The Temptation of the Caudillo, by Juan Eslava Galán

The Temptation of the Caudillo
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Zigzagging between the great historical novels and the informative works, Juan Eslava Galan always arouses great interest among readers, the interest of the author hardened in a bibliography as extensive as it is brilliant.

On this occasion, Eslava Galán brings us closer to a well-known photograph. That of the two dictators walking through the platforms of Hendaye towards a meeting that finally only bore fruit in sinister one-off agreements. But that could have meant a transcendent change in the position of Spain in the Second World War.

With certain analogies to the work Filek, by Martínez de Pisón, Eslava Galán borders on the uchronic, which can be deduced from alternative history if things had not happened exactly as they happened ...

"The red carpet stretched out along the platform is long enough, but too narrow for Hitler and Franco to walk through it paired."

It is 1940. Suspecting an early surrender of the allies, Franco is tempted to enter the Second World War on the side of the Berlin-Rome axis. Seeing what can be your
opportunity, he offers his help to the Führer, who does not hesitate to despise the offer.

Months later, when the contest swings in a very different direction, Hitler begins to calibrate the benefits of an alliance with Spain, but by then it is too late. Unable to offer Franco everything he asked for, he has to assume that, at that point, the Caudillo is reluctant to get involved in the conflict.

The Hendaye meeting, over which rivers of ink have already flowed, continues to fascinate us because of all the implications that a different result could have had. With his usual mastery, and closer than ever to the fictionalized story, Juan Eslava Galán makes us witnesses of an episode that could mark the history of Spain or, at the very least, take it on a very different course.

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The Temptation of the Caudillo
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