Primo de rivera

PRIMO DE RIVERA.

HISTORY OF INTERNATONAL RELATIONS.
Miguel Maojo Youl.

PRIMO de RIVERA .

Life Background.
Miguel Primo de Rivera was born in the sherry producing city of Jerez de la Frontera in 1870. His family were landowners and had a military background with his uncle holding the post of Captain General in Madrid. His uncle Fernando was to be the first Marquis of Estella and was apart of the aristocracy that ruled over the majority of agricultural labourers who in those days were quite poor and at the mercy of their rich land owning superiors. He was known to associate more with the ´peasants´ than was usual and have empathy for the workers.
He went on to study history and engineering before embarking on a military career with admission to the General Academy in Toledoprobably facilitated by his uncle Fernando where he graduated in 1884.He showed his professionalism in military operations and was awarded promotions and decorations for his iniciatives in battles in north Morocco and held various posts in Spain and overseas.He concluded that Spain must withdraw from what was called Spanish Morocco if it could not dominate the region.He was to witness the close toa once great empire with Spain defeated in the war against the United States losing Cuba and the Philippines.The politicians and parlamentary system was blamed for poor economic development within Spain and the failure to preserve Spains imperial glory. He then went on to serve in the Ministry of War in Madrid with his uncle.He was happily married to a young Hispano-Cuban called Casilda Sáenz deHeredia who bore six children before her death in 1908 following the birth of their son Fernando.His career flourished but he became increasingly discontent with the worsening situation of his country.He was the first from his academy to be promoted to Brigadier General in 1911 on his return to Spanish Morocco. At home tensions grew with Anarchists and radical Republicans demanding radical changesand declaring a general strike in Catalonia mostly due to the army conscripting soldiers to fight a Second Rif War in Morocco and the consequent Tragic Week of 1909 with thousands of non-compliant citizens being killed after martial law was declared due to anticlerical rioters burning churches and convents.The government proved to be unable to make adequate social reforms and 1918 post World War Ieconomic difficulties saw an increased social unrest.
An economical problem with internal post-monarquical systems which were out of step with the accelerated industrial revolution,growing nationalistic sentiment and traditional political parties inept in an increasingly democratic system lead to a political vacumn which Primo de Ribiera took advantage of to restore law and order to Spain asa whole. On the 13th of September in 1923, Miguel Primo de Rivera who was the Captain General of Catalonia took control of Spain with a ´Coup de Etat´ with accordance of the King Alfonso XIII which would last until 1930. Benito Mussolini had taken power the year before in accordance with the King Vittoria Emmanuel III.Primo de Rivera rejected the term fascist for his dictatorship but it wasinspired by the original Italian fascism.
Brief History of Spain and Primo de Rivera.
Spain held a marginal status in European nations after 1898 with the loss to the United States in a military defeat named the ¨disaster¨ of 98 which spelled the end to the final remnants of Spanish Empire in the Carribean and Pacific. The period when Primo de Rivera ruled over Spain was difficult and has animportant part in forming the future post civil war dictadorship with key aspects of the right wing politics and the clear nationalistic and imperialist outlook under Primo de Ribiera (1923-1930)being adopted under Franco (1939-75).However, Primo de Ribiera was more limited in his powers and his dictatorship would only lay the foundations of Francoism which would serve to compare and connect the two...