which was already a thought because of the unchange of power, but was made more explicitly a thread)
You may not know, but there have been heavy efforts to remove Francoist influence from the army. Mainly pre-retiring the eldest officers that made their career under Franco.
The National Police was completely rebuilt, uniforms, equipment, training, functions, and officers as well.
The Justice was also completely rebuilt with a new constitution, no longer had the government a final say, and judges could and would get punished if they intentionally fail in their ruling due to ideological bias. On top of that, there is a democratically (sort of) elected chamber of judges, more tied to the government than actual democracy, but that's unrelated to this topic.
And parties, well, Franco's ministers were pretty much all of the right wing politicians in Spain at the moment, from more liberal-leaning guys to hard traditionalists, they weren't all authoritarian, had they all been, the transition wouldn't have ever happened.
Not to mention the PCE was still controlled by people well known for murdering dissenters and opponents during the Civil War. Not just dictatorship supporters, actual people behind murders and executions.
@@staringgasmask lol, you may not know, your narrative sounds super cool, there is only one problem, which is that it doesn't add up to reality in which all the powers were kept and mantained by the same names same families same traditions same head of state ... There was a change into some kind of democracy, in which the concerns about separation of powers were disregarded and even stated as intended, some changes on structure, but at the end you can't make up new judges and officers and the state literally killed and pushed out any discent and supressed any other ideology, so same people same powers, and to finish same king that was apointed by the dictator was the head of state, but yes, full renewal and everything new and shiny.
@@staringgasmask Judges are not remotely democratic. Politicians place them themselves, how will the judges later go against them? It is a rigged system, far from democracy, the partisan-state doesn't fit it either.
In the Topography of Terror museum in Berlin I heard a similar story from a tour guide about Germany after WW2. For a generation, Germans really did not want to confront the Nazi era of their history. They didn't want to point fingers or prosecute the vast majority of Nazi war criminals, or really think about what had happened. It wasn't until the next generation who did not grow up in that time came to positions of power that Germany really started to address its past.
more or less our case. The problem is that now there is a political party that trully wants to make things that difficult. Remember PP are DIRECTLY BORN from the francoist stablishment (take manuel fraga as an example) and then you have Vox who are intelectual heirs of franco's memory. I just hope that we could TRULY talk in as soon as possible. there are still people alive that lived during war times and I would like to see this solved when they died. (the civil war was during years 36 to 39)
No my friend…. The current regime just wanted to wait till it could rewrite history with impunity. As there was no one left to attest otherwise.
And how has that gone for Germany? Most Germans I’ve met travelling say they’re sad they were born German because of the history. Perhaps Spain’s silent approach isn’t so bad when acknowledgment and reconciliation lead to self hatred and shame for crimes from 4-5 generations ago.
@@isaac6077 It's going worse. People don't know about Franco repression post Spanish civil war. The conservative party was created by 7 Franco ministers. Spain is the place of the world with most colective tombs with Vietnam. We still have streets with names of the sublevated band while we have none dedicated to the republicans that fought agains them...
@@gadeaiglesiassordo716 problem about the republic except the liberal side and maybe the anarchists they were outright communists and the red terror could have been just as bad as franco if they had won the civil war
What an amazing video with stunning visuals. The way the assets are combined into a cohesive picture with textures and glows is truly inspiring. These videos will be evergreen.
Excellent and well argued exploration of a little discussed topic. I've lived in Spain and interviewed Republican refugees in the UK - the echoes of the civil war are everywhere. Its an ooen wound that won't be healed until it's aknowledged and tended to.
Oh you better believe I'm stealing/HEAVILY being inspired by that 9:20 document effect. The whole video is incredibly designed and executed
I just saw this and I am happy to see a video about the Francoist regime and it's effects on modern Spain.
As a Filipino, I've never knew what happened under the Franco regime. Because of this video, it changed that. Thank you for making this video.
This man is a Liar and a Communist Franco Saved Spain and its ppl.
The Spaniards should look at the Philippines, to see what happens if you forget the past.
I’m Pinoy, I knew of Franco and this made me happy that I am independent
Great video on a topic so often overlooked when disvussing Europe's history (together with the Salazar era in Portugal).
Subscribed the second the video was over and gonna binge your other videos soon!
There isn’t much to discuss with Salazar, not nearly on the same level as with Franco. Our dictatorship was relatively tame (for a dictatorship), and didn’t kill hundreds of thousands of people in bloody reprisals.
Excellent coverage of the Franco regime and post-Franco Espana. I love this country and have been visiting for now 30 yrs and have a close friend living in the south. Since the 90's Spain has grown and changed, specially post EU and Euro transitions which were very painful but ultimately brought Spain into the First World.
Up into the 2000's I would regularly see Franco memorabilia in the streets, especially in Madrid and across Andalucía, the old were very much still pro-Franco, the young were mostly lost or forging their lives in the new democracy in which they found themselves.
I remember going to my friend's wife's graduation back in the 90's outside Malaga: There countless young women were graduating, and only a fraction of young men. Two decades earlier, there were no women in the universities and it was all men. However, this new generation of women weren't looking to outshine the men, no, they were only just getting educated, with no real ambitions of using that education to further themselves in their lives.
Catholicism still has a deep hold on Spain in an entirely socio-cultural grip, hardly religious at all.
That last sentence is a deep truth, and you ignore it at your own peril. Look what happened to the Republic.
I came here on Kraut's recommendation. And this is quality content. Subscribed.
as a baque person, i can't emphasise enough how much franco and his era impact current political and social life within Spain. Especially the basque country
and other culturally different autonomous communities.
Le tenéis como un hombre del saco pero la realidad es que el batua ya se estaba cocinando en el 1965 y las gau eskolak estaban operativas en iglesias en los 50. También en el 55 Barandiarán regresó del exilio y estuvo enseñando literatura vasca en Salamanca. Koldo Mitxelena también estaba enseñando en Salamanca bajo Franco.
