Comment by wtcactus | Hacker News Reader

Comment by wtcactus | Hacker News Reader

I'm not going to comment on the words chosen by BBC to portray the case - I think there are a lot of other better entries on HN where BBC bias (or the lack of it) can be discussed.

But I see a lot of comments here about what Fanquismo was and wasn't, and I believe it comes out of ignorance about Spanish history. Many comments here make it look like this was a choice between Franquismo/Fascism and personal freedom and democracy. It wasn't. It was a brutal struggle between Fascists and Communists, and good people that wanted freedom were caught in the middle right since the beginning. The choice wasn't between Fascism or Democracy, the choice was just between two major evils: Fascism or Communism and that's why it divided Spanish society

It can be argued that when this happened (1968), the bloody and brutal Spanish Civil War (that started with major violent acts from the communists' side after fair elections, BTW) was long over and the country should already be way on the path to democracy (and I agree if that was the point being made), but let's not pretend that she joined good company and proper people that just wanted to liberate Spain.

People commenting here really need to read about the Spanish Civil War to understand how it went down. Communists were so destructive that in the middle of the war, they started fighting and killing each other instead of fighting against the Fascist forces. Major atrocities were committed on both sides. POWs were routinely rounded up and executed, both by the Communists and by the Fascists.

The only group that seemed to have some sense when it came to defend basic humanity were the anarchists (although they did have a lot of other issues). Read Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell for a beautiful and sad description of a small part of this conflict.

There's this old 6 episodes TV Series from 1983, that really gives a good perspective of how awful it all was: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_I6C-VbFvI

> There's this old 6 episodes TV Series from 1983, that really gives a good perspective of how awful it all was

Playlist of the miniseries from the same channel:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxZAPogJjW_h2JbgYOgO3GZiI...

The Spanish Civil War (1983)

https://imdb.com/title/tt1718608/

"that started with major violent acts from the communists' side after fair elections"

This is simply false. The Spanish Civil War started in 1936 with Franco's fascist coup against a democratically elected government. Check your own ignorance before accusing others.

As you might understand (or avoid to). Franco didn't wake up one day and decided to start a civil war out of nowhere. In the period of 1933-1936, there was major violence against the legitimately elected Right-Wing government from Marxist groups that adopted a revolutionary approach to take power in Spain:

"The defeat in the elections and its consequences led to disenchantment with parliamentarism and radicalization within the Socialists. The increasing militancy within the Socialist workers was followed by Francisco Largo Caballero's adopting a revolutionary Marxist rhetoric which justified revolutionism as a way to combat rising fascism, uncharacteristic of European social democratic mainstream and the reformist traditions of the PSOE.[69] The CNT adopted a similar rhetoric in the wake of the elections, threatening with a revolution if "Fascist tendencies" would win the elections.[70] Open violence occurred in the streets of Spanish cities, and militancy continued to increase,[71] reflecting a movement towards radical upheaval, rather than peaceful means as solutions.[72] A small insurrection by anarchists occurred in December 1933 in response to CEDA's victory, in which around 100 people died.[73]

[...]

Fairly well armed revolutionaries managed to take the whole province of Asturias, murdering numerous policemen, clergymen and civilians, destroying religious buildings including churches, convents and part of the university at Oviedo.[75] Rebels in the occupied areas proclaimed revolution for the workers and abolished the existing currency.[76] The uprising was crushed in two weeks by the Spanish Navy and the Spanish Republican Army, the latter using mainly Moorish colonial troops from Spanish Morocco."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_Civil_War

I would have never thought to see a Franco apologist with my own eyes. Wow, thank you for this unique moment.

Anyhow, Franco was a fascist trash and allied with Hitler and Mussolini. Revolutionaries were mainly anarchists (NOT communists). In fact it's because of Stalin and the communists following him starting an infighting with the anarchists led to the fascist victory.

If the revolutionaries have won, Spain would have been an experimental socialist/anarchist republic. We don't know if ot would have been ended up like USSR. Maybe.

In 1968 though the flight was pretty much about fascism vs democracy.

Oh, last point: Torture is torture.

> "If the revolutionaries have won, Spain would have been an experimental socialist/anarchist republic."

I tend to agree with that, because nothing shouts "experimental socialist/anarchist republic" like "murdering numerous policemen, clergymen and civilians, destroying religious buildings including churches, convents and part of the university".

That is historical context, not justification for 39 years of fascist dictatorship.

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