[209] The Restoration system had functioned so long as there was little need for strong government in Spain. Popular apathy, an elite consensus, and military quiescence had enabled the turno parties to define their differences in purely personalistic terms, frequently without regard for public opinion or the national interest. But economic expansion and social mobilization since 1914, together with the failure of the Spanish army in Morocco, had transformed the Spanish political environment. As the fall of the Maura government in March 1922 made clear, a growing number of Spaniards now found the traditional immobility of the dynastic parties intolerable. If those parties -- and the parliamentary monarchy -- were to survive, they must meet the challenge of the parliamentary Socialists, who viewed the Moroccan war as the occasion to build a new majority in favor of political and social reform. Until the experiment was cut short by the pronunciamiento of September 1923, first the Conservatives and then the Liberals would attempt to render the regime more responsive to public opinion.

Although Romanones had defected from the Maura coalition in hopes of returning to power at the head of a reunited Liberal party, his ambitions quickly proved to be unrealistic. Not only was Santiago Alba bent on excluding him from the Liberal coalition, but the king was also unwilling to transfer power to the Liberals, whose alliance with the Reformists he distrusted as a potential threat to the military campaign in Morocco and possibly, to the Crown itself. Moreover, with his well-publicized defiance of the Maura government only two months behind him, Alfonso was unwilling to risk new elections to the Cortes. Accordingly, he appointed José Sánchez Guerra, the leader of the Conservative majority in the Cortes since January 1922, who formed a cabinet on March 8 that included Maurist and Lliga representatives. ⁽¹⁾

[210] For the Conservatives in 1922 there were two alternatives: they could emphasize their conservatism by adopting an intransigent posture on the issues of the war and "responsibilities," or they could attempt to expand their power base at the expense of the Liberals by responding more positively to the leftward shift in national opinion. Sánchez Guerra chose the second alternative, a choice signaled by his unilateral decision on March 30 to restore constitutional guarantees throughout Spain. Significantly, this decision immediately destroyed the Conservative coalition. On March 31 the Maurist César Silió and the regionalist José Bertrán y Musitú resigned to protest both the decree and its implications for the future. Undaunted, Sánchez Guerra persevered in his search for a new political equilibrium for the regime. During his nine-month tenure of office, he endeavored to make the Cortes, the administration, and the dynastic parties more responsive to public opinion and less dependent on the army. By late 1922 his success had alarmed the Liberals, who querulously demanded that "if we are to be governed liberally, let the Liberals govern." ⁽²⁾

Nevertheless, by December 1922 Sánchez Guerra had to admit defeat. His attempt to make the system more responsive without altering its fundamental structure was a failure: it had split his party, alienated a segment of the army, and forced the regime into a discussion of responsibilities that it ultimately could not master. The problem was that in a rapidly polarizing political environment, the center could not hold. Sánchez Guerra was unwilling to give in to the inflexible Conservatives on his right, but unable to foresee or accept all the consequences of his tentative steps toward the left. In the end, the Conservatives reverted to defense of the old system, a decision that brought the Liberals to power.

During 1922 the political influence of the military continued to grow. More factionalized than ever by Sánchez Guerra's sporadic attempts to provide a new orientation for civil-military relations in Africa and in the peninsula, the army still lacked the unity to impose specific programs on the government. But because of their precarious situation, the Conservatives succumbed to the pressures imposed first by one military faction, then by another. The vulnerability of the government was exacerbated by the tendency of civilians on both the left and the right to transform the professional quarrels of junteros and africanistas into symbols of the political debate within the country as a whole. As military issues became even more politicized, it was impossible to conduct a discussion of military reform or Moroccan policy without introducing larger questions involving the basic foundations of the regime. At the same time, the resolution of minor military disputes became the [211] chief preoccupation of the government, distracting it from more urgent political reform. This confounding of political and military issues -- the inheritance of the long years of political reliance on the army -- made the army the key to the political situation, despite a growing realization on the part of civilian politicians that civil supremacy was the necessary first step toward political and military reform. The confusion was not limited to civilians. In 1923 the army, acting to preserve its professional interests, would believe itself compelled to assume control over the political affairs of the nation.

The Moroccan Campaign

The ambiguities of the path chosen by Sánchez Guerra in 1922 were best illustrated by his approach to the most critical issue facing the government -- the Moroccan war. Although the homogeneity of his cabinet spared him the fate of his predecessor Maura, it could not help him close the unbridgeable gap between his desire to respond to public opinion and his party's commitment to military intervention in North Africa. The traditional policy of compromise and vacillation, useful while public opinion remained indifferent to Moroccan affairs, was inadequate to neutralize the rapidly polarizing forces in the peninsula and the Protectorate. On the one hand, an energetic policy seemed necessary to offset Abd el-Krim's escalating offensive; on February 1 the rebel leader had declared the independence of his "Emirate of the Rif" and a month later had initiated heavy shelling of Spanish fortresses in the central Rif. On the other hand, public opinion was eager for a halt in operations. Freed from the self-imposed restraints of the early months of the reconquest, the Liberals freely exploited the extensive middle-class disaffection over the war, demanding the repatriation of the quota soldiers and somewhat hypocritically urging a rapid resolution of the campaign. ⁽³⁾

As the enormous cost of effective pacification became apparent, public alienation increased. In response, Sánchez Guerra decided to modify the policy formulated at the Pizarra Conference by Maura and summoned General Berenguer to Madrid in late March. During their talks, Berenguer and the government agreed to return to the three-stage plan of operations devised by Berenguer before Anual in order to facilitate budget cuts and a partial reduction in troop strength. ⁽⁴⁾ Somewhat naively, they hoped that this would also restore the pre-Anual apathy in the nation. But a return to the past was impossible. The staggered plan of operations was feasible only if the Rif were quiescent, [212] as it had been in 1919-20. In the month following his conference with Sánchez Guerra, Berenguer was able to mount a successful campaign in the west by concentrating his forces and utilizing his best officers -- Sanjurjo, González-Tablas, Emilio Mola, and Alberto Casto Girona -- against al-Raysuni's mountain stronghold at Tazrut, forcing the sharif to flee to the Ghumara for safety in mid-May. But in the east, the line -- dangerously exposed and immobile in violation of Berenguer's own theories -- was harassed mercilessly by the haraka of Abd el-Krim. The frequent casualty reports alarmed the public and infuriated the army, both of whom thus remained unsatisfied by Sánchez Guerra's attempt at compromise. Furthermore, the prolongation of the campaign made it impossible for the government or Berenguer to promise an early end to the war. For everyone with a son or husband in Africa, total abandonment of the Protectorate became the only guarantee of early repatriation.

Furthermore, public opinion in 1922 would no longer accept the secrecy that had characterized the conduct of the war prior to Anual. Understandably, neither Berenguer nor Sánchez Guerra was eager to publicize the details of their policy discussions for fear of alerting the enemy. Nor were they accustomed to the incessant public debate on Morocco. On April 22 Berenguer threatened journalists who dared to criticize the conduct of operations with the Law of Jurisdictions. ⁽⁵⁾ Neither the Conservatives nor the army could appreciate the left's increasingly successful efforts to present the war as a violation of popular sovereignty.

Junteros and Africanistas

Throughout 1922 public opinion continued to be distracted by the ongoing quarrel between junteros and africanistas. The problem facing the government was the same as it had been since 1918: how to reward service in Africa without alienating the large bureaucratic faction in the officer corps. The dilemma was complicated by the tendency of nearly all groups in Spain to make political capital out of purely professional disputes. Public controversy over military factionalism usually resulted in political opponents' choosing sides. Consequently, the political leverage of both military factions increased even further.

Upon assuming office on March 8, Sánchez Guerra had inherited a difficult situation. Since January there had been two Infantry Juntas: the domesticated Advisory Commission in Madrid created by the decree of January 16, whose president -- Colonel Godofredo Nouvilas Aldaz -- [213] had served in Barcelona prior to his appointment, and the old organization, which continued to operate independently in Barcelona in clear defiance of the decree, under the leadership of Colonel Fernando Berenguer, a brother of the High Commissioner who did not share his africanismo. As usual, Barcelona remained the focus of juntero activity, not least because most appointments in the Madrid garrison were given, at the king's insistence, to africanistas. To alleviate the tension, Sánchez Guerra had chosen the Captain General of Barcelona, General José Olaguer-Feliú, as Minister of War, and had appointed General Primo de Rivera to fill the vacancy in Catalonia. Both were markedly pro-juntero and antiafricanista.