No había razón para demasiada represión: el PNV se rindió sin apenas batalla, ahorrando vidas a ambos bandos. El euskera no era idioma oficial y es verdad que inmediatamente de la guerra las autoridades estaban muy nerviosas y esto daba lugar a palizas.
De lo que no se habla tanto es por ejemplo del apoyo de las iglesias vascas al terrorismo.
As an American, I know very little about the modern history of Spain, so I appreciate this video making me aware of an issue I didn't know existed. Thank you.
God be with you out there everybody. ✝️
As Spaniard, Franco has been written by left by the nightmare or the worst part of spanish history. But Franco was a consecuence of the polarising of Spanish politics.
You Will never see in USA a democratic party agreeing with far-left and anarchist political parties in order to form a coalition. You Will never see that leader of that coalition trying to kill opposition leaders.
The right has no choice than agreed with Far-right to try to compete them.
Franco became a general of the right side, because he could join all right leaning parties. Even that the far-right has less support by Spaniards. The influence of Hitler make him to chose the far-right at start to fight communist threat.
The issue of the return of democracy was the agree of moderates in both sides. The Far-right and Far-left parties did everything to boycott the transition including killings. At the end, one part of the communist has to Accept the rules that moderate parties did by consensus, accept to be part of Constitucional Parlamentary Monarchy. The Far-right once they understand that they were a total minority at the politics they surrendered their violent campaign.
This consensus has been accepted until Pedro Sanchez arrived to power . The actual prime minister even losing elections Accepts everything in order to stay power, even that is illegal and unconstitucional he does. He is polarising the spanish politics. With one differencd, at the second republic the violent increased a lot. However, the actual majority spanish people are moderate and is against to come back to black history. The majority want Sánchez out.
Such a lopsided video, hard to watch from the second minute onward.
Woah dude I wonder how doesnt this channel has like hundreds of thousands of subscribers, the quality of the content, narration, subtitles(!!!), editing and animation is awe inspiring! Congrats on the hard work, you'll soon reap all the rewards!
This channel is a fine example of how to produce visually stimulating, academically fascinating and thoroughly watchable mini-documentaries.
And filled with halftruhs and missinterpretations.
This video is incredible
Guess you're first
Soy español, y es una mierda.
Excellent video , great quality in production and research! Can't wait to see this channel blow up! Keep up the amazing work!
Good job at presenting our present issues with Franco's past.
I know I'm late to this video, but I'd like to add that the attitude of apathy and forget was carefully orchestrated by Franco's regime. It lasted for more than 30 years and it never fully got away. This meant that during the span of two generations the regime utilised terror just as the Inquisition used to do. They caused a massive shock through cruel civil war and repression so nobody would speak on the matter.Thus, Spanish population do not talk because the fear of consequences was interiorized even after the dictatorship finished.
Just to give you an example, my great-grandfather was close to the socialist party right before the war, but due to the Civil War and Franco's regime, he stopped getting interested in politics, so only his wife and close family members knew about his past (my grandfather was born at the start of the war). After the 'dictatorship's downfall', it was announced on the news that the amnesty laws would give monetarial compensation to past republican soldiers. My great-grandfather, believing that he would receive money (he wasn't elegible because he never fought), announced my mother (who was around 20 at the time) that the government would give him money. Right inmediatly after hearing him, his wife (my great-grandmother) pulled my great-grandfather from the living room and started to reprimand him for talking. After that event, my great-grandmother (knowing that my mother was a left-leaning activist) would never let my great-grandfather sit alone with her just to make sure he didn't tell anything.
To this day, nobody in my family is sure what our great-grandfather did. We think he never affiliated himself to PSOE or UGT in 1936, but he heard illegal radios (such as Radio Pirenaica) in the 1940s. But these are all assumptions...
While I agree with the general thesis, I think there's some points that are overdone, like how Guernica, one of the most famous paintings in Spain and the world, is "hanging without fanfare alone in a museum". It's got one wall and a whole room to itself BECAUSE it's the most relevant painting in Reina Sofia museum. Every single Spanish child and teenager would recognise it and tell you that it's Picasso's Guernica, or at least they know it and have seen it. It's got prime billing in school curricula and in most places where art is taught or shown. There is much about Franco's regime which is not discussed, but there is also a lot of celebration of the people who fought francoism and those who participated in its dissolution (regardless of their previous participation in the regime, which should be discussed more).
Surely part of the reason why political stability is considered so paramount in Spain is because there are credible regional separatist movements in the country that would be greatly emboldened by mass questioning of the government's legitimacy, right?
True. Every independence movement in Spain right now has a very clear "we want to separate from the Spanish government because it still has fascist traces and fascist politicians".
However, the issue would be more easily solved not by looking the other way but by, you know, fighting fascism.
If our government right now was explicitly anti-fascist I would mind being a spanish citizen. However, it is not, so i mind
Amazing content! Not only visually very attractive, but the story and it'smain points are very well expressed, which is specially remarkable when covering such a complex topic (I am a spaniard myself). Congrats on such a great work! You are creating a top YT channel!
Since you used Guernica a lot as red wire, it might have been great not to gloss over the fact Picasso was a known rapist, and had taken a long time to accept the comission for Guernica from the republic of Spain. He has been influenced into this by his mistress, with whom he was very violent.
Apart from that point, I reaaly appreciated the video. I'm from french, where anyone with a spanish sounding last name has a huge probability of being there because of the Franco regime violence. The lack of recognition extends its trauma to the whole diaspora of spanish republicans and their family.
Late but it might be because Guernica was a event used by the Republican propaganda machine to demonize the Nationalists. While the events that happened there were horrible the truth is that this was happening across the entire nation both sides committing atrocities especially after the NKVD got control of the Republican’s police force.
