V

      THE MAKING OF A CONSPIRATOR

      Franco and the Popular Front, 1936

      THE IMPACT on Franco of the left-wing election victory was almost immediate. On 21 February, the new Minister of War, General Carlos Masquelet, put a number of proposed postings before the cabinet. Amongst them was that of Franco to be Comandante General of the Canary Islands, of Goded to be Comandante General of the Balearic Islands and of Mola to be military governor of Pamplona. Franco was not remotely pleased with what was, in absolute terms, an important post. He sincerely believed that, as Chief of the General Staff, he could play a crucial role in holding back the threat of the Left. As his activities in the wake of the elections showed, his experience in October 1934 had given him a taste for power. That was one reason why the new government wanted him far from the capital.

      The Military Region of the Canary Islands, like that of the Balearics, was not traditionally, even prior to Azaña’s abolition of the post, a Captaincy-General. Nevertheless, in importance, both jobs counted only marginally below the eight peninsular Military Regions and were held by a Major-General. After all, Franco was only number 23 in the list of 24 Major-Generals on active service. General Mola, four points lower at number three on the list of Brigadier Generals, was made military commander of Pamplona and so subordinate to the regional commander in Zaragoza.¹ Franco was fortunate to get such a senior posting from the new Minister of War but he perceived it as a demotion and another slight at the hands of Azaña. Years later, he spoke of the posting as a ‘banishment’ (destierro). Above all, he was worried that his work in removing liberal officers would be reversed.²

      Before leaving Madrid, Franco made the obligatory visits to the new Prime Minister Azaña and to the President of the Republic, Alcalá Zamora. The only accounts of these two meetings derive from Franco’s own testimony to his cousin Pacón and to his biographer Joaquín Arrarás. Even from his partial accounts, it is clear that his motives were complex. Ostensibly, he was trying to convince them to do something about the danger of Communism. It is clear that he thought their best course would have been to keep him on as Chief of the General Staff. In large part, as with his efforts in 1931 to hold onto the Military Academy, this was because he wanted to keep a post in which he felt fulfilled and for which he thought that he was the best man. It is impossible to discern whether he also hoped by staying in Madrid to be able to take part in military conspiracy.

      In Franco’s jaundiced eyes, Alcalá Zamora was dangerously sanguine about the situation. Franco told him that there were insufficient means available to oppose the revolution. The President replied that the revolution had been defeated in Asturias. Franco said ‘Remember, Mr President, what it cost to hold back the revolution in Asturias. If the assault is repeated right across the country, it will be really difficult to contain it. The Army lacks the basic means to do so and there are generals who have been put back into key positions who do not want the revolution to be defeated.’ Alcalá did not take the hint and merely shook his head. When Franco rose to leave, the President said ‘You can leave without worrying, general. There will be no Communism in Spain’, to which Franco claimed, with hindsight, to have replied ‘Of one thing I am certain, and I can guarantee, that, whatever circumstances may arise, wherever I am, there will be no Communism’.

      Again by his own account, Franco appears to have got short shrift from Azaña. His gloomy predictions that the replacement of ‘capable’ officers by Republicans would open the gates to anarchy were greeted with a sardonic smile. Franco said ‘you are making a mistake in sending me away because in Madrid I could be more useful to the Army and for the tranquillity of Spain’. Azaña ignored the offer: ‘I don’t fear uprisings. I knew about Sanjurjo’s plot and I could have avoided it but I preferred to see it defeated’.³ Neither Azaña’s diaries nor Alcalá Zamora’s memoirs contain references to these interviews. However, even if Franco’s versions of the conversations are apocryphal, they reflect a vivid recollection of his embittered state of mind at the time and of his disgust at what he saw as Azaña’s frivolous and malicious insouciance in the face of the Communist menace.

      Removed once more from a job he loved, Franco was more than ever a general to be feared. He was not the only one. The narrowness of the left-wing electoral victory reflected the polarization of Spanish society. The savage repression of the previous period ensured that there would be little spirit of conciliation on either side of the political divide. After the failure of the various efforts by Gil Robles and Franco to persuade Portela Valladares to stay in power with Army backing, the Right abandoned all pretence of legalism. The hour of the ‘catastrophists’ had struck. Gil Robles’s efforts to use democracy against itself had failed. Henceforth, the Right would be concerned only with destroying the Republic rather than with taking it over. Military plotting began in earnest.

      While waiting to leave for the Canary Islands, Franco spent time talking about the situation with General José Enrique Varela, Colonel Antonio Aranda and other like-minded officers. Everywhere he went, he was followed by agents of the Dirección General de Seguridad.⁴ On 8 March, the day before setting out for Cádiz on the first stage of his journey, Franco met a number of dissident officers at the home of José Delgado, a prominent stockbroker and crony of Gil Robles. Among those present were Mola, Varela, Fanjul and Orgaz, as well as Colonel Valentín Galarza. They discussed the need for a coup. They were all agreed that the exiled General Sanjurjo should head the rising.

      The impetuous Varela favoured an audacious coup in Madrid; the more thoughtful Mola proposed a co-ordinated civilian/military uprising in the provinces. Mola believed that the movement should not be overtly monarchist. Franco said little other than to suggest shrewdly that any rising should have no specific party label. He made no firm commitments. They departed, having agreed to begin preparations with Mola as overall director and Galarza, as liaison chief. They undertook to act if the Popular Front dismantled the Civil Guard or reduced the size of the officer corps, if revolution broke out or if Largo Caballero was asked to form a government.⁵

      After leaving the meeting, Franco collected his family and the inevitable Pacón and headed for the Atocha station to catch the train to Cádiz where they would embark for Las Palmas. At Atocha, a group of generals, including Fanjul and Goded came to wish him farewell. On arrival at Cádiz, Franco was shocked by the scale of disorder which greeted his party, churches having been attacked by anarchists. When the military governor of Cádiz informed him that ‘Communists’ had set fire to a convent near his barracks, Franco was furious: ‘Is it possible that the troops of a barracks saw a sacrilegious crime being committed and that you just stood by with your arms folded?’ The colonel replied that he had been ordered by the civilian authorities not to intervene. Franco barked ‘Such orders, since they are unworthy, should never be obeyed by an officer of our Army’ and he refused to shake hands with the colonel.

      Franco’s anger reflected his own deep-seated attachment to Catholicism inherited from his mother. It was inextricably entangled with his military-hierarchical view of society. From revulsion at the Left’s disrespect for God and the Church it was but a short step to thinking that the use of military force to defend the social order was both necessary and justified. He was even more dismayed when a crowd on the quay which had arrived complete with a band to see off the new civil governor of Las Palmas sang the Internationale with their fists raised in the Communist salute. The constant reminders of popular enthusiasm for the Republic led Franco to comment to his cousin that his comrades were wrong to imagine that a swift coup was possible. ‘It’s going to be difficult, bloody and it’ll last a long time – yet there seems to be no other way, if we’re going to be one step ahead of the Communists’.⁶

      The boat, Dómine, reached