"There Must Be Clarity"

The U.S. State Department spelled out the reasons last week why UNO could not admit Franco Spain. Fifteen documents recovered from Axis secret diplomatic files proved that Francisco Franco had been an even closer ally of Hitler than the world had supposed.

Fascist Bargains. On Aug. 15, 1940, Franco wrote Benito Mussolini: "Since the beginning of the present conflict it has been our intention to make the greatest efforts in our preparations in order to enter the foreign war at a favorable opportunity. . . ."

A little more than a month later he addressed a long letter to Hitler begging for guns. Said he: "The first act in our attack must consist in the occupation of Gibraltar. For our part we have been preparing the operation in secret for a long time. . . . My unchangeable and sincere adherence to you personally, to the German people, and to the cause for which you fight. I hope, in defense of this cause, to be able to renew the old bonds of comradeship between our armies."

Dr. Eberhard von Stohrer, German ambassador at Madrid, reported that Franco's price was Gibraltar, French Morocco and the Oran section of Algeria, plus military and economic assistance.

Hitler grumbled to the Italian Foreign Minister, Count Galeazzo Ciano, that the Spanish terms were high, and that whenever during the Civil War he asked for repayment from the Spaniards for his help they promptly transferred the conversation to high, idealistic grounds. He growled: "As a German one feels toward the Spanish almost like a Jew who wants to make business out of the holiest possessions of mankind."

Spain, argued the Fuehrer then and in later letters, must come in without conditions. Wrote he: "For about one thing, Caudillo, there must be a clarity: we are at this time fighting a battle of life and death and cannot at this time make any gifts." Franco drew himself up, replied: "I stand ready at your side, entirely and decidedly at your disposal, united in a common historical destiny, desertion from which would mean my suicide and that of the cause which I have led and represent in Spain."

Democracy's Dilemma. The evidence was strong but it merely served to prove what everybody knew: that Franco was an Axis stooge. Spaniards, sick of civil war, were not going to rise against him because of the U.S. disclosures. The question was: what were the Allied governments going to do about it? France, Britain and the U.S. issued a note expressing hope that "patriotic and liberal-minded Spaniards" may soon find the means to bring about "a peaceful withdrawal of Franco, the abolition of Falange, the establishment of an interim or caretaker government. . . ." Beyond that, there was only a vague threat to sever diplomatic relations, a promise that "there is no intention of interfering in the internal affairs of Spain."

For the fact was that the western democracies, anxious to increase their own influence in western Europe and reduce Russia's, did not quite know what to do. Franco was betting his political life that Allied confusion would win out over Allied wishes for his downfall. By executing a Spanish Communist hero of the French resistance, Cristino Garcia Granda, he forced a crisis with France in which he calculated that the U.S. and Britain would not give the French full support. Amid widespread demonstrations against the Spanish leader, France closed the border; but there were no signs that Britain and the U.S. would break off trade relations.

Franco counted on his ability to outbluff the democracies until the rivalry between Russia and the West rose to a pitch where he appeared as an ally of Britain and the U.S. He posed a tough dilemma for the democracies--and one not confined to Spain. Discussing Europe generally last week. Columnist Walter Lippmann sadly observed: "It is the weakness of our position in the contest with Communism that we find in bed with us, pretending to be democratic, factions and forces representing views as incompatible with our own as are the views of the Communists."

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