Franco Dictatorship

The Francoist Dictatorship or Francoist Spain was the authoritarian, catholic, semi-fascist right-wing dictatorship that ran Spain from 1939 to 1975. It is named after Francisco Franco, a general turned dictator of Spain who won the Spanish Civil War and ran Spain until his death in 1975. Francoist Spain was backed by the West during the Cold War as the regime was anti-communist, being admitted into the United Nations in the 1950's.

History

Isolation

Born out of the victorious Nationalist faction of the Spanish Civil War, the Francoists took power over a devastated Spain. Gold and foreign exchange reserves had been virtually wiped out, the massive devastation of war had reduced the productive capacity of both industry and agriculture. To compound the difficulties, even if the wherewithal had existed to purchase imports, the outbreak of World War II rendered many needed supplies unavailable. The end of the war did not improve Spain's plight because of subsequent global shortages of raw materials, and peacetime industrial products. After World War II, Spain was denied Marshall Plan aid for their closeness to Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. Thus, Francoist Spain spent the first decade of its existence diplomatically isolated, economically depressed and fighting off the remaining Republican insurgents.

Entering the Cold War

Spain began to warm up to France and Britain in 1948, and developed a close relationship with the US in 1950 as the US re-established diplomatic relations with Spain, and in 1953 a formal alliance was declared and soon the US began constructing several (still operational) military bases in Spain. Despite it being a fascist ally of Nazi Germany that engaged in horrific atrocities against its citizens and restricting free speech, the US was fine with allying with it.

Spanish Miracle

From 1959 to 1974, Spain became an economic miracle, it enjoyed the second highest growth rate in the world, only slightly behind Japan and became the ninth largest economy in the world, just behind Canada. In 1946 there were 72,000 private cars in Spain, in 1966 there were over 1 million. This growth rate had no equal in the world. The economic boom had three main factors:

• Political stability
• Protectionist policies
• State-ownership of key industries in shipbuilding, car manufacturing, petrochemical, textiles

Fall of the Dictatorship

Despite the economic boom, numerous leftist (most anarchist) guerilla groups began to emerge all over Spain, they are listed here by their year of founding:

• 1940: National Front of Catalonia
• 1958: Iberian Revolutionary Liberation Directory
• 1959: Euskadi Ta Askatasuna
• 1961: Defensa Interior
• 1964: Canary Islands Independence Movement
• 1966: First of May Group
• 1969: Catalan Liberation Front
• 1971: Revolutionary Antifascist Patriotic Front
• 1971: Iberian Liberation Movement
• 1975: First of October Anti-Fascist Resistance Groups