At the end of the First World War, many European countries, including Italy, experienced right-wing dictatorships. One of the most ferocious and long-lasting dictatorial regimes was that established in Spain by General Francisco Franco. Spain, which had remained neutral during the First World War, was in the 1920s a backward country, long on the margins of Europe's economic and social development. After centuries of monarchy, a republic was established in 1931.
The Spanish Republican government proposed a policy of renewal and reform, but it was held back by serious social and political tensions: on the one hand, the revolts of workers and miners, who demanded more radical reforms; on the other side, the protests and hostility of groups who felt damaged by the republic: landowners, the army, the Catholic clergy. The elections of July 1936 led to the victory of a popular front composed of socialists, republicans, radicals and communists.
At this point, however, the reactionary forces moved to armed action: in that same month, some army garrisons led by General Francisco Franco rose up against the government, starting a civil war that would cause almost a million deaths. The Spanish civil war was not only a manifestation of ideological, political and religious hatred, but also of class opposition: bourgeoisie against proletariat, wealthy classes against non-wealthy classes. The ferocity of the conflict was frightening: on both sides there were massacres of defenseless civilians, religious people, political vendettas, and collective executions. Between December 1938 and the spring of 1939, Franco carried out the “reclamation” of the territories that were being occupied, having all suspected republicans shot, and proceeded quickly to conquer Barcelona, Valencia and then Madrid. The area controlled by the Republicans shrank more and more, until Franco entered Madrid in March 1939. The civil war was over, but a fascist dictatorship began in Spain that would last until the mid-1970s.
Only after the death of Francisco Franco, in 1975, could the country return to democracy, but the democratic and anti-Franco forces, to avoid a possible new civil war, had to accept a painful pact: a clean slate for all the crimes of Francoism. Indeed, they had to accept a real removal of memory and truth. But can a people, a democracy, look forward with confidence without having healed wounds that are still open?