Two days after taking office, Olaguer had to deal with a confrontation between the new, official Infantry Commission and the old one, both of which had called general assemblies in Madrid on March 10. To avoid a public quarrel, Olaguer engineered a joint session between the two antagonists, a tactic that achieved the result he desired -- the fusion of the two organizations under the leadership of Colonel Nouvilas. With this maneuver, a potentially fatal breach in the juntero movement was averted, and the intent of the January 16 decree was subverted.

Having overcome their jurisdictional dispute, the delegates at the assembly were able to focus their energies on a common enemy -- the africanistas. The accords adopted at the end of the twelve-day session reaffirmed their opposition to all merit promotions -- earned or unearned. To enforce this principle, the junteros also reaffirmed its corollary -- compulsory unionization. Refusal to renounce any merit promotion awarded after April 30, 1921, meant violation of the juntero oath, punishable by expulsion from the Corps. In compensation, the Junta proposed the concession of nonremunerative decorations for those performing "extraordinary services" for the nation. In addition, the assembly urged the prosecution in honor courts of all military responsibilities, even though "such a severe criterion is not applied in other social sectors or in more elevated ranks of the military hierarchy." Finally, the delegates claimed a more active supervisory role for the Advisory Commission, especially with regard to academy training and the professional journal. ⁽⁶⁾

The accords revealed that the grievances that had given rise to the Juntas de Defensa in 1917 still festered. Alfonso's vigorous exercise of his constitutional prerogatives as head of the armed forces was the catalyst for the juntero protest, although africanistas had partially replaced the old military elites as objects of royal and ministerial favoritism. But the root causes of professional syndicalism in the officer corps lay in the structure of the Spanish army and in its relationship to [214] the political system. So long as the officer corps remained top-heavy and underemployed, opposition to selective promotions, however impartial or professionally justifiable, would continue. And so long as the civilian politicians and the king continued to rely on the army instead of on public opinion, the sizable bureaucratic faction represented by the Infantry Junta would be an effective pressure group.

Predictably, the africanistas retaliated shortly afterwards by publicly resigning from the Infantry junta. On April 15 officers in the vanguard shock units stationed at Dar Drius collectively resigned from the local Infantry Junta, rejecting "any intervention of the Advisory Commissions that is not authorized by the royal decree of last January 16." The decision was communicated to the president of the local Junta by the head of the Tercio units, Lieutenant Colonel Franco, in a letter charged with indignation. ⁽⁷⁾ Similar letters from two longtime adversaries of the Junta, Colonels Millán-Astray of the Tercio and Manuel González Carrasco of the Regulars, appeared the second week in May, followed by one from the Regulars stationed at Xauen, whose leader, the brilliant young diplomado González-Tablas, had died in the assault on Tazrut May 13. Simultaneously, the Regulars circulated a letter in the Infantry Corps urging unity, professional renovation, and the elimination of the Junta, "whose baneful action uselessly disrupts the life of the nation." ⁽⁸⁾ The most striking characteristic of all these letters, which were widely reproduced in the press, was their tone, combining the self-pity of the martyr with the outrage and moral condescension of the crusader. Like their rivals the junteros, the africanistas were beginning to see themselves as both symbols and saviors of the nation.

Although the three hundred africanistas who resigned from the Infantry Junta in 1922 represented only a small fraction of the ninety-three hundred officers in the Corps, their political leverage was disproportionately large because they commanded extensive popular support. The africanistas profited from their role as victims of juntero vindictiveness; they had also previously earned the nation's respect by devoting themselves to professional rather than political goals. In appreciation of this, Sánchez Guerra had already decided to resuscitate La Cierva's ill-fated promotions bill even before the latest juntero-africanista conflict became public. By eliminating the controversial promotions of Generals Berenguer and Barrera, two officers who had held high commands both before and after Anual, Sanchez Guerra hoped to separate the promotions bill from the still-unresolved issue of responsibilities. In a private meeting with the Socialist and Reformist leaders, Indalecio Prieto and Augusto Barcia, on April 4, ⁽⁹⁾ Sanchez Guerra obtained a promise of their cooperation.

[215] Prieto and Barcia were forced to reconsider their promise when General Picasso submitted his completed report on military responsibilities to the government on April 18. Although Sánchez Guerra agreed to submit the Picasso report to a parliamentary committee once it had been reviewed by the Supreme Military Council, ⁽¹⁰⁾ the left decided to try to block the promotions bill until after the arrival of the Picasso report in the Cortes in order to drive home the principle of popular sovereignty. ⁽¹¹⁾

The promotions bill passed easily on May 12, however, both because of the current furor over the africanista resignations and because of the rapid advance by Berenguer's forces in the Jibala. ⁽¹²⁾ The deputies even added an extra name to the list -- Colonel Alberto Castro Girona, a talented africanista who had played a leading role in the capture of Xauen in 1920. Fired by a desire to rebuke the Infantry Junta, both the Congress and the Senate ignored Prieto's arguments in favor of placing responsibilities before rewards, even though the same arguments had been persuasive six months before. No time was spent establishing a set of criteria for promotions; Prieto's efforts to evaluate the merits of each case were dismissed as sectarian protest. On June 6, 1922, the bill became law.

This was the first time the Cortes had exercised its promotion powers since the passage of the Law of 1918. The conduct of both left and right seemed to vindicate the critics, like General Luque, who had always argued that legislative approval was no guarantee of objectivity. During the debates in the Senate, Luque had once again insisted on returning the power to award merit promotions to the War Ministry, meeting the objections against favoritism with the contention that the seniority principle was worse. In Luque's view of the world, patronage was normal, even divinely sanctioned -- as he observed in the Senate, did not men pray for favors to the Virgin and the Saints? ⁽¹³⁾ Even those who did not embrace Luque's somewhat cynical view of the prerogatives of power were tempted to agree that promotions were technical matters best determined within the War Ministry. On June 21 the government presented a bill restoring merit promotions to the executive branch. ⁽¹⁴⁾ Although the Socialists opposed the bill in order "to exalt the parliamentary function," ⁽¹⁵⁾ the Conservative majority saw only that parliamentary debate had put meritorious africanistas at the mercy of left-wing politicians. On July 20, 1922, the bill passed the Congress and was signed into law.

Taking advantage of the sympathy for the africanistas, Indalecio Prieto introduced a motion in the Congress on June 14 to reinstate the ESG students expelled from the army by the Infantry Junta in December [216] 1919 ⁽¹⁶⁾ Three hundred africanistas had recently committed the same "crime" as the students by publicly resigning from the Junta, without suffering the same consequences. As a result, the government could not oppose the motion without mortally offending the africanistas and public opinion as well. Bowing to the inevitable, Sánchez Guerra agreed to reopen the case of the students if the left would settle for a judicial, rather than a parliamentary, solution to the conflict. After Prieto withdrew the motion, the prime minister ordered the civil Supreme Court to consider the appeals of the students, whose number had been reduced to twenty-two by the untimely death of the source of the whole conflict, Ramón Martínez de Aragón. On July 9, 1922, the court declared its competence over the case, and arguments began. ⁽¹⁷⁾ Foreseeing the outcome of the trial, the Infantry Directory and General Olaguer asked Sánchez Guerra to seek a delay while the junta polled its members on reinstatement. But the prime minister refused, conscious of the interest the case had aroused in the press. On July 11 the Supreme Court reached its verdict in favor of the students. The next day, the Infantry Junta predictably announced that its poll was also favorable to the students. Nearly one-third of the junteros, clustered in Barcelona, Saragossa, and La Coruña, had voted against reinstatement, however, a sign that the strongholds of juntero opinion were still unrepentant. ⁽¹⁸⁾ To placate them, Sanchez Guerra denied the reinstated students their rightful seniority in the War College, thereby implicitly sanctioning the juntero vendetta against the Staff Corps. On August 1 one of the former students, José Luis Coello de Portugal, resigned from the army in disgust. ⁽¹⁹⁾

The resolution of the ESG affair was typical of Sánchez Guerra's general military policy in the spring and summer of 1922. By joining the assault on the Juntas, he earned a small measure of popularity for the government. But the prime minister's assertion of civil supremacy owed less to conviction than to pressure from the left; he acted only because he could count on support among the africanista faction of the officer corps. Furthermore, the attack on the Juntas, like the promotion of the africanistas, did not grow out of a conscientious analysis of military policy. Both Sánchez Guerra and his critics were motivated exclusively by political considerations. As a result, the structural causes of praetorianism remained. Throughout 1922 the military factions continued to quarrel publicly, creating issues around which public opinion could coalesce.

