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THE commemoration a fortnight ago of the 50th anniversary of Francisco Franco’s demise served as a reminder that the fascist dictatorship established in Spain in the late 1930s had endured until 1975.
That was 30 years after the end of World War II, in which Spain had technically not participated, although both Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany had openly lent their support to the generals who sparked the Spanish civil war in 1936, in an effort to thwart an incipient democracy. None of the so-called Western democracies came to the Spanish republic’s aid, although plenty of individuals joined the international brigades striving to thwart the onslaught. American volunteers in the Lincoln Brigade were often tagged as ‘premature anti-fascists’ by the US authorities.
That attitude echoes the appropriation of Antifa as a slur under the Trump administration. Spain’s tragedy, meanwhile, is that its transition from a dictatorship to a democracy missed out on a necessary reckoning with its past. That might initially have been prudent, given the risk of a fresh military coup under Franco’s chosen successor as head of state, Prince Juan Carlos. Despite his fondness for Franco, the subsequent king leaned towards a constitutional monarchy whereby democratic rule was revived, and state institutions and social regulations gravitated towards broader European norms.
Yet, 50 years later, Spain continues to grapple with the ghosts of an era that apparently appeals to at least a fifth of its younger citizens — perhaps a shortcoming of its education system. But the political set-up too has been struggling with a past that conservative governments would rather ignore, while their supposedly socialist counterparts wish to go further but only if their endeavours don’t rock the boat too much.
The degree to which the West normalised the Franco regime is evident in US president Gerald Ford’s 1975 visit to Madrid in an effort to shore up the future of American bases, well before Spain joined Nato or the EU. This came after the Ford administration failed to prevent the liberation of Saigon by Vietnamese forces, not long after the more alarming capture of Phnom Penh by the Khmer Rouge.
Spain isn’t alone in grappling with its ghosts.
The other significant events in 1975 included Margaret Thatcher’s ascent to the Tory leadership in Britain, the liberation of Portugal’s African colonies Angola and Mozambique; assassination attempts against Ford; the dismissal of Gough Whitlam’s transformative Labour government by Australia’s UK/ US-backed governor-general John Kerr; and the brutal Western-backed invasion of East Timor by Indonesia shortly after its liberation from Portugal. It was also the year that a couple of American nerds set up a company initially called Micro-Soft.
Among the deadliest events of the year, though, was the inception of Operation Condor, a CIA-coordinated effort by the military regimes of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay and Uruguay to eliminate their left-wing opponents. It is perhaps no coincidence that the German Wehrmacht unit that aided Franco’s crusade against democracy 40 years earlier was known as Legion Condor.
All those countries, alongside Spain, continue to grapple with the ghosts that have haunted the transitions to democracy. Much the same could be said about Pakistan, which is still struggling, not very successfully, to transcend the horrendous Ziaul Haq era.
Perhaps there’s nothing special about 1975, given that almost every year in any era yields several crucial events. Looking back another 50 years, for instance, offers another bunch of memorable instances. They include the births of Thatcher and dogged rival Tony Benn, to those of Malcolm X and Pol Pot on the same day in May. Congolese leader Patrice Lumumba and West Indian liberation philosopher Frantz Fanon were born within weeks of each other in 1925. It was also the year that Benito Mussolini effectively outed himself as a fascist dictator. To some extent, Franco and Adolf Hitler followed in his footsteps.
Pakistan, not surprisingly, is among the many nations that constantly struggle with memory and forgetfulness. The Zia period may not be entirely beyond the bounds of reasoned discourse, but calling it out as a sustained atrocity that undermined the nation for decades to come is tougher terrain. What’s more, recognising the horrors of 1971 remains a tricky task, let alone abuses in Balochistan over decades.
Acknowledging the crimes and inadequacies of the past is essential for national rehabilitation, from Spain to South Africa and Pakistan to Paraguay. But that doesn’t necessarily prevent political actors from seeking to relive historical follies, with the support of those who are oblivious to the damage inflicted. Hardly any nation nowadays is keen to peer into the past — which only makes them all the more likely to repeat it.
Published in Dawn, December 3rd, 2025