The Guernica analogy is weak. I have seen the painting in person. I didn't see it as "hidden away". I see it as one of the symbols of Spain. And honestly it is still a sore wound. Not many countries want their wounds to blister in the sun.
going to disagree on with the conclusions made on the monarchy.
i'm not spainish but juan carlos I handed power to the parliamentarians and by extension the people in 1977 after franco's death, going against what the francoists wanted. if it wasn't for the monarch's role spain probably wouldn't have ever transitioned to a democracy without violence
Yeah, the monarchy thing is just republican propaganda
the Borbón monarchy are absolute cowards. Juan Carlos had no interest in being an actual king, he just chickened out in order to have an easier job. I am Spanish and the monarchy did nothing but sign some papers and get taxpayer money and still, today, continues to do the same
So your saying being an actual king is being an absolute monarchy?
@@macizogalaico You massively undervalue the role of the monarchy in Spain. It doesn’t just “sign papers”. The king’s position as commander of the armed forces is a vital safeguard, as shown by 23F in 1981. The king’s intervention was the singular ac which stopped the coup’s success. Secondly is the king’s political role. He doesn’t govern, he doesn’t make policy, but he plays an active role as an advisor to the government. He cautions them, and as laid out in the constitution acts as “moderator of the state institutions”. As a neutral and nonpartisan figure, it is he who facilitates coalition negotiations after elections, and determines who is most likely to get a majority in the Cortes.
@@macizogalaicoYou complain that the King doesn't do enough but refuse to give the King any power as well😂
The video is insanely well made and the explains the topic in a way that anyone that doesn’t know much about the topic totally knows what’s going on at the end. I don’t get why you don’t have more subscribers, I hope the algorithm promotes this video a lot, it’s sooo good!
I'm Spanish and I don't agree with the message of this video. The Civil War was not authoritarianism v democracy, it was two halves of the country caught between worse and worst situations. The remaining political groups of the II Republic became far-left authoritarians as well and regularly engaged in Stalinist tactics incluidng Soviet-style torture camps and prisons. The regime that emerged was ultranationalist and anti-communist, but that's very long in the past, there's been more than 40 years of democracy now. The insistence on this propagandistic "historical memory" is nothing more than populist demagoguery and revanchism of a very small group of leftist elites descended from leaders and top figures of the II Republic. We all know what happened, we're not dumb, we have grandparents and extended families on both sides, and by large Spaniards say "no" to their insistence on replaying the same hatred that tore the country apart when their only real belief is that Franco should've lost so we had become a Soviet satellite instead.
LIke, for instance, the leader of the left-of-center-left party Podemos that you mentioned is the son of a convicted far-left terrorist. The Socialist party (PSOE)'s largest faction was a marxist revolutionary party during the II Republic (POUM adjacent), they tried to block the legislation for women to be allowed the vote (because the first democratic elections in the II Republic resulted in a large right-wing majority thanks to the female vote)... engaged in political assassination, intimidation, and coup attempts. Nobody wants this kind of "historical memory" because historical memory is just propaganda for the far-leftists. They dig up bones of Francoist repression, but leave victims of Red Terror out because they're entirely one-sided and the goal is revenge not truth. It is a politics of resentment.
And your video echoes this one-sidedness.
Idk man, I think there’s serious value in reconsidering the past once the pain and hurt of the past has passed, and upon which room for unbiased introspection opens up.
As for the civil war, yes. While in the beginning the old democratic forces of Spain may have held sway in the anti-nationalist coalition in the first few parts of the civil war, the government’s over-reliance on communist militias and the infiltration of the intelligence agencies by the Soviets would lead to tragedies such as the one you described, as well as others and other political repressions such as the action against the anarchists and the anti-Stalinist communist POUM.
@@thomashale2096 I'm all for that, what I disagree with is that it's the spirit of our current 'historical memory' and 'democratic memory' legislation and the associated press bubble. I have a lot of sympathy for the families but not for the politicians
I agree completely. The war was not "anti-facists vs those that wanted to vanguard its rise" the republic had been abusing power, and leaning heavily into Stalinist practices and authoritarianism. They also were staunchly against the Catholic Church. So it involved so many layers. Religious, many people didn't like Franco but supported him due to faith, political, many would rather gamble with the rebels than potentially slide into a authoritarian Stalinist regime, historical, many monarchists, etc etc. the introduction is a complete oversimplification of what actually happened.
I have to say this video confuses me. As you pointed out yourself, the 'forget and move on' strategy seems to be working- contemporary Spain has successfully dismantled many essential components of the legacy of Francoism. So what would demanding justice for long dead and soon-to-be-dead people accomplish at the risk of destabilizing a rapidly progressing society?
Societies are not individual biological persons and they do not actually have 'traumas'- they have political and economic and cultural structures. The point of 'forgetting' isn't actually to 'repress' anything, it is to force individuals in the society to distance their political, class, and cultural identities from fascism and to prevent them from passing fascistic identities down generationally. In theory if this taboo is enforced for long enough, and reinforced with the right material changes to society, then it will push Francoism into irrelevance, the same way nobody today wants to avenge the honor of the Guelphs or Ghibellines or has strong opinions on whether Mithradates VI was a swell guy or not.
Your take on the presentation of Picasso's Guernica is completely wrong. It's displayed in its own room with all signs in the museum telling you where it is. it is surrounded by original Picasso sketches of Guernica and there are always guards on duty, and I believe photography is typically prohibited. You present it as if it's just another painting in the museum shoved off to one side, which couldn't be further from the truth. Great video as always though.
I've said it many other videos about the topic and I feel obliged to say it again: Franco's regime was not Falangist, Franco's regime was Francoist. What you in the video describe as "Franco's Falange Party" is a political movement which preceded Franco's rise to power by many years and had nothing to do with Franco in its material and ideological inception. The FE de las JONS (the official name of the Falange) was founded by José Antonio Primo de Rivera, Ramiro Ledesma and Onésimo Redondo. All of them died during the war and had no say in the shape the Falange took under Franco's leadership, but those who were under their guidance and remained - such as the provisional leader of the Falange during José Antonio's absence during the war, Manuel Hedilla - were absolutely opposed. Manuel Hedilla rose up in rebellion against Franco when he received the order that the Falange would be merging with the Carlists (a monarchist conservative movement completely opposed to the revolutionary republicanism of the Falange) into FET y de las JONS. Franco only imprisoned Hedilla because the Falangist minister and close friend of José Antonio, Serrano Suñer, intervened on his behalf. Franco's dictatorship did not impose any of the policies Falangism/Nationasyndicalism defended and only used Falangist imagery and symbolism to gain popularity among the "Nationalist Faction", a disguise it quickly dropped once it was no longer useful. Franco reestablished the monarchy and imposed a neoliberal economy on Spain, something the basic tenants of Falangism are absolutely opposed to. Modern Falangist go out of their way to distance themselves from Franco and denounce him as a traitor and a monarchist.
