Spain: Surprise !

Spain’s vote for continued membership in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization is a tribute to the leadership of Prime Minister Felipe Gonzalez, and a relief to allied governments that had feared the consequences of a Spanish withdrawal. The Reagan Administration, however, would be wise to take serious note of the strong anti-Americanism that surfaced during the weeks preceding the referendum.

Gonzalez himself had called for the closing of the American bases in Spain and for Spanish withdrawal from NATO before his Socialist Party came to power three years ago. Once faced with the responsibilities of governance, however, he saw things differently. He carried through on the Socialist campaign promise to stage a referendum on NATO membership, but strongly urged Spaniards to vote for remaining within the alliance.

As recently as last week pre-election polls had indicated that voters would reject NATO membership by a wide margin. Instead they voted by a decisive majority to keep Spain within the alliance.

The referendum result reaffirmed Spain’s movement away from its traditional isolationism toward greater involvement with Europe--an important milestone in itself. If the vote had gone against continued NATO ties, the alliance would have lost the considerable benefits of Spanish help in guarding NATO’s southern flank, and a troubling precedent would have been set for possible defections by some other NATO members.

As things stand, Gonzalez is still committed to negotiating a reduction in the 12,500 American troops stationed in Spain under a separate treaty, but the atmosphere will now be more conducive to calm and deliberate resolution of the issue.

The surprisingly large pro-NATO vote indicates that the anti-Americanism that became evident during the campaign was not as strong as had been feared. But it was strong enough to merit serious consideration by U.S. political and diplomatic leaders as to its source.

On-the-spot observers report that many Spaniards are still angry at the United States because they are convinced that the dictatorship of Francisco Franco would not have lasted so long without what they perceived as American political support. And it’s true that U.S. Presidents and vice presidents going back as far as Dwight D. Eisenhower embraced Franco in an unseemly fulsome and public way.

Anti-Americanism in Greece is similarly rooted in the unnecessarily friendly relations between Washington and the ruling Greek colonels a few years ago. Vice President George Bush’s effusive praise of then-President Ferdinand E. Marcos of the Philippines a few months ago strengthened the hand of those who wanted U.S. bases closed in that country.

Global realities require that we have security arrangements with governments that are not democratic. But U.S. political leaders have a seemingly incurable compulsion to pretend that leaders of such countries are fellow democrats, no matter how nauseous their treatment of their own people. That isn’t necessary. There is also ample proof that such behavior is counterproductive to this country’s long-term security interests.