ABSTRACT
The political evolution of the Franco regime can be divided into four phases, each identified by basic systemic change. The first phase, 1936–1941, is almost coterminous with the Civil War; the second extends from 1942 to 1952; the third from 1953 to 1958; and the fourth from 1959 to the death of Franco on November 20, 1975. Domestically and internationally, Franco supported others with totalitarian leanings. His first confidant was his brother-in-law, Ramon Serrano Suner—a militant pro-Nazi whom Franco appointed minister of the interior in charge of internal security from 1938 to 1942. After ill-fated Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941, it became apparent that the Axis powers, which had assisted Franco and helped make his victory possible, would be defeated in World War II. The agreement with the United States was signed on September 26, 1953, just a month after Franco had signed a new concordat with the Vatican to replace the one concluded in 1851.
