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«That of the two Spain is a myth invented by sectarians, those of one extreme and the other. There were no two Spanish. If there were four Spain: one revolutionary, another counterrevolutionary, one liberal and another trying to survive . Fernando del Rey Reguillo, Professor of the History of Thought and Social and Political Movements at the Complutense University, explains this in line with his new book, Red Back . Violence and Revolution in the Spanish Civil War (Gutenberg Galaxy), a study of violence in Republican territory during the first months of the war .

That is: a delicate issue that has often been narrated with rather crude political biases. However, King Reguillo is not next to those sectarians, "neither of the Manicheans, nor of those that simplify." The author, on the other hand, offers his "empathy" and his intellectual understanding to victims and perpetrators and also rescues many stories of compassion and nobility.

"There are many individual cases of authorities who do to stop killing, to save people ...". Like in the movies when the prisoner's mother goes to see a general to save his son? "Exactly. That existed on both sides and not exceptionally ... Also in the postwar period there are many right-wing people who testify in favor of their left-wing neighbors and risk a lot ... But I find the cases of collective nobility more interesting. There are small towns in which it is the community that closes on itself and protects neighbors at risk. They are moving stories ».

Red Back. Violence and Revolution in the Spanish Civil War is not done either to compare large numbers: so many thousands executed in one side, so many thousands in the other. On the contrary, its strategy is based on choosing a small and not very populated territory (the province of Ciudad Real) and reconstructing the small history of each shooting. Who shot? Who died? Did they have any relationship? Under what circumstances did the murder occur? «Ciudad Real is a curious case. There was no real uprising that fueled reprisals as in Madrid. There was, at best, some slight rebel conato. However, there were serious cases of repression ».

Ciudad Real was also a province with a majority of conservative voters and many small landowners. The implantation of Falange was small. What happened then? Rey Reguillo's theory is that this violence was a more complex reality than any of the explanations that are usually handled. It was not the party of a gang of psychopaths involved in labor leaders, nor was it an act of fair defense of the poor against the rich. "Although cruel people always exist and there is an element of class struggle."

King Reguillo includes more factors : the political rage that leads to settle accounts opened in 1932. Or the cultural wars (to use a current concept) that explains the violence directed against the regular clergy. «Why do they kill monks? They are not like the priests of the towns that were in the fight .. I see that there enters an old anticlerical culture. The Church was the enemy ».

Enemy is an important word in this book. King Reguillo explains that violence has to do with a climate of extreme polarization throughout Europe, with a time when the other was the enemy. "For the anarchists, for example, everyone on their right was fascist."

Another important word that has not yet appeared: Republic. «The Republic does not have much to do with this. The Republic does not decide the repression. Only Largo Caballero and two of his ministers can be criticized for their inaction, but their priority was to defend Madrid.

So, at the service of what ran that blood? Of the revolution. The revolution that occupied municipalities and collectivized the means of production in a few hours.

A test: the repression against rightists and religious in Ciudad Real did not begin on July 18, but a few days later, when the civil guards went to defend Madrid. The State disappeared from the province, the militiamen were left with the privilege of violence and the shootings began. And an example: the Civil Governor ordered 40 right-wing prisoners in a town to be protected in the province to protect them . Unfortunately, a convoy of militiamen stopped the train a kilometer from the city, took out the inmates and shot them.

During the first weeks there was what Rey Reguillo called "hot violence", emotional and uncontrolled. Then he went to the stage of "cold violence", more orderly. And then, when he arrived in 1937, the violence ceased, "because Franco's propaganda used the violence of the rearguard abroad and harmed the image of the Republic ».

We just need to remember the dead. Many Falangists, a majority of conservatives not radicalized. «And many liberals too ... I found a town that had 70 dead. When Franco offered to take his remains to the Valley of the Fallen, only four accepted ».

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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