In April 1939, officially, the Spanish Civil War is over.

In reality, the violence rumbles on.

General Francisco Franco has declared himself El Caudillo, Spain's warlord and savior.

Once across Europe and the world, including the UK and France, recognize him as a legitimate ruler.

But the schism through Spanish society, the division between the left wing Republicans

and Franco's right wing nationalists has arguably never been deeper.

Coming to power in such a divided land after such a bloody civil war, many leaders would

do their utmost to heal the country and bring the people together.

But Franco has absolutely no intention of offering an oligbrains to his defeated enemies.

Instead, he means to wipe them off the face of the earth.

This is part four of the story of Francisco Franco.

And this is real dictators.

Even before he officially won the war, even before he declared victory on April 1, 1939,

Franco was already intent on creating the legal structures, the judicial structures,

to persecute his political enemies or his opponents.

By the time he declared victory, the beginnings were already there to basically illegalize

everything the republic had stood for.

Franco issued a decree known as the law of political responsibilities.

More political responsibilities basically said that anybody who had supported

the opposing side in the civil war would face fines for their political involvement.

So I think that tells us quite a lot about Franco's uncompromising attitude to the defeated.

Franco gave a speech on the anniversary of the start of the civil war saying that after

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