The Spanish dictator Francisco Franco was a rabid anti-Communist and a staunch ally of the United States. But that did not keep him from forging a friendship with a Communist nation that was America's sworn enemy: Fidel Castro's Cuba. The Spanish dictator Francisco Franco was a rabid anti-Communist and a staunch ally of the United States. But that did not keep him from forging a friendship with a Communist nation that was America's sworn enemy: Fidel Castro's Cuba.