Franco brought stability to Spain

Dear Sir, DR. Smith (letters, Thursday) has chosen to answer my reply to his original letter, which thankfully was much shorter. I will try to be brief in my riposte. He says that I agree with the proposition that military governments can take over if they don't like their policies. This simplistic statement can be answered thus: The whole history of Spanish goverments from 1931 to 1936 was as I pointed out a series of different governments both left and right that nearly all produced strikes,riots, and later threats of insurrection. In 1934 one such took place in Asturias where a coup d'etat against a centrist elected administration by Socialists and Anarchists, resulted in its suppression by the Army under Franco. At the same time in Catalonia, Luis Companys roclaimed “A Free And Independent Republic”. Rebels also tried to seize government offices in Madrid. I could go on. The fomented unrest led to martial law being imposed in Barcelona etc.etc. It may interest Dr. Smith to learn that in the period I quoted, no fewer than six administrations, all stop–gap failed to quell the troubles. The last PSOE government was elected in 1936 by a very narrow majority, which led to increased violence, political assassinations and the like. This Dr. Smith, is why I do NOT denounce General Franco for his intervention. And equivocate as you may Dr. Smith, the net result was, after teething troubles, a stable Democracy and a King, far from being as you suggest, A Dictator King,( a ludicrous assertion) as we saw in the later failed military rebellion (1984) when King Juan Carlos acted in the true principles of a Parliamentary Monarchy. Phil Green, Nova Santa Ponsa. l POOR America, they just can't win. When they get involved where there is oil, as in Iraq, they are thinking only of the that oil. When their government spends money in a way which might be regarded as electorally popular, then its just vote–buying. Now Graham Philips criticises the USA for spending money which to him appears to bring it no apparent benefit. Perhaps the idea of having principles and moral standards and acting without benefit because it's the right thing to do is alien to him. Israel is a democracy, whose people have human rights, surrounded by aggressive religious dictatorships. Last week brought a documentary about the recent hanging by crane of a 16 year old girl in Iran, personally, by a vindictive “judge.” A 13 year old girl and several others await the same fate. Perhaps America regards the whole set up in this savage part of the world as so offencive to humanity that any glimmer of democracy is worth supporting. Like every other country, the Yanks do not always get it right, but at least their hearts are in the right place. After all, how many innocent German women and children did Britain kill with bombs in WW2?