Stanley G. Payne ist ein renommierter Historiker mit Spezialisierung auf das moderne Spanien und den europäischen Faschismus. Seine Forschung befasst sich eingehend mit den tiefgreifenden politischen und sozialen Kräften, die Spanien und faschistische Bewegungen in Europa geprägt haben. Paynes fundierte Analysen bieten wesentliche Einblicke in die komplexe historische Entwicklung des Kontinents.
Die große Gesamtgeschichte der Epoche des Faschismus (1914 bis 1945) aus der Feder des bedeutendsten Faschismus-Forschers unserer Zeit. Der Faschismus war - neben dem Kommunismus - die unheilvollste und zugleich massenwirksamste Ideologie des 20. Jahrhunderts. Die gefährliche Mixtur aus Führerkult, übersteigertem Nationalismus, Fremdenhass und Rassismus, oft gepaart mit aggressivem Antisemitismus, nahm ihren Anfang mit Mussolinis Marsch auf Rom und gipfelte im vom nationalsozialistischen Regime entfesselten Zweiten Weltkrieg und im Holocaust.
Was Franco sympathetic to Nazi Germany? Why didn't Spain enter World War II? In what ways did Spain collaborate with the Third Reich? How much did Spain assist Jewish refugees? This is the first book in any language to answer these intriguing questions. Stanley Payne, a leading historian of modern Spain, explores the full range of Franco's relationship with Hitler, from 1936 to the fall of the Reich in 1945. But as Payne brilliantly shows, relations between these two dictators were not only a matter of realpolitik. These two titanic egos engaged in an extraordinary tragicomic drama often verging on the dark absurdity of a Beckett or Ionesco play. Whereas Payne investigates the evolving relationship of the two regimes up to the conclusion of World War II, his principal concern is the enigma of Spain's unique position during the war, as a semi-fascist country struggling to maintain a tortured neutrality. Why Spain did not enter the war as a German ally, joining with Hitler to seize Gibraltar and close the Mediterranean to the British navy, is at the center of Payne's narrative. Franco's only personal meeting with Hitler, in 1940 to discuss precisely this, is recounted here in groundbreaking detail that also sheds significant new light on the Spanish government's vacillating policy toward Jewish refugees, on the Holocaust, and on Spain's German connection throughout the duration of the war.
The history of modern Spain is dominated by the figure of Francisco Franco, who presided over one of the longest authoritarian regimes of the twentieth century. Between 1936 and the end of the regime in 1975, Franco’s Spain passed through several distinct phases of political, institutional, and economic development, moving from the original semi-fascist regime of 1936–45 to become the Catholic corporatist “organic democracy” under the monarchy from 1945 to 1957. Distinguished historian Stanley G. Payne offers deep insight into the career of this complex and formidable figure and the enormous changes that shaped Spanish history during his regime.