Francoist Spain was not Falangist, it was Francoist: an ideology that had the definition Franco wanted to impose on it at any given moment.
I’m an American and I’ve never heard of Franco or anything of Spanish history past the colonial period.
I’m so grieved by this video, but it makes me want to learn more about Spain history past my current knowledge.
Ok but like how?
This video is a horrible place to start learning about the Spanish Civil War
im catalan and in my family theres a saying that, ''even if Franco is dead, his ghost is still lurking around..''
So is the ghost of the dead Republic. You leftists can’t let it go. You don’t want closure, you want revenge.
I have discord server and need catalans there, if you want to join
@@aqa-x6t whats the server about?
@@sala7tt nationalism, it will be the first discord server about nationalism
@@sala7tt nations, real nations and not artifial ones like Spain or Italy
trying to forget the past is a bad thing im from the philipines a former spanish colony alot of people are now trying to forget about the previous dictatorship which only led the son of the dictator securing the presidency currently
We should point out that the civil war wasn't a Democracy vs Authoritarianism fight. It was the result of a spark that provoke the implossion of a democratic system in which 4 different authoritarian factions (falangists, communists, socialists, and monarchists), that were swore enemies but were living together under the democratic scaffoldig of the spanish republic, suddenly, started fighting for dominance. No matter who started it, It was bound to happen at some point down the road. Most parties saw Democracy as a decadent system that have to be overcome, and the new republic, as a mere tool to transition to a totalitarian state under their sole rule.
The coup was doomed to fail at the third day, since the "strong man", General Sanjurjo, died in a plane crash when he was flying from Portugal, where he was exiled, to take command of the insurrection. The politicians in the republican side were elected, yes, but their agendas were authoritarian, and each of them played their cards while the original coup d'état was taking place, and in many ways saw this as an opportunity to seize absolute power, and pursue their own authoritarian plans.
We have to bear in mind this was the time of mass ideologies spread by radio waves, and there were thousands of radicalized individuals willing to build a new world on the ashes of the old one. Political parties were very popular back then, many of their members and associates carrying guns and knifes, getting involved in riots, violent strikes, and gun fights in public demonstrations promoted by their pollitical adversaries. There were political asassinations carried by all parties. None of the them really believed in democracy. Even the traditional Liberal and Conservative factions, both monarchy supporters that would rather preffer to be appointed by the king than to be elected, were happy to support General Sanjurjo's insurrection, since the original intent of his coup was the return to monarchy.
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In this context, the republican side never had a fast, unified, and sensible response supported by all parties, like negociate with the rebels a honourable end to the coup, right after the death of Sanjurjo. Instead, they gave the rebels time to regroup, and to rebuild their chain of command, ascending General Franco to second in command under General Mola, the new rebel, boss.
At this point. Falange, the fascist party, decided to support the rebelion, aiming to displace the traditionalists and catholic militants in the army from the political decission making process, and pursue their own agenda by riding on the back of the insurrection.The socialists saw the coup as an oportunity to seize "special powers" for their government, that were used to arrest political opponents and to ban the traditional and catholic parties from congress, while the communists consulted with their overlords in Moscow, and decided that war was good for their Interests. They just needed to create a popular militia, independent from the Republican Army, and controlled by Moscow, and use the war to, eventually, start a revolution and of course, to seize absolute power...So, with everything in place, the spanish civil war started.
I had to pause this video because of the disgusting lie that "Guernica" is displayed in an isolated and deserted hall at Reina Sofía Museum. Couldn't be farther from truth; it is well displayed, together with its historical context in a room paked with hundreds of visitors all the time. I've witnessed it, nobody told me. So, if the authors of this video took such a liberty to strengthen their position, what other inaccuracies did they commit purposefully?
They made it sound like the republicans were somehow better than the nationalist front. They weren’t. Both sides did disgusting things.
@Brandenburg-Poznan The truth is that Franco winning was the best outcome. If the Republic had won, we would have been invaded by Hitler during ww2 and the economy would have never recovered, because Catalonia and Basque country would likely be independent. The EU wouldn't have let Spain in either for being communist.
I can't imagine the work it took to research and animate this ..... Amazing work ❤
Research pretty much 0.
Animations are good tho.
Fantastic video
Thankyou for your analysis & effort in making this video. Excellent work. Subbed!
As an Spaniard myself, I feel like you did an incredible job the explaing this complex topic. Im subbed
I was born in Madrid in 1962. My grandparents came from a village in Lugo (Galicia region, NW Spain), from a family that established a small factory, a forge for iron & steel tools for farming (locksmiths I guess is the right term in English). They were just humble hardworking people, not big landowners. Around the time just prior to the civil war, their biggest fear were some people in the area that had convincedly adopted the ideology of the Marxist parties at the time (Socialists, Comunists, Anarchists...), since some of them were actually threatening with the expropriation of bussiness & properties, if the Spanish Republic succeeded on establishing a Leftist Government (Frente Popular).
For my family, as for many other Spaniards, the alternative was simple : Do we want to become Fascist Italy (or Nazi Germany), or Stalin's Russia?
I can understand that when the war started, many working class people had already taken the side of the Republic (the Left, let's say). But many other Spaniards (rich and not so rich), found in the new far Right wing parties (like fascist Falange), the counterbalance against the risk of becoming a socialist regime.
Was the Franco government that came after the war an intolerant fascist dictatorship? It is hard to deny that.
