Spain's government has faced some difficult issues this year, none more so than one beginning with C. But things could have been very much more difficult for the government (and for most of us), had there been an attack by zombies. The possibility of such an attack and the defence against it was raised in the Senate by one Carles Mulet of the Compromís party in Valencia.
Carles wanted to know what plans there were for a zombie apocalypse. The government wasn't able to provide a swift response. It needed, among other things, to consult the Dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy. According to the dictionary, zombies are "people who are supposed to be dead and are revived by the art of witchcraft in order to dominate their will". Given this definition, the government concluded that there was "doubtful probability of such a circumstance arising".
Carles wasn't overly impressed, but it seemed as if he hadn't really believed Spain was in imminent danger of a zombie attack. He was using it all as a metaphor. Hence: "The government has no plan of action for the zombie apocalypse. Its answer can be interpreted as meaning that the government itself is a zombie apocalypse, a human catastrophe brought about by stupefied and automaton people."
The relocation of Es Trenc
The Balearic government, meantime, was finally completing its legislation for the Es Trenc Nature Park. After many months of delay and endless arguments, the legislation was about to be published on the Official Bulletin when someone spotted an error in the nick of time.
This was just as well. Once on the Official Bulletin, things are official and it takes a lot to make them unofficial. In the case of the nature park, had the mistake not been noticed, Kenya and Ethiopia would now be able to boast having the park. The latitudes and longitudes for the park, as noted in the legislation, were wrong - by some several thousand kilometres.
Some might have in fact thought the park or at least Es Trenc beach had indeed been relocated. The promised chiringuitos, to replace the demolished ones, never appeared, while the sunloungers took an age to see the light of midsummer.
Hunt the tourist
There was a spot of anti-tourism agitation knocking around during the summer, but one of the last places that such sentiment might have been expected to have emerged was Esporles. It doesn't really have vast numbers of tourists. Still, this didn't prevent them coming up with a new game for their "jocs tradicionals" (traditional games) that are played during the summer fiestas.
This was "hunt the guiri", as in foreign tourist. It wasn't xenophobic, the organising committee insisted, just a spot of humour with an ironic touch that took "massification" and holiday rentals as its themes. No offence was meant and none was taken, probably because there weren't any tourists.
Kelvin MacKenzie
Even The Sun decided that enough was enough. Its one-time editor, Kelvin MacKenzie, was sacked because he compared footballer Ross Barkley to a gorilla. Shortly before this (it was something to do with Gibraltar) he had hoped the UK would say goodbye to all Spaniards living in the UK, that there would be a holiday boycott of Spain, that a special tax could be place on Rioja and that the state visit by King Felipe would be ruined. No sense of xenophobia there, then.
The CIA files
Declassified CIA files revealed that Joan March, Franco's banker, had been involved with the sale of Jewish assets. Michael Olian, who was a contrabandist like March, sold the assets of French Jews at reduced prices through an agreement with a Swiss bank in Madrid. Joan March was a beneficiary of this. The CIA had wanted to arrest March but was unable to as Spain was, in their words, "supposedly neutral" and because obstacles were placed in front of American intelligence by "our diplomats".
The files also pointed to Mallorca having been the focus for what in 1947 was felt might have been the imminent resurgence of the Nazi Party.
Josep Ferragut
Josep Ferragut's name crops up quite regularly nowadays, even though he died in 1968. He was the architect responsible, among other things, for the Gesa building in Palma and the Glass Church in Playa de Palma. In June there was a premiere at Bellver Castle for a documentary on his life and death.
Ferragut was a homosexual. He was bludgeoned to death by two men (supposedly rent boys) and his body left on the Bunyola road, a few kilometres from Palma. The two were arrested, held in custody and then released some eighteen months later. The case never went to court.
The truth about his murder will probably never be known. Was he murdered by two male prostitutes or had there been other motives? Ferragut was outspoken against corruption. His ethics frustrated building developments. He referred to "barbarities", such as ones in Puerto Pollensa. He had plenty of enemies.
Showing posts with label CIA files. Show all posts
Showing posts with label CIA files. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 27, 2017
Monday, January 30, 2017
Joan March And The CIA Files
The left-wing opposition at Santa Margalida town hall wants to revoke the title of illustrious son that was awarded to Joan March in 1956. There are three reasons why. One is because of information that has come from recently declassified CIA documents; not least the fact that he was involved with the sale of Jewish assets.
Joan March is known (and now mostly reviled) for all sorts of things. Being Franco's banker is just one. Another relates to the role he played in the Second World War and its aftermath. He also figures in the First World War, but by the time that war broke out in 1939 he had assumed a far more significant role. As the CIA files indicate, he was one of the most important businesspeople in Europe.
He used his business influences in different ways, such as with playing both sides during the war. His connections to both the British and the Germans have been well documented. For the Nazis, for instance, he supplied submarines in the Mediterranean from ships with the Trasmediterránea line. The same shipping company was the means by which Jews were transported to New York. March was paid handsomely for movements that were not permitted. When the FBI sought to intervene, it was Churchill who had a word with Roosevelt.
The CIA files really only confirm what was known about March's involvement in the war. A great deal of information had been gathered about him by the British, the French, the Russians, the Germans and the Americans. At the end of the war, the Americans and the Russians discovered a mountain of documentation related to him in Berlin. What the CIA now reveal is that a contrabandist, Michael Olian, was investigated in 1946 within the framework of Nazi war crimes. He sold assets of French Jews at reduced prices through an agreement with a Swiss bank in Madrid. Joan March was one of two beneficiaries.
