The proletarian, educational, and farcical sensibility of editorial cartoons and graphic art in the New York’s periodical España Libre invited readers to decode Fascist Spain’s news, which was often ignored in mainstream media.
Aragonés’s cartoons documented the pillars of Fascist Spain: the unique leader, autarky, censorship, Falange, imperial rhetoric, National Catholicism, oligarchy, and the militarized violence and repression of civilians. The ever-present Francoist slogan, España: Una, Grande y Libre (Spain: One, Great and Free) summarized the myth of military, Catholic, and totalitarian españolidad, free of subversives.
The myth of regenerative death as redemption and the veneration of a charismatic leader were common patterns in European and transnational fascist movements. The Spanish regime’s propaganda portrayed Franco as a charismatic, bold leader who saved Spain from leftist radicalism. In The Great Manipulator, Paul Preston shows how Franco consistently rewrote his life story, either directly in his speeches and articles or indirectly via interviews with journalists or in conversations with his official biographers. Franco created an exaggerated image of his achievements, which grew ever more disproportionate once he had a propaganda apparatus at his disposal. His delight in being compared to the mythical warrior heroes and the real empire builders in Spanish history – above all El Cid, Carlos V, or Felipe II – was derived, in part, from reading his own press (Preston 2013). Accordingly, Franco’s image as a military commander, El Generalissimo or Caudillo, permeated Spanish public spaces with grandiose monuments and portraits. The regime’s control of the press and its ubiquitous propaganda, termed NODO (Noticiario y Documentales/ News and Documentaries), infused cinemas and television with praise for Franco and his Movimiento. On such public occasions, people were expected to do the Spanish fascist salute, an imitation of the Nazi salute, even when simply going to watch a film in a cinema. Spanish fascists believed in the unity, uniqueness, and perfection of the Spanish state (Payne 1999)
Unique Leader Franco is behind a puppet theatre and has discarded several puppets that represent Ministers. He is thinking about which new puppets to use for his show. He is wearing a military uniform and a swastika. The caption says "Change of Secretaries." Franco está detrás de un teatro de títeres y ha descartado unos cuantos muñecos. Está pensado cuáles escoger para el espectáculo. Viste un uniforme militar y una esvástica.
Tumor A man whose head resembles the globe is sitting at a desk. The globe shows the map of Spain as a painful part of his head. A speech bubble says, "I hope my 1936 head tumor heals in 1963." Un hombre está sentado en un pupitre. Su cabeza es el globo terráqueo. En el globo se ve el mapa de España como una parte dolorosa de su cabeza.
Dorian Gray Francisco Franco, drawn as an old man and self-proclaimed King of Spain, looks at his reflection in his portrait. He sees a young lieutenant who is burning in hell. Francisco Franco, dibujado como un hombre viejo y que se ha proclamado Rey de España, mira un cuadro suyo. Ve un joven teniente quemándose en el infierno.
Fraga Iribarne
Manuel Fraga Iribarne is sitting on the lap of Franco as if he were the puppet of a Franco ventriloquist. The show is called "Secretary for Information."
Manuel Fraga Iribarne está sentado en la falda de Franco como si fuera el muñeco de un Franco ventrilocuo. El espectáculo se llama " Ministro de Información."
Fascist Violence Fascists romanticized violence and death as cleansing agents that would overthrow a corrupt democracy and bring instead a national fascist rebirth. La España de Franco In a Spanish prison, effeminate Civil Guards are shaving political prisoners' hair, and torturing and killing them. An imprisoned woman with a child implores a Civil Guard to stop. The caption reads "The Franco's Spain that tourists do not see. What intellectuals are exposing." En una prisión española, unos guardias civiles efeminados afeitan el pelo de los prisioneros políticos, los torturan y los asesinan. Una mujer embarazada implora a un guardia.
25 años The focal point of the cartoon is the number twenty-five. Franco is sitting on the number that signifies the longevity of his rule. His body posture is one of satisfaction and triumph. Nevertheless, Aragonés covers the number with banners and drawings that refer to political persecution, intolerance, calumny, lies, the rise of the black market, torture, corruption, hate, misery, bribery, hunger, murder, prison, skulls, swastikas, Civil Guards executing common people, and body parts scattered in mass graves, money bags, the devil, the military police, snakes, flies, spiders, and excrements.
Entre bastidores Two Civil Guards pose for tourists while they are propping up a theatrical backdrop that includes flamenco dances, a bullfighter, and picturesque white stucco houses. The backdrop hides other Civil Guards hitting demonstrators who are asking for freedom for political prisoners, trade union freedom, and civil rights. Libertad sindical Workers are demonstrating in Spain for their rights which gets them in prison in comparison to the rest of the world where workers, the government, and employers work together to protect workers' rights.
