A not-so-long time ago, in a country not-so-far away..........

[DFW]

It was a period of civil war.

One side, the evil empire, if you will, was well-organized and accepting help from militaristic regimes looking for a proving ground for their most modern weaponry, so that when "their time" came, they and their equipment would have been battle-tested. Their local "ally" was a dedicated enough fascist in his own right, but smart enough to know that the wind could easily change and start to blow against his benefactors. He was prepared to abandon them completely and declare "neutrality" rather than face the wrath of the victorious powers that might have destroyed his original allies. When enough time had passed, he even declared allegiance to his original soulmates' enemies, his erstwhile fidelity to the powers that put in him charge forgotten like a snowman in July.

The pragmatic leader of the victorious forces wasn't even supposed to be the leader. The general who was supposed to be in charge was waiting in a small plane weighted down by his many uniforms and decorations. His pilot expressed misgivings about trying take off in a plane so weighted down with heavy baggage, but the vain general insisted. The plane took off, promptly crashed, and the general was killed.

The forces of the good Republic, while well-intentioned, couldn't get organized. Everybody was right. Some of them even took to harassing, demonstrating against, and even executing ideological opponents within their own ranks. After all, THEIR main benefactor did so regularly. When their treasury seemed in peril, they secretly arranged for all the gold in their national treasury to be brought to a waiting boat at one of their coastlines, and sent off to that benefactor for safekeeping, so the bad guys wouldn't get it if they got too close. Their "ally" said "thank you very much!" and refused to give the suddenly VERY poor nation a receipt for their "contribution."

The refusal of the Republic's forces to unite (a true case of "nobody's right if everybody's wrong" ), the loss of their treasury, and the ruthlessness of their well-organized fascist enemies ended in their inevitable defeat. The cheering crowds supporting the victors celebrated in making the country "great" again, even adopting "One, Great, Free" as the national motto. Like so many countries in the future, such as "Democratic People's Republic of Korea" or "German Democratic Republic," none of the terms had much truth to them.

-------------------------------------
I lived in this country less than 30 years after the Republic was defeated. The fascist era was drawing to a close, and the world was passing them by as a political anachronism. Ten years after that, less than 40 years after the Republic was defeated, the Republic had been restored in all but name. The country has a token constitutional monarch in place but he is essentially powerless. Demonstrations still take place, and disagreements still occur, but they are no longer settled by firing squad.

The country I am talking about, as, presumably, just about all of you know, is Spain. It would be a REALLY good idea not to repeat the history of what happened there between 1936 and 1975. We do NOT have to repeat the actions of the Spanish Republic in 1936 in the face of the brutish, organized fascists.

A dying Basque author and intellectual told the fascists at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War:
"Venceréis, pero no convenceréis. Venceréis porque tenéis sobrada fuerza bruta; pero no convenceréis, porque convencer significa persuadir. Y para persuadir necesitáis algo que os falta: razón y derecho en la lucha."

"You will conquer, but you will not convince. You will conquer because you have overwhelming brute force; but you will not convince, because to convince means to persuade. And to persuade, you need something you lack: reason and righteousness in the fight."

The Republicans (and their benefactors-whom they will also ditch the moment they become excess baggage) DID conquer with their overwhelming brute force, and they DID NOT convince--not in 2001, and not in 2017. Like. the Spanish fascists, they also lack reason and righteousness in their fight. They are not worthy of being imitated.

Let us not start organizing our own political firing squads, and let us keep in mind that brute force, including megaphones on people's lawns at midnight, also will never convince. If you need to resort to that, you have already lost your argument.

[Alliepoo]

1. Good read!

[DFW]

2. Thanks!

It's not what everyone wants to hear, I realize. But I have lived there, and seen that.

[Hekate]

3. Thank you I hope people will heed. ...

[DFW]

4. I think you're waiting for Godot with that

But, as they say here in Germany, "die Hoffnung stirbt zuletzt (hope is the last thing to die)."

[Hekate]

5. Ain't that the truth

[Karadeniz]

6. Thank you...much appreciated, believe me!❤

[DFW]

23. Glad to hear it, thanks! n/t

[Initech]

7. I feel like this needs to be put into a Star Wars crawl.

[DFW]

22. People would probably walk out before the opening credits were over! n/t

[Perseus]

8. Unfortunately, Spain's story may repeat, they have chosen people to lead them who were involved

and trained by Hugo Chavez who was trained by Fidel Castro, and anyone who knows the situation in Venezuela will know that it didn't work well.

