Word: franco
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...sporting life, which offered Franco virtually his only escape from official routine, was abandoned in recent years for the regal pleasures of a cloistered castle existence: liveried servants, Moorish guards on white stallions, walls covered with Goya tapestries-and obsequiousness everywhere. Foreign ambassadors who were granted audiences with the Caudillo had a precise protocol of steps and bows. In addition to his love of pomp, Franco was a man of rigid decorum, methodical habit and deep Christian piety; his orderly days included regular attendance at Mass and midnight recitation of the rosary with his wife, the former Carmen Polo...
Though he was a legend to his people, Franco was never close to them. The son of a naval paymaster, he was born in Galicia on the Atlantic coast. Franco entered the Academia de Infanteria at Toledo in 1907 at the age of 15. During the Spanish campaign against the Riffs of Morocco between 1912 and 1926 he gained a reputation for unflinching physical courage. A three-time winner of the Medal of Military Merit, Franco was promoted to Spain's youngest captain at 22, major at 23, colonel at 32, and, at 33, he became the youngest general...
...Franco, as recent generations of Spaniards have been allowed to forget, was not a rebel leader before the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. Although he was King Alfonso's favorite general, Franco remained cautiously on the sidelines when the monarchy, abolished in a democratic election in 1931, was replaced by a reformist Republican government whose moderate policies were opposed by extremists of both right and left. He refused to take part in several abortive, ill-planned military revolts against the Republicans, and in 1934 crushed an anti-Republican uprising of Asturian miners so mercilessly that he earned...
...Soviet Union backed the Popular Front government, as did Communists everywhere. But the vastly greater weight of German and Italian arms, coupled with the decision by the Russians and Germans to seek a nonaggression pact, which dried up Soviet support for the Republicans, eventually gave the victory to Franco's forces...
Spain's Civil War was not only a testing ground for arms but also for ideals. Volunteers poured in from around the world-including 3,100 Americans who joined the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and other units-to fight on the Republican side against Franco. They believed that a Republican victory in the Spanish Civil War was the only way to stop the spread of fascism. Nearly half of the American volunteers died in Spain...