ETA has suspended the armed struggle. In this regard, the majority of the media have alluded to the end of a disease by recalling the number of victims of the armed organization. As if it wasn't anything else. It's like it's a one-dimensional phenomenon. However, ETA cannot be summed up with the victims it has caused. ETA has not been just a form of struggle or a strategy, it has not been just an organization. For five decades it's been a lot more. For one thing and its opposite for others, with very different or contradictory effects of one time or another.

From the point of view of personal experiences, ETA has undoubtedly been the source of terrible suffering, no more than the cruel band of hooded people that in the daily lives of some caused an unbearable and fearsome threat. But on the contrary, for many Basques, before and until today, the adventure of an absolute altruistic commitment has been dangerous, of dramatic use. The resentment of some and the honor and dignity of others. Permission to take your life as much as the reason you gave it. An unjustifiable attack on Spain or on “young democracy”. A legitimate weapon to respond strongly to the humiliation and oppression suffered.

ETA has on many occasions been a moral and ethical problem for many people. There is also the possibility of rejoicing at the clean-up of various torturers, Chibates and fascist military. One of the consequences of ETA is that the only nuclear power plant that took place throughout Europe was paralysed. For many political researchers, armed struggle was an unresolved anachronism that lasted from the past. Others have analyzed the broad social phenomenon of awakening and propagating modern Basque nationalism, the symbol of resistance that created political attachment and affective-cultural identification and the rapid mechanism to turn into abertzales a multitude of immigrants arrived from all corners of the Spanish State. ETA's activity has been to awaken and nurture the desire and courage of the Abertzale struggle, not only for violence, but also for many other areas and ways: In the sense of the phrase “We all have to give something so that a few don’t give it all…” But the one who proposed nationalism, which in other times the phenomenon of victimization began to work backwards, also made Spanish nationalism bellow. The martyrdom of Txiki and Otaegi shook Basque society terribly, but twenty-two years later M. The White Angel also caused the same thing. At one time ETA was an instrument to make the national liberation struggle of the Basques known internationally, gathering broad support among the leftist movements. The Spanish State has also used for a long time as an excuse to keep all kinds of disorder (torture, unlawful acts, litigation) facing Europe.

Some had a rigorous and effective political instrument at the service of an ETA strategy, since the Transition, as the main obstacle to the normalization of the situation and, therefore, to keep the political problems of sovereignty and territoriality alive. In parallel, the others had the pretext of avoiding fundamental political problems. It was the favourite theme of some parties to compete in the elections, and at the moment it was not. For others, they are illegalized and cause of total exclusion from the electoral arena. Without forgetting those who, together with ETA’s condemnation, used it as cross-cutting blackmail in the face of Madrid.

All this and much more is ETA. Ugly and beautiful, human and political, anecdotal and historical things. For most people in Euskal Herria ETA was “forever.” Now it's going to disappear and you're going to notice a hole. Who knows what Euskal Herria will be without ETA? The chapter that opens up to us is hopeful and complex, full of democratic struggle and confrontation, surely, but perhaps, at least, it is the desire of the majority, without blood or tears.