Franco's Final Years: Spain's Tumultuous Transition (1969-1975)

• The closing years of Franco's rule were marked by violence and unrest.

• Conflict arose between those advocating for reforms and liberalization of the regime, and those with a “bunker” mentality who staunchly resisted any changes.
• An economic recession in the late 1960s, coupled with labor agitation, strikes, and rebellion in universities, prompted Franco to proclaim a state of exception in March 1969.

• The remaining years of Franco's rule saw periods of intensified opposition, to which the government responded with harshly repressive measures.

• The most virulent opposition to the Franco regime came from the revolutionary Basque nationalist group, ETA. They employed terrorist tactics and assassinations. ETA's most significant act was the assassination of Prime Minister Carrero Blanco in December 1973. His assassination precipitated the regime's most serious governmental crisis and interrupted the continuity Franco had planned.
• Conflicts continued under Carrero Blanco's successor, Arias Navarro (1974). He promised liberalizing reforms; however, his efforts faced opposition from Francoists on the right, who equated any reform with chaos, and radicals on the left, who were not content with anything less than a total break from the regime.
• Opposition to the regime mounted significantly in 1974-1975. Labor strikes, university protests, and terrorist activity reached such a level that the government placed the Basque region under martial law in April 1975.
• By the time of Franco's death on November 20, 1975, Spain was in a chronic state of crisis. The preceding decades of economic and social transformation, complicated by mounting tensions, made change inevitable, though its precise form remained uncertain.

Foreign Policy Challenges

• European nations maintained their aversion to Franco's authoritarian rule.

• Western European members of NATO repeatedly vetoed efforts to include Spain in the European Community.
• A trade preference agreement between Spain and the EC, signed in 1970, opened relations with the European Community. However, Spanish membership in the community had to await the democratization of the regime.

• The problem of Gibraltar revived in the 1960s, jeopardizing relations with Britain. In 1969, Spain took steps to seal off Gibraltar.
• Morocco: Relations between Spain and Arab countries were closer in the late 1940s, partly due to Spain's non-recognition of Israel. However, when France decided to abandon Morocco in 1956, a long series of conflicts with Morocco resulted in Spain abandoning much of its colonial territory in the 1960s.
• In 1975, Spain declared its readiness to grant full independence to the Spanish Sahara under United Nations supervision.
• Following the Green March of 300,000 unarmed Moroccans into the territory in November 1975, Spain agreed to cede the Spanish Sahara to Morocco and Mauritania.