Spanish Civil War

This article is about the Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939. See also Spanish Civil War, 1820-1823.

The Spanish Civil War, which lasted from July 17, 1936 to April 1, 1939, was a conflict in which the Nationalists led by General Francisco Franco defeated the Loyalists led by President Manuel Azaña of the Second Spanish Republic. The Loyalists (also known as the Republicans) received weapons and volunteers from the Soviet Union and the international Communist movement, while the Nationalists (or Francoists) were supported by the Fascist nations, including Italy and Germany. The Republicans ranged from centrists who supported capitalist liberal democracy to communists and anarchist revolutionaries; their power base was primarily secular and urban (though it also included landless peasants) and was particularly strong in industrial regions like Asturias and Catalonia. The conservative Basque Country also sided with the Republic, largely because it, along with nearby Catalonia, sought autonomy from the central government which would later be suppressed by the centralizing nationalists. The Francoists had a primarily rural, wealthier, and more conservative base of support, were mostly Roman Catholic, and favoured the centralization of power. Some of the military tactics of the war - including the use of terror tactics against civilians - foreshadowed World War II, although both the Nationalists and the Republicans relied overwhelmingly on infantry rather than modern use of blitzkrieg tactics with tanks and airplanes.

While the war lasted only about three years, the political situation had already been violent for several years before. The number of casualties is disputed; estimates generally suggest that between 300,000 and 1 million people were killed. Many of these deaths resulted from mass killings perpetrated on both sides. The war started with military uprisings throughout Spain and its colonies, which were followed by Republican reprisals against the Church, which Republican radicals viewed as an oppressive institution supportive of the old order.

There were massacres of Catholic clergy and churches, and monasteries and convents were burned. Twelve bishops, 283 nuns 2,365 monks and 4,184 priests were killed by communist and anarchist milicians among the Republicans. The statistics on assassinations, destruction of religious buildings, etc. immediately before the start of the war come from Historia de la Persecución Religiosa en España (1936-1939) by Antonio Montero Moreno (Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 3rd edition, 1999).http://www.milesjesu.com/missions/mjmonthly-may01a.html Former landowners and industrialists were also attacked. During and after the war, the Nationalists carried out a program of mass killing of opponents where house searches were carried out, and unwanted individuals were often jailed or killed. Trade-unionists, known Republican sympathisers and critics of Franco's regime were among the first to be targeted. The Nationalists also carried out aerial bombings of civilian areas with the help of the German and Italian air forces. On all sides, brutality was common.

The impact of the war was massive: The Spanish economy took decades to recover. The political and emotional repercussions of the war reverberated far beyond the boundaries of Spain and sparked passion among international intellectual and political communities, passions which still are present in Spanish politics today.

Republican sympathizers proclaimed it as a struggle between "tyranny and democracy", or "fascism and liberty", and many young, committed reformers and revolutionaries joined the International Brigades, which thought saving the Spanish Republic was the front line of the war against fascism. Franco's supporters, however, especially the younger members of the officer corps, viewed it as a battle between the red hordes of communism and anarchism on the one hand and "Christian civilization" on the other.

Introduction

Election of Popular Front

From 1934 to 1936, the Second Spanish Republic was governed by a centre-right government of the Radical Party led by Alejandro Lerroux (despite the name, the Radicals were a moderate middle class party). Crucial parliamentary backing was provided by the authoritarian and Catholic-oriented Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right (called CEDA). Lerroux's government attempted to annul the social legislation that had been passed in the previous years, especially with regard to agrarian reform. During this time, there were general strikes in Valencia and Zaragoza, street conflicts in Madrid and Barcelona, and a miners' uprising in Asturias. Lerroux's alliance with the right, his harsh repression of the revolt in 1934, and scandal combined to leave him and his party with little support going into the 1936 election. (Lerroux himself lost his seat in parliament.)

As internal disagreements mounted in the coalition, strikes were frequent, and there were attacks on unionists and clergy. In the elections of February 1936, the Popular Front won a majority of the seats in parliament. The coalition, which included the Socialist Party, two liberal parties (the Republican Left Party of Manuel Azaña and the Republican Union Party), and Communist Party of Spain, as well as Galician and Catalan nationalists, received 34.3 percent of the popular vote, compared to 33.2 percent for the National Front parties led by CEDA[1]. The Basque nationalists were not officially part of the Front, but were sympathetic to it. The anarchist trade union Confederación Nacional del Trabajo, which had sat out previous elections, urged its members to vote for the Popular Front in response to a campaign promise of amnesty for jailed leftists. The Socialist Party refused to participate in the new government. Its leader Largo Caballero, hailed as the "the Spanish Lenin" by Pravda, told crowds that revolution was now inevitable. Privately, however, he aimed merely at ousting the liberals and other non-socialists from the cabinet. Moderate Socialists like Indalecio Prieto condemned the left's May Day marches, clenched fists, and talk of revolution as insanely provocative.Preston, Paul, "Spain 1936: From Coup d'Etat to Civil War," History Today, Volume: 36 Issue: 7, July 1986, pp. 24-29 Without the Socialists, Prime Minister Manuel Azaña, a liberal who favored gradual reform while respecting the democratic process, led a minority government. In April, parliament replaced President Niceto Alcalá-Zamora, a moderate who had alienated virtually all the parties, with Azaña. Although the right also voted for Zamora's removal, this was a watershed event which inspired many conservatives to give up on parliamentary politics. Azaña was the object of intense hate by Spanish rightists, who remembered his how he had pushed a reform agenda through a recalcitrant parliament in 1931-33. Joaquín Arrarás, a friend of Francisco Franco's, called him, "A repulsive caterpillar of red Spain."Preston, Paul, Franco and Azaña, Volume: 49 Issue: 5, May 1999, pp. 17-23. The Spanish generals particularly disliked Azaña because he had cut the army's budget and closed the military academy when he was war minister (1931). CEDA turned its campaign chest over to army plotter Emilio Mola. Monarchist José Calvo Sotelo replaced CEDA's Gil Robles as the right's leading spokesman in parliament.Preston, Paul, op. cit.

