PASCUAL MARAGALL
I
RUBERT de VENTOS
445
Only now they talk about change and democracy instead of merely
anti-Communism. Their new language should not be taken as an expression
of political goodwill. Far from it. These changes have been forced upon them
by events ; they are , in effect, changes produced in an effort to contain
change , and the biggest mistake of all would be to forget that the armed
forces' backing has always been the regime's surest weapon.
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Two things happened to give at least the idea of politics in Spain a
meaning. On December 20 , 1973 , Admiral Carrero Blanco, the linchpin of
Franco's efforts to ensure that his regime survives him, was blown up by
Basque nationalists. On April 25, 1974, the fascist post-Salazar regime in
Portugal was overthrown by the military, backed by illegal left-wing parties .
The post-Carrero government, with Premier Arias Navarro at its head,
had been trying to get across the following message: "We are fascists, you see ,
but we have chosen democracy- some sort of democratic clothing- to
survive . ' ' On the one hand, on February 12, Arias publicly promised evolution
toward a more democratic state ; on the other , on March 2, Salvador Puig
Antich , a Catalan anarchist who had killed a secret policeman in a Barcelona
shoot-out , was executed , traditionally , by garotte, following a very traditional
political trial.
The balancing act could have worked. But the Portuguese revolution
suddenly altered the meaning of the February promises. The press, in only
slightly veiled terms, urged the Chief of the High Military Staff to imitate
Spinola. The key-words "apertura" (opening, evolurion) and "espfritu del
12 de Febrero" (the date ofArias Navarro' sfirst speech) seemed to be enough to
cover all kinds of democratic manifestos in the newspapers. 1;"he new
Minister ofInformation, Pio Cabanillas, allowed it to go on. Many new , and
newly outspoken , magazines appeared.
In Spain " the future" means-unless otherwise stated-the period
following the dictator's death. InJuly 1974, Franco was hospitalized for the
first time since the Civil War. Then came Greece. From Cyprus until the
anti-monarchial referendum in December, the fall of the Greek Junta was
used as a weapon by evo lu tionists inside the system. In effect , the
Portuguese-Greek alternative was a paradigm of" how things ought to go and
ought not to go . " Greece was the insider's illustration of the" correct" way of
fascism ; Portugal, the example for the illegal opposition.
Preparations for the future had become , for Spain, open during Franco's
illness , and they continued to be even after the throwback following the
explosion of a bomb near the headquarters of the national police in Madrid.
