Q
It seems absurd to ask for forgiveness, just for the atrocities committed 500 years ago, when many more can be considered to date. However, it may be a good help to establish a more harmonious relationship between both countries for a group of Spaniards to establish their repudiation of what they condemn for making the original Mexican civilizations savage and voracious ancestors, even though almost five centuries have passed.
Such would also be the case if contemporary relations took into account the valuable flow of Spanish migrants who found refuge from the abominable peninsular Francoism that, in the shadow and with the support of Hitler and Mussolini, settled in Spain in 1939 and, even after their disappearance, continued until the mid-1970s.
It is well known what would have happened to so many Spaniards with “civilized” ideas if they had not found safe shelter in Mexico, as well as good conditions to develop personally and professionally. It is very curious that there is no shortage of peninsular people today who have the hard face to assure that there were no more than about 10 thousand… At least, until 1942, the number of those welcomed, thanks to which they saved their lives or, at least, their freedom, was around 40 thousand.
But it didn’t end there: relatives and friends of the “refugees” also crossed “the pond” at the end of the 1940s and the beginning of the following decade, when it was possible to do it “the good way”, although almost all of them also had every reason to flee from Franco’s rule.
For the most part, such refugees were food for Mexico, although their descendants can be divided between those who became Mexicanized and those who remained staunchly Spanish and, worse still, some who even came to denigrate Mexicanness, despite the benefits they enjoyed from it.
Fortunately, with the passage of time, those of human category, without losing respect for their origin, became true Mexicans and, like their parents, have been very beneficial for our country.
This separated some and others and, of course, it has been the “Mexicanistas” who, like their parents and even their grandparents, have stood out very favorably at the national level.
It is the case that many do not even attest to their origins, among other things because it is not necessary and it does not represent any value to them. After all, our country is made up of a string of Mexicans whose parents or grandparents or some of them were not born here.
I don’t know if that is for or against, but it is the case that such Mexicans are fully and, in general, of value.
What is true, although it seems to be forgotten at times, is that Mexico was not only the only country that opened its doors in such a way, but that it even made many wise efforts so that they could escape from “facha” Europe, thanks to which many even saved their lives.
Little is remembered, for example, about the enormous feat of Don Gilberto Bosques Saldívar, representative of Mexico in France that was not completely subdued by the Nazis, although Marshal Pétain, who was its ruler, turned out to be quite fascist.
Bosques was first -1939- consul general, then ambassador of Mexico and finally even taken prisoner by the Nazis by virtue of everything he did in favor of the French and other nationalities, starting with the Spanish who had managed to escape the fascism of their countrymen.
Not in vain, tributes are paid to him, for example, street names in the cities of Vienna and Marseille, while in Spain there are almost no testimonies of gratitude.
Sometimes the Spaniards lose sight of the fact that the great Mexican help did not only consist of receiving and protecting so many thousands of them in Mexico, but also in giving rise to so many persecuted people there being protected to seek asylum and be saved here.
But it is the case, it is worth reiterating, that they also gave rise to the fact that, at the beginning of the 50s, many more relatives and friends found shelter and refuge in this land of ours. I believe that in total we can speak of a figure close to 50 thousand Spaniards who, in the end, by one means or another, found security and a decent way of living in our country.
