Inside the ‘compromise’ over Spain’s Civil War memorial

The Valley of the Fallen was meant to be a symbol of reconciliation, instead it has become a perennial flashpoint

Valle de los Cuelgamuros. Image credit: Jorge Díaz Bes, CC BY-SA 3.0

Almost 85 years after General Francisco Franco led the Nationalists to victory, the Spanish Civil War is the kind of conflict that just refuses to die — and continues to motivate social discussion and strife across Spain.

Few symbols express this more deeply than the Valle de los Caídos, or “Valley of the Fallen,” which is once more at the center of a dispute involving the ideological heirs of both sides of the war, the government of Spain, the Archdiocese of Madrid, the Vatican, and even the Benedictines.

The monument of the Valley of the Fallen – or Valley of Cuelgamuros, as it was officially renamed a few years ago – was meant to be a symbol of reconciliation, built in the wake of a horrific conflict which tore Spain apart.

Instead, it has become a perennial flashpoint between the political left and right, and the subject of tense negotiations between the government, who want to “resignify” the site, and Church authorities responsible for its basilica.

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The monument is deeply Catholic, and includes a 152 meter (500 foot) vertical cross, a cross-shaped basilica, and a Benedictine monastery. Over thirty thousand people are buried there, one third of whom fought for the Republicans. But for many who sympathize with the losing side of the war, the whole complex reeks of fascism and stands as a testimony to a period and an event they wish had never happened, and would like to erase from the history books.

After more than a decade of discussion, the Catholic Church and the socialist-led government in Spain announced earlier this year that they had reached an agreement which would keep the basilica, its massive cross, and the Benedictines in place, with the government moving forward with plans to “re-signify” the secular parts of the monument.

And both sides have been criticized by their own supporters for selling out to the enemy. The more radical left wanted the valley cleansed of any Christian symbolism, and the more radical right consider any concession to the left as betrayal of those who won the war, and a threat to religious freedom.

What exactly the “resignification” entails is an open question. On April 14 – symbolically the anniversary of the 1931 proclamation of a Spanish Republic – the government launched an international tender for proposals that might reinterpret the site, or give it new meaning.

The Spanish bishops’ conference was quick to distance itself from the initiative, publishing a statement saying that “the Catholic Church has never been the promoter or driving force behind the re-signification activities that the Spanish government wishes to carry out in the Valley.”

“The government is taking the initiative by launching a tender for proposals without consulting the Church about the details or questions that should be clarified beforehand, in case the spaces and religious sensibilities are not respected.”

“The terms of the agreement made between the government and the Holy See are general and the details or particularities of the agreement have never been discussed,” the bishops said.

“Once again, the government is taking an initiative without resolving prior questions that affect the tender they are presenting and that should be clarified beforehand.”

Gesture of reconciliation, or monument to triumph?

The Spanish Civil War lasted officially from 1936 to 1939, but those were just the three years of open conflict.

Extrajudicial killings had started quite a while before that, with left wing militants shooting political opponents and carrying out a persecution of the Catholic Church in Spain so severe it became known as the Red Terror.

The uprising led by Franco in response, it was seen by many as a necessary response to the anarchy that had taken over large parts of the country.

The war itself was brutal. Both sides murdered thousands of civilians. Foreign powers became involved, with the Nazis openly using Spain as a testing ground for their air force in support of the Nationalists, and the Soviet Union providing support to the Republicans — and conning the government out of its massive gold reserves in the process.

In the end the Nationalists – in reality a coalition of many groups, from traditionalist monarchists to fascists and even regular Catholics who did not identify with the anticlerical republic – defeated the Republicans – an equally diverse group of socialists, communists and anarchists, among others – setting the stage for Franco to rule as “Generalíssimo” for the decades until his death, after which he was succeeded by King Juan Carlos, the regent who oversaw a national transition to democracy.

Everything about the Valley of the Fallen is disputed in Spain.

Franco’s supporters laud as visionary a monument dedicated to reconciliation, where fighters and victims from both factions are buried side-by-side and where Benedictines are tasked with praying for atonement, reconciliation and peace.

But his opponents do not see the basilica as a gesture of reconciliation, but instead as a celebration of the regime, and the victory of Catholic nationalism over anti-clerical republicanism.

