Nor did I intend to call Franco a Nazi.
I used the generic term national socialist as equivalent to fascist in their economic policies.
Those were people who supported Franco in Spain's civil war and who Spain supported (i.e., the Eastern Front) during WWII.
kearnyirish2: "the Western democracies stood by while Spain underwent a violent communist revolution;"
Agreed -- without doubt the Western democracies (France, Britain, USA) stood by and watched throughout the 1930s while Spain suffered a proxy war between fascist/national socialists (Italy, Germany) versus international socialists (USSR).
They also watched Italy invade Ethiopia and Japan invade China, doing nothing beyond speeches at the League of Nations.
One result of their inaction was the bloodiest world war in history.
The inaction of the Western democracies during Spain’s communist uprising mirrored their inaction ten years earlier when Germany and Italy underwent the same strife.
The non-aggression pact between Stalin and Hitler floored the West; that wasn’t part of their plan...