Chateau Lloyd

If you've read my ongoing discussion of the Spanish Civil War, you know one of my favorite authors is Stanley G. Payne.

He now has a article up at First Things which provides an excellent and concise account of Spain's slide into civil war.

It is a serious read, but well worth your time.

It also dovetails with the misgivings I expressed in November, which have not in any way been assuaged. 

In one sense, it is comforting that a historian with Payne's stature seems to share my sense of deja vu, but it is also deeply alarming.  I don't know Payne's politics, but his work has always been scrupulously neutral, carefully noting the excesses of the Spanish Right but also providing appropriate context within the environment and balancing them with the behavior of the Spanish Left.

This isn't false equivalence, but necessary information.  Similarly, his article offers no analogies, draws no modern parallels because it doesn't have to.  The modern left is purposefully using the exact same slogans and tactics.  To merely quote them is to expose this.

Maybe my book was driven by a premonition or subconsciously intended as a warning.  In any event, it's uncomfortably relevant.