LA SOTA DE BASTOS: FELIPE GONZÁLEZ
1977-1978
Felipe González spent almost a decade buried in a nameless grave and today he can't even say he is the great martyr of Spanish democracy, for someone else more deserving of that title would snatch that away from him a decade later. So he was unlucky, although, to be honest, he could have handled the situation more carefully.
And yet González could not have started his tenure better. 1977 had started badly for Spain, with political violence increasing, rioting and people angry at the Suárez government's slow reform pace. But at least there were reforms. Spaniards were elated when free elections -the first since 1936- were announced for June, with the aim of electing a Congress that would draft a democratic constitution. This elation was subdued once it was known that the PCE, the foremost symbol of the long dead Spanish Republic and of the fight against Franco, would not be legalized and would be unable to run in the election. Suárez didn't want to upset the reactionary forces in the army, who were already unhappy with the democratization process, and thought that outright legalizing Franco's nemesis would be a step too far. This proved to be a serious political miscalculation: in June, the entire left and a good part of the center and right threw themselves behind PSOE wishing to punish Suarez' overcaution and when the dust settled, Felipe González, a 35-year old with a thick sevillan accent, found himself as President of the spanish government.
As usual in Spain, this promising start could only go wrong, horribly wrong. At the beginning González dazzled spaniards and the world: he was young, he was dynamic, he was funny. Unlike the suits and military or fascist uniforms that Franco's ministers had worn for decades, González and his vicepresident Alfonso Guerra wore trendy workmanlike coats and corduroy pants. The corduroy generation, as Time Magazine called them. The world was looking forward to Spain finally transitioning towards democracy in a peaceful and social democratic way. Gonzalez and Guerra really looked like the future Spain wanted. Upon being sworn in, Guerra declared: “
In a couple of years, not even the mother that bore her is going to recognize Spain”. He was right,in a twisted way.
The PSOE's youthful enthusiasm could not handle the simmering pot of tensions that was Spain in 1977. Yes, the people wanted reform, and they wanted it now, but said reform had to be a complicated balancing act between many different groups -the people, nationalists, fascist nostalgics, monarchists, communists, socialists, trade unions, the Church- all still vying for revenge, reparation or continuing what had happened in Spain for the last 40 years. And neither González nor Guerra wanted to wait for everyone else to follow them. They wanted reform, they wanted a democratic and social Spain, they wanted some measure of reparation for Franco's crimes, and they wanted it now. They weren't hardcore socialists in the least: at the 1974 congress in Suresnes, the PSOE had renounced marxism in favor of a more moderate european-style social democracy. But González knew that a large part of his parliamentary majority was standing in for the PCE congressmen that had not been able to run, and needed to appease them.
1978 arrived and the comission charged with writing the new Constitution stalled, unable to reach a consensus: González had enough of a majority to rule, but not enough to pass a constitutional text without a large consensus between all political forces. And, while Suarez's UCD was happy to collaborate, the rest of the right, from Fraga's AP to the Fuerza Nueva reactionaries, was less understanding.
The summer of 1978 arrived with economy still stagnant -as most economic reforms were being blocked by an UCD wary of too fast leftwards movements-, riots in the streets, ETA and far right terror still striking and the army still losing its trust in González by the day. And worse, after a year, people were starting to lose hope as well. The only good news were Spain's unexpected qualification to the 1978 World Cup second round, after a surprise defeat of Brazil in the first round when Cardeñosa managed to score effortlessly on an open net. Spain would then be eliminated by Argentina in a very politically charged match marred by dubious refereeing.
Just as Spain beat Brazil in the World Cup, word came that the constitutional text being discussed included things such as a complete federalization of Spain, and references to socialism not unlike those in post-revolutionary Portugal's Constitution drafted in 1976. That was the last drop. In barracks, in bars and in safehouses, plans drafted long ago were put into action.
In June 25, just as spaniards watched the Netherlands stun Argentina in Buenos Aires with a last minute goal by Rensenbrink, tanks left their barracks and rolled onto the streets in Madrid, Valencia and other cities. What was known as the Second Spanish Civil War had just begun.
In a way, everyone was sort of expecting it. No one could really buy that The Usual Suspects would really let democracy go through after those 40 years, much less democracy ruled by socialists. Plenty of people who had spent decades planning escape routes because they had seen what happened in 1936 to friends or relatives who didn't have one decided to put those plans into motion. And yet, Miguel Gila, perhaps Spain's greatest humorist, who had lived and almost died through the first one as a teenage republican soldier explained with his characteristically dark humor how most spaniards old enough to remember 1936 felt as well: “
This war? This isn't war. Wars used to be something else, but this thing here, isn't war or anything. So few dead! So few bombardments! You go by the road and you can only see a couple of corpses lying by the roadside! Boo-fucking-hoo. They tell me the fascist jails have like a dozen inmates in them and some of them have actually done something! If I knew this was going to be the next war, I would have done it earlier! They really don't do wars like they used to, do they. It's like we really are ready for democracy and have become civilized this time. '36, that was a war como Dios manda! All those millions of dead people and destroyed cities: That's how it's done! We really got our money's worth of that one's ticket”.
Because, in the end, it wasn't the apocalyptic massacre that everyone had been fearing in the back of their minds since the old man croaked, and for some time it seemed as if the government would have the upper hand. In the first days of chaos, the rebels failed to take full control of Madrid after and after a week of confuse combats that left hundreds dead, it became clear that the rebels, led by general Milans del Bosch, only held full control over Valencia, Cádiz, Pontevedra and Navarra, with Madrid and other provincial capitals being disputed. It was a war indeed, but nowhere on the scale as the last one, and by mid- July, González could say that the rebellion could be crushed by autumn. It was really a more civilized affair: there was no mass panic, no mass murders, no mass flights and no mass atrocities, in fact, as Gila had remarked, there was only a few hundred extrajudicial murders countrywide, as civil society, that had worked superbly in marches and concentrations and mass petitions the previous year, melted in the face of tanks and airplanes. Things were so fast, confusing and -as it turned out- so haphazardly thrown out that soon even capturing subversives ceased to be the military junta's priority: finishing the job in Madrid was the top priority.
In the end bringing in reinforcements from rebel-held Valencia wasn't necessary. The air strike that destroyed the Moncloa Palace in July 12, was enough to get the job done, even if the putschists should have thought twice before wiping out everyone entitled to negotiate with them in a single strike. With the government beheaded, the entire country seemed about to be thrown in full chaos. By the end of the month, Spain was in the verge of disolution: its government beheaded, its Congress scattered and powerless, military strongmen advancing on the capital, Portugal and France massing troops in the borders while the Sixth Fleet moved on the Baleares, the Basque Country and Catalonia right about to declare independence.
With no elected government, street fighting in Madrid and all the powers of the state theorically going back to him, Juan Carlos I
El Breve, king of Spain, had no choice but to make a deal with the devil, one that would save Spain in the short term, even if sacrificing its newfound democracy, and himself.
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The PoD, btw, is Suárez electing not to legalize the PCE in March 1977.