Pablo Iglesias spent two years working under the tutelage of Hugo Chavez, and he is now a Minister and Pedro Sanchez (Prime Minister) who is also a communist, and as we all know communism is nothing but a dictatorship, which is what happened in Venezuela.

At least Francisco Franco was honest about his intentions and his behaviour, he never hid the fact he was a dictator.

The world is screwed, it seems that all so called leaders today are sociopaths, I hope not but it would not surprise me if a WW3 started in the next couple of years. Too many crazies in power, and one terrible attribute dictators and narcissists have is their lack of understanding that actions have consequences.

[DFW]

11. Franco became a pragmatist early on, a realist only toward the end

Although Franco sent what was basically a suicide squad (División Azul--the blue division) of "volunteers" to help Hitler on the Russian front (almost no one returned), when he saw the wind was changing during World War II, he quickly declared "neutrality" in order not to suffer the fate of Hitler and Mussolini. Also pragmatists, Roosevelt and Churchill let him get away with it. "At least he's OUR son of a bitch." Having our own military bases in Spain was cheaper and more practical than rebuilding one more country after bombing flat. Toward the end of his rule, Franco even told his intended successor, King Juan Carlos, "you will be able to do things I never could do." It was understood that Franco meant this in an ideological sense as well as a physical sense. He had acquired the vision to realize that Spain had moved beyond any inclination to cling to a fascist dictatorship, including his own. That vestige of realism that led him to his timely break with Hitler and Mussolini during World War II never left him completely, even if it appeared dormant for decades.

Stalin cleverly (though ultimately unsuccessfully) decided that Greece was a far more likely target for his attempt at a Mediterranean foothold. He eventually got one in Yugoslavia, but Tito, also a pragmatist, understood early on what it meant to be under Stalin's boot, and declared his own "non-aligned" status as early as 1948. Stalin was furious, but smart enough to know it wasn't worth starting another war over it.

Spain ALWAYS maintained relations with ANY Hispanic country, even during the darkest days of Franco's rule. The country was long past the days of its physical empire, but maintained to cultural ties no matter what. Even under Franco, there were daily flights to Cuba after Castro declared alliance with the Soviet Union. That meant that the exchange of ideas among political opposites speaking the same language never completely ceased. My first contacts with Cuban government officials that led to them inviting me to Cuba in 1982 were in Spain. Any member of the current Spanish government with ties to Chávez and Maduro will also be aware of what a basket case Venezuela became under socialism. Whatever acquired ideology they may retain from their time there, they are certainly aware what became of its implementation, and know full well, that Spain would never stand for it.

The real danger is, as you pointed out, from dictators and narcissists who have no understanding of the consequences of their actions. As we are seeing in Venezuela (and to some degree, now in the USA, albeit with some checks and balances still in place), the worst case scenario occurs when it turns out that they become aware of those consequences, and still don't care.

Spain has elected a so-called "socialist" prime minister (Felipe González) before, but instead of turning the country into a socialist state by force (every Spaniard knows the history of its own Civil War), after a few attempts at following through on his campaign promises (with disastrous results), González went the other way and actually privatized state-owned companies. Once he abandoned his ideological bent and adopted a more practical one, he actually was OK as PM, and, indeed, won four terms, more than any other post-Franco Prime Minister. He actually had run-ins with some of the powerful unions, who had no intention of abandoning ideology for pragmatism, but you don't get four consecutive terms as PM by being an ideologue.

The same goes on the other end. Angela Merkel won four consecutive terms as Chancellor of Germany--not being a conservative ideologue, but, indeed, by being pragmatic. After Fukushima and her decision to end Germany's nuclear power plants, some of her most productive cooperation has been with the Greens. It drove some of her conservative backers nuts, and the so-called "Free Democrats (FDP)," an erstwhile coalition ally of Merkel's party, chose instead to jump in bed with the fossil/nuclear energy companies, and abandon her because of her progressive energy policies. The FDP has been rewarded with a justly deserved political irrelevance ever since. When the wave of Syrian refugees showed itself to be inevitable, Merkel had two options: either try to wall them out, or prepare for their arrival. Wisely figuring they were coming no matter what, Merkel chose to prepare (as best she could) for their arrival. There have been plenty of ugly incidents of course, but no national epidemic of them, and there are always success stories of Syrian immigrants in the papers.