The most serious consequence of these small, and generally fruitless, confrontations with the Infantry Junta was that they distracted national attention from the government's indisposition to encourage [217] parliamentary debate on public policy, particularly with regard to Morocco. In June 1922 Sánchez Guerra took advantage of the smoke screen provided by the Juntas to push the new budget through the Cortes. The Maura coalition had collapsed during the budget discussions on Morocco the previous winter. As Santiago Alba argued, the budget was "the numerical expression of a criterion that must be previously established by the Parliament"; ⁽²⁰⁾ no funds should be appropriated before the government's domestic and foreign policy had been discussed and ratified. But neither the dissidents in the dynastic parties, like Alba, González Hontoria, and Cambó, nor the deputies on the left were able to arouse the Congress into a serious debate on the proposed figures, which included War Ministry expenditures in the peninsula and Africa totaling nearly eight hundred million pesetas. ⁽²¹⁾ Instead, most political energy was expended on rejecting the tax reforms that were to provide the revenue to pay for the inflated expenditures. By July 5 the entire budget had been approved after minimal debate in the Congress and even less in the country at large. Until the public could be persuaded that fiscal reform and legislative responsibility were the foundations of democratic government, the Spanish political system would remain defective.

The Indictment of General Berenguer

Although Sánchez Guerra profited from popular apathy over the budget, he would not be so lucky on the issue of military and political responsibilities for Anual. The link between the budget and the unpopular Moroccan war was difficult for a nation unfamiliar with responsible government to perceive; the link between the responsibilities question and the war was unmistakable. The government's attempt to steer a middle course between the two poles of public opinion was a dramatic failure that exacerbated the military situation in Morocco and discredited parliamentary government even further. After five months of reacting thoughtlessly to the divisions in the country and the army, the government would collapse.

The responsibilities issue, carefully left dormant by Sánchez Guerra, was brusquely resuscitated on July 6, 1922, when the Supreme Military Council, after a three-month review of the Picasso report, handed down thirty-nine indictments for negligence or dereliction of duty at Anual, including an indictment of General Berenguer, the High Commissioner and Commander-in-Chief of the African army. A condemnation of Berenguer's policies was implicit in the report submitted [218] by General Picasso on April 18, notwithstanding the circumscription of his investigation by La Cierva in August 1921; indeed, an ill-disguised resentment against La Cierva and the obstacles Picasso had encountered during the investigation permeated the entire document. ⁽²²⁾ Without directly accusing Berenguer or his civilian supporters, Picasso condemned the war of positions, the halfhearted governmental support for the war, and the low morale and careless disregard for the security of the zone that had characterized the Melilla Command under General Silvestre. Picasso leveled no specific charges against Silvestre, in part because Silvestre's personal papers had apparently disappeared immediately after his death. For this reason, none of the telegrams the king had supposedly sent to Silvestre before the disaster was ever discovered. The only specific indictments in Picasso's report were against thirty-seven lower-ranking officers for dereliction of duty during the retreat.

The Supreme Military Council, however, acted on the unstated implications of Picasso's report. Denying the legality of La Cierva's efforts to protect Berenguer from Picasso's investigation, the military prosecutor concluded that Berenguer was primarily responsible for Silvestre's mismanagement of the Melilla sector in 1920-21, an accusation of negligence that was in some measure justifiable. ⁽²³⁾ But the prosecutor went on to charge Berenguer with responsibility for every defect in the African army, including those that were the result of long-standing government policy, such as the limited use of European troops or the absence of uniform academy training for officers. Significantly, the prosecutor rejected as a "new and lamentable error" the testimony of Lieutenant Colonel Miguel Núñez de Prado of the Regulars, who had blamed the absence of merit promotions for the decline in morale in the zone. For "emitting an opinion contrary to the Legislation on merit promotions," ⁽²⁴⁾ the Supreme Military Council had added Núñez de Prado's name to the list of thirty-nine accused officers, which also included Generals Silvestre (whose body had never been recovered) and Navarro (still a prisoner at Ajdir). ⁽²⁵⁾ The prosecutor had reportedly also wanted to indict the Vizconde de Eza and La Cierva, the War Ministers who had supported General Berenguer as High Commissioner in 1921-22, but the Council had reluctantly voted against asserting its jurisdiction over civilians. ⁽²⁶⁾

The Supreme Military Council's list of charges was vindictive and unjust. The public had expected the military to close ranks in the face of civilian demands for high-ranking military responsibilities. Instead, the highest military tribunal had taken the initiative against the General-in-Chief who had been protected from the consequences of [219] the Anual disaster by the civilian politicians in the dynastic parties. The answer to this paradox lay in the incalculable depths of the military factionalism that had paralyzed both civilian government and military reform for decades. The nine-member Council was almost unanimously out of sympathy with Berenguer and his policies; it included several mediocre senior generals isolated from the Moroccan campaign and resentful of Berenguer's meteoric career; a former War Minister, General Santiago, who was doubtless eager to divert attention from ministerial responsibilities; a former rival in Africa, General Domingo Arraiz; Picasso himself; and most important, the head of the Council, General Francisco Aguilera, an ambitious political general whose notorious desire for national prominence had been thwarted since the rise of the Juntas and the renewal of the Moroccan war. Picasso's investigation, influenced largely by the testimony of two juntero colonels from the Melilla Command, Riquelme and Fernández Tamarit, had provided Berenguer's enemies with the ammunition they needed, while furnishing Aguilera with a platform from which to catapult back into the public eye.

His hitherto brilliant career abruptly interrupted by the rise of the Juntas in 1917 and by his break with Garcia Prieto in 1919, Aguilera now found an outlet for his frustrated ambition as the leader of a third military party composed of senior generals isolated like himself from the centers of power. More important, he overnight became the darling of the political opposition, who were discouraged by the government's evasion of the responsibilities question. As in 1917, the left optimistically turned to the army as a source of political regeneration; on July 17 Aguilera received a letter signed by twenty-six well-known writers and journalists -- among them, Miguel de Unamuno, Julio Camba, Ramón del Valle-Inclán, Marcelino Domingo, Manuel Ciges Aparicio, Ramón Pérez de Ayala, Roberto Castrovido, and Luis Araquistáin -- that hailed the indictments as the gesture "that can be the dignification before History of this infamous hour in Spanish life." ⁽²⁷⁾ A few days later Aguilera thanked the intellectuals for their "historic" letter, and the alliance between Aguilera and the left was sealed. ⁽²⁸⁾ Once again the army owed its political leverage to its civilian supporters.  The Council's decision caught Sánchez Guerra by surprise because his War Minister, the pro-juntero General Olaguer, had not bothered to warn him. As a consequence, his first response was to minimize the implications of the indictment by suggesting that the Council did not intend to ask the Senate to release Berenguer -- a life senator since January 1921 -- for trial. ⁽²⁹⁾ Quickly informed by Aguilera that such indeed was his intention, Sánchez Guerra had no choice but to accept [220] Berenguer's resignation as High Commissioner, proffered in person on July 9.

On the fourteenth, Berenguer rose in the Senate to defend himself. As he perceived it, the primary charges against him were based on events both before and after the retreat from Anual: he had failed to curb the rash advance of General Silvestre, and he had refused to rescue Monte Arruit in the days immediately after the disaster. The former charge he answered by explaining the relative autonomy of the Melilla Command; the latter, by recalling the lamentable state of the expeditionary forces upon their arrival in Melilla. In conclusion, he turned on the government, accusing it of engineering his indictment in order to remove him from his post. ⁽³⁰⁾ Although this was not true, the War Minister's juntero sympathies made it difficult for him to present a convincing rebuttal. In order to make clear that he had supported Berenguer in good faith, Sánchez Guerra accepted General Olaguer's resignation on July 15 and took over the War portfolio himself.

All the same, the indictment of Berenguer produced a shift in Sánchez Guerra's attitude toward the army. During his first four months in office, he had favored the africanistas in order to combat the Juntas. Henceforth, he would strive to maintain a balance between the two factions in order to avoid a dangerous identification with either of them. It was apparent that continued support for the ex-High Commissioner would be politically disastrous. In the peninsular army, officers with a grievance were delighted to discharge their venom against the africanistas and the governments that had favored them. According to La Correspondencia Militar and the elderly lieutenant generals who volunteered their opinions to the press, Berenguer and the Maura government of 1921 shared the blame for not rescuing Monte Arruit and for not taking advantage of the initial popular support for the war to achieve a rapid conquest of the entire Protectorate. ⁽³¹⁾ By implication, the Conservatives were also guilty for retaining Berenguer and for failing to prosecute the war with vigor. The virtue of this position was that it allowed peninsular officers to attack the africanista faction that had risen to national prominence and royal favor under Berenguer without attacking the Moroccan war itself.

