On my last trip over to Spain I made my usual trip up to the Republican defensive positions on the headland at Santa Pola to check on the progress with the refurbishment work. Essentially, the defences are being turned into a bit of a tourist attraction as well as featuring on some great new mountain bike routes. I dont have a problem with that, but what I do have a problem with is the local PP council painting the guardhouse a ridiculous shade of blue and adorning it with hippy grafitti. That is frankly and insult to the republican defenders who fought to stop the fascist planes as they wheeled in from the Med to bomb Alicante. I wandered away cursing and through the pine groves found what was clearly a bomb crater and after taking some snaps I picked up a strange chunky looking pieced of metal, twisted, scored and obviously subjected to extreme heat at some point. Shrapnel - either from a shell casing or an enemy bomb. The Mahou bottle is purely for perspective but its a piece of the Civil War history and sits on the shelf now in pride of place.
As part of the refurb of the positions up at the Santa Pola headland some fantastic signage has been erected explaining the role of the gun batteries amd the network of bunkers. A beautifully produced map shows how the fascist plains would head in from Majorca and swing in from the Med heading along the coast to bomb Alicante and other positions. Other signs have some contemporary pictures of the defences in action that I have never seen before. There is also some excellent technical information on both the fascist planes and the Republican ordnance. Very impressive stuff. However, the one thing missing from the commentary is the obvious one that clearly still sticks in the throat of the right wing council - that these positions were built to defend democracy and the Republic from fascist attacks sponsored by Hitler and Mussolini. Maybe the recent change of the balance of forces at Santa Pola town hall my change that? We will see.
