Modern democratic Spain has an uneasy relationship with Franco, its former dictator. No monuments seem to have been built. Where I am now, the pilgrimage town of Carrión de los Condes, the marble Plaza sign that had honoured him as been painted over but the name still leaches though.
I read an anecdote about him that dated from his service commanding the Spanish foreign legion in Morroco before the coupe d'etat and civil war.
It is said that a soldier threw a bowl of soup in his face protesting the quality of the rations. Franco said nothing, wiped his face and continued his inspection. Afterwards he investigated the claim. The soldier had been right and so he arranged for the food to be improved. And he had the soldier shot for insubordination.
While Spain suffered under Franco, he bought them peace. He did not immediately send his troops to invade France from the south as Hitler and Mussolini had gone on their fateful rampage across Europe. When he did, it was a volunteer unit to the Eastern Front against the Communists. He did not irritate the UK or the USA. and so had bets both ways on the outcome. Until his death, Spain gradually improved, building a modern post colonial economy within its own borders.
Perhaps, like El Cid, the myth has yet to be written.
Posted from Lee Shipley's phone
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