The Franco dictatorship was faced with a threat not only foreign, but in this case of global scope.
A body had been created that for the first time was ratified by a large-scale global consensus. It was the UNO (United Nations Organization), which here did not take long to acquire the obligatory Spanishized version: the UNO.
The founding ceremony was held in San Francisco in 1945.
In 1946, when it had already started, the so-called “Spanish question” was raised: that Franco’s Spain had collaborated militarily with Hitler’s Germany and Mussolini’s Italy. The General Assembly, in a plenary meeting, voted by an overwhelming majority to approve a series of measures against what it described as “Franco’s fascist government”. If a democratic regime was not established, the liberties of the population were not respected and elections were not called, he recommended the withdrawal of all ambassadors and the expulsion of the international organizations established by the United Nations.
The next day, Francoist Spain mobilized its followers, which under a military dictatorship and after a terrifying and devastating civil war, is always easy.
Madrid’s Plaça d’Orient appeared flooded by a huddled mass of people. In Barcelona, ??a large popular parade was organized that started in Plaça Calvo Sotelo, faced the Diagonal and went down Passeig de Gràcia; after the large gathering in Plaça Catalunya, he went down the Rambla and went up Passeig Colom to Capitania. And from the balcony, Captain General Solchaga and Governor Barba delivered their harangues.
It is of interest to highlight some of the many posters and banners that the angry demonstrators carried. Maurice Thorez, then the highest leader of French communism, was the target of numerous darts. Here are some samples:
“Per als Thorez, Manolete!”
“Giral-Negrín and Thorez, neither at UNO, nor at three. We are Spanish and not dolls.
“If Napoleon couldn’t, how can the coward of Thorez?”
“Ten thousand Thorez will fight in the Iberian bullring. Since the cattle are hands, the bullfight will be without biters”.
But none beats this one: “If they have ONE, we have two.”
