"Barely containing his fury, Hitler had no choice but to make the long trip back home empty-handed. The following February, he tried a final time, writing to Franco, "We three men, the Duce, you, and I, are bound together by the most rigorous compulsion of history... In such difficult times... a bold heart can save nations." Flattery didn't work with Franco, who politely declined the chance to link his fate to the Nazis. Writing again, this time to Mussolini, Hitler predicted that Franco- who would die in his bed at the age of seventy-five- was making "the greatest mistake of his life.""