Abstract
The impact of Juan Carlos’s designation was somewhat undermined by the eruption of the MATESA affair — the most serious financial scandal in the regime’s history — in the summer of 1969. The affair, which affected several ministers belonging to the technocrat Opus Dei faction, was given substantial media coverage by Fraga and Solís, who thereby hoped to discredit their opponents in government. This prompted Franco to carry out the most sweeping cabinet change in over a decade, inspired by Carrero Blanco and López Rodó, who saw off their major rivals, notably Fernando Castiella, Fraga and Solís. The latter made a desperate last-minute attempt to prevent his removal from office by appealing to Juan Carlos, but the prince was careful to remain above the fray.
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Notes and Reference
Richard Eder, ‘Juan Carlos promises a democratic regime’, The New York Times, 4 February 1970.
The Times, 22 January 1970.
Vilallonga, The king, p. 108.
El Socialista, 30 July 1969; Mundo Obrero, 2 August 1969.
The New York Times, 4 February 1970; Vilallonga, The king, p. 109.
Silva Muñoz, Memorias, p. 279.
López Rodó, La larga marcha, pp. 401–2; López Rodó, Memorias, III, p. 25; Areilza, Crónica, pp. 97, 164–5.
López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 26, 47, 193.
Ziegler, From shore to shore, p. 226.
The New York Times, 4 February 1970.
Shortly before the prince’s audience with the shah in 1969, the Iranian minister of court observed that the Spanish ambassador was ‘sticking to him like glue’. Sofia discreetly informed the minister that her husband would rather be received on his own, in view of which he ‘arranged for the limpet-like ambassador to be detached’. This episode illustrates Juan Carlos’s determination to fend for himself. Alam, The Shah and I, p. 96.
On the French and German visits, see Armada, Al servicio, pp. 177–81. RTVE, La transición espanola, episode 3.
Juan Carlos enlisted Mountbatten’s support in convincing Don Juan of the need to renounce his rights to the throne in his favour. In December 1969 Mountbatten informed Juan Carlos of a recent conversation with Don Juan, whom he had urged to ‘execute a legal Instrument of Abdication to be issued by you on the evening before you become king so that the world can see you are the legal king in your own right and not the puppet of a dictator’. Ziegler, Mountbatten, p. 678.
On returning from Finland, which had a Socialist government, princess Sofia remarked on how ironical it was that the Danish royal family refused to have anything to do with them on the grounds that Spain was a dictatorship, but were happy to visit the Soviet Union. López Rodó, Memorias, IV, p. 130.
Walters, Silent missions, p. 552. ‘During dinner I was able to talk to the President a bit about both Tino [Constantine] and Juanito to try and put over their respective points of view about Greece and Spain, and how I felt the US could help them. The President appeared to be so interested that he called over his Secretary of State to join the conversation and we had a three-cornered conversation lasting about twenty minutes’. Ziegler, From shore to shore, p. 204.
Vilallonga, The king, pp. 14–15. Armero owned a major news agency, Europa Press.
Armada, Al servicio, pp. 174–5; The New York Times, 25 January, 1 February 1971; Chicago Tribune, 27 January 1971; Time, 8 February 1971. One US journalist glibly observed that ‘when he [Juan Carlos] takes over, the reign in Spain will plainly be humane’. Newsweek, 8 February 1971.
The Chicago Tribune, 27 January 1971; Bardavío, Los silencios, pp. 53–5.
Walters, Silent Missions, pp. 555–6.
Despite an official State Department denial, on 28 July 1971 The Washington Post claimed the Nixon administration was waging a low-intensity campaign to convince Franco to stand down in the prince’s favour before his physical decline produced a crisis. Payne, The Franco Regime, p. 574.
López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 49, 75, 94, 13.
López Rodó, Memorias, III, p. 179.
Mountbatten later wrote to congratulate them for ‘the tremendous way you have increased your popularity with the people – that is a great personal triumph for both of you’. Ziegler, From shore to shore, p. 226; Ziegler, Mountbatten, p. 678.
Opinion Poll number 1046, Cuestiones de Actualidad política II, July 1971, carried out by the Instituto de Opinión Pública (IOP). According to one observer, Juan Carlos ‘has begun to project a more positive image both at home and abroad’, and was proving to be ‘more intelligent than was assumed, without being brilliant, which would have been a distinct disadvantage’. The Times, 11 October 1971.
Opinion Poll number 1050, Cuestiones de Actualidad politica, I, November 1971, IOP. It should be noted that 50 per cent of those polled failed to pick out any of the names from the list offered to them, which excluded leaders of the illegal anti-Francoist opposition parties.
López Rodó, La larga marcha, pp. 417–18.
Opinion Poll number 1054, December 1971, IOP.
The poll did not please Carrero, and although the minister of information retained his portfolio, the director of the Institute of Public Opinion was summarily dismissed. Fraga, Memoria breve, p. 282; Vilallonga, The king, p. 70; Payne, The Franco Regime, p. 582.
López Rodó, Memorias, HI, pp. 320, 333. For further evidence of the prince’s obsession with his cousin Alfonso in late 1972, see De la Cierva, Retratos que entran en la Historia, pp. 288–90.
López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 334–5.
López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 349–50.
Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, pp. 139–41, 90; López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 365–6.
Fraga would later remark that ‘everyone is of the opinion that the prince’s influence has played a decisive role in the crisis, within what was possible’. Fraga, Memoria breve, p. 296.
Carrero Blanco’s first choice as minister of information was Suárez, an appointment Juan Carlos would have endorsed, even though he thought him excessively keen to become minister. When Franco imposed Arias Navarro as minister of the interior, Liñan was moved to the Ministry of Information, thereby depriving Suárez of a job. Forced to choose between Suárez and Linan, Juan Carlos favoured the latter. López Rodó, Memorias, III, pp. 334, 344, 379, 385, 387.
Vilallonga, The king, pp. 158–60. The tunnel was built not far from the US Embassy in Madrid, at a time when the latter was preparing a visit by Kissinger. The ETA terrorists involved were apparently trained in South Yemen and Cuba by East German agents, and purchased the explosives from IRA members they had met in Algeria, at a camp run by the KGB.
When the admiral’s sons subsequently thanked him for presiding the funeral, Juan Carlos replied: ‘how could I have stayed away?’ In February 1974 the prince gave Carrero Blanco’s widow the pen with which he had signed the document by which he became Franco’s successor in July 1969.
Fernández-Miranda, La Reforma, p. 321; Vilallonga, The king, p. 161.
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© 1996 Charles Powell
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Powell, C. (1996). Prince of Spain. In: Juan Carlos of Spain. St Antony’s Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-24423-2_3
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