Left-wingers say the basilica was built by forced inmate labor, while right-wingers argue that only volunteer prisoners were used, and they had two days struck off their sentence for each day they worked, besides being paid a proper wage.

Alvaro de la Peña, a Spanish Catholic lawyer who lives and works in the UK, worries that efforts to subvert the meaning of the monument today risk undoing the hard work put in by those of his grandparent’s generation who managed to forge a new life in peace after the conflict.

“Franco conceived this as a symbol of reconciliation. The artist who designed and sculpted the giant statues, Juan de Ávalos, was himself a socialist who was fully supportive of this monument,” he told The Pillar.

“He is just one of many of my grandparents’ generation who decided that the war could not be repeated and that reconciliation was the way forward. This generation gifted us one of the most peaceful democratic transitions of history where even Franco’s parliament voted in favor of a democracy.”

“I also lived this spirit at home,” de la Peña recalled. “My grandmother lost a brother in the war. He was a teenager and his only crime was to be the son of his father, who worked in the army and was Catholic. I recently saw the leather bag where his remains were kept after his father found him buried and decapitated. Despite this, my family forgave the killers and hid people from both sides at home, including nuns and leftist workers.”

“This was the cruel reality of the war,” he said. “My grandparents’ generations wanted to live in peace, and the Valley symbolizes this. Many families from both sides decided to bury their relatives next to each other as a symbol of reconciliation, under the cross of Christ, and many still want their relatives to remain there, despite the efforts from the government.”

Controversial burying site

When he died, and against his own instructions, Franco was buried in the nave of the basilica, near the remains of Primo de Rivera, leader of a nationalist faction, who was executed by Republicans during the war.

In fact, Franco was the only person buried in the Valley who was not killed in the conflict.

In 2007, socialist prime-minister José Luís Zapatero’s PSOE government introduced the Historical Memory Law, which was presented as a mechanism to provide justice to those who had been persecuted under Franco’s dictatorship.

Initial proposals included granting citizenship to foreign members of the International Brigades, who fought for the Republicans, and the rejection of laws passed by the Francoist regime.

But the legislation eventually evolved, leading to the removal of Franco’s remains from the basilica in 2019, after a fierce legal battle. Primo de Rivera’s family has meanwhile voluntarily removed his remains from the basilica to another resting place.

Now, under Pedro Sanchez, the current socialist government has its sights on doing a makeover of the Valley of the Fallen, transforming it into what it claims will be a more neutral space, changing its overall symbolism.

In hindsight, the decision to bury Franco in the basilica turned the Valley of the Fallen into a place of pilgrimage for the far-right, Sanchez has said.

Alvaro de la Peña agreed that the decision was misguided, but says that this is not enough to explain the left’s drive to change the monument and “re-frame the real narrative of reconciliation towards a narrative of hatred. None of the other 200 crosses destroyed or threatened by the government have Franco buried next to them, but they still targeted them,” he said, referring to other Christian symbols removed or destroyed, because they were deemed to represent Francoism.

Javier Villamor is spokesperson for the conservative activist group HazteOír (Make yourself heard), in Spain. He also thinks that the issue was never only about Franco.

“The left has never wanted to admit either the defeat in the civil war or much less that their great enemy was buried there,” he told The Pillar.

“Despite this, even if Franco had not been buried there, the monument would have been equally questioned by opposing ideological sectors due to its construction during the Franco era.”

Many Spaniards like Villamor believe that this ideological struggle is actually about something much deeper.

“In the opinion of many, the focus is no longer only on the Civil War issue but also on the cross and what it represents for the current enemies of Spain,” he said. “The Valley is not only a cross or a basilica but also a symbol of a Catholic Spain that refuses to die.”

“The Spanish left, led by the PSOE and more radical political forces, currently seeks to impose a partial and revanchist vision of the past,” according to Villamor. “It instrumentalizes the Valley as an ideological tool to perpetuate division and obtain symbolic victories they could not achieve historically. This type of initiative does not contribute to reconciliation; on the contrary, it revives and deepens social fractures.”

But could that be the plan? Many opponents of the current government believe it is.