The relative success story of Felipe González is still fresh enough in Spanish minds, I think (and hope), to prevent any attempt at a revival of a purely socialist movement.

[erronis]

20. I wish you were teaching history somewhere nearby. I'd enroll in the U just for it.

I've always enjoyed your posts from outside the boundaries of the US. You have a good alternate perspective that I don't see even in the "liberal" press. I assume a perspective formed from a life lived.

[DFW]

21. I've never taught a class. It might not go well.

I have really only "lived" in two countries, Spain and Germany. Of course, these days, "living in Germany" really means living in the EU, with the borderless Schengen area. What makes the difference, if it can be so described, is that I learned the languages of the countries I most frequent. Where many look up places in the internet and think they know all there is to know, I speak German, Spanish, Italian, Catalan, French, Russian, Swedish, Schwyzerdüütsch (Swiss German) and Dutch, and use them with natives several times every month.

The press often attempts to do a credible job, but if you don't have at least conversational ability in a language, going to that country and digging for information will only give you a view limited to those who speak English. The stuff I see posted, even here in DU, defies common sense sometimes. "Catalunya wants to separate from Spain!" Some of it does, but a majority does not. The separatists are loud and get the headlines. The ones who are against separation get no headlines, and do not scream, but have their opinion all the same. Just learn Catalan, and go there to find out. Of course, THAT is not something you can just do on short notice just because your editor tells you to.

The same goes for here in Germany. They're all neo-Nazis and everything is free. "I know, here's my link!" Right. If things were that simple, everyone would be coming here for the freebies and heading for the hills as soon as their immediate needs were fulfilled. My wife is a German social worker. She worked in the real world every day. She is my "link!" to the real world here, where my own info may come up short.

My dad was a member of the D.C. print press for 50 years. There was no greater critic than he--of Congress OR the press when they fucked up. And yet, members of BOTH parties stood up to read tributes to him in the Congressional Record. Of course, this was 25 years ago, when there WERE thinking members of both parties in Congress.

So, yes, my perspective comes from real life. You don't have to look far to find people who find that to be inferior to websites professing what they want to hear. So, thanks for your encouragement, and keep in mind that there will always be people, including here on DU, who think my perspectives are incomplete and inadequate (i.e. outright wrong). At the end of the day, I am no more reliable than your average baseball umpire: "I call 'em as I see 'em."

So, don't look for a class being taught by me anywhere any time soon. On the other hand, if you're even in the Düsseldorf area, stop by for dinner. Not only is my wife a gourmet chef, but she's also pretty interesting to talk to. You'll get your chance to enroll in the ever-growing membership of the "what does she see in him?" crowd!

[NBachers]

9. DFW- I met a man today. I recognized a certain, common spiritual awareness about him,

even though he was a bit older than me, slightly grizzled, with a deep, raspy voice. He came into the hardware store I work in, to buy some heating parts.

As we were engaging, I started thinking of Richard Alpert - Baba Ram Dass- and other people I've encountered on my erratic "path to enlightenment." Our San Francisco world population sometimes exposes me, momentarily, with people who resonate with my soul. Something about this guy made him one of those.

After I'd pointed the guy to a solution for his problem, he asked me, "What do you think is the most important thing in your life? What is your purpose in doing what you do?"

I told him that, aside from caring for my living needs, I wanted to integrate the common soul we all share, and express it through the way I do my work and deal with the people I encounter throughout the day.

He started talking about the dreams and illusions that make up our life on Earth, and referred to the part of ourselves that exists outside of the dream of our daily lives. And then he told me a story:

He said that his name is Miguel, and he is from Spain. He asked me if I had heard of Franco, and, of course, I had. He told me that he had opposed Franco and fascism, and for that, he had been thrown into prison and tortured. He said it was so painful that he was driven beyond his consciousness and his awareness of pain. He said, from that point on, they could not influence him, whatever they did to him. It is a story that is shared by some torture victims. He drew comparisons to events he sees in the world today.

I told him that I had recognized a certain charisma in him, and he said he'd sensed that, too.

