Spain and Anti-Spain

The thesis of Arthur Whitaker’s Spain and the Defense of the West (Harper, $6.00) is that Spain, because of certain mistaken or sinful American policies, has become and will continue to be a “political liability” for the United States; that we must “dissociate” ourselves from the Franco dictatorship, alike in the eyes of the world and in the eyes of the Spanish people, by reversing those policies. We must cease to do things that confer international political “respectability” on the Franco regime, and begin to use the leverage of our economic aid program in behalf of Spanish policy reforms in the direction of “freedom,” “social justice,” and the kind of “institutionalization” that would remove or at least lessen the present intolerable uncertainty as to Spain’s political future, and hence as to the security of our Spanish bases. The book further argues that continuation of present American policies (e.g., trying to get Spain into NATO and scheduling visits by American Presidents to Madrid, and other acts that strengthen Franco’s hand domestically) is incompatible with our role as leader of the free world in its struggle against Communism, and violates our deepest ethical commitments.

Whitaker argues both that a girl like the United States is known by the company she keeps, and that a nice girl like the United States ought, calculations of good repute entirely to one side, to want to keep good company. Good policy, the author holds, is policy directed at good ethical purpose, let the chips fall where they may. Spain and the Spanish people—with love and affection for whom the book fairly drips—rightly expect that kind of policy from us, and we must not let them down.

LL

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Lev Ladnek

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The thesis of Arthur Whitaker’s Spain and the Defense of the West (Harper, $6.00) is that Spain, because of certain mistaken or sinful American policies, has become and will continue to be a “political liability” for the United States; that we must “dissociate” ourselves from the Franco dictatorship, alike in the eyes of the world and in the eyes of the Spanish people, by reversing those policies. We must cease to do things that confer international political “respectability” on the Franco regime, and begin to use the leverage of our economic aid program in behalf of Spanish policy reforms in the direction of “freedom,” “social justice,” and the kind of “institutionalization” that would remove or at least lessen the present intolerable uncertainty as to Spain’s political future, and hence as to the security of our Spanish bases. The book further argues that continuation of present American policies (e.g., trying to get Spain into NATO and scheduling visits by American Presidents to Madrid, and other acts that strengthen Franco’s hand domestically) is incompatible with our role as leader of the free world in its struggle against Communism, and violates our deepest ethical commitments.

Whitaker argues both that a girl like the United States is known by the company she keeps, and that a nice girl like the United States ought, calculations of good repute entirely to one side, to want to keep good company. Good policy, the author holds, is policy directed at good ethical purpose, let the chips fall where they may. Spain and the Spanish people—with love and affection for whom the book fairly drips—rightly expect that kind of policy from us, and we must not let them down.