Around World War II, (in)famous dictators appeared one after another. To list a few, there was Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), Benito Mussolini (1883-1945), Joseph Stalin (1878-1953), and Francisco Franco (1892-1975). You could say they were all the same generation. Did the uneasiness of the people produce a dictator, or did dictators take power and cause war and uneasiness? It is the chicken and the egg, and both may be right. Another thing characteristic of this time was that these dictators took over after the collapse of an absolute monarchy. A revolution broke out in Russia in 1917, and, with the abdication of Nicholas II, the Romanov dynasty collapsed. In Austria, Charles I, the last emperor of the House of Habsburg, took refuge in 1918, and the Habsburg Empire that had ruled over Central Europe for 650 years collapsed. In Spain, as a result of a general election held in 1931, the left-wing Republicans gained power, and Alfonso XIII abdicated; the Second Spanish Republic was established, and the House of Bourbon fled to Italy. Italian history is complicated, but to say it briefly, the House of Savoy continued to rule until the end of World War II, but the House of Savoy, which supported the dictatorship of Mussolini, lost the trust of the nation; in a national referendum carried out in 1946 that questioned the continuation of the monarchy, it was decided by the narrow margin of 54% to abolish the monarchy. Umberto II was dethroned, and Italy adopted a republic, becoming the Italian Republic. Also, a long time ago, the rise of Napoleon was welcomed by the people of France—who abolished the Bourbon dynasty. All of these are very different from Great Britain, which built a democracy while using the royal families (with the idea of “reigning, but not ruling”) as a moral support for the people.
Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco tend to be discussed in the same category of being fascists, but Franco walked on a different path than the other two. In March 1939, just before the end of the Spanish Civil War, Franco joined the Anti-Comintern Pact with Japan, Germany, and Italy; but when World War II broke out in September of that year, Franco decided that the nation was not strong enough to participate in the war due to the devastation in the nation from the civil war, and thus declared neutrality. However, at that time, he maintained friendly relations with Japan, Germany, and Italy. Later, when the Allies gained the upper hand around 1943, Franco firmly maintained a neutral stance, and he broke off relations with Japan, citing a conflict of interests regarding the Philippines. The United States—which had become a world leader after the war—could not entirely eliminate their suspicion of Franco. After all, Franco ruled as a dictator over Spain, which was close friends with Germany and Italy. However, it was undeniable that Spain was militarily and politically important for the U.S. With the historic meeting of President Eisenhower and Franco in 1959, the two people unexpectedly succeeded in building a deep mutual understanding, and from this, the relationship between America and Spain rapidly improved.
Looking at the surface, Franco seems to just be an opportunist, whose actions were very strange. However, I think Franco was a consistent person in his essence. Throughout his whole life, Franco was afraid of two things that he couldn’t understand. The first was communism, which succeeded in Russia; to Franco, Germany and Italy were a breakwater to keep communism from penetrating Spain. The other was a fear of activity by any ethnicity other than Caucasians. These cannot be criticized unconditionally. Everyone is afraid of things they don’t understand and that are new. Franco was an officer who had risen through the ranks, and he may have felt that he could trust President Eisenhower and President Peron, who proudly carried out their professional duties and supported their administration, even though their countries and environments were different.
Franco seems to have thought seriously about what kind of government Spain should have after his death. Since he watched the repeated failure of a parliamentary democracy in Spain, he did not seem to think that Spain could transition smoothly to a democracy when he died. He thought that switching over to a monarchy after the dictatorship he established would be the best for Spain’s future. In 1947, Franco instated a “law of succession,” which changed Spain into a “monarchy,” declared Franco the head of state as the “Regent to the King of Spain” for life, and gave Franco the power to decide the next king. This “law of succession” was established with a national referendum in July, and Franco was given the position of head of state for life.
When his health began to deteriorate in his 70s, Franco named Juan Carlos—the grandson of the former King Alfonso XIII of the House of Bourbon—as his heir in 1969; Franco died in 1975 at the age of 83. He is a man considered across the world to be a fascist and terrifying like Hitler, and was criticized by opposing factions in Spain, but he died in peace a natural death in his own bed.