Could Spain have become a Socialist Republic (like the dictatorships in the Slavic countries under Russia's Warshaw Pact), if the Republican army had won the war? Quite possible.
The fears of small businesses and other sectors certainly were legitimate, but I believe a closer look at the events in the years before and during the civil war may point to a different interpretation. The Frente Popular represented many different political and economic perspectives, expropriation and collectivisation among them. However, it was Franco's coup, coupled with infighting within the Frente and the refusal of Great Britain, France and the United States to assist the Second Republic in its fight against the Franco-Nazi-Fascists, that gave room for the expropriation and collectivisation elements within the Frente to rise to prominence. Left to work out differences without the Franco coup, the different parties within the Frente (center right to left) would have had to find solutions without any one perspective able to impose its entire philosophy on the other Frente members. That's how democracy works, messy and complicated with all sides making compromises it doesn't like.
Things could have probably developed very differently if the dynamics in the new Republic prior to Franco’s coup, hadn’t polarized towards both extremes left and right after the fall of the monarchy, and yes, if the western democracies had been more supportive of Spain’s moderate parties.
But it seems that the fate here is to continue calling to remember our recent past, to restart that sort of polarization. This time, the Socialist party under Pedro Sánchez wants to organize a number of events in 2025 to commemorate the end of General Franco’s era in 1976, etc.
For many people that sort of retrospective exercise seem’s more of a distraction maneuver, that instead of looking towards the future will just reiterate the sort of left-right polarization that leads towards national confrontation.
Extremely well made video. You deserve way more views and subscribers than you have.
Your high quality of priduction, both in visuals but also the script is 10/10. I have heard about the same thing before but in the first seconds you really got me thinking. It is enticing and interactive.
I think this is very similar to what has happened in the Philippines.
I think the Philippines has failed in remembering, confronting and facing the events of the Ferdinand Marcos regime and the Martial Law era. There is this Historical Amnesia plaguing Philippine society. This made Filipinos vulnerable to historical denial and revisionism.
what do you recommend for me if i want to dive into philippine's history from this period in time? like books, movies, docs etc. (in english)
bc i found it a bit hard to find stuff
cheers 🇧🇷🤝
Thank you for tackling such an important topic, so often ignored by many. I applaud your insight and approach. You earned yourself a new suscriber
I happen to study on that street shown, "Calle Federico García Lorca". The former name of the "Del Fresno" plaza was "De La Gesta"(militar campaign), a reference to the civil war. It is a generally conservative city so we had to wait until the late 2010s for the application of the '07 Historic memory law by a progressive mayor. Even then the next (conservative, of course) and current mayor attempted their removal and would have probably gotten away with it if it wasn't the only conservative city on an overwhelmingly progressive region, whose government blocked the attempt. The mayor usually cited "caos to citizens and local stores by changing addresses" (funny considering he caused much more caos trying to reinstall some but not all streets) and "changing heroes from one side of the conflict to the other", equating authoritarian generals with assassinated intellectuals and activists.
Why would they oppose such benign and democratic measures? To distract. Like most culture wars. They pretend that progressives are using this issues to hide their lack of ability to solve Spaniards' "real" (as if this were imaginary) problems such as inflation, for which their solutions are just as good as the progressives' solutions or even worse, yet that is irrelevant. All that matters is to yell that everything"red" is bad by default and hope that by election year (2023) the people have forgotten whether the sitting central government improved things or not.
Right, because when the butchers happen to be communist, they are “activists”.
12:05 the part about the names reminded me of the fact that most places in Spain have a "Constitution street", which sounds odd, until you realize they used to be "Generalísimo street" or something similar. IIRC, there are still some places that haven't changed the names.
As a spaniard, I have to clear some things up. Firstly, the republicans who committed atrocities against that priest in the photo was a child molester who had abused children at his school, and it is a very famous picture.
As for everything else, the truth is everyone in Spain is just trying to move on. The Franco regime was harsh, yes, but the times were also very harsh. You can't say that the british or the french governments and oppositions were any better than both sides on the spanish civil war at the time. This is a very "Western" view on the whole subject, talking about how everything done was wrong and everything is black and white. Good men fought hard on both sides for their ideals, and all thought they were doing what was best for Spain. It's still a very touchy subject in Spain, and Guernica is an example of that.
Even my mother, a staunch republican, had to admit that while franco was in charge, it was safer, and more stable, and there were jobs for spaniards. just because we didnt fit the western idea of a stable country didn't mean we weren't one. I fact, the franco regime was much more stable than even thatcher's regime in the 80s.
To conclude, not everything is what it seems, and foreigners really need to stop making videos on the spanish civil war, not even one of them get it right.
Bro said thatcher regime 😂
Such incredible work on a fascinating topic. This channel deserves much more recognition
Another important point of the memory of the regime (and one of the limitations of liberal democracies when engaging with fascism as a concept) is the extent to which the present day Spanish economic elite are direct descendants of those who supported, funded, and profited off Franco's dictatorship in its plunder of Spain. Almost all big Spanish companies have their hands soiled with the blood the regime shed.
The whole war started to crush social movements, communism and anarchism, to discipline the working class back into submission when for the first time in its history the Spanish working class looked like it could shape its future with its own hands, and for 40 years they systematically exploited the Spanish people and nation for profit, while eventually sharing a bit of the wealth with the nascent middle class as part of its social pact.
It is really difficult to aknowledge your past when your present ruling class was born from its bloodshed.
Ok, start naming them.
Go on. Be my guest.
Hey man awesome video. I love content like this, as an American we don’t here much about things like this.
As a Catalan, I agree with most of the video except for the chapter “Compensating for the past”. Spain has a progressive façade, but at its core, the judges, politicians and state media are remnants of Franco's regime. Point in case, in the last municipal elections a few weeks back the far-right won decisively. Parties like Vox, who hold views akin to those from the dictatorship and are supported by people displaying Francoist paraphernalia, or the PP whose integrants have close links to the regime's officials, are getting voted more than ever. The truth is that fascism was never defeated in Spain; it is, in fact, very much present still.
