The Spanish Civil War: One enemy but no friends.

The Spanish Civil war was one of the bloodiest and most brutal conflicts of the 20th century. It is often untalked about or even unknown, but Spain was the first battleground in which Fascism and the Rest fought out for victory. It started when Franco wanted to reimpose the monarchy with a coup d'etat. The 2nd Spanish Republic was trying to lift Spain out of the feudal system it was still in. Only three regions had been industrialized: the Basque Country, Catalonia and Madrid. The rest of Spain was still agricultural and some parts, still remote. The Republic was in charge of introducing democracy into the country and of passing laws for agricultural reforms. However, because parliamentary democracy is a slow process and the country's peasants and workers had been organized by Anarchists and Socialists in unions or not, within weeks the country was paralysed by strikes and demonstrations. Very soon the Republic was forced to bring in the military, to maintain its power over the people, who were increasingly growing restless. The traditional centres of power: clergy, nobility and military and those close to them saw that the Republic could not control the situation and in 1936 organized a 'secret' coup d'etat. I say 'secret' because the Anarchists in the CNT-FAI (Anarchist Union) had discovered it through their espionage apparatus. So, in part, we could say that the Spanish Republic took part in the coup, as it did nothing to stop it; it ignored the information the Aarchists gave them. The Socialists and Anarchists practically controlled the factories and the fields. So when the military rised in every city in the country two days before the planned time, the resistance replied defeating half of them and giving out the weapons to the citizens. In the Spanish Civil War we can see how amazing workers unity can be and also how sectarian it can become. First of all, they took over half of the military forts of the country and then, when the power of the Republic had dissapeared, collectivised the land. Factories continued to run and communities continued to work, but without the elite in charge. But secondly, the many groups that formed part of the resistance: The International brigade and forces, Catalan and Basque nationalists, trotskyists, stalinists, anarchists and progressive capitalists were the key to the downfall of the movement. There was no cohesion amongst them. There was one common enemy, but the resistance would not fight in unity against it. In the backlines political skirmishes were constant. Barcelona had become the scene of "the civil war in the civil war". Its streets were a battleground amongst all of the resistance factions, even though the enemy was closing in 300 km to the west.
In the end the Republic collapsed and Franco won. 39 years of a fascist dictatorship followed, which caused many people to exile and at the end of the day a lot of suffering.

This lack of cohesion is still apparent in the revolutionary left. We may all have our differences and the way we reach our goals may be different, but it pays to create ties and help eachother every now and then, for specific long or short-term campaigns. The ISO may be trotskyist, Worker's Party Maoist and Beyond Resistance, Anarchist; but we all want to improve worker's rights. We all know that the parliamentary parties will not give us workers any improvements, so we should earn them ourselves, united. This doesn't mean we have to accept every opinion of the other groups, just that we have to remain united for the sake of the workers. This won't dilute our politics, it can only strengthen them. Through debates, arguments and demonstrations.

YFTR.