Women in ETA in Francoist Spain were few in numbers, and portrayed as dangerous by the media. Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) grew out of a Basque nationalist movement with roots that pre-dated the Second Spanish Republic. When Franco seized power, the new regime cracked down on Basque nationalism, imprisoned and killed many activists and made traditional women's activism difficult to continue. Women found themselves being investigated by the new regime. Basque nationalists began to stockpile weaponry following the end of World War II. ETA was created in 1952 by students in Bilbao, creating a fissure in the Basque nationalist community by the mid-1950s. Their attitude towards women was patriarchal and informed by their conservative Roman Catholicism. There would be few women in the movement in this period.
Women's involvement increased in the mid-1960s, usually as a result of male relatives like fathers, husbands or boyfriends. The media began portraying these women as being one-half of a terrorist couple. ETA affiliated women began to be arrested and sent to prison. By the 1970s, female ETA members were involved in violent acts of murder against representatives of the Spanish state. Women were also now being targeted if they were viewed as part of the state or having betrayed ETA. The death of Franco saw little change in the status of women in ETA or state actions to crack down on the terrorist organization. María Dolores Katarain had become a part of ETA leadership by the early 1980s, but was killed as a consequence of leaving. An attempt to start a peace process was underway by the mid-1980s. The creation of the 1999 ceasefire would see more women become leaders in ETA. Their presence came at the time of generational shift in organizational membership, with middle-aged male members who were willing to consider a détente with the Spanish state becoming less visible as younger members, including women, more willing to engage in violence took over. Women were involved with bombing police officer. ETA declared a permanent end to violence in 2011.
Timeline
The regime's relation to the Basque language and Basque nationalism has three periods. The first was from the fall of Bilbao in 1937 to the mid-1950s, and it involved active suppression. The second phase was from 1955 to 1975. In this period, the government accepted they could not fully suppress Basque language usage, and consequently became more tolerant of it. The third phase was from 1975 to 1982. Starting before the death of Franco, this period started a period of reconciliation around the Basque language and Basque culture.
1937-1955 (active suppression) After the Carlist Wars, the abolition of the fueros and the boom of industrialization that brought with it a strong immigration and a great change in a short time for the Biscayan society, Sabino Arana founded the Basque Nationalist Party in 1895 with the aim of achieving the independence of "Euzkadi" (the Basque territories) and founding a Basque State. The party maintained a conflictive relationship with Carlism, since Basque nationalists accused the party of being "Spanish," and Carlists, on the other hand, accused the accused party of being for a "separatist" and "unpatriotic" Basque nationalism.
The Spanish Civil War started in July 1936. Immediately in areas controlled by Francoist forces, women's activism was crushed. By April 1939 when the Spanish Civil War concluded, Franco had forcibly made the Basque Country and Basque culture part of the "great household" of a united Spain.
The Basque Country in the early Franco period saw many people being subjected to mass arrest and imprisonment, along with many people being killed. The regime engaged in an active suppression of all nationalist expressions across Spain, impacting Basques, Catalans and others. National flags were prohibited. All languages by Spanish were banned. Basque cultural symbols were replaced by those of Spanish National Catholicism.
Following Franco's victory over the forces of the Second Republic, his government ruled militarily as if they were an occupying force. Consequently, this resulted in many people inside Spain feeling alien inside their own land. Franco supported this attitude, saying on 3 April 1939, "Spaniards, alert, peace is not a comfortable and cowardly repose against history. The blood of those who fell for the Homeland does not allow for forgetfulness, sterility or betrayal Spanish. Be alert. Spain is still at war against all enemies from within or from abroad."