{"id":874779,"date":"2026-10-08T05:18:14","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T05:18:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/874779\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T05:18:14","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T05:18:14","slug":"spains-pride-in-the-united-states","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/874779\/","title":{"rendered":"Spain’s Pride\u00a0in the\u00a0United States"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWhat is taking shape in America\u00a0is impressive.\u201d This is how the French thinker\u00a0Alexis de Tocqueville\u00a0summarized the process of independence of the Thirteen Colonies and the birth of the country destined to become a beacon of freedom and democracy for the world.<\/p>\n

It is one of the many insightful remarks made at the seminar \u201cTransatlantic Relations\u00a0on the 250th Anniversary of U.S. Independence,\u201d held at the\u00a0Casa de Am\u00e9rica\u00a0and sponsored by the\u00a0Franklin-UAH Institute,\u00a0the Spain-U.S. Council Foundation, and the U.S. Embassy in Spain and Andorra.<\/p>\n

\"espa\u00f1a_USA2\"
\nMichelle Riebeling, Counselor for Public Diplomacy at the U.S. Embassy in Spain and Andorra, highlighted the depth of the ties and shared values \u200b\u200bbetween Spain and the Americas during her remarks.<\/p>\n

Four roundtable discussions\u00a0and talks explored many aspects of Spain\u2019s role in the birth of the nation, which not long afterward would play a decisive role in ensuring that Europe preserved its freedoms and was able to achieve prosperity after defeating Nazism, winning the Cold War against communism, and establishing itself as the destination for all those who aspire to realize their greatest dreams and innovative projects.<\/p>\n

The first wake-up call came from the current president of the Council of State,\u00a0Carmen Calvo, who captivated the audience by highlighting the figure of\u00a0Jos\u00e9 de G\u00e1lvez, the brother of Bernardo\u2014the latter being the better-known and more popular figure. \u201cIt was Jos\u00e9 who truly carried out the will of King\u00a0Charles III\u00a0to provide the rebels with decisive financial and in-kind aid\u2014gunpowder and cannons\u2014in their fight against England.\u201d That \u201cpygmy republic\u2014but God knows how far it may go,\u201d in the words of the Count of Aranda, soon became a laboratory of ideas for the politics and democracy of the future. \u201cThe people will decide which governments remain in power; they will rise or fall and be replaced by others,\u201d proclaimed Professor\u00a0Jos\u00e9 Antonio Gurpegui, director of the Franklin-UAH, quoting Tocqueville.<\/p>\n

\"Espa\u00f1a_usa3\"
\nJos\u00e9 Antonio Gurpegui, Director of the Franklin-UAH Institute, engaged in an in-depth conversation with the President of the Council of State, Carmen Calvo, regarding the major role Spain played in the birth of the United States.<\/p>\n

The former Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces (Jemad) and ex-director of the CNI,\u00a0F\u00e9lix Sanz Rold\u00e1n, pointed out that if Spain\u2019s role in that independence is less well known than France\u2019s, it is due, among other reasons, to the fact that it was Charles III himself who advocated secrecy regarding Spanish aid and support operations, and even to the fact that the Spanish naval fleet, which was then far more powerful than the French one, agreed with Paris to safeguard France\u2019s overseas possessions while French ships and sailors were engaged in the decisive victory at Yorktown.<\/p>\n

The lieutenant general recounted how\u00a0Spain had differences\u00a0with the United States practically from the very beginning: first over border disputes, when quite a few Black slaves sought the protection and shelter of the Spanish Crown; then came\u00a01898, which instilled truly monstrous lies\u2014attributed to the Spanish\u2014in the minds of several generations of Americans, \u201cwhich I encountered and refuted during my nine-year stay in a country that I love and respect, as I do its people.\u201d Then came the 1920s, Hemingway, Dos Passos, the Civil War, and the subsequent dictatorship. \u201cIn reality,\u201d says Sanz Rold\u00e1n, \u201crelations with the United States\u00a0only began to normalize under King Juan Carlos I.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Espa\u00f1a_USA4\"
\nPanel discussion featuring Manuel Lucena (CSIC researcher), Raquel Barras (GEIS-Franklin researcher), and F\u00e9lix Sanz Rold\u00e1n (Chief of the Defence Staff [JEMAD] 2004\u20132008 and former Director of the CNI), moderated by researcher Pedro Rodr\u00edguez. Photo Casa Am\u00e9rica<\/p>\n

