The visit to 'Mecca'
Just as it is obligatory for Muslims to visit the holy city of Mecca at least once in their lifetime, for the presidents of the Spanish government their particular Mecca is the White House, the official residence of the president of the United States.
In recent days we have witnessed a forced and at the same time costly, in terms of results, the seventeenth visit by a Spanish president to his American 'namesake'. All our presidents have gone through such a pilgrimage with greater or lesser assiduity and glory, with varying results; and we could say that each one has had to pay an important toll for it.
Just as Muslims are willing to invest a lot of money and suffer sacrifices, even death, to make such an important journey, our presidents do not hesitate to offer sweets, winks, shadowy support and even fetid public adulation to Uncle Sam so that he will receive them with greater or lesser paraphernalia and pomp, depending on the personality and personal baggage of the illustrious Spanish president.
Everyone is aware of Sánchez's long and regretful pilgrimage to appear next to Biden in a photograph or a small report. His multiple efforts to approach him, even for a few seconds and in a corridor, were pathetic and gave rise to many memes on social networks.
It was clear that such a system did not work and that the results of such approaches were more negative than positive, so more elements had to be brought into play, something like what we know as 'pulling out all the stops'.
After the fleeting and useless stroll in Brussels more than two years ago, various efforts had to be made and for this, following Sánchez's 'whatever it takes and whatever it costs' style and manner, the offer was made to make Madrid available to NATO to hold the planned summit on 29 and 30 June 2022. Our official excuse was that this year was the 40th anniversary of Spain's accession to the Alliance.
A Summit that initially had neither a fertile nor attractive agenda was saved by the lure of Madrid for foreigners, less so for holding the Olympic Games, and mainly because Putin felt like invading Ukraine and turning NATO and the EU upside down.
It is clear to no one that the organisation of such macro events, although the host country always receives some payments for the disbursements and running costs of the delegations, has to cover many expenses, so it is increasingly difficult for Brussels to find a country that is willing to do so, let alone totally free of charge.
It is customary that, during summits, the president of the host country takes on a certain prominence and holds bilateral or multilateral meetings with his counterparts to discuss various issues, mainly the adoption of a common policy or the simple marketing of general or specific military equipment and infrastructures. So Sánchez had his private meeting with Biden, but it was either not enough or too superficial and, moreover, it was held outside the White House. It was therefore necessary to 'sacrifice more lambs' to satisfy the irrepressible hunger and mania of those who sell the limited bilateral meetings they offer at a very high price.
Prior to this event of singular importance, another much more transcendental event took place for Spain and also for the United States, an event that has never been adequately explained and which was presented as a personal decision by Sánchez.
I am referring, of course, to the 180-degree turnaround in Spain's position on Morocco's role in the future of the Sahara. This decision, which was made public on 17 March 2022, turned Spain's traditional position on the issue upside down, the UN mandates to our country to hold a referendum among the aborigines - former Spaniards in their own right - regarding their future and dependence, and tarnished the traditional and very important trade and neighbourly relations with Algeria, seriously jeopardising, among other investments, the supply of gas - of which it was our main supplier at the time - in the midst of the fuel price crisis caused by the war in Ukraine.
We were not able to elucidate the reason for such a momentous decision and, except for some, it went unnoticed that Morocco is one of the biggest, if not the best, ally of the US in Africa, the main arms buyer and the one that fights the hardest alongside them in trying to sustain the expansion of the Islamic State and its franchises into NATO countries.
Such a turnaround was to offer a cellophane-wrapped gift to both, in exchange for little or nothing. Now, it is much easier to understand the reason for this turn of events, which I believe was not the work of Sánchez - I do not consider him to be so intelligent - but of one of those sorcerer's apprentices who swarm around him to interpret and carry out all the delusions and desires of the great leader so that he can continue to fatten his sickly prurience and personal selfishness.
All of this, put into a cocktail shaker, changed Biden's position of contempt towards Sánchez for being allied with terrorists and communists and, thanks to great diplomatic efforts, a programme was set up to accommodate Biden's request during the aforementioned NATO summit to increase the size of the US anti-missile system fleet based in Rota by 50 percent, a programme was created in response to Biden's request during the aforementioned NATO summit to increase by fifty percent the size of the fleet of US anti-missile system ships based in Rota, to which was added the purchase of multi-purpose helicopters for the Spanish Navy The Spanish excuses or quid pro quo were that they were going to discuss the abusive taxes on various Spanish agricultural products and try to recover the ever-present issue of the partial cleaning of the sands on Palomares beach in Cuevas del Almanzora (Almería), The sands of the Palomares beach in Cuevas del Almanzora (Almería) have been infected with radiological elements since the plane crash of two American planes flying over the area on 17 January 1966, in which a KC-135 tanker plane and a B-52 strategic bomber collided in flight during a refuelling manoeuvre, causing the four thermonuclear bombs carried by the bomber to fall.
Despite Spain's great efforts, concessions and real sacrifices to satisfy its tireless president, it seems that after the meeting, if one looks at the actions taken and the ensuing reactions, it is easy to see that the meeting should be filed among those of little or no importance.
The reasons for this are striking and very clamorous: at the end of the meeting there was no joint press conference between the two leaders, in the gardens with the respective flags as is usually the case with important people; the meeting was rather brief or a dressing-up; Sánchez was not put up in a residence provided by the White House for important leaders, nor was he offered the very frequent dinner that is given to them.
Once the photo was taken and after praising him drooling sickeningly, Sánchez has returned to Spain, once again, empty-handed; no agreement has been reached on the cleaning of Palomares; nothing is known about the tariffs; but yes, we are going to pay a more than substantial amount of money for an American material; the number of American destroyers or frigates in Rota will soon increase from four to six, making it a much more profitable target, and lastly, we are once again going to swallow refugees who want to reach American soil - we have already done so with those from Afghanistan. To which must be added the national betrayal of the Sahara issue, the complication of our relations with Algeria and the dangerous gift to Morocco in exchange for nothing. Knots that are very difficult or impossible to unravel or resolve.