The indictment of Berenguer also reinvigorated the left's languishing campaign in favor of abandonment and the prosecution of responsibilities. ⁽³²⁾ The government's initial response was to repress the antiwar demonstrations that broke out in several cities and to arrest the organizers. ⁽³³⁾ It was readily apparent, however, that the clamor for a change in policy was not limited to the extreme left, but was widely seconded among the Spanish middle class. Anxious to retain support [221] for his government, Sánchez Guerra made two gestures calculated to appease the critics: he delivered the Picasso report to the Cortes and appointed Berenguer's old rival, Ricardo Burguete, as High Commissioner in Morocco. Unfortunately, these decisions implied a policy reversal that the Conservatives could not entertain. By December the contradictions in its policy would bring down the government.

Although he had agreed under duress in March to submit the Picasso report to the Cortes, it is not clear that the prime minister had thoroughly considered the implications of this concession. Parliamentary examination of the report was sure to disclose the organizational defects that the Supreme Military Council had attributed to Berenguer but that were more correctly attributable to government indifference and neglect. More important, the report's vivid portrayal of the disarray and demoralization in Melilla was bound to resuscitate the debate on the relationship between weak government and the absence of military reform. By July his Conservative colleagues had called the prime minister's attention to these undesirable consequences. But in the wake of Berenguer's resignation, he believed he could not defy the parliament. In order to put pressure on the government to submit the report, all factions but the Conservatives had formed a "Minority Commission" on July 18. On July 23, the last day of the summer session, Sánchez Guerra agreed to the creation of a parliamentary committee reflecting the total political composition of the Cortes, which was to examine the report during the summer recess and prepare its own recommendations for presentation at the autumn session. ⁽³⁴⁾

Replacing Berenguer was more difficult than countenancing the fait accompli of his indictment. The time seemed ripe for a change of policy. Since June the Liberals had been demanding the creation of a "civil Protectorate" to replace the predominantly military regime in Morocco, ⁽³⁵⁾ a proposal Berenguer had opposed as unrealistic. With Berenguer gone, Sánchez Guerra might now respond to the popular desire for a halt in operations, while at the same time satisfying the anti-Berenguer faction in the army. On July 16 Sánchez Guerra chose General Burguete as High Commissioner. The appointment, gratifying to the Juntas if not to the lieutenant generals who were once again passed over for the position, was initially confusing to knowledgeable africanistas. Burguete was well known for the Nietzschean bellicosity of his earlier writings, but his first pronouncement on his intended policy was ingratiatingly pacifistic. ⁽³⁶⁾ His subsequent statements rejecting a "military solution" to the Moroccan problem made it clear that whatever his past philosophy had been, Burguete was no man to sacrifice ambition to consistency. What he shared with Sánchez Guerra [222] was a desire to avoid controversy and to stay in power. Public opinion demanded an end to operations, and the new High Commissioner was ready to comply, at least verbally.

Burguete's accession thus represented a return to the static policy followed by Spanish governments prior to 1919. Quite predictably, the inherent contradictions in that policy quickly reproduced the conditions that had frustrated colonial officers in Morocco throughout the world war. Having promised an end to operations, Burguete opened negotiations with al-Raysuni shortly after his arrival in Tetuan on July 20, a foolish decision that saved al-Raysuni once again from imminent defeat and converted the Spanish position in the Jibala from one of strength into one of weakness. In the Rif, where the Spanish position was already weak, Abd el-Krim could not be persuaded to negotiate. The tribes near the Spanish line remained hostile, even though General Castro Girona, an officer noted for his skill in dealing with the Moroccans, was appointed head of the Office of Native Affairs in Melilla. ⁽³⁷⁾ There, the middle course favored by the government was impossible; the only logical alternatives continued to be abandonment or a convincing show of military superiority. Abandonment was, of course, not contemplated, and within a month Burguete, infected by the impatience of the vanguard units at the front near Dar Drius, was contemplating a renewal of operations and a future landing at Alhucemas Bay. On August 24, prior to a small security operation near the forward line, Burguete delivered a rousing exhortation to the troops that suggested he had already forgotten his commitment to "peaceful penetration" and was ready to launch an offensive against the rebel stronghold at Ajdir. ⁽³⁸⁾

The government's dismissal of Burguete's harangue as "wartime literature" ⁽³⁹⁾ did not dispel the public apprehension of renewed military operations, which were indeed inevitable if the government intended to retain control over the Rif. Preoccupied with his political survival, however, Sánchez Guerra did not want to recognize this inevitability, at least not publicly, and possibly not even to himself. Burguete was called to Madrid, where he was reminded once again of his commitment to a policy of peaceful penetration, a commitment Burguete publicly acknowledged on September 1 in La Correspondencia Militar. At the same time, he promised the public he would be in Alhucemas by January, "without it having cost us combats to go there. . . ." ⁽⁴⁰⁾

To provide institutional support for this policy, on September 16, 1922, Sánchez Guerra signed a decree establishing the "civil Protectorate" demanded by the Liberals and the left. In essence, the decree [223] restored to the Ministry of State most of the functions that had been gradually delegated to the War Ministry or to the High Commissioner as General-in-Chief since 1919. The virtue of the decree, in the government's eyes, was that it made the civilian Minister of State the ultimate authority over the Protectorate while simultaneously bolstering the fiction that the Protectorate was being administered in the name of the sultan by creating a Riffian ^camil subordinate to the khalif. In addition, the decree facilitated a transfer of credits that appeared as a reduction in the budget of the War Ministry. Despite the reorganization and transfer of the Office of Native Police to the jurisdiction of the Minister of State, however, ⁽⁴¹⁾ the decree did not necessarily insure an end to military operations in Morocco. The High Commissioner, who retained the title of General-in-Chief, was given explicit authority to utilize the Native Police (relabeled "Khalifal Forces") as he chose.

Given the reality of the situation in Morocco, the decree in fact affected the practical administration of the zone very little. So long as the Rif remained unpacified, the military would continue to dominate the administration -- and consume the budget -- of the Protectorate. Furthermore, neither Sánchez Guerra nor Burguete was truly interested in altering the fundamental structure of the Protectorate; their main concern was to rob the Liberals of their best issue. Nevertheless, the decree did contain substantial implications for the formulation of Moroccan policy in Madrid. With the appointment of a strong Minister of State, Santiago Alba, in December 1922, the implications of the decree would be realized.

The decree was less politically profitable than the government had anticipated because its promulgation coincided with the exposure of more corruption in the African army. On September 6 it was discovered that 1,050,000 pesetas from the monthly Quartermaster Corps budget in Larache had been embezzled by a captain in the Corps, Manuel Jordán. ⁽⁴²⁾ Further investigation revealed that nearly 3,000,000 pesetas a year had been stolen in the General Command at Larache alone. ⁽⁴³⁾ Through a system of fraudulent bids and orders, a consortium of Quartermaster Corps officers had received monthly dividends ranging from 60,000 to 30,000 pesetas, according to rank, a comfortable arrangement that might have continued indefinitely had not greed intervened. After a two-month leave in the peninsula, Captain Jordán had returned to Larache to find that he had been eliminated from the cut during his absence. Seeking revenge, he stole the rake-off for the entire month of August 1922 -- 1,050,000 pesetas -- and then threatened to report the consortium unless he were allowed to keep the money. His superior officer demanded Jordán's court-martial, thus exposing the entire [224] operation. Word quickly leaked to the peninsula, sparking a public outcry that forced the government to order a full judicial investigation. ⁽⁴⁴⁾ Ultimately, the case of the "Larache Millions" would lead to General Pedro Bazan's investigation of military "administrative responsibilities" in 1923.

To offset the scandal, Burguete redoubled his efforts to ingratiate himself with news of a negotiated peace throughout the zone. On September 22 he triumphantly -- and prematurely -- announced that through the good offices of the ex-sultan, Mawlay ^cAbd al-Hafiz, Abd el-Krim was about to submit to Spain. ⁽⁴⁵⁾ But the French had exiled ^cAbd al-Hafiz in 1913 for disloyalty. The government quickly disavowed the announcement and forced the ex-sultan to disengage publicly from Moroccan politics. ⁽⁴⁶⁾ Stung by this failure, Burguete compensated by rapidly concluding his negotiations with al-Raysuni, who formally recognized the sultan's sovereignty and returned to a new house and comfortable pension at Tazrut. ⁽⁴⁷⁾ On October 6 Burguete journeyed to Madrid in order to announce personally the repatriation of twenty thousand troops. To all outward appearances, the "civilianization" of the Protectorate was well underway.

