*** GETTING TO KNOW DURRUTI ***

To condense in a few lines the life story of he who was the true expression 
of rebelliousness and anarchist utopia is a complicated but necessary task, 
because the testimony of liberty in struggle that was the life of 
Buenaventura Durruti must be broadcast yesterday, today and always.

He was born the second of eight brothers on July 14 1896 in Leon, city of the 
Spanish province by the same name. As an adolescent he is initiated on the 
same path as his father, a workingman affiliated with the socialist 
union UGT. As a member of his railroad section, he takes active part in the 
revolutionary general strike of August 1917, promoted in conjunction with the 
anarchosyndicalist Confederacio'n Nacional del Trabajo (CNT); which 
caused his being expelled fron the UGT for being too radical, his persecution 
by the police and his escape to France, where he comes in contact with exiled 
anarchists, joining CNT of Asturias upon his return in January 1919.

He joins the open fight against the aggresive employers in the Asturian mines 
and is arrested for the first time in March 1919; he escapes and by December 
he is in San Sebastian, an industrial city in the Basque country, with a job 
as a metal worker. The bourgeoisie was then promoting a wave of assasinations 
of syndicalists and Durruti joins a self-defense group - Los Justicieros, 
they plan a sensational hit in reprisal: an attempt on the life of King 
Alfonso XIII who would be visiting the City in August 1920, but their plan is 
discovered and they must escape. Durruti continues doing dangerous 
clandestine work throughout the nation, meeting Francisco Ascaso who would be 
his fraternal friend and comrade. They travel to Barcelona in August 1922 and 
form the group Crisol, that would later adopt a name that would be famous in 
libertarian history: Los Solidarios. This group brought together the most 
valuable elements of the catalan proletariat, hitting hard against reaction 
where it hurt the most, until the Spanish political crisis brought the 
dictatorship of General Primo de Rivera, installed September 1923 with the 
King's wholehearted support. Proper praise for what Los Solidarios did in 
courageous defense of the CNT during that hopeless hour has never been given. 
Hundreds of militants fell and CNT could barely survive and recover thanks to 
its deep roots among the working class, but the price was high: most of the 
Solidarios were killed or served long sentences, while Ascaso and Durruti had 
to seek refuge in Paris.

The failure of the insurrection plans cooked up during exile forces them to 
travel to Latin America in December 1924, accompanied by Gregorio Jover, in 
search for funds for the outlawed and persecuted Iberian anarchosyndicalism. 
Following 15 months of unbelievable adventures including urban guerrilla 
actions to obtain supplies, unknown in those parts until then, chases and 
chilling escapes through several countries. The solidary assistance from an 
endless number of comrades that supported them wherever they went was their 
infallible resource in outsmarting police persecution.

During quiet times they earn their frugal living as laborers, without ceasing 
to take part in union work from the grassroots, as the legend grows about 
these men. In April 1926 they return to Europe and are seduced by an 
espectacular idea: to kidnap the Spanish King and the dictator when they 
visit Paris on July 14, but are captured by the police and, after a stormy 
trial, are expelled from France in July 1927. They keep on living as 
semiclandestine militants abroad until the fall of Alfonso XIII in April 1931.

Back in Barcelona Durruti is in the midst of a great deal of activity, 
accompanied by his French companion Emilienne, pregnant with their daughter 
Colette, who would be born on December 1931. He joins the Iberian Anarchist 
Federation (FAI), a specifically anarchist organization secretly created in 
July 1927 - and together with other militants they form the affinity group 
Nosotros, spokesmen within the CNT of a radical tendency that harbored no 
illusions with respect to the recently proclaimed Republic, maintaining that 
the moment was ripe for continued progress. This inner confrontation within 
the CNT became more bitter until a split ocurred, while repression became 
harsher as well as the government's provocations against these humble workers 
- whenever they weren't prisoners Durruti and Ascaso worked as mechanics in a 
mid-sized company in Barcelona - who were seen by the do-gooders as the 
terrifying fist of the Social Revolution. The repressive hysteria fell upon 
Durruti and other anarchists in January 1932, being deported to the Canary 
Islands and the "Spanish" Sahara. Popular pressure resulted in their release 
in September, but Durruti was inmediately arrested for two more months.