“Pedro Sánchez is surrounded by judicial investigations. His wife is being investigated for several cases, his brother too, as are some people from his inner circle, including a former Minister and one of his former employees. In this context he is trying to appeal to his voters by re-opening civil war wounds”, said the London lawyer.

The compromise decision on the future of the Valley was reached after direct negotiations between the Spanish government and the Vatican.

This is because the custody of the monument belongs, among others, to the Spanish state, the Church, and private foundations, and Church-state relations are subject to a concordat between the Holy See and the Kingdom of Spain.

Pope Francis named his close ally, Cardinal José Cobo Cano, Archbishop of Madrid, as representative of the Vatican in these negotiations, with the government represented by Justice Minister Félix Bolaños. The final meeting took place in Rome in the presence of Secretary of State Cardinal Parolin, shortly before Pope Francis died.

During the 12 years of his pontificate, Pope Francis never visited Spain, and is not known to have made any comments on the Valley or its fate.

But his successor, Pope Leo XIV, did visit the Valley of the Fallen in 2003, when he was prior general of the Augustinians, with an international gathering of Augustinian youth.

According to the agreement, the basilica will continue to serve as a place of worship, though reduced to only a small portion of the current building. The rest will be used for secular exhibitions, as part of the government’s objective of “re-signifying” the site.

The two parts of the building will have separate entrances. The monks will remain, though Brother Santiago Cantera, who headed the monastery for nine years and was said to be a staunch Francoist, has been replaced by the more moderate Alfredo Maroto, who has committed to keeping the basilica “a monument to reconciliation and a valley of peace.”

Also, the 500-foot cross, the largest in the world, will not be removed.

Considering the left had vowed to try to remove the cross and the monks from the valley, the Church seems to have good reason to be pleased with the result of the negotiations.

Javier Villamor, whose organization campaigned against the secularisation of the site, describes this as “a significant victory for the Catholic Church and citizens who defend religious freedom and respect for the Christian identity of Spain,” but warns that “we know we will have to keep fighting because the left will not stop at this.”

“The plans for the reconfiguration of the Valley continue,” Villamor said. “The longest basilica in the world will be reduced to about ten meters, and the entrance will be turned into a museum of revision of recent history. And let's not forget that the basilica is also in the shape of a cross. As they dare not demolish the elevated cross, they will go for the cross that draws the basilica.”

Others, on the other hand, say that those who see this as a victory are missing the larger picture.

“In general, I would say engaging in these conversations with the government is already a loss and the government is using the Church to legitimize its plans. As a Catholic, I am happy the basilica and the monks will remain, but it’s amazing how we can be in a position where we believe that avoiding the destruction of the cross is a win,” said de la Peña.

“The mere fact that a government is trying to destroy one of the largest crosses in the world should be of great concern even if they don’t manage to do so yet. Governments should focus on protecting religious freedom, and we should not underestimate the threat to religious liberties that these conversations represent.”

As the government prepares to receive proposals for its desired “resignification,” the Spanish bishops have tried to rein in expectations, reminding everyone that: “It was established that a person proposed by the Catholic Church will review the final winning project of the competition before its execution to ensure that the agreements are respected and the interventions are in accordance with liturgical norms.”

Quid pro quo?

Around the same time that the government and the Church announced they had reached a deal about the future of the Valley, the government also said it had decided not to create a commission to look into sexual abuse in the Catholic Church in Spain. The coincidence led some to claim that the deal between Cobo and the government had been about more than just the Valley.

The Church, however, has strenuously denied that.

One Spanish priest who spoke to The Pillar, but asked not to be named because this is a sensitive issue, called the theory “garbage.”

“The Valley mostly belongs to the state, they could basically have done whatever they wanted to it. Yet the Church managed to get almost everything it wanted: saving the cross, the monastery and the basilica. It makes no sense to say that in exchange for this the government decided not to go ahead with the commission on abuse, because the Church didn’t really make any concessions.”

Rather, the priest suggested, the government’s decision is related to the fact that the Church had accepted the official involvement of the “People’s defender” – an ombudsman charged with protecting fundamental rights and civil liberties in the kingdom – in the bishops’ own commission, created to evaluate abuse cases and decide on financial compensation for victims.