March was untouchable. Although he principally treated the war as a grand business opportunity, there was also his duplicity. The Americans, or at least the Office of Strategic Services (which was to become the CIA), wanted to detain him. March had Churchill to thank for the fact that he was not detained and was to amass ever greater fortune and business power after the war. The CIA was unable to arrest March because Spain was "supposedly neutral". Obstacles were placed in front of American intelligence by "our diplomats".
The CIA files in some ways are more revealing about the post-war activities of Nazis in Mallorca. To what extent, if any, March was involved in Nazi activity isn't stated. Such involvement was probably unnecessary, as what emerges is a picture of how the Franco regime consented to the presence of Nazis and would indeed provide protection.
The Nazi presence on the island had been established prior to the war. Hans Dede became the permanent German consul in 1933 and remained so during the war. It was Dede who had pursued, with local assistance, German Jews and pacifists who had settled in Mallorca: in Cala Ratjada in particular. One was Karl Otten, who the British helped to escape. He became a propagandist with the BBC. Another was Hugo Cyril Kulp Baruch, better known as Jack Bilbo, who had established the Waikiki bar, but who left Mallorca when he recognised that the island wasn't the safe haven he had hoped it would be.
The CIA files establish that Dede had originally and ostensibly arrived in Mallorca as the employee of a company. He was categorised as being "notoriously anti-Semitic". He was also a spy. Following the war, the Allies demanded that he be handed over. It was too late. He had gone to South America. But, and as one dossier in the CIA files shows, there was apparently no shortage of Nazis residents on the island after the war. Military people and scientists, they were the focus of what in 1947, according to the CIA, was an imminent resurgence of the Nazi Party.
But was there really a resurgence? Nazism had been well embedded during the war and prior to it: there had, for example, been a Nazi rally in Portals Nous in 1938. Although there may have been Nazis on the island, did they pose the type of threat the CIA files hint at? Of the better-known names, Dede was no longer in Mallorca. Otto Skorzeny, who was to live in Barcares in Alcudia, wasn't here in 1947. He was undergoing de-Nazification, but didn't renounce National Socialism. He escaped and went to Madrid in 1948.
The point is that whatever strength of Nazi sentiment there may have been in the years immediately following the war, this didn't create a momentum. Mallorca and Spain did, after all, have its own brand of fascism to sustain it.
Joan March is known (and now mostly reviled) for all sorts of things. Being Franco's banker is just one. Another relates to the role he played in the Second World War and its aftermath. He also figures in the First World War, but by the time that war broke out in 1939 he had assumed a far more significant role. As the CIA files indicate, he was one of the most important businesspeople in Europe.
He used his business influences in different ways, such as with playing both sides during the war. His connections to both the British and the Germans have been well documented. For the Nazis, for instance, he supplied submarines in the Mediterranean from ships with the Trasmediterránea line. The same shipping company was the means by which Jews were transported to New York. March was paid handsomely for movements that were not permitted. When the FBI sought to intervene, it was Churchill who had a word with Roosevelt.
The CIA files really only confirm what was known about March's involvement in the war. A great deal of information had been gathered about him by the British, the French, the Russians, the Germans and the Americans. At the end of the war, the Americans and the Russians discovered a mountain of documentation related to him in Berlin. What the CIA now reveal is that a contrabandist, Michael Olian, was investigated in 1946 within the framework of Nazi war crimes. He sold assets of French Jews at reduced prices through an agreement with a Swiss bank in Madrid. Joan March was one of two beneficiaries.
March was untouchable. Although he principally treated the war as a grand business opportunity, there was also his duplicity. The Americans, or at least the Office of Strategic Services (which was to become the CIA), wanted to detain him. March had Churchill to thank for the fact that he was not detained and was to amass ever greater fortune and business power after the war. The CIA was unable to arrest March because Spain was "supposedly neutral". Obstacles were placed in front of American intelligence by "our diplomats".
The CIA files in some ways are more revealing about the post-war activities of Nazis in Mallorca. To what extent, if any, March was involved in Nazi activity isn't stated. Such involvement was probably unnecessary, as what emerges is a picture of how the Franco regime consented to the presence of Nazis and would indeed provide protection.
The Nazi presence on the island had been established prior to the war. Hans Dede became the permanent German consul in 1933 and remained so during the war. It was Dede who had pursued, with local assistance, German Jews and pacifists who had settled in Mallorca: in Cala Ratjada in particular. One was Karl Otten, who the British helped to escape. He became a propagandist with the BBC. Another was Hugo Cyril Kulp Baruch, better known as Jack Bilbo, who had established the Waikiki bar, but who left Mallorca when he recognised that the island wasn't the safe haven he had hoped it would be.
The CIA files establish that Dede had originally and ostensibly arrived in Mallorca as the employee of a company. He was categorised as being "notoriously anti-Semitic". He was also a spy. Following the war, the Allies demanded that he be handed over. It was too late. He had gone to South America. But, and as one dossier in the CIA files shows, there was apparently no shortage of Nazis residents on the island after the war. Military people and scientists, they were the focus of what in 1947, according to the CIA, was an imminent resurgence of the Nazi Party.
But was there really a resurgence? Nazism had been well embedded during the war and prior to it: there had, for example, been a Nazi rally in Portals Nous in 1938. Although there may have been Nazis on the island, did they pose the type of threat the CIA files hint at? Of the better-known names, Dede was no longer in Mallorca. Otto Skorzeny, who was to live in Barcares in Alcudia, wasn't here in 1947. He was undergoing de-Nazification, but didn't renounce National Socialism. He escaped and went to Madrid in 1948.
The point is that whatever strength of Nazi sentiment there may have been in the years immediately following the war, this didn't create a momentum. Mallorca and Spain did, after all, have its own brand of fascism to sustain it.
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