And the point here is - I have this significant encounter today, and find it continued in the post you have written. It is one of those meaningful coincidences that are beyond random. So I will take your words to heart.

[DFW]

10. I wish I had had your chance to talk to him

I'd bet anything that he knew of Unamuno and his speech to the Spanish Fascists (you will conquer, but not convince). Because of the play on words it forms in Spanish (vencer/convencer=conquer/convince), I can imagine Unamuno speaking, emphasizing that one syllable "con" that made the meaning of the two words so different. "Vencer" meaning to conquer physically, and "convencer" meaning to conquer intellectually. I find it interesting that in English, the direct descendant of "vencer," i.e. "vanquish," has become almost obsolete in daily use, where the direct descendant of "convencer," i.e. "convince" has remained current.

In Spain, even today in big cities like Madrid and Barcelona, they still usually close down for about three hours at lunchtime. Obviously, few people want or need three hours for lunch. So they talk about almost anything BUT work. It gives them time to air their views with others, talk about things happening in the world other than their own personal lives. As you have seen with Spain's history, especially of the last 150 years, it has not led them to divine insight on how to solve the problems of their country or the world. Far from it. But maybe what it DOES do is give them insight into how others (both pro and con) feel about issues that concern them all.

When I am in Barcelona, I usually take lunch with a Catalan friend I have known for many years. Not only does it give me the chance to speak Catalan for hours uninterrupted, thus keeping the language fresh in my mind, it also refreshes my awareness on what they are thinking about down there. We occasionally talk about the Catalan separation movement (my friend, a dedicated Catalan patriot, is dead set against it, as he is also a pragmatist, knowing what it would mean for Catalunya on a practical basis). We talk about the USA (their pronunciation comes out, appropriately enough, as "Tramp" ). And we talk about our families, and most anything else.

It never changes anyone's mind, of course, but it sometimes DOES let you in on how others think, especially if there are three or four at the table. To some extent, I sense that in the USA, particularly on the right, but we are not immune, either, everyone wants to think they know what the other side is thinking, but in reality they no earthly clue.

Of all people, my friend from the right wing lunatic fringe (he thinks the same of me on the left, of course), Richard Viguerie, likes to attend gatherings where he is a minority of one. If you don't know the name, he is easy to find. He is so far to the right, if he takes two steps in the wrong direction, he'll fall off the edge of this flat earth. I asked him once why he would even consider hanging around "kommanists" like us. He says it helps him to know how we think. What it does is help him formulate the frothing-at-the-mouth crap he puts out on his website and in his publications. But he does it cleverly, knowing in the back of his mind how WE see things. He is nonetheless convinced HE's right, of course, and thus doesn't hesitate to let us in on his view of the world. It is maddening, but it is also INFORMATIVE. Infuriating as he is, he also radiates a certain charisma, something most on the radical right do not even attempt to do to anyone outside their own bubble.

As for your encounter--that really IS timely. Beyond random? David Ben Gurion was reputed to have said that anyone who does not believe in miracles is not a realist.

[panader0]

12. I knew it was Spain by the end of the first sentence.

[DFW]

13. Good to hear that some still know that more happened in the 20th century than the Beatles

"Guernica" remains one of the most moving works of art of that century as well.

Thanks for posting it! Eskerrik Asko!

[CaliforniaPeggy]

14. Bookmarked for closer reading when I have time. Thank you, my dear DFW! n/t

[DFW]

15. Just my usual rambling. Make sure you are good and bored!

THEN it might come across as coherent!

[CaliforniaPeggy]

16. You are NOT rambling! It's a very intelligently written treatise.

I need to be fully awake and alert to really get this.

[Lionel Mandrake]

17. very cleverly written!

You manage to combine allusions to George Lucas's imaginary world with allusions to real 20th century European politics and war. Among the latter is the technique of Blitzkrieg, by which France was defeated in 1940. But you know all this better than I do.

[DFW]

18. For much of the year, I practically commute between the two former enemies

In a very atypical reversal of tradition, after World War II, when De Gaulle and Adenauer got together to figure out a way to make sure their two countries would never go to war against each other again, it was De Gaulle who was fluent in German, not Adenauer who was fluent in French. That ability to communicate one on one without an interpreter was crucial to their relationship--something not lost on me for my work and personal life, as you have seen first-hand.

