(1) International Brigade / Fight for Democracy / Rewriting History

Tots els experts ens diuen que l’Historia és subjectiva i que sempre ens ho conten els guanyadors. OK, hi estic d’acord, però també estic convençut que hi ha uns fets indiscutibles.

Tornem a l’any 1936. Segons a qui escoltes, el govern espanyol, elegit democràticament, eren uns inutils, el demoni banyut, uns idealistes, gent en ganes de estirar Espanya fins al segle 20 d’una vegada per totes, gent en ganes de construir una república moderna i demòcrata, o gent amb ganes de vendre els seus bebes a Stalin per a fer caldo .... però, trobo que hi ha un fet que no es pot discutir. Era un govern elegit democràticament.

Segon fet; Franco va començar un cop d’estat, el qual, per la forma que ell actuava, es va convertir en una guerra civil.

Tercer fet; vist que els governs aliats miraven per l’altre costat, per motius politics, molts voluntaris d’arreu del món van anar a Espanya a lluitar a favor de la democràcia. Eren els Brigadistes Internacionals.

Quart fet; va guanyar Franco i Espanya va viure 40 anys de dictadura.

Ara que han passat els anys, i Espanya ha fet una “transició” cap a la democràcia, hi ha veus diferents sobre com s’hauria d’actuar amb aquest bagatge. Que si oblidem, que si no remenem, que lo fet està fet etc ... suposo que es pot parlar de totes les opcions mirant com altres països han actuat amb referència al seu passat fosc.

Però els fets continuen sent fets.

 A gairebé totes les ciutats d’Espanya, i moltes de Catalunya (Tortosa sense anar més lluny), encara hi ha monuments o recordatoris a la victòria dels copistes, amb debats publics sobre la convivencia o no de retirar-los. A Madrid resulta que tenen l’Arc de Triumf de Franco. I un petit monument recordant les Brigadistes que va posar l’Universitat – ni el govern ni “el estat”. Ara resulta que és aquest monument que molesta, un petit record de la gent que va venir fins aqui i va morir en nom de la democràcia, és el seu record que molesta – i, segons aquest article, van a retirar-lo. No tinc paraules. Passen coses molt grosses a la peninsula cada dia, però aquest m’ha deixat bocabadat! A gairebé totes les ciutats del Regne Unit o Irlanda tenim plaques recordant els morts, però aquí molesten (mentre gasten una fortuna restaurant el Valle de los Caidos).

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Ever since I was a lad, I’ve heard the one about History being a subjective issue, and that History is always written by the victors. However, I still believe that a fact is a fact.

Let’s go back to 1936. Spain has a newly elected democratic government. Some say they were a bunch of idiots, some say idealists, some say they’d set up a republican democracy worthy of the 20th century, others say they couldn’t have organised a piss-up in a brewery – geniuses, back-stabbers, the devil incarnate willing to sell babies to Stalin to make his soup with ... who knows? But, Fact One, they were democratically elected.

Fact Two. Franco staged a coup d’etât which evolved (either deliberately or through incompetence) into a civil war.

Fact Three. As most foreign governments turned a blind eye it was up to politically conscious volunteers to come from all around the world and fight on the side of the democratically elected government. The International Brigades.

Fact Four. They lost. Franco won and Spain suffered a 40-year dictatorship.

Years later, and Spain is still trying to come to terms with this historical burden. 35 years after their “transition” into a democracy and there is still public debate about what’s best – whether to sweep all this under the carpet and pretend it never happened or to make an attempt at a public acceptance and explanation of this dark past, following the example of other countries. Who knows what’s best. Again, a political, psychological, and personal debate.

However, facts are still facts.

Most towns in Spain, and Catalonia (Tortosa being a prime example) retain monuments and street signs celebrating the victory of Franco and his coup. Madrid even has its own huge Arc de Triumf apparently, not to mention the infamous monument/tomb built for Franco – el Valle de los Caidos – which has just been restored for a few million €uros. Turns out there is also a small monument commemorating the International Brigaders in Madrid, on the University Campus. Turns out, according to this article, that the Franco “Theme Park” that parts of Spain resemble, does not annoy the government and is not under debate. Turns out that the monument to lives lost fighting for democracy does. And they are going to pull it down.

Luckily there are many more such monuments in cities and towns all over the UK, Ireland, USA etc, but even so, a sad sad day for Spain.
UPDATE: since I wrote this I have found these two more serious and interesting opinions on this matter and the general question of how to approach history. One by historian Richard Baxell and Two by Sheffield University PhD student Matthew Kerry.

