A hundred years ago Zeruko Argia was published and nine months later Eusko Ikaskuntza organized the Assembly of the Municipal Administration of the Basque Country. However, as we followed the Catalans, in 1914 the Commonwealth of Catalonia saw the light and under its leadership on 19 January 1919 Catalonia approved a draft statute. It was abandoned by Madrid, Spain did not participate in the First World War and, consequently, the stateless nations of the Iberian Peninsula did not have the opportunity to achieve the autonomy or independence of many other European countries. In 1910 there were 25 independent countries in Europe; in 1919 they were 32 as a result of the geopolitical struggle.

A hundred years later, things haven't changed much. Catalonia has shown its willingness to build a state, while Euskal Herria, on the other hand, is very weak in this work. In any case, if one wants to conquer a state, it must be clear that geopolitical struggle remains the cornerstone, along with the logic of the broad majorities.

The propaganda of low-cost independence is exhausted. The achievement of the right of self-determination that Catalonia set in motion has found the conflicting struggles within it – small majorities and costs that are not to be assumed – and the external borders – geopolitics. In order to force Spain to negotiate, the level of confrontation must be increased, but the majority of Catalan society is not prepared to risk its well-being. A solution needed to deal with this reality, but it is not enough for independence to extend its support. It is known that when unilateral secession processes have been used as an argument for the support of the people, they have put on the table a majority of at least two-thirds in Parliament or in the referendum. Achieving this in the medium term does not seem to be an unthinkable mark, but the betrayal of Spain and the leadership of independence in the social and cultural sphere allow it.

If it is possible to extend the majority in Catalonia, interpreting the geopolitical variable well seems more difficult. Until now, the Catalan hegemonic independentism, and more recently also the Basque, have embraced the paradigm of deannexation, that is, the strategy to express the Western adulation in geopolitical terms that the process of secession is not dangerous. What happens is that Spain does the same with more credibility, because it is a state with a greater territorial scope. Consequently, in the midst of the harsh geopolitical struggle that the world is experiencing today, the West is not going to enrage Spain from its own will. It is better that all Spain be allied/dependent than only Catalonia and Euskal Herria.

Therefore, it can be said that the way to achieve an independent state is not to flatter the West, but to seek its contradictions by developing a multipolar diplomacy of the twenty-first century. Coming to alternative scenarios, in the Iberian peninsula, the processes of secession could have been supported by a process of accelerating the integration and federalisation of the European Union, should Madrid lose territorial sovereignty for the benefit of Brussels. However, this hypothesis is not credible, at least if pro-multipolar forces do not strengthen their positions or if a new hegemony does not appear (China). Then, yes, there can be the disintegration of Spain or a great acceleration in the integration of the European Union in order to better manage the privileged decline of Europe.