Eugenio Vegas Latapie | |
|---|---|
| Born | Eugenio Vegas Latapie 1907 |
| Died | 1985 (aged 77–78) |
| Known for | Monarchist activist |
| Notable work | Memorias politicas.El suicidio de la monarquia y la Segunda Republica (1983) |
| Political party | Acción Española,FET y de la JONS |
Eugenio Vegas Latapie (1907–1985) was a Spanishmonarchist writer, activist and conspirator who was noted for the extremism of his monarchism. A native ofIrun, he was a leading member of theAcción Española.[1]
In his later years, Vegas Latapié served as Secretary and principal advisor toDon Juan de Borbón, the father of the future kingJuan Carlos, whose early education he oversaw as well.[2]
A founder member of Acción Española, Vegas Latapié was noted for his extreme monarchism to the point that he lost faith variously inAlfonso XIII, his sonJuan and grandsonJuan Carlos, to whom he was a tutor, as he felt that they were not monarchist enough.[3] A hard-line supporter of the RomanCatholic Church, he nonetheless was prepared to criticise thePapacy for not reaching his own standards, notably in a series of articles published in theAcción Española journal in 1931 and 1932 in which he attacked the supposedly conciliatory attitude towards the republicans inFrance.[4]
After the 1936 assassination ofJosé Calvo Sotelo, Vegas Latapié and his brother Pepe instigated a plot to murderManuel Azaña in a revenge attack, but the plan was scuppered when they took it to their allies in the army, as it was already in an advanced stage of planning the uprising that precipitated theSpanish Civil War.[5] His idea rejected, Vegas Latapié then decided to launch a suicide attack on theCongress of Deputies by entering the building while he was carrying a supply ofmustard gas, but this plan was abandoned as well since he feared incriminating his brother Florentino, who worked for the only producer of the gas in Spain.[6]
Vegas Latapié had been close to theFalange and had exhorted it to greater violence in the early days of theSpanish Civil War. Alongside this, however, he had a fraught relationship withJosé Antonio Primo de Rivera, as he did not approve of the Falangist leader's high-living private life. They were estranged not long before Primo de Rivera's death, when Vegas Latapie attacked his "social frivolity" while Falangists were being killed.[7]
He sat on the National Council of theFalange Española Tradicionalista y de las Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional-Sindicalista until 4 March 1938, whenFrancisco Franco, seeking to remove potential troublemakers, removed the abrasive and uncompromising Vegas Latapie from his position.[8] The action led to a freezing of relations between Franco and Acción Española, as many activists saw that as a slight on their leader and so ended co-operation.[9] Deprived of his office, he entered into a series of conspiracies against Franco withJuan Antonio Ansaldo, but since neither man was particularly popular or had good contacts, they came to nothing.[10] He became a public critic of the Franco regime to such an extent that he was forced into exile inSwitzerland for a time in June 1942.[11]
In 1946 he formed part of a coterie of advisors around Don Juan, which included the likes ofPedro Sainz Rodríguez,José María Gil-Robles y Quiñones, Julio López-Oliván and GeneralAntonio Aranda, all of whom were involved in trying to secure restoration for the prospective king.[12] Within the group, Vegas Latapie and Sainz Rodríguez were noted to be the most extreme and anti-democratic members.[13]
His autobiographyMemorias politicas. El suicidio de la monarquia y la Segunda Republica appeared in 1983 and revealed his disillusionment with his political career.