The two societies remain fundamentally different. The Germans envy the French their "savoir vivre," and the French envy the Germans their efficiency, more a legend these days than fact. The Germans, themselves, despise their inefficient and cumbersome, uncaring bureaucracy. Since the bureaucracy in France is three times worse, you can imagine how frustrating France is in German eyes for anything other than vacations, wine or soft cheese. What De Gaulle and Adenauer DID accomplish, however, is making sure that no one alive today could even imagine France and Germany ever going to war against each other again. Today, that is no more likely than Iowa going to war with Illinois.

I have work colleagues in northern Germany who are also two brothers, different as night and day. One speaks very little English, some Dutch (they live close to the border). His idea of a vacation is going hunting wild boar in sparsely populated Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The other is a Francophile, speaks nearly fluent French and nearly fluent English. His idea of a vacation is a stay in Strasbourg, staying in fancy hotels and going to gourmet restaurants. The first one jokingly refers to France as "das Erbfeindland (the traditional enemy country)." The other studied there, and would just as soon be there as anywhere else.

Their father was a draftee in the Wehrmacht in Russia, and was almost executed by his commanding officer for refusing to machine gun two women who had been captured as partisans (another soldier defused the situation by offering to do it). A rare case of a German who had seen combat in Russia, and was willing to talk about it, he imparted the horrors of war to his sons, hoping they would get the "never again" message. They did. In the case of my father-in-law, he was drafted off his farm at age 17 and sent to Russia. He got a leg blown off at Stalingrad, and returned to Germany as a crippled teenager. He was so traumatized, he never once talked about his combat experience until he lost control of his conscious self during his final delirium.

The French Republic in 1940 was nearly as fragmented politically as the Spanish Republic in 1936. Hitler's meticulously planned conquest of France was over in weeks. Again, the local politicians were quite busy arguing among themselves. That he was ever foolish enough to invade Russia, knowing what happened to Napoleon, showed that his abilities as a strategic military analyst were not without their limits. That Churchill was the only major European leader (besides Mussolini) who understood what Hitler was about does not exactly compliment the continent's politicians of the 1930s and 1940s, not to mention his immediate predecessor as PM.

[Lionel Mandrake]

19. A few minor points ...

Every once in a while there's what historians call a diplomatic revolution, i.e., a change in traditional friends and enemies. For example: France's traditional enemy from the hundred years' war through the the time of Napoleon was England. Napoleon was defeated at Waterloo by an alliance of English and German forces. In 1870-1871 France began a tradition of enmity with newly unified Germany, and that enmity lasted until de Gaulle and Adenauer got together in the manner you so eloquently describe.

Poor Neville Chamberlain had believed that betrayal of Czechoslovakia would satisfy Hitler, but he learned in September 1939 that war with Germany was inevitable. Chamberlain was a broken man when Churchill took over as PM.

I would credit Heinz Guderian, rather than der GröFaZ, for the lightning-like conquest of France in 1940.

[DFW]

24. True about Guderian, but

In 1940, it was still the case that his generals didn't sneeze without a direct order from Berlin.

[Lionel Mandrake]

25. Yes, and Hitler's micromanagement lasted until the end.

Last edited Sat Feb 29, 2020, 11:33 PM - Edit history (2)

In June 1944 Hitler would not release the reserves to repel the invasion at Normandy. Rommel begged, but Hitler continued to believe that Normandy was a feint and that the real invasion would take place at the Pas-de-Calais.

On edit I had to delete the last sentence, which was hopelessly garbled and wrong. "The Man Who Never Was" (not "the man who wasn't there" ) had to do with fooling the Germans into thinking the Allies would invade Greece and Sardinia when in fact they were about to invade Sicily.

[PatrickforO]

26. I guessed Spain until the paragraph about the money from their

treasury and how it was stolen by a supposed ally. I did not know that part of the story.

As to the danger of repeating history, I've been seeing startling parallels of what is going on now with the Wiemar Republic in Germany in the early 1930s. With Trump in the starring role as Hitler, and Steven Miller as Reinhard Heydrich. Their policy positions are very much straight out of Storm Front.

This is a very scary time, and like Maher, I'm expecting that if COVID-19 gets serious here, Trump may try to declare martial law or take on some special powers, and cancel the election. That wouldn't surprise me.

