DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS RUSSIA SPAIN

 

Due to my naturally kind condition, I sometimes err on the side of credulity by preferring flattery and the censer to stabbing in the back, even though I have experienced a profession such as journalism where knife-knifing is common. I confess moralizing and sometimes satirical with no other intention than to warn vices, denounce shenanigans and collusion. I incline to the legal maxim of in dubio pro reo. Sometimes this leniency formula cannot be applied. Then you have to go to the scalpel. The war in Ukraine and my thesis that almost all of it was Russian, especially in the area of ​​Crimea, Odessa and most of the cities bordering the Black Sea, has turned me into the odd hand ut. I must be one of the few Spanish journalists who speak out in favor of Putin, which has earned me disqualifications, insults and even spitting. I am not a resentful handler of the information of a man who traveled the world as a correspondent in London and New York and I have read most of the Russian literature, which in many cases resembles ours. Gorki reminds me of Quevedo. Galdós puts on an air with Tolstoy and in Chejov's theater I found reminiscences of Tirso de Molina. Castile and Russia have a critical soul towards the system of government. Gogol's Dead Souls could have been signed by Cervantes. This factor does not occur in almost any European literature. Both English and French or Germans and Italians sweep home. Cow of mystery that two towns so distant face life with a character so similar. The Russian globetrotters resemble the Spanish rogues and some mystics of the sects such as the flagellants or the starzi resemble the Castilian conversos who walled themselves in for life to flee from the world.

Diplomatic relations with the Duke of Muscovy date back to the middle ages. He traded furs. An Armenian bishop made a pilgrimage to Compostela in the 13th century. Calderón talks about them in Life is a Dream. His Segismundo was a man of the steppe.

Until 1613, when the first Romanov came to the throne, diplomatic relations were not established. These are not strengthened until the 19th century when Elizabeth II appoints the Duke of Osuna ambassador to the court of the tsars. The extravagances of this character who threw gold coins into the Neva and had affairs with actresses and professionals from the capital left a mark on some Russian novels where the Spanish is reflected as bizarre and exotic, Osuna must have been a very passionate guy. He had Don Juan Valera, the author of Pepita Jiménez, as his secretary. This one did honor the name that he had of her because he was leaving a trail of love wherever he went, so much so that in Washington one of her lovers committed suicide when she found out that he was abandoning her.

during the civil war these relations intensified. Stalin sent his best journalists: Ehrenburg, ambassadors like Rosemberg or generals like Primakov. When they lost the war and returned to Russia, he ordered them to be shot and only Ilia Ehrenburg, a very astute Jew who was enthusiastic at the sight of the city of Toledo, was saved from the Saracen.

Russia was generous to the children of the war. Many did not return, they made careers, became engineers and teachers and married Russian girls.

Dolores Ibarruri's son Rubén died fighting the Germans on the Eastern Front. On the other side there were also Spaniards, the little soldiers of the Blau. I spoke with some of them who were in my father's regiment: an artilleryman was commissioned to fire on the palace of Catherine the Great, the famous czarina who has gone down in history for her love affairs "but the goniometer had frozen that day and the shot did not explode… we had many casualties, the Russians were very brave, they attacked in waves, they even hit our identity cards… I was lucky enough to get on the last Wehrmacht evacuation truck leaving for Berlin. Those who remained there in sight of Catalina's palace were taken prisoner by all of Captain Palacios's company or froze to death” the story of this caller expresses the admiration for the Red Army and that certain sympathy that always existed between the two peoples. That is why it saddens me that President Sánchez makes common cause with the hairless Boris Johnson, that crazy-looking Englishman, applauds Biden with his ears, and shows solidarity with Zelensky, a war criminal for me who is leading Ukraine into chaos in the midst of of a massacre. But of course I am no longer the odd hand out. The dissenting voice in the midst of this choir of thurifers. Despite the attacks and insults and the silence of which I am the object, they will not silence me