Spanish Civil War Graves Haunt Modern Spain
Republican Supporter Federico Garcia Lorca Will Finally Be Exhumed
Oct 22, 2009
70 years after the end of the Spanish Civil War and more than 30 years after the death of dictator Francisco Franco, the mass graves of thousands of Republican supporters are finally being opened. The move has not been uncontroversial, but it represents the best hope for genuine reconciliation in modern Spain.
The Spanish Civil War And Its Aftermath
The civil war in Spain (1936 – 1939) was triggered by an attempted military coup against the democratically elected government of the Spanish Second Republic. The fascists were supported by Mussolini’s Italy and Hitler’s Germany, and German planes bombed Spanish towns such as Guernica in a 'practice run' for the aerial bombings of the Second World War. Other countries failed to offer clear support to Republican Spain or joined a cynical ‘non-intervention’ pact, with the result that the Republican government was effectively denied access to adequate arms.
The troops loyal to the Republic were bolstered not only by Spanish citizens but also by individuals from many other countries who volunteered with the International Brigades to fight fascism in Europe. Despite their limited resources they held the fascists for three years, but the Republic finally fell to Franco in 1939, just as the Second World War was beginning.
During Franco’s 40 year dictatorship political prisoners were among those forced to build the massive monument at The Valley Of The Fallen where the bodies of Franco himself and of fascist general Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera are now buried. By contrast, the many thousands of Republican supporters who had been summarily executed and buried in mass graves were left to lie where they were.
Modern Spain and the Demand for Justice
After Franco’s death in 1975, power passed to King Juan Carlos, chosen by Franco to succeed him as absolute monarch. But the popular demand for democracy was strong, and the transition to liberal democracy was peaceful and quick, with elections held in 1977 and a new constitution created in 1978. The price, widely seen as necessary to a peaceful transition, was a law of amnesty which effectively meant that the perpetrators of crimes committed during the civil war and the dictatorship would never be punished.
One of the consequences was that relatives of Republican victims believed to be in the mass graves (fosas) had no recourse to public assistance in recovering and identifying the bodies of their loved ones. As a result, although the whereabouts of many of these graves is still known and flowers often left there, the majority of families simply lacked the resources to fight for their recognition in the courts.
Political power in the new Spain soon passed from the initially triumphant PSOE (Socialist Workers’ Party of Spain) to the right-wing PP (Popular Party), but it became evident that despite claims that the amnesty law formed one part of a general “reconciliation” in Spain, there has in fact been no reconciliation.
The activities of ETA (Basque Homeland and Freedom), formed during the dictatorship but continuing after the transition to democracy and into the present day, the “dirty war” of the 1980s and the waves of complaint against the “pact of silence” bear testimony to the failure of the “reconciliation” of the victorious side. The slogan of the transition, “freedom without revenge” soon disappeared, and the most dominant slogan of recent years has been “no freedom without justice”.
The Law of Historical Memory v. The Amnesty
In 2007 Jose Luis Zapatero’s PSOE Government, elected in 2004 in the wake of the Madrid Train Bombings, passed a new ‘Law of Historical Memory’ aimed at redressing the balance and answering the grievances of those defeated in the Civil War. Among other things, the law provided for state help to families wanting to open the mass graves to recover and identify the victims, promised the removal of fascist statuary and symbols from public places, and outlawed political rallies at the Valley of the Fallen, which had become the focus of modern fascist activities.
Judge Baltazar Garzon, best known for pursuing and demanding the extradition of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, responded to a petition on behalf of various families to open 19 mass graves, and went further in opening an investigation into fascist crimes under the dictatorship. Other branches of the Spanish legal system immediately invoked the 1977 amnesty against any legal possibility of doing so, and after a grim courtroom battle Garzon backed down and turned responsibility for ruling on the mass graves over to the local courts.
Representatives of the families are angry that the law does not go far enough, and that these events have led to further delay and expense for those seeking justice. Further controversy focussed on the different wishes of family members of those buried together, and inevitably media attention focussed on the Lorca grave, with various relatives initially arguing against disinterment and others refusing co-operation in the DNA testing needed to identify some victims. While some graves have already been opened and the identification process is under way, the Lorca grave is due to be opened at the end of October 2009. The families have requested privacy and at the time of writing the site is under 24 hour guard, but media interest is sure to be keen, whether or not the rumours that the poet had previously been transferred elsewhere turn out to be true.
For further information see these interviews with British members of the International Brigades
See also The Case Of Spain by Vicent Navarro, Professor of Policy Studies and Public Policy, John Hopkins University, USA, and Professor of Political Science, Pompeu Fabra University, Spain.
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