Justicia Francisco Franco moves "Justice" as if it were a puppet. Autarky Hunger was an effective way of repression that the Franco regime employed. Wanting to emulate Fascist Italy, Franco's Spain “massively intervened in the economy, regulating both trade and the supply system. It also manipulated markets, imposed import substitution, and forced industrialization.” (Cazorla Sánchez 2010) Although there was enough food to feed the population, much of it was diverted to the black market, leaving too little to be rationed.[i] Cazorla Sánchez attributes this disaster to the “corruption, racial and class prejudice, and economic ignorance” that characterized the regime (Cazorla Sánchez 2010). The results were poverty and starvation, which caused great suffering and limited the population’s resistance to terror. Alemania Old and smiling Francisco Franco says goodbye to a Spaniard emigrating to Germany. In doing so, the medals on his jacket fall to the floor, symbolizing his disgrace as a statesman. Franco thinks "More Foreign currency." Franco holds a thin, poor, and sad woman by the hand. Spain is written in her dress. She thinks "Less workforce." Turismo There are two machines in a factory. The old machine is full of spiderwebs and has these names written in the pipes: commerce, agriculture, industry, and cattle industry. The new machine has pipes with the names tourism, foreign currency by emigrated workers. Money bills fall from the machine to Franco's hands. He gives the money to a priest, a military man, and a civil guard. The caption reads "It falls in their hands like rain of gold." El Milagro económico Franco is making a house of cards. The image is an idiomatic pun to the title of the cartoon.
National Catholicism Spanish fascists believed in the uniqueness of Catholic Spain, otherwise known as “National Catholicism.” According to this ideology, Franco was Caudillo by the grace of God. During the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), Catholicism played a crucial role in the popular mobilization of Franco supporters (Del Arco Blanco 2018). Once in power, Franco ordained Catholicism the only tolerated religion of the nation, causing it to become intertwined with Spanish fascism. In contrast to what occurred in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, the Francoist regime turned Catholic symbols and liturgy into essential means of shaping the political culture. The Vatican did not address the violence against dissenters and this lack of intervention only prolonged the state terror in Franco’s Spain.
El gran fariseo. The Great Hypocrite. In Aragonés’ cartoon, Franco is crying over the death of Pope John XXIII. The Generalissimo is resting on a pile of skulls and bones. In the pile of bones, Aragonés places banners with the names of those who died defending democracy during the Spanish Civil War and its exile, and those who were brutally assassinated under Franco’s rule, including Socialist politicians Julián Besteiro and Francisco Largo Caballero, Catalan President Lluís Companys i Jover, Communist politician Julián Grimau, Poet Miguel Moreno Barranco, anarchist Joan Peiró, and SHC member Luís Zugadi Garmendia. The caption reads “El gran fariseo” (The Great Hypocrite). The cartoon discloses the General’s hypocritical Catholic devotion that makes him cry over the death of the Pope while he ruthlessly executes dissenters. The funeral banners continue to hold subversive power because thousands of Franco's victims have not been properly buried because their bodies were disposed of in mass graves. Siameses. Two catholic priests look alike as if they were Siamese twins. One is shaking hands with Francisco Franco and the other with a Spanish worker.
América del Sur Imperial Spain Before the Spanish Civil War, Latin América was already part of the colonial imagery of Spanish fascists, and during the Franco dictatorship, the Consejo de Hispanidad promoted a new totalitarian order in the area through professional associations (Brydan 2019). Franco’s imperial concept of Hispanism proclaimed the universal task of assimilating the former colonies for the defense of Catholicism and the fascist Movimiento (Gallego 2017). The Spanish fascist identity was, in this respect, inseparable from the imperial one. Not only in Latin America but also in the United States, Franco’s agents promoted a Fascist’s and imperial Spain (Chase 1943; Espasa 2017). For example, this Aragonés’s cartoon “América del Sur” illustrates an article of Miguel R. Ruiz about a recent announcement given by Jaime de alba, Spanish Ambassador to Brazil, about providing Latino America with $2,000M credits over 10 years for development programs via the diplomatic offices, businesses, and the Inter-American Development Bank.
Prensa española Censorship The Law of the Press (1938) gave all control of censorship of the press and denied any publication of civil rights infringements, and the press became a mere apparatus of propaganda (Sinova 1989; Diego González 2017). The regime also controlled the publications for children and indoctrinated future generations (Fernández Sarasola, Ignacio 2017). Even during the last years of the dictatorship, the law was against any literary works that intended to “destroy or relax the national feeling ... attack the unity of the Spanish Nation or promote or disseminate separatist activities [and] carry out or project an attack against the security of the State" (Boletín oficial del estado, 5887).
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