You are spanish
@@LaTierraNueva19 Primero Catalan, español secundario
Bro you do not care about Spain or its history, you just want an excuse to say "everyone I disagree with is fascist"
As a German I’d like to say..
Forgetting the past and ignoring it is never a good idea..
It’s bound to repeat itself in that case
Franco was a monster….but I think it’s foolish not to contextualize his actions against the sentiments, political movements, and traditional Spanish beliefs….but most importantly this piece doesn’t even mention communism, or their push to eliminate religion in Spain, or their numerous atrocities. These things do not excuse Franco or his rule…but they help explain why many who opposed him similarly want to move on. To explain history and not fall into the guilt trap is a difficult task.
This is a huge aspect that is often not spoken of. The "Republicans" werent exactly good people and by the time they lost the civil war they certainly were not. People always harp on Franco for the attrocities he commited, but no one ever speaks of the fact that the Republicans would have dont the exact same thing.
Well as of 2023 religion has been almost eradicated, the majority of Spanish people are not Catholic any more and those who are are only in paper with a tiny minority ~15% being actively religious. Thank God the progressive ideas of the left won at the end. Coming from a religious country it's shocking to me how Spain became one of the most irreligious countries in the world while before was one of the most religious, originating the Spanish inquisition.
@@ComradeHellas
Because Franco did not finish the Job. By 1960 there were MANY socialists professors in important universities. Late Stage Franco's ministers were bureocrats and opportunists. They selled Sahara to Marroc the day after Franco died.
I hope that one day you can do a full cover of what lead to the Spanish civil war
That is conveniently 'forgotten'
@@gazelle6027 true true true.
A commonly repeated phrase no doubt, but a very relevant one nonetheless: "Those who do not learn from history, are doomed to repeat it"
haven’t had a chance to watch the whole thing yet but the visuals/animation are sick, really interesting topic too
Your entire discussion around Gernica feels strange. Guernica is hardly ignored, in fact discussing it was part of my history assignments as a Spanish high school students. It is also a massively recognizable piece that every Spanish person has heard about, comparable in fame to giants of pop culture. And it is exposed in the Reina Sofia, which as good as you can get in Spain for a piece of modern art as far as I know. What about this feels like Guernica is being ignored?
Also, minor complaints, it's "Miranda de Ebro" not Erbo, and it's pronounced GerNIca, not GERnica. The latter felt somewhat disrespectful somehow given the topic? But I get pronunciation is hard.
Not to come across as too negative, I praise your audiovisual design, worthy of the highest production values. And the way you treated the content seems respectful, if imblanaced, I appreciate it
Oh yeah, I remember The Guernica being the center piece of one of my primary school Cultural Week "Semana Cultural" all students had to study the art piece, paint a mural together and put up texts defining and explaining it, I even have a plywood painting we did that week depicting part of Picasso's Guernica in my parents house.
Regarding the issue of "collective trauma and historical consciousness in the context of violent social and political divisions"; there are some parallels in several European countries where effective 'amnesties' came into being at the end of periods of violent repression.
France - Vichy regime
Germany - reunification after communism
Portugal - post dictatorship
Spain - post dictatorship
Italy - post dictatorship
Why don’t they talk about the belligerence of the republicans towards Catholics and the untold horrors they unleashed on the populist of Spain that led up to the civil war? 🤔
Congratulations, this was perfect, from the visuals to the storytelling and the research. Well done, seriously.
In Spain we think that we live in an oposite way that we used to under Franco's regime, and also that's good to react and condemn everything that happened on that period, but we're still slaves of the fear, ignorance, reaction and conformity, promoted from the goverment and the official speech to justify their "legitimacy". And that's the main element that reamins from Franco's regime and the rest of Spain's history, that the spanish society has allways been submissibe ans manipulable by anyone who had the power, and that blinds us when it comes to knowing the facts and the truths that have marked the present of our nation.
The Spanish nation has never been free and it won't be untill we start to being honest with ourselves and start to reivindicate the truth, freedom and independence.
The same is happening here in Argentina, Javier Milei administration has a lot of so called "revisionist" intellectuals (like Agustin Laje or Nicolas Marquez) and Milei himself calls the 1976 Dictatorship an era with "excesses" as if dissapearing thousands of people, torturing them and throwing them away to the Rio de la Plata is a simple excess. Its scary how far right politics are growing in the 21 century
It's a very complex topic to cover in a 20-minute video, but I appreciate you taking the time to talk about it.
Twenty years ago, Franco was somewhat surpassed by the majority of Spaniards, in 1992 the Olympic Games were held in Barcelona, later Spain entered the euro zone, the economy was going from strength to strength and it was a country with great international relevance, both for better or for worse... there was no apparent reason to worry about that, everything was going well, it was not until the crisis of 2008 that this problem of collective conscience resurfaced, previously the Historical Memory Law was ratified, but most of the population did not see it as a problem, although it received criticism alleging that "it brought back ancient dead from a forgotten era" and the crisis simply brought the creation of new political formations that adopted historical confrontation as part of their agenda, you know, politicians.
Today this has become the day-to-day of political life in Spain, there is not a congress session where the dead of a war that occurred almost a century ago or the dark past of some party are not mentioned, be it Whether from the left or the right, Franco's exhumation was seen by a large majority of Spaniards as a direct attack on reconciliation and a perfectly executed political propaganda maneuver (it was an event that was broadcast on all the country's television channels). Many saw it as a great act of historical responsibility and justice for the victims of a regime that ended three generations ago.
This, added to the modern progressive ideas that have permeated the spanish society, has brought a new wave of nostalgia for Francoism in the younger generations of the country, although it sounds like an oxymoron, when I went to high school, speaking well of Franco was almost a crime, today you can see kids praising the Franco regime because it's cool, it makes them look rebellious and some even raise their arm.
I personally blame all this on the politicians, there are very few left with a true sense of state and almost all of them are more concerned with keeping their seat in the congress of deputies than with governing and trying to improve the situation in the country, and they don't care about dividing 47 million people in order to achieve it, it feels like a big step backwards because what seemed like it was going to be a prosperous and advanced country ended up becoming a victim of its past. It's almost tragic.
