Editing ETA (separatist group) (section)

===During Franco's dictatorship===
{{See also|Opposition to Francoism}}[[File:Federiko Krutwig euskaltzaina 1989an.jpg|thumb|[[Federico Krutwig]], the anarchist theorist of the ETA. He sought to move [[Basque nationalism]] away from its ethnic and religious origins.]]
ETA grew out of a student group called Ekin, founded in the early 1950s, which published a magazine and undertook direct action.<ref name=newandcourrier>{{cite news|title=Basques Stir Ferment in Spain|url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=fnZJAAAAIBAJ&pg=4795,3283737&dq=eta+bayonne+france+1962&hl=en|access-date=21 October 2011|newspaper=The News and Courier|date=1 October 1968}}{{Dead link|date=December 2021 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> ETA was founded on 31 July 1959 as {{Lang|eu|Euskadi Ta Askatasuna|italic=no}} ("Basque Homeland and Liberty"<ref name="ETA BASQUE ORGANIZATION"/> or "Basque Country and Freedom"<ref name=ideological/>) by students frustrated by the moderate stance of the [[Basque Nationalist Party]].<ref name=studentgroup>{{cite news|title=ETA: from student group to Basque bombers|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/8839645/ETA-from-student-group-to-Basque-bombers.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220112/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/spain/8839645/ETA-from-student-group-to-Basque-bombers.html |archive-date=12 January 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|access-date=21 October 2011|newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|date=20 October 2011}}{{cbignore}}</ref> (Originally, the name for the organisation used the word ''Aberri'' instead of ''Euskadi'', creating the acronym ''ATA''. However, in some Basque dialects, ''ata'' means ''duck'', so the name was changed.)<ref name="Kurlansky-2004">{{cite book|title=1968|author-link=Mark Kurlansky|last=Kurlansky|first=Mark|page=254|year=2004|isbn=0-224-06251-4|publisher=[[Jonathan Cape]] ([[Random House]])|location=London}}</ref>

ETA held their [[First Assembly of ETA|first assembly]] in [[Bayonne]], France, in 1962, during which a "declaration of principles" was formulated and following which a structure of activist cells was developed.<ref name=Conversi>{{cite book|last=Conversi|first=Daniele|title=The Basques, the Catalans, and Spain|year=1997|publisher=C. Hurst & Co|location=London|pages=92–97|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=wwSve0Mb0ocC|isbn=978-0-87417-362-8}}{{Dead link|date=February 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> Subsequently, [[Marxism|Marxist]] and [[third-worldist]] perspectives developed within ETA, becoming the basis for a political programme set out in [[Federico Krutwig]]'s (an anarchist of German origin) 1963 book ''Vasconia'', which is considered to be the defining text of the movement. In contrast to previous Basque nationalist platforms, Krutwig's vision was anti-religious and based upon language and culture rather than race.<ref name=Conversi/> ETA's third and fourth assemblies, held in 1964 and 1965, adopted an anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist position, seeing nationalism and the class struggle as intrinsically connected.<ref name=Conversi/>

Some sources attributed the 1960 bombing of the [[Amara station]] in [[Donostia-San Sebastian]] (which killed a 22-month-old child) to ETA,<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.elpais.com/articulo/reportajes/primera/victima/ETA/elpepusocdmg/20100131elpdmgrep_1/Tes |title=La primera víctima de ETA |date=31 January 2010|last=Duva |first=Jesús |work=El País |access-date=25 June 2020 |trans-title=ETA's first victim |language=es}}</ref><ref name="EC">{{cite web|url=http://www.elcorreo.com/vizcaya/v/20100619/opinion/primera-victima-20100619.html |title=¿La primera víctima de ETA? |language=es |access-date=23 October 2011 |date=19 June 2010 |work=El Correo |trans-title=The first victim of ETA?}}</ref> but statistics published by the [[Ministry of the Interior (Spain)|Spanish Ministry of the Interior]] have always showed that ETA's first victim was killed in 1968.<ref name=SpainInteriorMinistryStatistics>{{cite web|title=Últimas víctimas mortales de ETA: Cuadros estadísticos |url=http://www.interior.gob.es/prentsa-3/balantzeak-21/ultimas-victimas-mortales-de-eta-cuadros-estadisticos-630?set_locale=es |publisher=Spanish Ministry of the Interior|access-date=23 October 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120406224236/http://www.interior.gob.es/prentsa-3/balantzeak-21/ultimas-victimas-mortales-de-eta-cuadros-estadisticos-630?set_locale=es |archive-date=6 April 2012}}</ref> The Amara station attack was claimed by the Portuguese and Galician left-wing group [[Directorio Revolucionario Ibérico de Liberación]] (DRIL), together with four other very similar bombings committed that same day across Spain – all attributed to DRIL.<ref name="deia-21feb2010">{{cite news|url=http://www.deia.com/2010/02/21/politica/verdad-eclipsada|title=Verdad eclipsada |trans-title=Eclipsed truth |last=Núñez |first=Javier |date=21 February 2010 |website=Deia |language=es |access-date=9 August 2011|archive-url=https://archive.today/20130102111007/http://www.deia.com/2010/02/21/politica/verdad-eclipsada|archive-date=2 January 2013}}</ref> Attribution of the 1960 attack to ETA has been considered to be unfounded by researchers.<ref name="EC"/><ref name="deia-21feb2010"/><ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.gara.net/paperezkoa/20100212/182505/es/como-construye-una-mentira|title= Cómo se construye una mentira |trans-title=How a lie is built |language=es |access-date=23 October 2011 |date= 9 February 2010 |work=Gara |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111024003828/http://www.gara.net/paperezkoa/20100212/182505/es/como-construye-una-mentira|archive-date= 24 October 2011 }}</ref><ref name="Begoña Urroz afera">{{cite web |title=Begoña Urroz afera |url=http://www.berria.info/dokumentuak/dokumentua730.pdf |language=eu |access-date=23 October 2011 |date=20 February 2011 |publisher=Berria |archive-date=27 April 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120427021244/http://www.berria.info/dokumentuak/dokumentua730.pdf }}</ref> Police documents dating from 1961, released in 2013, show that the DRIL was indeed the author of the bombing.<ref>{{cite web|title=El DRIL mató a Begoña Urroz, y no ETA, según documentos de la Policía|trans-title=DRIL killed Begoña Urroz, not ETA, according to Police documents|url=http://www.eitb.com/es/noticias/politica/detalle/1331936/begona-urroz-eta--el-dril-mato-nina-no-eta-policia/|publisher=EITB|language=es|access-date=6 May 2013|date=5 May 2013|archive-date=7 May 2013|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130507101906/http://www.eitb.com/es/noticias/politica/detalle/1331936/begona-urroz-eta--el-dril-mato-nina-no-eta-policia/}}</ref> A more recent study by the ''Memorial de Víctimas del Terrorismo'' based on the analysis of police diligences at the time reached the same conclusion, naming Guillermo Santoro, member of DRIL, as the author of the attack.<ref>{{cite news |last=Aizpeolea |first=Luis R. |date=24 June 2020 |title=Fin de la polémica: el DRIL mató a niña Begoña Urroz |trans-title=The end of the controversy: DRIL murdered the child Begoña Urroz |url=https://elpais.com/espana/2020-06-23/fin-de-la-polemica-el-dril-mato-a-la-nina-begona-urroz.html |language=es |work=El País |location=[[San Sebastián]] |access-date=24 June 2020}}</ref>

