Spain reopens old wound. A dispute over man who fought for Hitler
International Herald Tribune - October 13, 2004

http://www.iht.com/articles/543320.htm

Renwick McLean/IHT IHT

MADRID A Spaniard who fought for Hitler during World War II was honored Tuesday during Spain's annual celebration of its armed forces, drawing complaints from liberals and offering a reminder that the ideological tensions that split the country during its civil war remain fresh nearly 70 years later.

The solider, Angel Salamanca, fought for Franco during the civil war from 1936 to 1939 and then was sent to fight for the Germans against the Soviet Union.

The Spanish defense minister, José Bono, said that Salamanca was invited as a gesture of reconciliation and that the parade was meant to honor all Spaniards who fought for the principles they believed in.

But political leaders o­n the left said the decision was an insult to those who opposed the fascism of Franco and Hitler.

"The government is making a big mistake," said Gaspar Llamazares, the leader of a coalition of leftist parties. "There is no room for reconciliation based o­n putting Spanish Republicans o­n the same level with those who fought in the name of Nazism."

After learning of Salamanca's invitation, several liberal politicians, including Llamazares, said that they would not attend the parade.

The tension over the march is just the latest example of a gradual movement in Spain toward facing some lingering issues that were put aside, but not resolved, after Franco's death in 1975, when the country began making the transition to democracy. The priority then, historians say, was to go beyond the differences that had divided the country since the civil war in order to establish a unified nation. The two sides agreed to get o­n with establishing democratic institutions.

But with political stability achieved, attention has recently turned to coming to grips with the past.

One expression of this movement is a group called the Association for the Recovery of Our Historical Memory, which has been pushing the government for years to help dig up and identify victims who were killed by Franco's forces and dumped into mass graves.

The group also accused former Prime Minister José Maria Aznar of doing more to recognize the service of soldiers who had fought for Hitler than to help recover the remains of those killed in the civil war.

But the group has generated a bit of a backlash, with conservatives accusing it of a double standard for ignoring the stories of Spaniards loyal to Franco who were killed by his opponents.

The dispute over Tuesday's parade brought the tensions between these two sides into the open. Newspaper editorials over the past several days have been full of talk about a return to "the two Spains," a reference to the ideological split that led Spaniards who had opposed each other in the civil war to carry their differences over to the battlefields of World War II. Despite sending some troops to support Hitler, Franco did not explicitly commit his country to either side during the war, and in 1943, o­nce the tide had turned in favor of the Allies, he declared that Spain was neutral.

Defenders of the decision to honor a man who fought for Hitler said that it was o­nly fair to invite him since the government had also invited an opponent of Franco who went to France to fight for its liberation from the Nazis.

That man was Luis Royo, who went to France in 1943 after fighting for Republican forces in Spain against Franco.

Bono, the defense minister, said inviting both would help bring the country together, and he accused his critics of blowing the whole issue out of proportion.

"This is not about doing cultural relativism, or pardoning Hitler or Stalin or any of the genocides that have occurred in the world," he told SER, a Spanish radio network.

"This country is strong enough for generosity and harmony, and it can handle discord."

The parade drew thousands of spectators, many carrying the Spanish flag, an uncommon sight in everyday life in Spain. About 3,500 military men and women passed before the crowds, many waving their arms vigorously in a synchronized march.

About 300 tanks and armored vehicles drove by, while nearly 100 aircraft few overhead.

International Herald Tribune