I have been to see Guernica in the Reina Sofia, and I have to disagree eith you that it's understated or perfunctory or anything of that sort. Guernica has several rooms dedicated to it, with early sketches and ideas even out on the walls in the outside, and then that whole hall devoid of anything except the massive painting. It's so large that you can't even see the whole thing through the door opposite. I'm not even into art (we went on a school trip), but the Reina Sofia makes a STATEMENT with Guernica. And they advertise it as well.
I think it's safe for me to say that you've put so much passion on this video. This is the first video I've watched from your channel (Kraut recommended you) and subscribed right away at the end. Watching your other videos covering Soyuz, Orban, and Dugan's Russia, and enjoying it! Keep up the good work and stay passionate!
Your introduction reminds me of what Carlos Ruiz Zafón writes about post war Barcelona in The Shadow of the Wind. The child protagonist feels the ghost of what happened, but none of the adults will talk. Descansa en paz, Ruiz Zafón.
❤
God this was good & worth the wait. I know how much work you put into this project & this truly is brilliant on its own merits. Plus the topic of Francoism seems to be broadly overlooked by so many. It's bad how many people are unaware of it & how his regime has left a lasting impact on Spanish society.
My girlfriend has a degree in Spanish so I'm not gonna lie, she influenced me heavily and enlightened me on the topic - and I found it interesting enough to research it further and make it into a video.
@@IMPERIALYT Well I'm glad she did influence you to do this topic & once goes to show again behind every great man is a great woman lol.
After watching this video, I expected to see a channel is 500k-2m subs. Hopefully your channel starts getting more attention now
Having just watched this, you have beautifully organized this into a coherent and visually immersive video. The Franco regime definitely needs to be shown because of the points you have indicated, hopefully Spain disassembles its pact of forgetting.
You don't live in Spain and it shows. Neither the republicans were that good nor Franco was that bad. There's an irrational hate for dictatorships that simply isn't present. Franco wasn't as brutal as you believe, especially in comparison to the other dictatorships of the time, from Hitler to Pinochet. Both in Portugal and in Spain the dictators weren't murderous psychotic bastards out for blood, they were respected by many and tolerated by most. You're tlaking about putting one of these pseudo politicians that are talking about renovation while sending my country to the shithole and stealing money like few thieves ever have because you think the system is a fraud without even having lived in here.
from an spanish pov, pact of forgetting its what keeps the society peaceful for most people,challenge its like reopening wounds and casting the agressor/victim role into the descendants. I think most people have seem infighting in villages over the retire of 'fascistic' monuments due to past allegiances. Most dont want to return to that level of animosity, so its not easy.
The left likes picking at scabs. Let it go!
Maybe the result isn't, but the (kind of chaotic) dynamic is very familiar as an eastern European
Poor and one-sided framing of the Spanish Civil War at the beginning of the video.
Franco was Spain's necessary hero.
Technical thing - make music quiet when someone speaks and there are no subtitles.
My brother in Christ, there are also those of us who descend from the victims of communist crimes, and who think more fondly of the short man under the great cross. It’s a shame we weren’t even acknowledged, but by this point, hardly a surprise.
I did note that the republicans committed war crimes here 4:21 - but I suppose I should have added a minute explicitly looking at the crimes of the left-leaning side of the civil war for the sake of balance, this was an oversight on my part since I didn't reallly want to make the video about the civil war, more Spanish colllective conciousness so I didn't want to spend too long discussing the civil war itself. It was more a context building excercise, but yes, I should also have discussed purported republican crimes.
@@IMPERIALYT I get it perfectly. Keep up the good work.
Great video, I have been looking for something like this for weeks since I saw Kraut mention this. Volume of the background music was a bit too loud though, it was hard to even hear what was being said sometimes.
Ah damn, I'm sorry about that - it's sometimes hard to balance audio for every device. I edit with a high-dynamic range headset so I sometimes underestimat how audible some elements of the video can be.
@@IMPERIALYT What music did you use?
The Pact of Forgetting feels almost like the inverse of the denazification and decommunization you saw after fall of the Reich, and the fall of the Warsaw Pact. How do you constructively deal with a regime in which a majority of the population was in some way complicit? How many people would not have to face trial, and be thrown into prison? Whether they be active militant collaborationists, propaganda workers, informants, or even local government officials. How do we arrive at a response that will both satisfy the initial justice-seeking lust, the want for post-collapse normalcy, AND secure future cohesion?
The majority were not for the Nationalists. The common working man and lower classes sided with the Republic. It was the elites and zealously religious that supported Franco.
Well, denazification was possible because of Germany’s defeat & occupation, after having started WW2, invaded all of Europe, & killed millions of people based on their lineages (“race”). Decommunisation was more like an emanciaption from the “Soviet” (“Moscovite”) occupation, rule & political controle, & there still are legal Communist parties in almost every European country. Decommunisaion doesn’t seem to have fully happened everywhere in Europe.
Spain was non-belligerent in WW2, & then wasn’t occupied by foreigners. Franco died at age 82, after 36 to 39 years of “reign” (depending if you count the civil war years). He didn’t invented any significant symbol for his regime (just regular monarchist-traditionalist feudal symbolism) & was more obsessed with the “Christian civilisation” than with any concept of Master-Race. Besides, since the 50s & 60s Franco was an ally (or collaborator if you want) of the Pentagone for its anti-communism, having several American bases in his territory (still the case), & normalising diplomatic relations with the neighbours from then on. Economy was growing. When King Juan-Carlos I “inherited” the country, he made it transition to a constitutional, parliamentary, “officially a-confessional”, & highly decentralised kingdom (kinda like Belgium…). Some of the people in administration, justice, etc, were already generationally replaced by those who grow up after the civil war, & some of them were already questioning the regime from the inside, being surrounded by “the Free world”. There is a known song that exeplifies the mentality in 1976 (1st year of King Juan-Carlos rule) called “Freedom without wrath” / “Libertad sin ira”.