Franco and the river Ebro

Si tolerem això ....
El Casal Panxampla ha tornat a donar una bona espenta a la campanya per eliminar la vergonya més gran de Tortosa. O sigui, treure el monument franquista del riu. Potser si algú de fora de Tortosa està llegint aquest apunt no s’acabarà de creure el que dic, però la foto ho demostra – 35 anys desprès encara tenim la “gloria” de Franco damunt de natros a Tortosa. Una vergonya per Tortosa i tot el territori ebrenc ja que el riu ens representa i ens dona la nostra forma de viure i no mereix tenir aquest tros de ferro feixista plantat al mig.
En propers apunts penjarem els motius (obvis) per treure el monument.
Per avui, però, començarem amb una explicació en anglès amb més detalls ja que si algú d’Anglaterra visita el bloc hauré de començar l’explicació al 1936! Estalvio la lliçó per a vatros en català perquè estic segur que, malauradament, la coneixem, però si voleu llegir el breu historia en anglès podeu afegir alguna correcció si cal.

Tot seguit per un video amb imatgens de Franco i la guerra amb la cançó Si Toleres Això, Els Teus Fills Seran Els Proxims, que els Manic Street Preachers van gravar a l’any 1998.

A brief history of Franco and the river Ebro. General Franco led a military uprising against a democratically elected government in Spain in 1936. This led to a civil war which lasted until 1939. Franco, leading a union of fascists, pseudo-fascists, right-wing extremists, catholic extremists, and others of that ilk, received the backing of other fascist powers such as Germany and Italy who provided man-power, weaponry, technology, and money. The democratic government, on the other hand, received very little aid or support from other democratic governments (obviously here we must remember the heroic volunteers of the International Brigades who went where their governments refused to go). England, for example, carried out a dry-run of its non-intervention appeasement policy which would later turn out to be so “successful” regarding Hitler!

Communist Russia did offer some help as the elected government was a left-wing amalgam of various tendencies. I say “help” as this later became more of a hindrance when Russia tried to take control of the situation, facing off stalinists against marxists, or was that leninists against anarchists, or was that trade-unionists against socialists! To cut a long story short, this eventually led to in-fighting and repression amongst the same side!

As with all civil wars, some people took up arms willingly but many were simply recruited depending on which side of the battle line you lived. Most people were more worried about finding money or food to get by, I suppose, than dying for their ideals. Anyway, death, misery, and destruction followed, more so on one side than the other as, while the “lefties” fought with old-fashioned Russian rifles, Franco was trying out Hitler’s new war planes.

The decisive battle for Franco’s victory and entry into Catalonia was the Battle of the Ebro. Thousands of people were killed in mass air-borne bombing raids as a futile resistance effort was crushed by Franco. The war in Spain was already virtually won, and only time and patience would have been necessary to overrun Catalonia but some historians believe that Franco deliberately sought and prolonged this battle so as to serve a lesson no one would forget. Many of the people who died were young men of no more than 16 or 17 years of age, as the recruiting age had become lower and lower for obvious reasons.
Eventually Franco won which led to 40 years of dictatorship and hardship – let’s not forget that Europe and the USA tolerated this and eventually became “buddies” with him.

The objective behind this lecture is to give a little background to the present polemical situation in Tortosa.
In the 1960s to remember the Battle of the Ebro and offer “glory” to the fallen (on Franco’s side), a fascist monument was erected in the river Ebro as it flows through the capital city of this region, Tortosa. Thirty-five years after his death and the introduction of democracy, membership of the EU and NATO, and a change of millennium, the monument still stands!
Admittedly the first years after Franco’s death was maybe not the best moment to upset nostalgic extremists or the army (as seen in the attempted coup in 1982), but I think no one now can have any doubts about Spain’s acceptance of democracy. Governments have come, governments have gone, but no one has had the political will to carry out the people’s will.

While there have been various social-citizen campaigns to have this monstrosity removed, obviously there are arguments in favour of maintaining it: some say it helps us remember how bad the Civil War and Franco were; others claim, if we remove its fascist symbols it could commemorate the fallen on both sides; or, suitably explained, it could be a monument for peace; it’s a touristic photo of Tortosa; it symbolises Tortosa for many people; its removal would be an unnecessary waste of time and money, and so on ....

Personally I am not convinced by any of these. Nor are the 2000 people who have signed a petition asking Tortosa’s council to take steps to get rid of this horror. Apparently the council will debate this next month – watch this space!

The Manic Street Preachers sang about the Spanish Civil War with If You Tolerate This, Your Children Will Be Next on 1998’s album This Is My Truth, Tell Me Yours. Here's a video with images of Franco and the Civil War.

foto de La Marfanta