(See Cover)
Like most of his countrymen, Generalissimo Francisco Franco, Caudillo of Spain, is fond of good food. Unlike most of them, he has been able to indulge the taste consistently for many years and possesses respectable ebonpoint to prove it. Yet if ever a man had cause to pick nervously at his victuals, that man is Francisco Franco. This week his well-padded posterior is planted on one of the hottest governmental hot seats in all the world. And the main question facing him is not whether he can ease the situation, but whether he can stay there at all, and how long.
Trial Balance. Four and one-half years after his victory in Spain's rebellion and civil war, Franco could see little enough to give him comfort or joy. After months of slow disintegration, Spanish affairs were brought into sharp focus. Out of Spain last week came the clearest picture yet of a tottering regime. Franco's country, unreconstructed, is hungry, sullen, restive. He has not a strong friend abroad, and precious few at home. Of the two powerful allies who forged his victory, Italy lies prostrate, the battleground of foreign armies; Germany, no longer able to do him any real good, still has the means to work him grievous harm. In an economic sense he is living on the measured bounty of the "Western Pluto-democracies," which he once scorned for their weakness.
On the credit side Franco could register only one fact that most Spaniards approved: despite his original involvement with the Axis, he had kept Spain out of World War II.
At Home & Abroad. Last week, at Franco's northern border, German troops were poised; German agents already had infiltrated his country thoroughly, with his own connivance. On his sea frontiers, in the air, in nearby Africa, the Allies he once mocked had grown terrifyingly powerful. Even his meekest & mildest neighbor, Portugal, nestling in Spain's Atlantic flank, was holding grim and elaborate civil-defense exercises, and rumor ran fast that she might be about to join the Allies. If, in the logic of events, Germany declared war on Portugal, the squeeze would fall on Franco. He knows, better than most, that the Allies owe him no gratitude, that any advance against him would be an advance against Hitler.
In Spain itself there was no true unity to meet such a crisis. Of the groups supporting his Government, none was entirely satisfied. Some were definitely dissatisfied. In shrill alarm the Madrid El Espanol denounced "conspiracies against the Caudillo which favor a regime of free-for-all shooting." The paper added: "At present the operations against the legitimate regime are being launched in the name of nationalism, capitalism, monarchism, conservatism and Christian liberalism. All these groups, in league with the Reds in a half-baked alliance, fear the Falange and its unified leadership. . . ."
That covered plenty of ground. If even approximately true, it indicated that almost everyone in Spain was in a mood to gang up on the Falange and Francisco Franco. Observers recently returned from Madrid estimated that some 85% of all Spaniards now opposed the Government.
From London came detailed reports of a meeting held in Spain last fortnight by members of six opposition political groups. They were reported to have decided that