As he basks in the warm glow of respect, and even affection, surrounding his coronation this weekend, King Charles should recall the story of his distant cousin and near namesake ex-king Juan Carlos of Spain as a warning of how speedily a popular monarch can go from hero to zero.
The ties between Spain’s Royal Family and our own are close in blood and warm mutual regard. Both families are direct descendants of Queen Victoria, with Spain’s current King Felipe calling our late Queen Elizabeth ‘Aunt Lilibet’; our new monarch reportedly had a private lunch with Felipe’s disgraced dad Juan Carlos only last month.
The sad downfall of Juan Carlos should flash a red warning light to our somewhat naive new King
When he succeeded Spain’s durable fascist dictator General Franco as head of state in 1975, few thought that Juan Carlos would last for long. His Bourbon family had a track record of alienating their subjects, and the king’s grandfather King Alfonso XIII had been forced from his throne to make way for a republic in 1931.
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