The Democrats
The democratic opposition is of its very nature much less monolithic than the Communists, but it has at last formed a united front and constituted a Central Committee. This is composed of the fol- lowing groups, all illegal : the Christian Demo- crats, the Unicin Espanola, the Accion Demo- cratica, the UGT (the Socialist Trade Union), the CNT (the Anarchist Trade Union), and the Agrupacion Socialista Universitaria.
The Christian Democrats are led by Gil Robles and Jimenez Fernandez. Gil Robles was the Right wing's leader under the republic, and Jimenez Fernandez was for a time Minister of Agriculture in the Right-wing republican government. The Christian Democrats are a Catholic group, who believe that the Church should keep out of politics for its own good. Their views, indeed, on the Church and politics are similar to those of the younger priests outlined earlier. They aim to be a party like the Christian Democrats in Germany and Italy and the MRP in France, and repudiate any intention of being confessional in the historic sense of the word. In a democratic Spain the Christian Democrats would be on the right centre. Gil Robles himself has moved leftwards since the Thirties.
The Union Espanola is chiefly composed of enlightened businessmen and is led by Joaquin Satrustegui, a Basque businessman, and Tierno Galvan, a professor. at Salamanca University. At a meeting at Madrid earlier this year Satrustegui and Tierno publicly criticised the regime and were heavily fined. Tierno has been to prison for his views. The Union Espanola is fervently mon- archist and its most firmly held tenet is that the monarchist solution is the only one for Spain. In a democratic Spain many of its members would join the Christian Democrats; others would form a conservative party to the right of that group.
Dionisio Ridruejo is the leader of the Accion Democratica. A former Falangist, Ridruejo has been arrested twice for expressing what may roughly be described as liberal or Right-wing labour views. The Accion Democrzitica is a liberal, social democratic body and can expect to gain most of its followers from the four million or so people in Spain who are employed in services, administration, etc. It will be in the centre, to the left of the Christian Democrats and to the right of the Socialists.
The ASU was formed after the Madrid Univer- sity demonstrations in 1956 and is composed of young men of Left-wing Socialist opinions. The police are inclined to be particularly nasty to the Socialists they arrest, so only Vicente Girbau and Juan Kindelan, who are both safely abroad, can be named. For the same reason the leaders of the UGT and CNT in Spain must remain anonymous; though two Socialist leaders, Antonio Amat Mali and Luis Martin Santos, the first a lawyer and the second a doctor, can be mentioned since they are both already in prison.
In Barcelona there are similar groups: the Union Democratica de Catalunya, who are Christian Democrats, the Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya, which used to be the majority party in Catalonia and is Left-wing but non-Marxist, the Moviment Socialista de Catalunya, the Catalan equivalent of the ASU, and the Nacional- istas, the Catalan Nationalist Party. Here again, because of Franco's fear and hatred of Catalonia and Catalans it is better not to mention names.
All these, together with the important PSOE, the main Socialist party with headquarters in Toulouse which will be discussed later, form the united democratic opposition to the General- issimo. What are they united on? They are united first on the need to get rid of Franco and to end his debauchery of Spain with all possible speed. Whereas émigrés will argue late into the night about the exact legal form which should follow the exit of the Caudillo and the precise terms upon which they are prepared to co-operate with other groups, the opposition of the interior, who have to live under him, are impatient of such niceties. They realise that the poison must be expelled before arguments begin as to how the cure should be celebrated. Secondly, they are united in the belief that Franco should be succeeded by a democratic and constitutional monarchy.
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