SHOWDOWN COMES IN SPAIN

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 290, 5 September 1942, Page 7

SHOWDOWN COMES IN SPAIN

Army And Fascists SUNER’S DISMISSAL BLOW TO NAZIS

(By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright.) (Received September 4, 9.30 p.m.) LONDON, September 3.

Changes in the Spanish Government and the Falange, announced in Madrid, have caused great interest in London (says British Official Wireless).

The principal change is the replacement of Senor Suner as Foreign Minister and as president of the political committee. Senor Suner (General Franco’s brother-in-law), who has long been known for his extreme views, has been replaced as Foreign Minister by General Jordana, and in the Falange position by General Franco.

General Asensio replaces General Varela at the War Ministry, and Senor Perez replaces Colonel Galarza at the Ministry of the Interior. “The long-expected showdown between the Spanish Army and the Falange, which is Spain’s Fascist

Party, has suddenly burst with the dismissal of iSuner, who is the principal Falangist boss,” says the “Daily Telegraph's” diplomatic correspondent, “The whole shake-up may Ibe read in Berlin as a keep-out sign. “Franco has found that he can , no longer temporize and has had to swing right over to the Army, whose opposL tion to Suner and also to the Falange’s home and foreign policy has been mounting for mouths.

Militarists’ Outlook.

“Kuner’s pro-Germanism is intense, but he was compelled to observe a certain restraint in, foreign affaffilrs, probably -at Franco’s orders. During Kuner’s control the Falange has been a tool in Germany’s hands; Falangists have been introduced in all departments of the State’s activities, with the single exception of the Army, which is free from any form of party control. “The army as a whole is fundamentally monarchist and the higher officers are intensely nationalist; they are proSpanish' and nothing else. They do not want to see Kpain used as a German pawn and would put up determined, if not desperate,, resistance to any German plans for an invasion of the Iber ian Peninsula.”

A Madrid message confirms the Cabinet changes. General Jordana is a noted Spanish jurist. Asensio, who was one of Franco’s generals, in the civil war, became High Commissioner in Morocco in 1939. The Chief of 'Staff of the Army in 1941, General Perez replaces Senor Galarza as Minister of Justice. Senor Figueroa replaces Senor Luna as the Falange’s deputy secretary-general and Asensio is appointed a member of the Falange political committee.