In the Rif, however, the reality was less sanguine. Abd el-Krim's haraka continued to harass the forward positions, and tempers in the Melilla garrison were badly frayed by the demoralizing halt in operations. ⁽⁴⁸⁾ Thus, even as he trumpeted the success of his pacification plan, Burguete privately requested -- and received -- permission to resume forward progress toward Alhucemas Bay, which he promised to take without casualties. ⁽⁴⁹⁾ At the end of the month, a column of 30,000 men marched in the direction once taken by General Silvestre, only to be ambushed at Tizi Azza on October 28 by rebel tribesmen. There were 121 casualties, and the skittish government ordered an immediate halt in operations. ⁽⁵⁰⁾ For the next three years, the Spanish army would be stymied at Tizi Azza, which was difficult to defend and equally difficult to supply. Although there were almost daily casualties, the government was too weak, and the army too proud, to order a retreat. Morocco thus continued to be the weak spot of the parliamentary regime.

The Demise of the Juntas

Critical as it was, the ambiguity in the government's Moroccan policy was again obscured during the fall of 1922 by the resurgence of the factional quarrels that had dominated military affairs in the peninsula [225] since 1917. The crisis was triggered by the king, who wanted to bolster africanista morale -- somewhat battered by the discovery of the Larache Millions, the creation of the civil Protectorate, and the halt in operations -- with a special homage in Seville featuring the king, the Regulars of Larache, and Major José Varela, a Regular officer who had won two Laurel Wreaths and a merit promotion for his exceptional bravery in the Jibalan campaign of 1919-21. Never averse to exploiting the national popularity of the young officers in the elite units, the Conservative government had unwisely consented to the ceremony, which quickly became the vehicle for a public display of solidarity between Alfonso and the africanistas. Although only the Regulars were invited to Seville, the leader of the Tercio, Millán-Astray, drew attention to his own unit by collecting money from his men to buy the queen a jewel. The preparations for the ceremony, scheduled for October 14, were followed enthusiastically in the africanista press.

In the Infantry Junta, however, the ceremony had aroused much less enthusiasm. For one thing, the homage to Varela, who had been promoted by the Cortes the previous June, was an obvious manifestation of official support for merit promotions. For another, the visibility of Millán-Astray lent an antijuntero cast to the entire proceedings; ever since the africanista resignations the previous spring, Millán had been the target of discreet but constant hostilities by junteros in the peninsula. ⁽⁵¹⁾ Most important, however, the personal attention being lavished on the Regulars underscored the potential inequities of a return to battlefield promotions. To emphasize their continuing support for the seniority principle, Infantry officers in the Seville garrison boycotted both the royal presentation on October 14 and a testimonial banquet offered by the government to the head of the Regulars, González Carrasco, three days later. ⁽⁵²⁾ Then, in a press interview on the eighteenth, the president of the Infantry Junta, Colonel Nouvilas, pointed out that the favoritism that had provoked the formation of the Juntas de Defensa in 1917 had not disappeared. Indeed, since merit promotions had been restored to the discretion of the War Ministry on July 30, nearly 250 names had been submitted, including two recommendations for the aide of one of the generals. Nouvilas also criticized the presentation of jewels, which might easily degenerate into "pugilism between the Corps to display their dynasticism." ⁽⁵³⁾

The conflict sent shock waves through the officer corps, which was still bitterly divided over the issue of selective promotions. Predictably, the junteros were attacked most vociferously by those who had profited under the old system. Luque's El Ejército Español urged the Advisory Commissions to "leave the Army in peace" in editorials on [226] October 18 and 19, and on October 20 the Staff Corps voted against the closed scale with only forty dissenting votes. The same day, officers from the Infantry regiments in Madrid (composed largely of former africanistas and favorites of the king) saw Millán-Astray off at the station as he left for Melilla. ⁽⁵⁴⁾

Ironically, the Junta's protest was received most sympathetically by the antidynastic left, whose attitude toward the military Juntas had now come full circle since 1917. Once again, the left found it convenient to view the junteros as the victims rather than the agents of political decay and the Juntas as the only institution strong enough to resist the Crown's tendencies toward absolutism. Alfonso's blatant courting of the africanistas bolstered the left's contention that military indiscipline was only a symptom of the general indiscipline that permeated the Spanish state at every level. Military reform was only a necessary first step toward a more sweeping political renovation that included the subjugation of the Crown to the rule of law. ⁽⁵⁵⁾

The government's support for the fete in Seville thus proved to be a political liability -- particularly since the issue of military reform was no longer confined to the extreme left but was being exploited by the Liberals as well. Sánchez Guerra was looking for an opportunity to demonstrate his own devotion to the principle of civil supremacy when one was unwittingly presented by General Martínez Anido in late October. The general's resignation as Civil Governor of Barcelona climaxed several months of mounting tension that had begun shortly after the restoration of constitutional guarantees on March 31, 1922. Although the CNT remained an illegal organization, the leaders released from prison had begun to reorganize and the underground action groups had resumed their street warfare with the gunmen of the Sindicato Libre. Fearing a return to the anarchy of 1919-20, the urban middle classes had complained strenuously both to the Diputation and to the Civil Governor himself. Another source of tension in Barcelona was Martínez Anido's aggressive anti-Catalanism. The Lliga's collaboration with Conservative governments in Madrid since 1919 had served the interests of the Catalan bourgeoisie, but the prolonged suspension of constitutional guarantees and, more especially, Cambó's highly protective tariff of February 1922, had alienated a large sector of the lower-middle class. In June 1922 a newly formed left Catalan party, Acció Catalana, was making serious inroads in Barcelona. By continuing to support the resolutely anti-Catalan Civil Governor, the Lliga was once again caught between its class and regional interests. ⁽⁵⁶⁾ On August 7 Martínez Anido had petulantly resigned, only to be persuaded to return to office by massive displays of civic solidarity and repentance. ⁽⁵⁷⁾ [227] To consolidate this support, Martínez Anido and his agent, Police Chief Arlegui, had encouraged the assassins in the Libre, who shot and severely wounded the moderate Syndicalist leader Angel Pestaña on August 25. In a brazen show of his contempt for civil rights, Arlegui then stationed pistoleros outside Pestaña's hospital room to await his release.

For both the government and its critics on the left, the alternatives were clear: the regime of Martínez Anido was incompatible with a normalization of civic life in Barcelona. In an effort to recover his credibility, Martínez Anido staged an attempt on his own life that left four Anarchosyndicalists and a policeman dead. When this ruse was exposed, Sánchez Guerra reacted decisively, firing Arlegui and receiving, as he had expected, the resignation of Martínez Anido as well. If the general had foreseen the usual capitulation by the government, he was soon disappointed. Sánchez Guerra quickly replaced him with a mild-mannered Staff officer, General Julio Ardanaz, who was instructed to follow a more conciliatory policy with regard to the CNT. Nor was Martínez Anido's support in Barcelona sufficient to restore him to his post. The protests registered by the Employers' Federation and the extreme right were perfunctory, and while rumors circulated about rebellion in the garrison, only two of Martínez Anido's closest collaborators in the Infantry Junta actually resigned their posts. ⁽⁵⁸⁾ In a few months the former adherents of Martínez Anido would find a new hero in the Captain General of Catalonia, General Primo de Rivera.

With the dismissal of Martínez Anido, Sánchez Guerra had once again co-opted the Liberals, whose desire to return to power increased in direct proportion to the remoteness of their opportunity to do so. In June the Liberal-Reformist alliance headed by Alba, García Prieto, Álvarez, and Alcalá-Zamora had been sealed with the announcement of a program that included constitutional reform and the civilianization of the Protectorate. ⁽⁵⁹⁾ The new coalition had deliberately excluded the Conde de Romanones, who still aspired to sole leadership of the party. Complete unification might have remained elusive if Sánchez Guerra had not shown such success in stealing planks from the left-Liberal platform: during the summer and fall of 1922 the indictment of Berenguer, the delivery of the Picasso report to the Cortes, the decree creating the civil Protectorate, and the halt in military operations had revitalized the image of the Conservative party, without apparently damaging its fundamental political interests. Romanones, in particular, was alarmed, for the Conservatives had captured the africanista clientele that he had aimed to make his own, leaving him isolated from both the throne and the bulk of his own party. Thus in September 1922 his [228] rapprochement with the Liberal coalition had been achieved, ⁽⁶⁰⁾ and in late October, in a widely publicized speech delivered at the Liberal Circle in Madrid, Romanones cataloged the new Liberal program. Significantly, this program of national reform focused on civil-military relations: dissolution of the Juntas, restoration of merit promotions, and prosecution of responsibilities. ⁽⁶¹⁾ Romanones betrayed his party's anxiety over the future when he proclaimed on November 5, "If we are to be governed liberally, let the Liberals govern." ⁽⁶²⁾ The Liberal offensive against the government was expected to begin when the Cortes reopened for the fall session on November 14.

