Word: caudillo
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...quarter of a century since the war Spain's ruler has been the stocky, mustached Francisco Franco Bahamonde, Caudillo, Jefe del Estado, Prime Minister, Generalissimo of the Armed Forces, Regent of the Kingdom, and President of the Falange. Franco inaugurated a year of memorial celebrations--"Twenty-Five Years of Peace"--earlier this month with a service at the Holy Cross Basilica, a multi-million dollar monument to the war dead. The service will be followed by a year-long continuum of fairs, parades, dances, and patriotic exhibitions. "As tragic as were the dead," commented the government's Director-General...
...Generalissimo can make law by publishing any order in the government gazette, the Boletin Oficial del Estado. The cabinet plays a more important role in the business of state but it, too, is subject to Franco's whim. At its bi-weekly meetings Franco presides benevolently. "The Caudillo patiently listens," writes a junior minister, "while government members argue at length with one another. He talks little himself but makes all the big decisions--alone." Similarly, ministers are awarded portfolios or replaced altogether by a simple letter from Franco. The government of the nation...
...rally several weeks ago, the Generalissimo announced without fanfare that he would continue to rule "as long as the Lord gives me strength. Many of the powers which are now mine are, because of their very nature, non-transferable." But twenty-five years after his victory the Caudillo is a weathered seventy-one. A hunting accident suffered several years ago brought the succession question to the front of everybody's mind. Since a 1947 plebescite--the only one during his reign--Franco has had the right to name an heir at any time. Yet, to date he has done nothing...
Spain's bid for associate membership in the Common Market was at stake, and el Caudillo was willing to relax his autocratic grip a bit in order to convince the Eurocrats of his sincerity. Last week in Brussels, on the eve of the 25th-anniversary celebration of Franco's Civil War victory, Spain's two-year-old application finally got a hearing...
Delaying a formal decision until mid-April, the Six left open the possibility of further discussions with Spain over its economic future. That just about gave Spain a toe hold. But Common Market membership appears impossible as long as Franco rules. El Caudillo's economic brain-trusters would be glad enough to settle for mere trade agreements at present, but their problem now is to keep Franco encouraged despite the slap in Brussels...