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7. Establishment of the Franco Dictatorship
- University of Wisconsin Press
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1 Establishment of the Franco Dictatorship Mola and the other leading conspirators had always been eager for Franco to playa major role in the revolt against the Popular Front, but there had never been discussion of anyone other than Jose Sanjurjo as primary leader. Though he was also senior to the main rebel chiefs, Sanjurjo's primacy was based on his leadership ofthe abortive 1932 revolt and was recognized by all the other conspirators. A plane was sent to fly him from his Lisbon exile to rebel territory on July 20. Its fiery crash on takeoff left Sanjurjo dead and the rebel movement without a leader.1 Franco, as usual, had much better luck. The private British plane chartered to fly him to Spanish Morocco made the trip successfully, landing him in the Protectorate's capital ofTetuan on July 19.2 During the next few 1. There is an account by Sanjurjo's pilot, Juan Antonio Ansaldo, who survived, in the latter's memoir dPara que . ..? (Buenos Aires, 1953), 140-43. Cf. Federico Bravo Morata, Franco y los muerlos providenciales (Madrid, 1979), 49-96. 2. Perhaps the most direct and graphic account ofFranco's flight is by his cousin and aide, Lt. Gen. Francisco Franco Salgado-Araujo, Mi vida junto a Franco (Barcelona, 1977), 152-64. The background is related by Luis BoHn, who helped to make arrangements, in his Spain: The Vital Years (London, 1967), 159-66; and in Douglas Jerrold, Georgian Adventure (London, 1939), 37Off. Other arrangements were made to place Franco's wife and daughter aboard a German freighter bound for France, where they spent three months with Dona Carmen's former French governess. Her account ofthis is presented in Carmen Polo de Franco, "lQue hacfa Ud. mientras su marido se a1zaba en armas?" Y (Revista para la mujer nacional-sindicalista) (June, 1938). According to Ram6n Garriga, leftist crewmen of the Uad Arcila, the Spanish gunboat which transferred them to the German vessel, tried to rebel while Franco's family was on board but were put down. In most of the Spanish Navy, the revolt and takeover by leftist sailors was successful, so that the General's wife and daughter just missed falling into leftist hands. Cf. Garriga, La Senora de El Pardo, 91-93; and Los validos de Franco (Barcelona, 1981), 28-30. 107 108 II. The Civil War, 1936-1939 weeks he worked feverishly to prepare forces for the march on Madrid, but was left temporarily isolated by the Republican command of the sea. This desperate situation led to his early and independent contacts with Rome and Berlin, seeking some form of support to transfer his forces logistically and to muster more for an assault from the south. It also left him out of the first political steps taken by Mola in the core of the rebel zone. On July 19, after declaring martial law in Pamplona, Mola hastily reedited his earlier political sketch for the new military directory. The new draft proposed a corporative economic administration, a system of cooperatives , and the continuation ofa moderate program ofagrarian reform. Freedom ofeducation was to be generally permitted, but encouragement of "anarchy" and pornography were rigorously prohibited. Concerning religion, Mola's memorandum stated: "We are Catholic, but respect the religious beliefs of those who are not. We believe that the Church ought to be separate from the State, for this benefits both institutions."3 In general , this sketch was a faithful reflection of the peculiar combination of authoritarianism and liberalism that informed Mola's political attitudes. In at least two cities, Zaragoza and Mahon (on Menorca), the first municipal governments set up by the Army rebels were not staffed by conservatives but by the Radicals and other center elements.4 Four days later, on July 23, Mola officially set up a seven-member Junta de Defensa Nacional in Burgos to serve as the executive leadership ofthe military movement.5 Membership was based in part on seniority but was also calculated to reflect the several sectors of the officer corps that had participated in the revolt. Nominal president was General Miguel Cabanellas , highest in seniority among the rebel generals and one of the least enthusiastic. His district headquarters at Zaragoza was one of those responsible for appointing local luminaries of the Radical Party to major posts-Cabanellas had earlier been a Radical Cortes deputy. He had quickly made concessions there to avoid antimilitary sentiment, and was considered by other rebel leaders to be wavering and indecisive.6 Within...