Still, let's hope that doesn't happen, and let's hope the American people are wise enough to vote this grifter out of office. And, let us hope those we elect will be wise enough to make some serious reforms.

[DFW]

27. I am confident we will vote Trump out of office. After all, we never voted him in.

The trouble will be in the counting of the vote. Republican voter suppression is in full swing, and they will mess with the tallying in any case. They have had a lot of practice. Jeb Bush and Scott Walker have practically written manuals on the subject, and the Roberts Court has upheld their every move.

Stalin is reputed to have said: "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything."

Stalin, be the way, was one of the most ruthless, cynical rulers of the 20th century. He was the one who stole Spain's gold. Purporting to be the great friend of the Spanish Republic when others timidly shied away, he offered to store Spain's vast gold reserves for the Spanish Republic in case the fascists got too close, or even achieved military victory. The Spanish Republic foolishly accepted the "offer." The gold was transported to a freighter docked at the coast, and loaded onto the ship. The Soviet emissary then refused to give the Spanish official any kind of document of receipt, and Stalin later said the gold was for "services rendered," or some such BS phrase. Stalin didn't give a rat's ass about his socialists brothers in Spain. He just wanted their wealth, and he got it.

There is a curious aftermath of that story. The Soviet Union stored its gold in five massive depositories. Four of them contained gold in purely bullion form (bars or newly minted issues by the Soviets themselves). One, in the Ural mountains, contained all the old gold coins of collector value, some quite rare. This included, from the theft of Spain's gold, old 8 escudos of Spain and its American colonies, plus hundreds of thousands of 19th century gold coins from Brazil and Argentina. Then there was all the Czar's gold from before 1917. One group of twenty thousand US $20 gold coins, almost all dated 1908 (a few 1907), was in the Czar's stash, later marketed in the USA as "Wells Fargo Nevada Gold," even though they were all minted in Philadelphia. Then, don't forget all the gold coins sitting in the Reichsbank when the Soviets took Berlin in 1945. Hundreds of thousands of these coins started showing up in Switzerland about the time the Soviet Union was dissolving, and one distributor I know personally was told, "your children are already too old to see the end of this." A renegade unit of KGB operatives realized what they had, and like during the chaos of 1936 in Spain, figured they could get away with stealing it, and they did. At first, the coins were being sold out of England, later on out of the USA. I only found this out after talking with a high-up in the Russian state bank soon after the break-up of the Soviet Union. I have seen tens of thousands of these coins with my own eyes, some of which could ONLY have come from the Reichsbank in 1945, so this guy was not just making up a fairy tale to entertain me.

[PatrickforO]

28. Holy cow! You've told me something I never, ever knew, but that

doesn't surprise me a bit. Stalin was a dirt-bag, of the same brutal caliber as Putin. He ruled by terror and is directly responsible for the deaths of over 20 million people in his purges. Thanks for telling me this.

[Liberal In Texas]

29. Fascinating thread. n/t

[DFW]

30. Ended up going off on a few side tangents.

Hope it didn't get too distracting.

[Liberal In Texas]

31. Side tangents were also very interesting. n/t

[Javaman]

32. Brilliant. And it lead me to think of this.

Also on edit: this is one of those truly rare threads, were I felt smarter after reading it. I can't say enough just how brilliant your writing is. Thank you.

[DFW]

33. Thanks for the kind words!

There are plenty here in DU who feel differently.

[Javaman]

34. then they don't know what they are missing. :) Cheers! nt

[DFW]

35. Oh, I think they know what they want, and I think they understand me fine.

They just feel I'm completely wrong about mostly everything!

[dixiegrrrrl]

36. Thank you for one of the most rewarding threads I have read.

Side roads made it all the more interesting.

You alluded once, in a thread about Bill Barr being Opus Dei., that they were involved in Spain back in the day.. During the Franco era, perhaps?

[DFW]

37. Even before that

They were enthusiastic supporters of the fascist uprising. The left-leaning parties that supported the Republic tended not to be very religious, and the fascists were die-hard Catholics. Opus Dei saw in the fascists their natural allies, and they weren't wrong. Franco was the closest thing they would get to a theocracy in the 20th century in Europe and they embraced him fervently.