[[File: Placa Carrero Blanco.jpg|thumb|Memorial plate at the place of the assassination of Admiral [[Luis Carrero Blanco]]]]
ETA's first killing occurred on 7 June 1968, when [[Guardia Civil (Spain)|Guardia Civil]] member José Pardines Arcay was shot dead after he tried to halt ETA member [[Txabi Etxebarrieta]] during a routine road check. Etxebarrieta was chased down and killed as he tried to flee.<ref>{{cite news|url=https://elpais.com/elpais/2008/06/04/actualidad/1212567420_850215.html |title=El primer día en el que ETA asesinó |work=El País |date=4 June 2008 |access-date=25 June 2020 |language=es |trans-title=The first day that ETA murdered |author=Staff}}</ref> This led to retaliation in the form of the first planned ETA assassination: that of [[Melitón Manzanas]], chief of the [[secret police]] in San Sebastián and associated with a long record of tortures inflicted on detainees in his custody.<ref>{{cite news |url=http://www.elpais.com/articulo/domingo/HABLAN/ViCTIMAS/MELITON/MANZANAS/elppor/20010128elpdmg_12/Tes |title=Hablan las Víctimas de Melitón Manzanas|access-date =19 June 2008 |work=El País |date=27 January 2001|language=es|last1=Iglesias|first1=María Antonia}}</ref> In December 1970, several members of ETA were condemned to death in the [[Burgos trials]] (''Proceso de Burgos''), but international pressure resulted in their sentences being [[Commutation (law)|commuted]] (a process which, however, had by that time already been applied to some other members of ETA).

In early December 1970, ETA kidnapped the German consul in San Sebastian, Eugen Beilh, to exchange him for the Burgos defendants. He was released unharmed on 24 December.<ref>{{cite news|title=40 Aniversario del Proceso de Burgos|url=http://www.elmundo.es/elmundo/2010/12/02/paisvasco/1291298318.html|access-date=21 October 2011|newspaper=El Mundo|date=3 December 2010}}</ref>

Nationalists who refused to follow the tenets of Marxism–Leninism and who sought to create a [[united front]] appeared as ETA-V, but lacked the support to challenge ETA.<ref name=sullivan>{{cite book|last=Sullivan|first=John|title=ETA and Basque nationalism: The Fight for Euskadi|year=1988|publisher=Taylor and Francis|location=London|pages=128–9|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FOMOAAAAQAAJ&q=ETA+V|isbn=978-0-415-00366-7}}</ref>

The most significant assassination performed by ETA during [[Francoist Spain|Franco's dictatorship]] was [[Assassination of Luis Carrero Blanco|Operación Ogro]], the December 1973 bomb assassination in [[Madrid]] of Admiral [[Luis Carrero Blanco]], Franco's chosen successor and president of the government (a position roughly equivalent to being a prime minister). The assassination had been planned for months and was executed by placing a bomb in a tunnel dug below the street where Carrero Blanco's car passed every day. The bomb blew up beneath the politician's car and left a massive crater in the road.<ref name=studentgroup/>

For some in the Spanish opposition, Carrero Blanco's assassination, i.e., the elimination of Franco's chosen successor was an instrumental step for the subsequent re-establishment of democracy.<ref>{{cite book|author=Michel Rosenfeld|title=The Identity of the Constitutional Subject: Selfhood, Citizenship, Culture, and Community|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jGqNAgAAQBAJ&pg=PT179|year=2009|publisher=Routledge|isbn=978-1-135-25327-1|page=179|chapter=Chapter 4.3}}</ref> The government responded with new anti-terrorism laws which gave police greater powers and empowered military tribunals to pass death sentences against those found guilty. However, the [[last use of capital punishment in Spain]] when two ETA members were executed in September 1975, eight weeks before Franco's death, sparked massive domestic and international protests against the Spanish government.