In winter of 1944, Franco’s diplomat in Hungary Ángel Sanz Briz saved thousands of Hungarian Jews from being murdered by Nazis. He was recognized for his heroic actions by Yad Vashem decades ago but talking about his feats has been difficult in Spain. Sanz Briz was acting on orders from the Franco regime, and that messes with people’s understanding of the dictatorship as unadulterated evil. Journalist Arcadi Espada, who is very liberal, found that his research into this story always led people to ask, “but isn’t it true that Franco hated Jews?”
“Would you prefer that he loved Jews but let them die?” Espada would answer.
This is the difference between saying and doing that plagues our existence these days. What matters more, things that people say or what they do? Do the reasons behind their actions matter? Of course, Franco decided to save the Hungarian Jews because it was clear that Germany was losing the war and Franco wanted to make nice with the Allies. He did achieve that goal, and the Allies allows him to stay in power long after Hitler was gone. Does that matter, a little or a lot? Or do the thousands of lives that Franco’s diplomat saved in conditions of great risk to himself matter more?
Since nobody in Spain was interested in telling Sanz Briz’s story, some Italian dude who was marginally present in a few of the rescue operations took all the credit and made a whole career out of pretending to have been far more important to the story than he actually was. Espada unravels all this in his fascinating research. He’s a liberal who is tired of leftist excesses and wants to do serious, old-fashioned journalism. I never read anything by him before but he’s a gifted author with a unique voice, and this book was extraordinary in how free Espada feels to speak without taking recourse in any leftist pieties.
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