Letter from Francisco Franco to Getúlio Vargas

Even though many members of the Brazilian political elite sympathized with the military rebels, the government of Getulio Vargas maintained diplomatic relations with the Republic throughout the Civil War. Vargas was in control of Brazil’s foreign policy and, despite demonstrating personal affinity for Nazism and Fascism and heading a government that resembled authoritarian regimes in a number of ways, such as political propaganda and repression, he executed a pragmatic foreign policy. This helps explain his position on the Spanish Civil War. 

This pragmatism did not prevent internal policies that led to the surveillance and criminalization of the activities of Spanish Republicans inside Brazil. In response to a request from United States Secretary of State Cordell Hull, in November 1938, Brazil sent 10,000 sacks of coffee to the Spanish Republic. But Vargas’ personal sympathies surfaced when he authorized the sending of tons of coffee and sugar to territory under rebel control. In this personal letter, Francisco Franco thanked Vargas for the gift and promised to keep it a secret, as the Brazilian leader had requested. Brazil’s surplus of coffee allowed it to make these donations, which had the dual objectives of strengthening the country’s humanitarian image and reducing the excess. 

Spanish historian Ángel Viñas has demonstrated in a recent book that a significant part, some 20 per cent, of the massive fortune that the Franco accumulated while in power came from the 600 tons of coffee that Brazil donated to the Spanish people. In reconstructing the sources of the dictator’s enrichment, Viñas was surprised to find documents that show that in 1939 Franco sold the coffee to the General Commissariat of Supplies and Transport (CAT), which was created just three weeks before the end of the Civil War.  

Brazil recognized the Franco government as the government of Spain in March 1939, after this was done by European countries and the United States.