"You are the history, you are the legend"

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http://www.elpais.com/articulo/english/You/are/the/history/you/are/the/legend/elpepueng/20111026elpeng_1/Ten


The four International Brigade members (standing) at the unveiling of the monument in Madrid.- SANTI BURGOSÓSCAR RODRÍGUEZ


They were less than 20 years old when they left their countries and families to come and gamble their lives in Spain in defense of a government that was not theirs but whose ideals they shared: the Republic. They came to number 35,000 - among them writers such as George Orwell and politicians including Willy Brandt - arrived from 55 countries. Around 9,000 of them died or were taken prisoner. Today, few are still alive, but four of them have come to Spain to participate in the tribute organized by the Friends' Association of the International Brigades to mark the 75th anniversary of their creation by decree of then-Republican Prime Minister Francisco Largo Caballero.

"I was 17 and I thought I had to do something," says Briton David Lomon, who is a month away from celebrating his 93rd birthday. "I didn't want to just stand there while I saw fascism winning in Spain. The day I turned 18, I went. I didn't say anything to my mother because she would never have let me go, and I felt a lot of remorse for what she suffered, but afterwards she said she was very proud and I turned into her favorite. And I had eight brothers and sisters."

Lomon arrived thinking they would win. "We were the good guys," he says with a smile. It didn't take him long to realize it wasn't going to be so easy. "When I arrived in Spain I wasn't aware of the magnitude of the support that the Italians and Germans were giving Franco. I wasn't expecting that. Neither was I expecting that we would be so alone. Nobody was supporting the Republicans, only volunteers."

But it was during the brief training he did before heading to the front that Lomon really realized how weak his side was. "It was terrible. For weapons we had the leftovers from the Russians in the First World War. They kept jamming. They were very delicate. Neither the heat nor the cold suited them."


:applause: :patriot:

[bemildred]

1. "Homage to Catalonia" - George Orwell

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homage_to_Catalonia

[xchrom]

2. it's sad that the anti-franco forces were wracked by so many factions and that stalinists had

managed to get themselves into positions of power & influence.

[bemildred]

3. Once they go for the dogma, you can kiss the revolution good bye.

I am watching the development of OWS with just that in mind. So far they are doing good, the occupation IS the message, IS the program, IS the speaker.

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4. indeed. nt

[marmar]

5. Muy impresionante !!!

k/r

[starroute]

6. Papers like the NY Times were covering up the Italian and German support

I don't know the details, because this is something my mother told me when I was little -- and she'd learned about it from reading Georges Seldes' reporting at the time. But basically, the Times was catering to its wealthy pro-fascist advertisers by never mentioning that Franco's forces were puppets of Hitler and Mussolini.

If the British papers were the same -- and I'd expect they were -- it's no wonder that Mr. Lomon didn't know about it.

That's one difference today. The mainstream media may not have given up their lying ways, but we're no longer limited to a single heroic reporter like Seldes to get at the truth.