[From "The Spanish Distinction"]

I recently finished reading The Last Crusade: Spain 1936 by Warren Carroll, it’s a history of the first year of the Spanish Civil War written from a traditional Catholic perspective. Unlike secular historians, Carroll covers the religious motivations of the Nationalists during the war in a more serious way.
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One of the strengths of Carroll’s book is that it discusses the realities of the battle for control in Spain. He describes how unlikely a coup would be successful. The Popular Front took control of the Spanish Navy, traditionally the most prestigious of the branches of the Spanish military. They used the Spanish Navy’s humiliation in the Spanish-American War as a pretext to upend it (oddly enough, Franco was from a traditional naval family, but the decline of the Spanish Navy convinced him to join the Army instead). Too popular to dismiss them entirely, the Popular Front then proceeded to make sure the most conservative, Nationalist generals were deployed out of mainland Spain. Franco, for example, was deployed to the Canary Islands. To stage a coup, Franco would have to find a way to get to mainland Spain from the Canary Islands without naval support.

Fortunately, the Republic overlooked the power of aircraft, mostly because the technology was so new at the time.
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It’s a great story, but it is also a sobering one. Nationalists in the United States are in a far worse position than the Nationalist Right of Spain in 1936. If you have been on social media for the past several years, you’ve no doubt heard someone talk about the possibilities of a new civil conflict. The Normie-Right usually takes comfort in the hope that, “the military will have our back.” On the surface, it makes a lot of sense. It is a sentiment I once shared. I have since changed my mind. There are several parallels between 1930s Spain and the modern U.S. A key component is the exploitation by the Left of a historic and humiliating defeat to take over a traditionally rightwing institution, the Spanish Navy in the first case and the American military, as a whole, in the second. But, there are several differences and they don’t bode well for traditionalists in the American Empire.

For one, the American Left has been working on this a lot longer, and thus done a more thorough job than the 1930s Spanish Left. By 1936, they had only completed the takeover of the Spanish Navy. By contrast, the leftist takeover of the U.S. military has been far more effective. If you ever want an example of this consider the differences between the early 1990s and the late 2000s. When Bill Clinton tried to repeal the military’s ban on homosexuals in the 90s, the top brass fought him tooth and nail, eventually forcing the “don’t ask, don’t tell” compromise. Flash-forward about two decades and the political generals have been in open revolt over Trump’s plan to ban transsexuals.
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One of the most impactful actions Obama undertook during the early part of his presidency, and one that has largely been ignored, even by most of the Right, was a purge of the military leadership. Largely using the disaster of the Iraq War as a pretext, Obama dismissed the older, more conservative generals in favor of more leftist ones.
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There is no element of the U.S. military that is overlooked. It is a seamless, interconnected series of services. Air has been an important part of warfare for over 100 years and its ability to carry cargo has greatly improved. The Left knows this and will not allow such an oversight to happen this time. The American political Left has grabbed control of all facets of today’s U.S. military. Members of the U.S. military cannot provide any private or public commentary favorable toward traditionalism or Nationalism, unless they want to be removed from the service. Rightwing enlistees and officers have learned to keep quiet and follow orders.

Considering the modern realities, an American Franco waiting in the wings to lead a rightwing coup against a leftwing government is pure fantasy. It almost feels like a secular version of Christ’s Second Coming, where the good guys are saved at the last moment. Yes, Christ will eventually come back. Yes, Christ promised us that, “the gates of hell will not prevail over my Church.” But, to hope for this is an incredibly poor strategy. Christ’s promise was to the global Church, not locally, and no man knows the day or the hour when Christ will return. Neither stopped several intense persecutions of Christians in the past 2,000 years and nothing will stop it in the U.S. either.

If your plans rely upon a savior from within the U.S. military, you are set up to lose. Likewise, if your plan is to hope an American Francisco Franco will rise up, you are setting yourself up for failure down the line. There is no American Franco coming. Don’t expect Trump to reverse this trend, either.
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The history of the American military makes it sound like a ripe breeding ground for our own Nationalist Franco, but the fact is the military, or at least the leadership, has gone through a significant change and the Right must adjust accordingly. There is no Franco on the horizon. It is a sobering thought, but a necessary one. The political Right, and especially Southern Nationalists, must accept a stark reality: the military is no longer a conservative, Nationalist institution. It is now conquered by the Left.