ABSTRACT
When Franco died on 20 November 1975, few Spanish politicians of either right or left could have predicted with any precision the country’s political development over the subsequent decade. Only the broad outlines were vaguely discernible. With their Caudillo gone, all but the most frenzied defenders of the Francoist fortress realized that concessions would have to be made to the democratic enemy at the gates. There was hope, but no certainty, that a passage to a pluralist regime might be managed bloodlessly through negotiation between the more liberal supporters of the dictatorship and the more moderate members of the opposition. Yet even the most reasonable men and women on both sides had widely differing views about what they expected from such dealings. Moreover, there existed powerful elements at the extremes of the spectrum who were unlikely to relinquish their maximalist positions. In the event, the skill and steadfastness of Adolfo Suárez, King Juan Carlos and the principal opposition leaders ensured a relatively tranquil transition. However, only the most percipient observer could have foreseen that their stumbling progress towards democracy would be through the ambushes laid by terrorists of right and left and across the minefields of military recalcitrance.