Even with the imprisonment of the so-called "leaders", harder positions grew 
within the CNT and the proletariat, which brought the failed anarchist 
insurrection of January 1933, after which Durruti must go in hiding until 
arrested at the end of March. He is out by July, with the CNT and the FAI 
facing changes in the political scene, as the right wing prepares to assume 
power after the fiasco of the republicans and socialists, which happens 
after the November elections. In December there is another failed attempt at 
a general strike; Durruti and hundreds of anarchists go to prison, but an 
amnesty lets them out in May 1934, in time for Durruti to play a decisive 
role in the transport of 13,000 children of Aragon strikers to Barcelona, to 
be care for by the solidarity of Barcelona's working class families.

In October 1934 the Asturias uprising takes place, 14 days of heroic and 
unequal combat between the united workers and the army, while the repression 
and the undecisive behavior of the UGT and other sectors left the anarchists 
isolated in their effort to spread the revolutionay flame. Once again Durruti 
suffers months in prison alternating with weeks of feverish public militancy, 
until the electoral victory by the Popular Front in February 1936, with the 
crucial vote of CNT members, signaled another turn in the situation. In the 
midst of an explosive political-social climate, the IV CNT Congress meets in 
Zaragoza from May 1 to 5, 1936 where an integral part of the debates and the 
anarchist fervor that permeated the proceedings was due to the Nosotros 
group, in those days dedicated to workers' readiness for the enormous 
challenge that was coming. Left and Right were in a collision course, 
initiated rather soon by the military uprising of July 19 1936.

The CNT and the FAI confronted with courage, organization and mass 
mobilizations the fascist superiority in weapons and resources; their 
contribution was decisive in resisting the blow throughout the nation and in 
Catalunya defeated the rebels singlehandedly, Durruti being one of the 
boldest fighters in this popular victory and suffering the loss of Francisco 
Ascaso. On July 24, from Barcelona where libertarian communism was starting 
to be a reality, Durruti left with an armed column towards Zaragoza, occupied 
by the rebels. After hard combats that equalitarian militia, without officers 
or other military trappings advanced and estabilized the Aragon front against 
regular troops better equipped, even though they could not retake the city.

Parallel to this the anarchist forces supported a social transformation which 
meant the establishment of agricultural collectives in Aragon, upsetting 
communists, socialists and other acolites of the creed according 
to which the war could not be won with the revolution going on. Durruti 
embodiedthe feelingsand goals of the workers in arms, being a peculiar 
"chief" whose main privilege was to fight in the first line, his only rank 
the esteem his equals had for him.

That courageous and shining life - "The short summer of Anarchy" according to 
his chronist Enzensberger - would come to an end in November of that same 
year. On the 15 Durruti arrived with a force of 1800 men to reinforce the 
defense of Madrid, where they went inmediately to the toughest section and on 
the 19 he was struck by a bullet as he walked by a supposedly secure area. He 
died at dawn on the 20, being buried two days later at Montjuich's cemetery 
in Barcelona, accompanied by the largest funeral cortege seen in the city.

As with Zamora in Venezuela, el Che in Bolivia or Zapata in Mexico, his death 
has a stigma of treason and the main suspect, the stalinist PCE (Comunist 
Party of Spain), would unleash a few months later a brutal persecution of 
anarchists and other radicals that not only ended the threatening revolution, 
but was also the begining of the end of the Republic they claimed to safeguard.

40 years of intense life had this man that fought for his ideals without 
uarter nor fanaticisms; who never ceased to live of his labor, who acted as 
much as he read or thought, who loved, dreamed and had close and dear 
friends. Durruti was who he was, and also the best of what remains in us when 
we share his luminous trajectory.

SOFIA COMUNIELLO
(CORREO@ #20, pp.16-17; August 1992)