Our schools often teach that nationalism, militarism, and xenophobia were the drivers to fascism, when it was actually communism. Without the communist movement, Franco and other fascist leaders would never have attained power. He was a reactionary leader. I assume he kept power not out of some desire to rule with an iron fist, but to be what he viewed as Spain's protector and to put enough time between the revolution and returning the crown to the monarchy so as to put the communists in the past. Most would be dead when he was dead. There is something romantic about it in the literary sense. There's also something very Spanish about it too — it's spanish pragmatism, not german idealism.