The interdependence of political and military reform was dramatized by yet another outbreak of the juntero-africanista conflict just four days before the opening of the Cortes. On November 10 Lieutenant Colonel Millán-Astray submitted his resignation, and in a theatrical manifesto directed "to the nation" appealed to "mayors, deputies, senators, generals, and officers" for support in his battle against the Juntas. ⁽⁶³⁾ Since their confrontation in October, Millán-Astray had sent several letters to Sánchez Guerra complaining of the continuing harassment of the junteros, only to be put off with vague assurances that "justice would be done." ⁽⁶⁴⁾ It was clear to him that the government would avoid taking sides unless its hand were forced. Confident of the support of the king and the prestigious africanista wing of the army, Millán felt no qualms in taking his case directly to the nation. Implicit in his manifesto was the assumption that the government's policy of nonintervention thwarted the expression of the national will.

At first the response was gratifying. Opposition parties on both the left and the right delightedly echoed his demand for the dissolution of the Juntas, Young Maurists and other students took to the streets, and antijunteros in the Madrid garrison deposited calling cards at Millán's residence. ⁽⁶⁵⁾ Within two days, however, the bourgeois left had recovered from its initial enthusiasm for Millán's challenge to the government. As El Liberal observed on November 12, one need not support "the partisans of all-out war and of an orgy of promotions" in order to oppose the Juntas. Indeed, the bureaucratic egotism represented in the Infantry Junta was at present less an obstacle to constitutional reform than the unholy alliance between the africanistas and Alfonso XIII. ⁽⁶⁶⁾ Eagerly awaiting the opening of the Cortes, the Liberal coalition intended to make the principle of civil supremacy a question of confidence for the government.

But once again Sánchez Guerra stole a march on the Liberals. Shortly after the formal opening of the legislative sessions on November 14, the prime minister introduced a bill dissolving the Juntas de [229] Defensa. ⁽⁶⁷⁾ Unlike previous attempts at curbing their power, Sánchez Guerra's bill took notice of the grievance that had given them their leverage within the peninsular army: favoritism in the promotions process. Sánchez Guerra proposed a compromise that would enable the state to reward excellence without unduly offending the bureaucratic mentality of the majority of officers. The Law of 1918 was modified to permit merit promotions within a rank, in percentages varying between 5 and 20 percent. In no case could such promotions be refused. Not only would the much-envied closed scale of the Artillery disappear, but also the meteoric careers of royal and ministerial favorites would be held in check. The major significance of the bill was that it mandated the establishment of bureaucratic norms for promotion that, by diminishing the effect of privilege and connections, promised a greater democratization of opportunity for career officers. Thus it satisfied the long-standing aspirations of the military middle class without sacrificing the state's right to select military leaders on the basis of their expertise and accomplishment.

The bill, which was immediately approved, was both politically and legally sound. Not only had it robbed the Liberals of one of their best issues, it represented a long-overdue gesture of independence for the civil state. Sánchez Guerra had not allowed himself to be blackmailed by the africanistas or Millán-Astray, who was replaced as head of the Tercio by Lieutenant Colonel Rafael Valenzuela. He thus began to rescue his party from its uncomfortably close identification with the advocates of military conquest in the Protectorate without falling into the embrace of the rival faction in the officer corps. It was an important first step toward the elimination of military influence in the political process.

Unfortunately, the bill also enhanced the political power of the officer corps by eliminating the principal grievance dividing it. Although the antagonisms between junteros and africanistas were too real to disappear entirely, the dissolution of the Advisory Commissions and the compromise on merit promotions did make it easier for the rival factions to submerge their differences temporarily when it appeared that the autonomy and interests of the army might be seriously threatened by the civil state. Thus the army, encouraged and aided by the king, would not oppose the pronunciamiento of General Prime de Rivera in September 1923.

[230] "Responsibilities" and the Fall of the Government

In spite of Sánchez Guerra's resounding success on November 14, within a month his government would fall, a victim of the responsibilities debates that occupied both the Congress and the Senate as soon as the stir created by the dissolution of the Juntas had abated. Although the government tried to turn the issue to its own political advantage by taking the initiative, it was unable to confine the debate to the military responsibility of General Berenguer and the other officers named in the Picasso report. From the moment Sánchez Guerra had agreed to a parliamentary discussion of the Picasso report, his government, which contained three former members of the 1921 Allendesalazar cabinet, was doomed. The opposition would not be denied a discussion of Conservative responsibilities for the disaster.

The major issue in the Senate was the suplicatorio, or release for trial, of General Berenguer, who had been formally accused of negligence by the Supreme Military Council on October 28. ⁽⁶⁸⁾ Hoping to focus public attention on the military failure in Morocco, the government had agreed to sponsor the suplicatorio, even though it had kept General Berenguer at his post for four months before his indictment. Berenguer had received the news with some bitterness; as he pointed out, he was being asked to serve as a scapegoat for political and military responsibilities that were diffused throughout the system. ⁽⁶⁹⁾ Nevertheless, on November 15 Berenguer urged his colleagues in the Senate to concede the suplicatorio so that he might defend -- and vindicate -- himself before the court.

The president of the Senate, Joaquín Sánchez de Toca, and most of the Conservative majority in the Senate, however, were not eager to comply. Less convinced than their leader Sánchez Guerra of the need for a revision of past policies, they had deplored his delivery of the Picasso report to the Cortes in July and were now determined to use every means at their disposal to protect Berenguer and, by extension, the Conservative politicians who had supported him as High Commissioner both before and after Anual. By December 1 the impunistas, as they were called by their political opponents, had exhausted most of their parliamentary options and were arguing that a vote on the suplicatorio should be delayed until it was clear that Berenguer would not be coming up for trial in the Senate itself along with others "politically responsible" for the disaster at Anual. By suggesting a trial in the Senate, the unreconstructed Conservative majority clearly anticipated acquittal for everyone, including Berenguer. ⁽⁷⁰⁾

These dilatory tactics alarmed all those who considered both civil [231] and military responsibilities to be inseparable from political reform. Already there was evidence that accountability for the Anual disaster would be kept at a minimum. Only a few days before, the first courts-martial in Melilla of junior officers indicted by the Supreme Military Council had resulted in the acquittal of all three defendants. ⁽⁷¹⁾ Now it appeared that General Berenguer and his allies would escape as well. This prospect was disturbing to Berenguer's enemies within the army. On November 29 La Correspondencia Militar had hinted not too subtly that "the Army" would "watch over the dignity and the intangible prestige of the Fatherland." ⁽⁷²⁾ Just as in 1917, officers perceived and presented their professional grievances to the nation as part of the popular movement for national renovation.

Stung by the accusations of impunismo, Berenguer once again requested approval of the suplicatorio on December 5. ⁽⁷³⁾ But he was temporarily rescued from deliverance to his military judges by the fall of the government. The government had foreseen the danger of discussing the Picasso report in the Cortes but had not been able to avoid it. Faced with a belligerent "Minority Commission" formed to examine the report in mid-July, Sánchez Guerra had endeavored to minimize the damage to his party that serious debate must inevitably entail by including majority representatives in the Commission. Having thus sanctioned the concept of parliamentary scrutiny, Sánchez Guerra had hoped that public opinion would be satisfied. Unfortunately, the ten Conservatives on the Commission had been unable to control its deliberations. When the Cortes opened on November 14, the Commission submitted not one report, but three. The Conservatives' majority report predictably denied the existence of political responsibilities that could be "linked to a single government" and hinted at disagreement with Picasso's findings against Berenguer and other high-ranking officers. ⁽⁷⁴⁾ Ten of the eleven minority members found this whitewash inadmissible, however, and signed one of the two other reports submitted for parliamentary action; only Alejandro Lerroux had refused to express any opinion at all. Given his anomalous position as a Republican supporter of the Moroccan war, it was perhaps his only alternative.

Paradoxically, the responsibilities issue was both the basis for a new national consensus and an obstacle to its translation into a concrete political configuration. Unlike social or fiscal reform, the Moroccan war was an issue that transcended class boundaries, making a broad center-left parliamentary coalition possible for the first time. But the minority members of the Commission were unable to unite around a single recommendation to the Congress. The Socialist deputy, Indalecio Prieto, saw the parliamentary investigation as a way to discredit [232] completely the old system, preparatory to an era of political and social democratization. The Liberals, however, were too deeply implicated in the regime to tolerate its wholesale destruction. For them, the responsibilities campaign provided an opportunity to discredit the Conservatives and to reconstruct the Liberal party on the basis of a new commitment to political reform.