Manuel Lucena, a historian at the CSIC, believes that, contrary to a fairly widespread belief,\u00a0King Charles III of Spainachieved everything he set out to do, with the exception of reclaiming Gibraltar. But, in addition to wresting the island of Menorca back from the British, he had to contend with revolts in Peru and Colombia against his modernizing reforms, just as he did domestically with the Esquilache mutiny. None of that resistance stemmed from any supposed desire for independence from Spain, since those Spaniards on the other side of the Atlantic were well aware of the power and prosperity that working and doing business in the Empire\u2019s viceroyalties afforded them.<\/p>\n

Regarding current bilateral relations,\u00a0Sanz Rold\u00e1n himself highlighted\u00a0Spain\u2019s status as a reliable ally with a compelling example: \u201cSpanish pilots and aircraft monitor NATO\u2019s eastern airspace, including border areas in the Baltic States. We have now completed\u00a016 rotations of these highly specialized teams, and the Baltic states have not yet purchased a single aircraft. \u2018Are we worse allies for not wanting to spend 5% of our GDP?\u2019 he asked, while asserting that our status as a partner and ally should not be measured solely by the money we contribute, but by what we do in solidarity with the goal of our common defense.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Espa\u00f1a_usa5\"
\nSoraya S\u00e1enz de Santamar\u00eda, State Attorney and former Deputy Prime Minister, analyzed the state of Spain-U.S. relations in conversation with David Garc\u00eda Cantalapiedra of the Franklin-UAH Institute.<\/p>\n

Regarding relations and future prospects, the former Deputy Prime Minister,\u00a0Soraya S\u00e1enz de Santamar\u00eda, after listing a series of events from recent history, emphasized China\u2019s meteoric rise and the Asian giant\u2019s decisive entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO), in the very same year\u20142001\u2014that the attacks on the\u00a0Twin Towers in New York\u00a0took place. \u201cFrom that point on, China used the WTO\u2019s own rules to establish itself as an economic power with enormous influence and rapidly growing ambitions.\u201d However, the state attorney pointed out some of China\u2019s weaknesses, which she summed up in a pithy phrase: \u201cChina is growing old\u00a0[due to the rapid aging of its population] before it has become rich.\u201d<\/p>\n

Regarding the future of transatlantic relations, she highlighted the fact that every year\u00a030,000 students from the United States\u00a0choose Spanish universities to pursue their studies\u2014a flow that, like no other, fosters the forging of personal and professional ties, grounded in a significant set of shared values, which will shape the elites of the future and, therefore, shape a world undergoing the most rapid change in human history.<\/p>\n

\"Espa\u00f1a_USA\"
\nMesa sobre el futuro de las relaciones transatl\u00e1nticas y los pr\u00f3ximos l\u00edderes a un lado y otro del oc\u00e9ano, conformada por\u00a0
Natalia Oliva (Ferrrovial), Clara S\u00e1nchez Portela (secretaria general del Consejo Atl\u00e1ntico Juvenil Espa\u00f1ol y Jes\u00fas Garc\u00eda Aparicio,\u00a0
secretario de Fulbright Network Spain, moderados por Alba Grieb, investigadora GEIS<\/p>\n

And here is a telling anecdote illustrating American appreciation for Spain.\u00a0Carmen Calvo\u00a0also recounted it: \u201cWhen President Obama visited the Rota base, near the end of his term, he told Spanish authorities that, among the rotating postings where U.S. troops are stationed around the world, \u2018the jackpot was\u2014and is\u2014the Rota base.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWhat is taking shape in America\u00a0is impressive.\u201d This is how the French thinker\u00a0Alexis de Tocqueville\u00a0summarized the process of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":874780,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,368214,60628,338640,60633,3,3662,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":["post-874779","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-espana","tag-estados-unidos","tag-etats-unis","tag-l","tag-news","tag-spain","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874779","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=874779"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/874779\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/874780"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=874779"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=874779"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=874779"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}