@@johnathanmay9143 false. The middle class supported them, and JONS started as a workers' union, Ramiro Ledesma left Falange after he was discontented with it becoming less of a worker party, but the proletariat was still a large part of their lines.
Plus, the largest economical elites sided with the republic, most industrial owners sided with the republic, Franco had the army and the church, talking about which, was neutral until the anarchists started outright murdering them.
Saying Franco had the elites is outright a lie, especially considering the largest industrial centres were all under control of the Republic when the war broke out.
Unless you consider "elites" some bank directors, who were indeed targeted by the revolutionaries and generally supported the CEDA (Not FE-JONS), elites were mainly Republican
@@staringgasmask Yeah, the middle and lower classes supported the Republic. And you don't know the first thing anything about the Spanish Civil War.
@@johnathanmay9143 You're the clueless one here, I am from spain, talked with people who lived it, read books from people who lived it that will never be translated because they're niche biographies or adaptations of guys who lived it. And it wasn't an elite vs lower and middle classes thing.
Don't tell me what happened in my country
I am really glad to see this video presentation as it’s the only one that deals directly with the impact on the Spanish society today post dictatorship. I know the Franco era is contentious and bitter still, and what he doesn’t talk about and what I think contributes to the lack of closure is that there are still many people in Spain, who very much like Franco, if not idolize him, so it’s not at all agreed among the people that they’re all victims. I don’t think some of them feel like they are. They are also quick to point out that the communists and other “rebels” were just as violent to those that supported Franco and to Catholic priests and nuns. In war, violence happens, and very gruesome violence can happen, and it happened on both sides. But after the war the human rights, abuses, reign of terror and repression was strictly on the shoulders of Franco and his supporters, and that needs to be confronted., I also disagree with his assessment of the masterpiece by Picasso, “Guernica“. It is in the second most prestigious, art museum in the country after the Prado, and it is placed where it is as a sacred space, 21:55 not to hide it. I think the Majority of people who attend that museum for the first time do so knowing and wanting to see this masterpiece. It is not downplayed by the museum certainly. I’m glad to see that Almodovar, complete, the most well-known spanish Director Worldwide, has taken this on, and now is a part of his body of work, because in that 70s and 80s his movies seem to really tap into the reaction side of wanting to Express rebellion and freedom , the taboo celebrated, to counter those many years of repression, rather than really dealing with the trauma. His movies tended to be outrageously funny with outrageous characters, distracting from the true outrage of what they went through. by the way, although the Portuguese dictator ship was probably not as extremely violent, the city of Lisbon doesn’t have the museum dedicated to looking at the impact on the country and its people and its marriage with the Catholic Church. Excellent museum in the middle of Lisbon, which I recommend highly. I live in Lisbon and at times I pick up on Lil clues having to do with the character of the Portuguese, their norms and policies and bureaucratic dysfunction that I see is related to vestiges of authoritarian rule, but the regime seems to be really discussed. And like the one gentleman noted, when they’re dictatorship ended, they went back to a Republic. They did not want to go back to moNArchy, and it is not even seriously discussed here. but the other time I saw the impact of Franco was in my conversation with a Spanish attorney, and I happen to use the word dictator, but not in the context of their history, and it was the only time that his facial expression notably changed as soon as I used that word.
18:41 the monarchy is not a Falangist thing, the monarchy has been around for centuries. Confrontation of history is important but it shouldn’t steamroll to become a cancel culture movement that could cause rupture in society and used for political gain.
What makes it extra funny to equate falangism with the monarchy is that the falangists - the actual ones like Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera - were staunch republicans who absolutely despised the monarchy.
Franco only formally restored the monarchy in 1947 as a concession to the Carlists and alfonists within his coalition, but refused to crown a king because, in truth, Franco didn’t really care about the monarchy. The only reason he named Juan Carlos as his successor in 1969 was that he saw that there were no other viable successors, and that without a viable successor Spain might descend into a new civil war between his own generals.
Juan Carlos, of course, dismantled Francosim barely before Franco’s body was cold and issued in the transition to democracy. To tie the monarchy of today’s Spain with the Franco regime is ridiculous
What I find amusing is that the people who lived through the regime want to forget and continue with their lives. Its only the politicians who make their living with these types of endless debates and use these topics to distract the people from the real serios problems that affect Spain nowadays ( Crisis, Unemployment, Debt...) and the modernday youtubers and tictokers, who try to talk about controversial topics to gain viewers and likes, who talk about and don´t want to forget what happened during the regime.
What is there to discuss, the man saved the country from the plague of communism, he deserves praise!
True
Agreed. But Franco himself was a socialist as fascism is socialism's offspring just like communism.
Describing the “Republican” forces as centrist is a lie. Many of my ancestors fought in the nationalist side and still supported democracy. Many people forget (or ignore) that Spain had a democracy well before the republic from the 1880s to about the 1920s. It wasn’t a perfect democracy but it was improving. The republic brought chaos to anybody that was not a radical. During the civil war, the republic forces detained my great grandparent because they had donated money to the monarchy’s exile. They were interred in concentration camps and their children were about to be exiled to Russia. The English amabassador saved my great grandfather from execution a couple times and stopped the deportation of my grandfather and his siblings to Russia. When Franco won the war and decided to stay, my great grandparents expressed their disapproval. They thought he should reinstate the parliamentary democracy that had existed before the republic and lost a lot of their possessions for it.
And now here we are. A foreigner with superficial understanding of Spain making videos about how Spain has “buried” its past.
Spanish here. Before making a video about a "silence pact" you should try to ask people from "the other side" instead of accepting one side story.
"The pact of forgetting" is a theory that any spanish that doesnt want to speak about the war as a good vs bad conflict is a fascist.
My grandfather was leftist, and executed innocent people at gunpoint before the war, but I bet those who ask to rise up questions about the regime will at the same time make their own silence about the reasons the war started in the first place.
Here because of Kraut, gonna binge all your vids at the gym rn.