Retired Colonel Calls for Emergency Government and New Constitution

Retired Lieutenant Colonel Calls for a Coup d'état in Spain

A retired lieutenant colonel called for a full-blown coup d'état on September 16th from Madrid's Military Casino: that the Armed Forces form a "provisional emergency government" and initiate a constituent process to draft a new Constitution. Written down, it sounds like a telegram from another era. What's striking isn't the date. It's the naturalness with which it was said within an institutional setting.

According to the video of the event, accessed by Público, the former military officer, Francisco Bendala Ayuso, denounced the "unconstitutionality, illegality, and illegitimacy" with which, in his opinion, the head of state, the prime minister, and the entire executive branch operate. He dismissed the opposition as "inept and passive." The event was introduced by a former Artillery Colonel.

Why wouldn't there be international support today?

The most solid argument circulating isn't sarracena, it's accounting-based. Franco's dictatorship was sustained, according to a participant, by support that no longer exists today: Nancy Germany, Fascist Italy, the oil company Texaco, then the Vatican, and from 1953, the United States during the Cold War. None of those umbrellas are available now.

And without an umbrella, the globalized economy shows no mercy. The scenario depicted is that of a sanctioned country, closed off to the outside. "We'd end up like Cuba, recycling the same cars for 70 years," summarizes a participant. The opposing thesis emerges: that isolation would be bearable because, apart from oil, everything is produced domestically. This is where the debate breaks down.

The visible discontent left by the video

The discussion quickly turned to something else: the diagnosis of the current government, not the defense of a coup. A participant brought up an article by Jesús Cacho in Vozpópuli according to which many people in Spain wouldn't mind living in a dictatorship if the dictator were Pedro Sánchez.

With foreign trade carrying the weight it does and no partners willing to finance the adventure, the coup scenario has little practical viability. It remains to be seen if this reassures anyone or if the discontent simply moves elsewhere.