A Woman In Defense
From the Franco era until today in Spain, occurred in defence a huge transformation whose value can be blurred by the passage of time, but can’t ignore those who have lived the military profession for several decades. In those years of Francoism, quite a few were the military, having made courses abroad and knowing the functioning of armies in other countries, shout that it was unworkable, in the short term, the permanence of the Trinity ministerial of the army, Navy and air and its consequent dispersion of efforts and lack of coordination. But great were the vested interests and the sensitivities are rooted in the old and new military commanders, in a political regime whose survival depended in great part of the armies, and very strenuous efforts aimed at rationalizing the functioning of the military when this, in addition, meant to replace the outdated concept of backbone of the homeland by the most democratic of arm armed State. In that regard he worked with very hard personal wear, general Diaz Alegria, one of whose concerns was the correct structural defects ignored over the years. This Stela also moved general Gutierrez Mellado, after Franco’s death.
A significant image of those days: that of Gutierrez Mellado resisting on foot, on February 23, 1981, the brutal aggression of the coup leader Tejero, who sought to overthrow him to the floor of the Chamber. It failed. At this crucial moment in the recent history of Spain are some of the roots of democratic legitimacy with which today Carme Chacon holds the position of ultimate responsibility in front of the Spanish armed forces. The armies had to accept then what initially was considered aberrant: led by civilian personnel, by fellow countrymen. Do you know these what’s be military?, complained the irreducible. I also witnessed the hostility with which in 1980 was received to the President Suarez in his first visit to the State of the Army school, accompanying the King to preside over delivery of diplomas to the new officers of the General staff. For some, the presence of Suarez (the traitor) was equivalent to the abominable desecration of a Holy of Holies military.
The following transformations were the appointment of Ministers of defence no military (disparagingly called politicians by some professionals living in the nostalgia of the past) and, what is worse, Socialist; the progressive incorporation of women to the armies; and, above all, the opening of these new missions that opened their eyes to the outside and would eventually overcoming obsessive concern about the enemy within that so much damage had occurred in the mentality military in recent decades of the Franco regime. Although there will always be those who take advantage of the personal circumstances of the new Minister of defence to criticize it and provide an outlet for their hidden resentments, the only fact of their appointment is a remarkable milestone in progressive social and political transformation of the Spaniards. The appointment to lead the Ministry of defence of a woman, young, Socialist, Catalan and pregnant, is an indication that in Spain is still advancing in a sense of social and political progress.