MIA > Archive > Nin > TUs Against Fascism
‘”THE elements constituting the basis of Spanish Fascism are: (a) the Somaten, (b) the Free Unions, (c) the Citizen Guard, (d) the Requeres, (e) the Defense Committees. Traditionally, the Somaten was a sort of rural police which engaged in the pursuit of malefactors. Its great majority was composed of petty-bourgeois and peasants who joined voluntarily. It only functioned when circumstances demanded.
Towards the end of 1918, the bourgeoisie, alarmed by the growth of the revolutionary labor movement, organized the Somaten in the large cities and particularly in Barcelona, the center of the revolutionary movement. The Somaten is under the orders of the Captain General, that is to say, the military commander of the district. It is commanded by military officers. Its members perform the functions of strike-breakers, police, and white guards.
Since March, 1919, when the Somaten made its apperance on the occasion of the great general strike in Barcelona, it has played an important role. It replaces strikers, does patrol duty, searches and examines passersby, and secures arrests. Its members often murder working-class militants.
In Barcelona alone, the Somaten has 12,000 members. It has recently perfected its organization to a considerable degree. Its members are armed with Winchester rifles, and they also have machine guns and armoured cars. They have organized a complete spy-service, and have a central bureau where are piled the police records of all revolutionary elements.
The “free unions” were organized towards the end of 1920. They are unions only in name, being really bands of assassins, recruited from among the most debased social elements. The members of these bands are furnished with permits to carry arms, furnished by the police. They have killed scores of our best militants. Not only are they not molested by the police, but they even receive protection from them. Quite often the police, members of the Somaten, and the free unions, take part together in attacks upon the workers.
As a consequence of the combined action of the authorities and the “free unions,” the trade unions were completely crushed. It was then that the “free unions” really commenced seriously to organize as such. Groups of them presented themselves in the factories and, revolvers in hand, forced the workers to join the “free unions.” They succeeded in obtaining the membership of several thousands of workers in this way, but it was purely a nominal membership.
In fact as soon as constitutional guarantees were restored, the workers deserted the “free unions” en masse, and joined the revolutionary unions. During two or three months the “free unions” ceased their outrages. But the bourgeoisie of Barcelona, fearing the renewal of the revolutionary working-class movement, engineered the reappearance of the White Terror. For some months not a day has passed without the murder of working-class militants by the “free unions.”
The Citizen Guards, established in 1917, has aims similar to those of the Somaten and the French Civic Unions; but it is numerically weak. It exists in several cities, notably in Madrid and Saragosa, but so far has not played an important role.
The Requetas is an organization of the youth of the ultra-reactionary Carlist Party. They are organized on a military basis, and have murdered several of their political adversaries. They sometimes work together with the “free unions.”
The Defense Committees, composed of army officers and founded in 1917, are a sort of secret power which exercises control over various political organizations of the country. Profoundly dissatisfied with the Government, and especially with its policy in Morocco, the Defense Committees threaten to engage in wider action. They are also the inciters of practically every form of persecution against the workers.
The Spanish Anarchists, leading the National Confederation of Labor whose members have been particularly the victims of the White Guards, find no tactics with which to oppose this terror, except through attacks upon individuals. The consequences of this have been disastrous. An outrage committed by one side necessarily implies reprisals from the other. Thus terrorism continues indefinitely.
The workers are very dissatisfied with the tactics of the Anarchists, and daily manifest more sympathy for the R.I.L.U. followers who advise them that the most efficacious method of opposing Spain’s growing Fascism is through mass action, the united front, and the organization of proletarian self-defense bands.
Last updated on 20 January 2023