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11 Complacent Dictator By the close of 1950 Franco enjoyed the satisfaction of having achieved the security of his regime primarily on his own terms. Certain changes had been made in deference to international opinion. The Catholic identity of the regime had been reemphasized, and the content, though not the baroque excess, of official rhetoric had been altered, and nothing more was heard of the reivindicaciones de Espana. With the hardening of the Cold War, Franco seemed to be gaining respectability. The pope was a hardline anti-Communist who had declared members ofthe party excommunicate , and in September 1950 the French government forced the Spanish Communist Party out of France because of its subversive international role, requiring it to shift headquarters to Prague. Franco was now being actively courted by the American military, transforming the West's oldest and most successful anti-Communist from "fascist beast" into "sentinel of the Occident," the title of his next semiofficial biography. I From all this derived a mounting sense of complacency and selfsatisfaction , reinforced by the shameless rhetoric of the official organs whose tone had altered much less than their content.2 On the Day of the Caudillo, October 1, 1949, Arriba hailed him as beyond all simple, spare, narrative description. It would be a mistake merely to place him at the level of Alexander the Great, Julius Caesar, Gonzalo de C6rdoba , or Ambrosio de Spinola. Francisco Franco, the greatest sword ofthem all, belongs to the vanguard of providential destiny. He is the man of God, the one who always appears at the critical moment and defeats his enemies proclaiming 1. Luis de Galinsoga (with Francisco Franco Salgado Araujo), Centinela de Occidente (Barcelona, 1956). 2. Hence the chapter's heading, which has been borrowed from the title of the British ambassador Sir Samuel Hoare's memoir of his wartime mission to Spain (New York, 1947). 397 398 III. The Dictadura, 1939-1959 himself champion of the forces of heaven and earth. If we heed Niccoli> Macchiavelli , he holds the titles of Caudillo, Monarch, Prince, and Lord of the Armies . Caudillo by his own military achievement; Monarch by his well proven nobility; Prince by his keen political talent and Lord ofthe Armies by his courage , skill and knowledge oftactics, strategy and other complex problems ofwar. . . . On this day, let us devote a moment to meditation in honor of the figure of Francisco Franco. Let us renew our promise of loyalty to his person and in the name of Christ pardon those who do not understand him. On this day we see ourselves petty, dwarfish, and ridiculous by comparison. Two months later, on December 4, he was the man of invincible sword who belongs to the ranks of the advance guard of providential destiny. He is the man ofGod, as always. . . . Who can dispute his laurels ofthe richest, most just and honest Victory? To Franco is owed the mobilization ofthe Vatican, ofWashington, and ofthe entire world, even before Germany . . . . And as if that should not suffice, the Caudillo, the Monarch, the Prince, the commander of armies is beneath it all a simple and affable man, loving home and hearth, profoundly human. Or, as the Falangist organ put it simply on October 21, 1950, "Franco is the Caudillo and star of the entire world." Perpetually bathed in this sea of absurdly extravagant rhetoric by his own press,3 he would maintain absolute indifference, at least externally, to the harsh criticism and denunciation which still sometimes came from abroad. Franco once indicated that he did not find the government of Spain a particularly heavy burden, and given the way in which he ran it that was doubtless the case. In an interview with an American history professor he declared that his role had been analogous to that of the sheriff in the typical American western, a cinematic genre that he enjoyed. Franco went on to observe with considerable mirth that the Spanish, rather than being rebellious and difficult as they were often portrayed, were generally patient and long-suffering. "The proof of that," he said breaking into a sudden loud cackle, "is that they have put up with [soportado] my regime for so long!" 4 His most demanding trials came during the first eleven years when Franco was still in his prime, with abundant stamina and emotional resilience . The final quarter-century ofthe regime, as he gradually aged and lost his acuteness, was for him a period of routine administration conducted according to a personal schedule that...

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