In his report, submitted on November 16, Prieto repudiated the Conservative interpretation of the Anual disaster as a regrettable but intranscendental military setback. On the contrary, the disaster at Anual was the logical result of a greater political failure: specifically, the toleration of an expensive, inefficient, and insubordinate army. ⁽⁷⁵⁾ Recognizing that "all the Governments since 1900" were responsible for the Moroccan fiasco, Prieto nevertheless imputed direct responsibility to the Allendesalazar and Maura governments and formally accused them of "prevarication" and thus, of violation of Article 45 of the Constitution of 1876. In addition, Prieto demanded the separation from the army of Generals Berenguer and Navarro, the former junta president, Colonel Araujo, and all of the colonels with a command in Melilla at the time of the disaster. More generally, he suggested abolishing the Quartermaster Corps, the honor courts, and the Law of Jurisdictions. Taken together, Prieto's charges comprised an indictment of a politico-military system in which the state had complacently subordinated the popular will to the interests of an arrogant and incompetent military establishment.

The figure whom the Socialists considered chiefly responsible for the ills of the regime in general and for the failure of the army in Morocco in particular went unnamed in their list of charges, since in constitutional law, the monarchy was above criticism. In his report, Prieto paused to point out that because of the constitution, revolution was the only way to rid the nation of the institutions that had pushed it to the "brink of humiliation and ruin." But this verbal aggression did not disguise the fact that the Socialists were playing by the established rules. Anual, by providing them with an issue with broad middle-class appeal, had introduced the real possibility of a democratic transformation of the regime without the necessity of violent revolution.

This indirect route toward ministerial responsibility -- and thus toward constitutional revision -- was tentatively seconded by the Liberals, who submitted their minority report on November 24. ⁽⁷⁶⁾ But the Liberal proposition was neither as bold nor as consistent as the blanket condemnation of the Socialists. As the self-proclaimed champions of popular sovereignty, the Liberals believed the nation could not be denied an accounting for Anual; on the other hand, their own identification [233] with the parliamentary monarchy was too close to suffer prolonged or serious scrutiny. The Liberal report asked the Congress to "censure" Manuel Allendesalazar and his Ministers of State and War (the Marqués de Lema and the Vizconde de Eza) but denied the existence of a specific legal or constitutional violation that would require a trial in the Senate under the provisions of Article 45. This opportunistic compromise, which demanded reform without risking revolution, was endorsed by all the Liberals, the Reformists, and the Lliga.

Quite predictably, the lack of consensus within the Picasso Commission was duplicated in the Cortes, each proposition receiving support or criticism according to the political affiliation of the speaker. Since the Conservatives held a majority, it seemed likely that no charges of political responsibility would ever be formulated, much to the dismay of responsabilistas in the Cortes and in the country. On November 27 a general meeting of the Madrid Ateneo voted overwhelmingly in favor of a massive public demonstration to force the Cortes to determine ministerial responsibilities. Yet as Álvaro de Albornoz perceptively pointed out in El Liberal, "The disaster at Anual was not due to the negligence of a minister or of various ministers: it was due to a system. That system is an entire political policy. And that policy is the regime . . . and in the trial of a regime, the Parliament of that regime cannot serve as an adequate, efficacious instrument." ⁽⁷⁷⁾ In effect, the dynastic parties could not formally acknowledge the political responsibility of the regime they had created without destroying it and themselves. If the parliamentary monarchy were to continue, Anual could serve only as a stimulus to contrition and gradual reform.

It was probably this realization that provoked the decisive intervention of Antonio Maura on November 30. In a typically erudite, yet elusive, speech, Maura defined the issues before the Congress: whether ministerial responsibility was provided for in the Constitution of 1876, and if so, whether a "censure" by the Congress was an appropriate and adequate response. Answering his own questions, Maura demolished the Liberal position by insisting that ministerial responsibility existed even in the absence of specific legislation defining its parameters; the exercise of power always implied obligations and responsibilities. Under the Constitution of 1876, failure to govern responsibly required not censure, but a formal accusation in the Congress and a trial in the Senate.

Having justified the legality of a formal accusation to the satisfaction of everyone but the Liberals, Maura refused to formulate an accusation against one or two individuals on the grounds that responsibility for Anual was diffused through a succession of ministries. Political [234] responsibilities undoubtedly existed, but they could not be pinpointed. Further discussion of the responsibilities issue was therefore useless. Because this argument was much more decorous than the outright denial of responsibility expressed in the majority report, the Conservatives, including Sánchez Guerra himself, ⁽⁷⁸⁾ eagerly embraced it as their own, much to the outrage of the entire opposition. Maura's thesis allowed the Conservatives to acknowledge the existence of political responsibilities without running any serious risk of a formal accusation, since the Liberals were clearly unwilling to go beyond a political censure. Yet Maura's own impunismo was probably not so self-serving. Unlike Sánchez Guerra and the Liberals, Maura had no doubts about the continuing viability of the regime; the turmoil of the past six years had left his basically authoritarian outlook unscathed. Denying the legitimacy of popular rule, he had no difficulty in refusing to accede to the demands for accountability. From his point of view, all that was needed to weather the current crisis was consistency and confidence in the traditional right of the dynastic parties to rule.

Maura's solution to the responsibilities issue was in fact anachronistic in 1922. But it might well have defused the Liberal attack -- which was crippled by the ambiguous Liberal attitude toward political change -- had it not been unexpectedly sabotaged by Francisco Cambó, who withdrew his support from the Liberal report on December 1 in order to present a formal accusation against the entire Allendesalazar government of 1921. ⁽⁷⁹⁾ In answer to Maura's contention that responsibility was too diffuse to locate precisely, Cambó retorted that "the way to do no justice at all is to desire to do perfect justice." The reasons for Cambó's desertion of the regime at this critical moment are unclear. Surely crucial was an interview with the king held earlier that day, in which Alfonso had untactfully offered Cambó power in exchange for his "hispanization." Already under severe pressure from left-wing Catalan nationalists in Barcelona, Cambó received this offer as an insult to his political integrity and refused to abandon his regionalist loyalties. But Cambó's alienation from the system antedated his unfortunate encounter with the king; it stemmed from the regime's failure to respond positively to his own vision of a modern, economically integrated Spain. In any event, Cambó's disillusionment made him, for the moment, the most effective responsabilista in the nation. ⁽⁸⁰⁾ Immediately after his accusation, three members of Sánchez Guerra's government and the president of the Congress, Gabino Bugallal, all of whom had formed part of the 1921 government, resigned their posts. The Conservatives' thoughtless embrace of the Maura doctrine had exploded in their faces.

[235] After a hasty cabinet reorganization, Sánchez Guerra girded himself to save his government -- and the Conservative party -- from collapse. On December 5 the prime minister attempted to rally the Conservative majority behind the government by introducing a motion to reject the resignation of Bugallal, a maneuver that might have succeeded had not Juan de la Cierva intervened. Minister of Development in the Allendesalazar government formally accused by Cambó, La Cierva's vehemence was understandable, but the violence of the language he directed against the Catalan leader (whom he came close to accusing of dishonesty during the Bank of Barcelona bankruptcy in 1921) reduced the Congress to anarchy. Unable to restore order or to force a vote, Sanchez Guerra resigned, abruptly terminating -- at least temporarily -- the responsibilities debate in the Congress and the concession of Berenguer's suplicatorio in the Senate. ⁽⁸¹⁾

The sudden collapse of the government represented the end of the Conservatives as a functional political alternative within the parliamentary monarchy. For nine months Sánchez Guerra had endeavored to renew the party's image by responding to popular opinion; satisfied of support in the nation, he had been able to loosen his party's ties to the army and to make several long-overdue decisions, including the halt in military operations, the dismissal of General Martínez Anido, and the abolition of the Advisory Commissions. The responsibilities issue, however, had proven impossible to master because it implied a radical transformation of the regime that neither of the dynastic parties was prepared to countenance. So long as the system remained essentially intact, there could be no resolution of the responsibilities campaign completely satisfactory to the left; its place in a nonrevolutionary reconstruction of the regime could be only as an irresistible goad to reform. This was the path the Liberal government of 1923 would prepare to take, once it had realistically assessed the implications of the responsibilities question. Unfortunately, in seeking the peaceful transformation of the political system, the Liberals would encounter the opposition of the army and the king.

