出版社：Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas
摘要：This article seeks to examine the relationships of the U.S. trade union confederation, AFL-CIO, with both the «Vertical» (Francoist) and the anti-Franco labour unions. The time frame analysed covers from the signing of Spanish-American military pacts of 1953 to the summer of 1971. During that time, the interaction between the unions of both sides of the Atlantic was significantly influenced by two factors: 1) the climate of tension and very high politicization of the Cold War, that conflict of ideas rather than bombs ; 2) the traumatic memory of the Republican defeat in the Spanish civil war. The relationships were affected harder by the first factor, since it lasted throughout the whole period analysed; the second was higher at the beginning, but was progressively loosing momentum, more slowly among the Spanish syndicalist than among their American or European counterparts. In any case, both conditions generated a sort of «lens» through which the reality was perceived. Perceptions, stereotypes and strong political polarization, which, sometimes, distorted what was really happening. The State Department and the AFL -CIO shared information, and occasionally objectives in its relations with the Spanish trade unionists. From the documentation studied here, it cannot be concluded, however, that the AFL-CIO was always a mere «puppet» in the State Department and the CIA’s hands, as some authors have affirmed. I will try to explain the ins and outs of such connections, confronting American archives with Spanish sources.
