Talk:Francisco Largo Caballero

Cut sentence: PSOE congress in autumn 1936

I removed the following sentence, mainly because of its strange verb tense and lack of indication of the outcome: "A PSOE congress in autumn 1936 would try to bridge the Prieto and the Largo Caballero factions." Its placement in the article (before the discussion of July 1936 outbreak of the Civil War) led me to wonder if perhaps it was a planned congress that never took place? In any case, it is not mentioned in the corresponding Spanish-language article. If anyone can sort this out and make it clearer, I have no problem with something to his effect being put back in the article, but as it stood it was little more than a source of confusion. -- Jmabel 06:41, Sep 15, 2004 (UTC)

Concentration camp

We say he was imprisoned in Dachau. The corresponding Spanish-language article says Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg. Does anyone have a citation? -- Jmabel 06:41, Sep 15, 2004 (UTC)

Sorry, I don't know how to stagger this to indicate a reply, but I just wanted to say that I have it on good authority that Francisco Largo Caballero was emprisoned at Sachsenhausen, NOT Dachau. Good authority is this: when I visited Sachsenhausen, I ended up having a conversation with another visitor who happened to be an academic expert on Caballero, who told me about how he went to the camp almost every day to talk to people about him because Caballero is "the most famous victim of the camp that nobody's ever heard of." I looked the guy up when I got home, and he turned out to be legit; he was a professor at some university in Germany (though he was Czech himself), and his name and academic work turned up in all the right places, including "Who's Who in the World." Problem: this was several years ago, and I can't for the life of me remember his name. No name means no citation, and I don't want to change the article without a citation to back it up. I'm going to try to find something, though, eventually, but if somebody stumbles across this before I make the edit and wants to do the research -- be my guest. My rain face 00:06, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Given that neither specific camp seems to have a reference, I will reword less specifically pending a reference. - Jmabel | Talk 05:21, 28 May 2006 (UTC)

99% sure it was Orianengburg. Dachau 100% sure not. MJGR 10:15, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

POUM

An anon has changed "the Trotskyist POUM" "the Ex-Trotskyist, POUM". I suppose they were technically ex-Trotskyist (they'd broken with Trotsky personally, although a party like them would today be called Trotskyist) but Centrist? I am partially reverting, leaving the "ex-"; even though it may be a little misleading, this is not the article about the POUM, but deleting Centrist. If someone wants to take this up, I'd really appreciate some citation of sources, because this is subtle and contentious stuff. -- Jmabel | Talk 23:44, Dec 3, 2004 (UTC)

Wouldn't it simply be more accurate to label the POUM as "oppositional communist" or even "anti-Stalinist"? I think that the label of "Trotskyist" is misleading in reference to the organization's origin. As the Wikipedia article on the POUM states, the POUM drew membership from both the Right Opposition (Workers and Peasants' Bloc) and the Left Opposition (traditional Trotskyism. Merely referring to the organization as "Trotskyist" implies that it is simply a Leftist Opposition organization. Futhermore, labelling it "ex-Trotskyist" is almost as misleading, since that implies that the POUM was either at one time led by Trotsky or vastly Trotskyist in its membership, neither of which, to my knowledge, is correct. Lastly, we can't label the POUM "Trotskyist" merely because it believed in Trotsky's world-revolution thesis. Several individuals of varying labels, especially amongst the anarchists, subscribed to a similar belief. I wouldn't say that belief in world-revolution alone is enough to qualify one as a "Trotskyist," though it certainly puts their respective philosophies on a parallel. An excerpt (pages 177-178) from George Orwell's Homage to Catalonia reads as follows:

"But the POUM had no connection with Trotsky or the Trotskyist ('Bolshevik-Leninist') organization. When the war broke out the foreign Trotskyists who came to Spain (fifteen or twenty in number) worked at first for the POUM, as the party nearest to their own view-point, but without becoming party-members; later Trotsky ordered his followers to attack the POUM policy, and the Trotskyists were purged from the party offices, though a few remained in the militia."

Hopefully this was of some help. I'll refrain from editting until you've replied with your opinion. - Thomas Facchine | Talk

Thanks. I seem to have typo'd when I wrote my comment above. The phrase I'd objected to (which I misquoted) was "the Ex-Trotskyist, Centrist POUM". "Centrist" was the word I was really objecting to. But, yes, "oppositional communist" or "anti-Stalinist communist" would be more correct. Go for it. - Jmabel | Talk 04:36, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Doubts

The article states the following: "In the elections of November 19, 1933, the right-wing Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right (CEDA) won power in Spain." I believe CEDA got a lot of deputies but it couln't govern alone. In fact, all the presidentes in the "Bienio Negro" belonged to the Radical Party (Lerroux and so on) or other republican forces. So that paragraph should be changed. MJGR 10:17, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

The article ends with this paragraph: "Largo Calvo fled Spain to Mexico in 1949 where he resided until his death in 2001. He is survived by his granddaughter, Sonia Lellis, and two great-grandchildren, Christopher and Ryan Lellis, who reside in the United States." I suppposed Sonia, Cristopher and Ryan are the granddaughter and great-grandchildren of Largo Caballero but the wording is confusing and it's not clear if they don't refer to Largo Calvo. I've changed the article to eliminate the ambiguity, I hope I'm not wrong. MJGR 10:29, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

The article says that "His son, Francisco Largo Calvo, was imprisoned by the Francoists at the start of the Spanish Civil War and spent the entire war behind bars under the threat of execution". No citation is provided and I have doubts about the risk of execution. Interchanges of prisoners were typical of the Spanish Civil War and the son of such a prominent leader as Largo Caballero was too valuable to "waste" it. So I think a source is necessary here. MJGR 10:33, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Problem of neutrality

The article states that: "In early October 1934, after three CEDA ministers entered the government, he was one of the leaders of the failed armed rising of workers ...". Well, is that 100% proved and accepted? It has serious consequences. If he was a leader of that revolution it means he didn't accept the legitimacy of the Republic and that the PSOE didn't either. I believe the accusation has always been there but has never been proved beyond doubt. In fact, he was not even judged at the time if I'm not wrong. So that paragraph should be present as a theory not a proven fact. MJGR 10:22, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Why don't talk about he's an Stalinist?

This man was a total Stalinist. Under his government he placed big pictures in the main square of Madrid with the face of Stalin, with the legend "LIVE THE USSR". He changed the name of the main avenue of Madrid to "Avenue of the Soviet Union". Why is not any mention to all his speeches during the 30's when he said often that "spain had to reach a true communist revolution, and it will come no matter if with good or bad methods, and if we must go to war, we will". This man is one of the main responsables of the civil war, something that people doesnt use to know, even when his darkest history is removed to be not remembered. --FoxR (talk) 22:51, 23 April 2013 (UTC)

External links modified

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