Behind the Windbreaks

From Spain a TIME correspondent brought this report:

The winds that blow Spain toward economic bankruptcy are sharper now than ever before. High prices for food fan the little man's desperation to a sharper pitch. The stink of governmental inefficiency and corruption is rising above normal. But the best guess is that Generalissimo Francisco Franco will probably not reap his whirlwind just yet. For he holds as tight as ever the only windbreaks that count--the army and the police.

Walk along Madrid's Gran Via in the early evening--the hour of the Paseo. Smart women in furs and well-dressed men jostle along the avenue, huddling in their mufflers against the chill wind from the Guadarramas. Street lights gleam on neatly cleaned streets, on the chaste, well-stocked windows of expensive stores. The roadway is crowded with French, German, Italian, British and American automobiles and with rickety taxis that are always full.

Behind the discreet curtains of the cafes, crowds jam the tables drinking wine or coffee and eating little plates of grilled shrimp or fried baby octopus tentacles. Silent, grey-coated policemen stand discreetly in the background with little to do. Order is so perfect that Spaniards--against all their temperament--wait for the green light before they cross the streets.

That is show-window Spain--sleek, animated, and very, very expensive.

Life on $1 a Day. But go instead to the house of, say, a streetcar conductor about 10:30 p.m., when most Madrilenos eat dinner. Ask your host, who earns less than $1 a day, to show you his week's ration of food at controlled prices. He can put it in a soup plate. His wife may serve to a guest the best dinner they have had in weeks--soup with meat and noodles, a dish of chickpeas, cabbage and sausage, with an orange for dessert. To buy that meal for four people, he had to spend $2.28 on the black market. And in his household, where two people work, the combined income is $1.80 a day.

Most Spaniards agree that if Franco could bring down the price of food, the country would accept his police state without too much grumbling.

On the Chute. Spain's economy is sliding inevitably down the chute to bankruptcy. Since 1936 Spain has had little new machinery. Its railroads are 50 to 20 years out of date and seriously inadequate. The three years' drought has ended and reservoirs are full, but Madrid still has no electricity three days a week for lack of efficient dynamos.

The Caudillo should be given his due. Spain is orderly and there is relatively little crime--thanks to police in overwhelming numbers and varieties. In recent months there have been fewer political arrests and no political executions. The Falange is currently on the wane--to the gratitude of every Spaniard except the Falangists. There has been a certain mellowing over the years; individuals may criticize discreetly, although the newspapers are still government-cast stereotypes.

But the rod and the staff of Franco support is the Army--an estimated 500,000 men, pampered and reasonably well equipped. The families of every officer and soldier above the rank of private can purchase good food at government prices in the economatos or commissaries. Much of this promptly reaches the black market. No significant dissatisfaction with Franco is apparent in Spain's army. Remarked one Spaniard with a shrug: "Why should there be? They have never lived better in their lives."

It Could Happen There. Under the combined pressures of high food prices and economic deterioration, "something" could happen to Franco's rule. What would it be? Mass revolution is the least likely. Leftist hopes for a Spanish refugee invasion from France are dreamboats. The exiled republican government of ex-pharmacy Professor Jose Giral carries little weight in Spain.

But if economic pressures forced some action, then Franco would probably step aside for a junta of generals--with military and police controls clamping down tighter than ever. Restoration of the monarchy might follow.*

"Franco, Franco, Franco!" The U.N. resolution, seized upon by Franco's expert propaganda machine, appealed to the xenophobia in every Spaniard. Many rallied to the Chief of State just to confound the foreigners who were trying to tell Spaniards what to do.

The government-organized demonstrations against the U.N. were impressive. In Madrid (see cut) 100,000 herded into the Plaza de Oriente to hear Franco. In Barcelona more than 100,000 marched down the Paseo de Gracia in the icy winter sunshine. The raised-arm salute was used only once (it has been replaced by waving white handkerchiefs). But the barked "Franco, Franco, Franco!" is still used with almost hypnotic effect. Signs carried included one showing a man preparing to lower his trousers and a dog lifting his leg over the letters "U.N.O."

Spanish opponents of Franco, right and left, are currently in an apathetic, hopeless mood. They are bitterly disappointed at the U.N. resolution. Said a wealthy, anti-Franco monarchist: "I find this resolution to be a comedy. I do not think the United States or Britain want to upset Franco until they make some permanent arrangement with Russia."

Said a well-to-do Mason (out on parole from a twelve-year jail sentence): "Why don't you declare an economic blockage? It would be better to suffer a few months that way than to suffer Franco a few years more."

* In London, "an authoritative government source" said the British were talking to centrists inside Spain in an effort to form an anti-Franco coalition government.

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