With two episodes in our series about national liberation movements in France, and two in Spain, we thought it was time for a secessionist movement that straddles the two countries along their mountainous border. This group, with a long history of fighting for freedom, was one of Francisco Franco’s fiercest foes during his military rule. Today we discuss the Basques and their truly ancient nation. 

The Basque language is the oldest living language in Europe, a fossil from before the Indo-European invasions over 4000 years ago. The fact that the Basques have been so linguistically (and to a certain extent, genetically) distinct for so long is a testament to their independence. Basque Country is in the very rugged terrain of the Pyrenees Mountain Range, and while many empires have extracted tribute from them, as early as the Romans, they have failed to assimilate them. A Basque polity was formed in the middle ages, Navarre, which passed between French and Spanish hegemony, similar to how Brittany played off British and French competition. The Spanish grew to control most of Basque country, and the Basques enjoyed a high degree of autonomy with their own distinct fueros, codes of law, with related protections given to their northern cousins under French rule. The fueros of medieval Spain are a fascinating example of bottom up, customary law, law that the King of Spain and his vassals were bound to uphold and not allowed to amend.

Statists on both sides of the Pyrenees took away the Basques’ ancient rights. In France, the customary autonomy of the Basques was, like the Bretons, dissolved by the Jacobins in 1790 who sought French national unity over silly things like rights. With war against the Spanish in 1793, Basque men refused to engage in blood spilling against their brothers across the border, and the French state responded by deporting thousands of Basques away from the border regions (their homelands). A well known Jacobin propaganda line was “Fanaticism speaks basque”. Yes, to oppose war is fanatic, DOYYYY. In Spain, the increasingly centralized Spanish state which was once a loose union of kingdoms before it became Absolutist in 1714 still more or less respected basque autonomy until it was conquered by Napoleon in 1808. With the return of native rule the old understandings were upheld in 1814, however as Spain continued its descent into centralization (now under the cover of “liberal” ideas passed down to the spanish legislature from France) conservatives and liberals fought over privileges and rights in the same way they did in the 1848 Sonderbund War in Switzerland. The conservatives, for the wrong reasons, supported regional autonomy and decentralization, whereas the so called liberals wanted direct rule and saw holdouts like the basques as vestiges of feudalism. In 1833 the first Carlist war broke out and the basques backed the man who promised to restore their ancient rights of autonomy, Carlos V. This series of civil wars lasted through Carlos’ grandson and to 1876. With the defeat of the reactionaries came the last gasp of hope for a Spanish state that was interested in Basque autonomy. 

The next major chapter in Basque history begins in 1865 with the birth of Sabino Arana, a son of a carlist. Arana’s politics would become much more radical. Carlism was in vogue in Arana’s childhood, but in 1882 when a stranger saw his Carlist insignia he told him “Well, look, that’s what I don’t quite understand. If the people of Biscay are Spaniards and your homeland is Spain, I do not know how you want to enjoy privileges that other Spaniards do not have and avoid obligations that all Spaniards must understand equally before the common Homeland. Enjoying the fueros you do not serve in the Spanish army, nor do you contribute money to the Treasury of the Fatherland. You are not good Spaniards”. 

Arana, instead of being offended, saw the truth in his words. How can a nation like the Basques simply ask for privileges from their mother empire? The solution was to create their own polity where they can become more than just parasites on the national core. In 1894 he founded one of the oldest political parties still around in Europe, the EAJ or Basque Nationalist Party. A man who detested both classical liberalism (as he saw it) and socialism he formed a sort of christian integralist ideology that totally rejected spanish nationalism and indeed even spaniards. Despite his reactionary leanings however he was a stalwart abolitionist and anti-imperialist, supporting the African Zulus in their fight against the British Empire in his time. During the disastrous Spanish-American War Arana was imprisoned for sending a telegram to then Colonel Teddy Roosevelt congratulating him for liberating Cuba from Spain. He died in prison in 1903. 

Basque nationalism continued to develop after Arana’s death, moderating somewhat, but by the Spanish crisis of 1936 political catholicism was a strong enough force within the EAJ that the party and the Basque people were not sure who to back. Navarre had voted for the right bloc in the last democratic elections, and the Republicans were disliked and distrusted for their anti-religious bigotry. Still, the programme of Franco’s Nationalists was much too centralist for the Basques and ultimately they threw their lot in with the Republic. In 1937 the Basques were to suffer greatly for this choice, as the city of Guernica was mercilessly bombed by Nazi German warplanes, unopposed as the Republicans gave little help to the Basques. Their suffering continued after the victory of the Francoists, as the party was banned and its leaders were forced underground or in exile. Many Basque fighters ended up fighting the German occupation of France during the 40s in the shelter of the Pyrneees. 

While the EAJ was under constant threat of destruction in Spain a group of young men who disagreed with their non-violent approach founded the ETA (Basque Homeland and Liberty) in 1959. This group quickly became enmeshed in the Third Worldist Maoist ideology of the far left against their mother organization’s at this point very center-right outlook, and started conducting bombings and assassinations starting from 1968. In their bloody war against the Spanish State, they had the honor of successfully killing Franco’s chosen successor in 1973, unquestionably crippling the military dictatorship. The last men in Spain executed by the State were ETA members, and their deaths in 1975 only did more to threaten Franco’s tenuous hold on power and international acceptance in his last few months of life. One would think that the overthrow of the regime in 1977 would have ended the ETA’s bloodlust, but in the late 70s and early 80s they were totally unmoved by the new government’s Statutes on autonomy which gave the Basque nation a measure of self rule once again. Only in 2010 did the ETA finally agree to a ceasefire, after decades of car bombs and indeed the infamous 2004 train bombing in Madrid was initially blamed on the Basques. 

As the ETA conducted their war against the Kingdom of Spain, after the restoration of democracy the EAJ did very well for itself, being the largest party in every single election in the Autonomous Basque Region since 1980 and being the senior governing party in all but one. The current central spanish government relies on the EAJ along with a number of other regionalist parties to pass important legislation. The old Basque province of Navarre has been separated from Basque country and EAJ has some influence there as well, but as a junior partner with the left wing EH Bildu (Basque Country unite!)

Prospects for an independent Basque state are unclear, however the Basque nationalist movement continues to hold significant cards in the very polarized Spanish central elections. Autonomism is a fairly strong force in Spain in almost all the provinces but the Imperial core of Castille, but full throated independentism is only popular in brave Catalonia and among Basque parties like EH Bildu. The EAJ, once a focal point for the radical program of freedom from Spain, has become a moderate roadblock to what the Basque people have demanded for millennia. Freedom! Let us hope they return to their motto: God and the Old Laws. Long live the Basques and may 1000 flowers bloom.