Queen Juliana attempted to stop the marriage, first by sending a member of her staff to Madrid to persuade the Princess not to go ahead with a marriage that would be a political disaster for the monarchy in the Netherlands. It seemed to work and the Queen went on Dutch radio to tell the citizens that Princess Irene had agreed to cancel her engagement and was returning to the Netherlands. When the airplane arrived at Schiphol Airport, the Princess was not on it, and Queen Juliana and her husband, Prince Bernhard were supplied with a Dutch military plane to go to Spain to retrieve their daughter. However, a message was delivered to the Queen from the Dutch government warning that it would resign "en masse" if she set foot in Spain. It was suggested that Princess Irene was a pawn of General Francisco Franco who tried to maximize the event to his benefit.