1. The cabinet included: State, Joaquín Fernández Prida; War, José Olaguer-Feliú y Ramírez; Interior, Pío Vicente de Piniés; Justice, José Bertrány Musitú; Finance, José Bergamín; Development, Agustín Argüelles; Public Instruction, César Silió; Labor, Abilio Calderón; Navy, Mariano Ordoñez. After the resignations of Bertrán y Musitú and Silió on March 31, Ordoñez went to Justice and was replaced at Navy by Admiral Rivera, while Tomás Montejo y Rica took Public Instruction.

2. Romanones in El Liberal, Nov. 5, 1922, p. 2.

3. See ibid., Mar. 11 and 30, 1922, pp. 2, 1.

4. Congreso de los Diputados, Comisión de responsabilidades politicas, La Comisión de responsabilidades, pp. 70-71.

5. ABC, Apr. 23, 1922, p. 15. Berenguer also expelled one of his most acerbic critics, Francisco Hernández Mir, correspondent for Alba's paper La Libertad. SHM-A, 1-4-9-24.

6. The complete accords are in CM, Apr. 13, 1923, pp. 1-2. Abbreviate dversions appeared in most of the daily press around this date.

7. In Gabriel Martínez de Aragón y Urbiztondo, Las juntas militares de defensa, pp. 242-43, and Jorge Vigón Suerodíaz, "Breves notas para la historiade las juntas de defensa y de la dictadura," pp. 44-45.

8. El Heraldo, May 10 and 12, and June I, 1922, p. 1.

9. La Época, Apr. 5, 1922, p. 1.

10. DSC (1922), 2:901-6, 940-50.

11. Indalecio Prieto in ibid. (May 5, 1922), 2:1163.

12. The bill is in ibid. (1922), 2:1063, app. 4.

13. DSS (May 30, 1922), 3:915-16.

14. DSC (1922), 7:2798, app. 7.

15. Indalecio Prieto in ibid. (July 20, 1922), 10:3947.

16. Ibid. (1922), 6:2453. For the ESG affair, see chap. 7.

17. See El Liberal, July 2, 1922, pp. 1-2; July 4, p. 1; and July 9, p. 2. The court declared itself competent on the grounds that the disputed honor court had been formed in compliance with a royal order and not with the Code of Military Justice.

18. Ibid., July 12 and 13, 1922, pp. 3, 1.

19. Ibid., Aug. 2, 1922, p. 3.

20. DSC (June 29, 1922), 8:3174.

21. See the figures presented by the Reformist Augusto Barcia in ibid.(June 28, 1922), 8:3102-5.

22. Cortes, El Expediente Picasso, pp. 1-300. This volume also contains the report of the Supreme Military Council of July 10, 1922.

23. Ibid., p. 307

24. Ibid., p. 314.

25. Ibid., pp. 387-88.

26. El Liberal, July 9, 1922, p. 1.

27. Ibid., July 18, 1922, p. 3.

28. Ibid., July 20, 1922, p. 1.

29. Ibid., July 9, 1922, p. 1.

30. DSS (1922), 6:1724-58.

31. See, for example, CM, July 15, 1922, p. 1.

32. See El Liberal, July 14, 1922, p. 1; Gerald Meaker, The Revolutionary Left in Spain, 1914-1923, pp. 437-38.

33. According to Gerald Meaker, "the Communist Party was nearly as much a victim of the Moroccan conflict as the army of General Fernández Silvestre" (Revolutionary Left, p. 438). Marcelino Domingo was arrested under the Law of Jurisdictions on July 16, and organizers from the Madrid SocialistYouth were arrested for scheduling an antiwar meeting in the Casa del Pueblo on July 29. El Liberal, July 18 and 19, Aug. 1, 1922, p. 1.

34. The Picasso Commission included 10 Conservatives (Sres. Rodríguezde Vigurí, Lazaga, Sáiz Pardo, Sánchez de Toca [D. Fernando], Marfil, Canals,Lequerica, Marín Lazaro, Estrada, and Matos); 7 Liberals (Sres. Álvarez Arranz,Nicolau, Alvarado, Rosselló, Armiñán, Alcalá-Zamora, and Sala); 1 Reformist (Pedregal); 1 Catalan (Bastos); 1 Republican (Lerroux); and 1 Socialist (Prieto).

35. El Sol, June 11, 1922, p. 3.

36. El Liberal, July 16, 1922, p. 1.

37. CM, July 20, 1922, p. 1.

38. Burguete's harangue is in El Liberal, Aug. 26, 1922, p. 1.

39. El Heraldo, Aug. 30, 1922, p. 1.

40. CM, Sept. 1, 1922, p. 1.

41. The decree abolished the Office of Native Affairs and created two new offices, Civil Inspection and Khalifal Services, and General Inspection of Military Intervention and Khalifal Troops, both under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of State.

42. Most of what follows is taken from Rafael López Rienda, El escándalo del millón de Larache.

43. "Ministerio de la Guerra. Informe sobre abono de la administratión militar de Marruecos." RA, leg. 28, no. 17.

44. See Sánchez Guerra's instructions to Burguete in SHM-A, 1-4-8-21.

45. El Heraldo, Sept. 22, 1922, p. 1.

46. Ibid., Sept. 27, 1922, p. 1.

47. Ibid., Sept. 29, 1922, p. 1.

48. See the insubordinate remarks of the Commander General of Melilla, General Carlos de Lossada, in El Liberal, Sept. 9, 1922, p. 1.

49. Ibid., Oct. 10, 1922, p. 2.

50. Ibid., Nov. 7, 1922, p. 1.

51. See EE, July 17, 1922, p. 1; El Heraldo, Aug. 3, 1922, p. 2; and Francisco Madrid, El ruidísimo pleito de las juntas de defensa y Millán-Astray.

52. El Liberal, Oct. 18, 1922, p. 3.

53. El Heraldo, Oct. 18, 1922, p. 1.

54. EE, Oct. 18-21, 1922, p. 1.

55. El Liberal, Oct. 19 and 22, 1922, p. 1, and España, Oct. 21, 1922, pp.3-4.

56. Amadeu Hurtado, Quaranta anys d'avocat, pp. 422-23. See also El Liberal, Feb. 12, 1922, p. 1.

57. EE, Aug. 8, 1922, p. 1; El Liberal, Aug. 8 and 11, 1922, p. 3.

58. El Liberal, Oct. 28, 1922, p. I. One was Captain Rafael Espino, a member of the original Infantry Superior Junta.

59. El Sol, June 11, 1922, p. 3.

60. Conde de Romanones, Obras completas, 3:411.

61. In El Liberal, Nov. 1, 1922, pp. 1-2.

62. In ABC, quoted in ibid., Nov. 5, 1922, p. 2.

63. CM, Nov. 10, 1922, pp. 1-2.

64. El Liberal, Nov. 12, 1922, p. 1.

65. CM, Nov. 13, 1922, pp. 1-2.

66. El Liberal, Nov. 12, 1922, p. 1.

67. DSC (Nov. 14, 1922), 11:4016, app. I. The bill as passed is in ibid.(Nov. 23, 1922), 11:4295, app. 1.

68. Berenguer was charged with violation of Article 275 of the Code of Military Justice: "The governor or commander who loses the military garrison or post under his command because he has not taken preventative measures or has not asked in time for the means necessary for defense when he becomes aware of the danger of attack, will incur the punishment of life imprisonment."

69. El Heraldo, Oct. 28, 1922, p. 3.

70. See the motion and speech of the Maurist Tomás Maestre in DSS (Dec. 1, 1922), 8:2144.

71. El Liberal, Nov. 19, 1922, p. 1.

72. CM, Nov. 29, 1922, p. 1.

73. DSS, (1922), 8:2169-70.

74. DSC, (1922), 11:4089, app.2.

75. Prieto's report is in ibid., p. 4128, app. 1; he spoke in its defense on Nov. 21-22, 1922, in ibid., pp 4186-4204, 4225-46.

76. Ibid., p. 4089, app. 3.

77. El Liberal, Nov. 26, 1922, p. 1.

78. Sánchez Guerra hailed Maura's position as "the only possible parliamentary and constitutional doctrine." DSC (Nov. 30, 1922), 12:4459.

79. Ibid., pp. 4471-72.

80. See Jesús Pabón, Cambó, 2 (1):405-6.

81. For the events of December 5, 1922, see DSC (1922), 12:4511-33. See also La Cierva's interpretation of the responsibilities debate in Notas de mi vida, pp. 283-89.