Foreshadowing the conflict: Salvador Dalí's Soft Construction with Boiled Beans (Premonition of Civil War)

This was a period of rising tensions. Radicals became more aggressive, while conservatives turned to paramilitary and vigilante actions. According to official sources, 330 people were assassinated and 1,511 were wounded in politically-related violence; records show 213 failed assassination attempts, 113 general strikes, and the destruction of 160 religious buildings.

Deaths of Castillo & Calvo Sotelo

On 12 July 1936, José Castillo, a member of the Socialist Party and lieutenant in the Assault Guards, a special police corps created to deal with urban violence, was murdered by a 'far right' group in Madrid. The following day, the leader of the conservative opposition Calvo Sotelo was killed in revenge by a commando unit of the Assault Guards. The assassination aroused suspicions among the right of government involvement in the act. Sotelo had protested against what he viewed as an escalating anti-religious terror, expropriations, and hasty agricultural reforms, which he considered Bolshevist and Anarchist, and instead advocated the creation of a corporative state and declared that if such a state was fascist, he was also a fascist. He also declared that Spanish soldiers would be mad to not rise for Spain against Anarchy. In turn, the leader of the communists, Dolores Ibarruri, had vowed that Calvo Sotelo's speech would be his last speech in the Cortes. Although the Nationalist generals were already at advanced stages of planning an uprising, the event was seen as a catalyst for what followed.

Nationalist military uprising

On July 17, 1936, the conservative rebellion long feared by some in the Popular Front government began. Casares Quiroga, who had succeeded Azaña as prime minister, had in the previous weeks exiled the military officers suspected of conspiracy, including General Manuel Goded y Llopis and General Francisco Franco, sent to the Balearic Islands and to the Canary Islands, respectively. Both generals immediately took control of these islands. Franco then flew to Morocco, where the Nationalist Army of Africa were almost unopposed in assuming control. The rising was intended to be a swift coup d'etat, but was botched while the government was unable to fully suppress it. The rebels failed to take all major cities - in Madrid they were hemmed into the Montaña barracks. The barracks fell the next day with much bloodshed. In Barcelona, anarchists armed themselves and defeated the rebels. General Goded, who arrived from the Balaeric islands, was captured and later executed. The anarchists would control Barcelona and much of the surrounding Aragonian and Catalan countryside for months. The Republicans held on to Valencia and controlled almost all of the Eastern Spanish coast and central area around Madrid. The Nationalists took most of the northeast apart from Asturias and the Basque Country and a southern area including Cádiz, Huelva, Sevilla, Córdoba, and Granada; resistance in some of these areas led to reprisals.

Factions in the War

The active participants in the war covered the entire gamut of the political positions and ideologies of the time. The Nationalist side included the Carlists and Legitimist monarchists, Spanish nationalists, fascists of the Falange, Catholics, and most conservatives and monarchist liberals. On the Republican side were Basque and Catalan nationalists, socialists, communists, liberals and anarchists.

To view the political alignments from another perspective, the Nationalists included the majority of the Catholic clergy and of practising Catholics (outside of the Basque region), important elements of the army, most of the large landowners, and many businessmen. The Republicans included most urban workers, most peasants, and much of the educated middle class, especially those who were not entrepreneurs.

The genial monarchist General José Sanjurjo was figurehead of the rebellion, while Emilio Mola was chief planner and second in command. Mola began serious planning in the spring, but General Francisco Franco hesitated until early July, inspiring other plotters to refer to him as "Miss Canary Islands 1936." Franco was a key player because of his prestige as a former director of the military academy and the man who suppressed the Socialist uprising of 1934. Warned that a military coup was imminent, leftists put barracades up on the roads on July 17. Franco avoided capture by taking a tugboat to the airport. From there he flew to Morocco, where he took command of the battle-hardened colonial army.Preston, Paul, "From rebel to Caudillo: Franco's path to power," 'History Today' Volume: 33 Issue: 11, November 1983, pp. 4-10 Sanjurjo was killed in a plane crash on July 20, leaving effective command split between Mola in the north and Franco in the South. Franco was chosen overall commander at a meeting of ranking generals Salamanca on September 21. He outranked Mola and by this point his Army of Africa had demonstrated its military superiority.

One of the Nationalists' principal claimed motives was to confront the anticlericalism of the Republican regime and to defend the Roman Catholic Church, which was censured for its support for the monarchy, which many on the Republican side blamed for the ills of the country. In the opening days of the war religious buildings were burnt without action on the part of the Republican authorities to prevent it. As part of the social revolution taking place, others were turned into Houses of the People. notes to the documentary Reportaje Del Movimiento Revolucionario en Barcelona, Hasting Free TV Similarly, many of the massacres perpetrated by the Republican side targeted the Catholic Clergy. Franco's religious Moroccan Muslim troops found this repulsive and for the most part fought loyally and often ferociously for the Nationalists. Articles 24 and 26 of the Constitution of the Republic banned the Jesuits, which deeply offended many of the Nationalists. After the beginning of the Nationalist coup, anger flared anew at the Church and its role in Spanish politics. Not withstanding these religious matters, the Basque nationalists, who nearly all sided with the Republic, were, for the most part, practicing Catholics. Pope John Paul II later canonised several people murdered for being priests or nuns.

Foreign involvement

Mussolini and Hitler.

The rebellion was opposed by the government (with the troops that remained loyal to the Republic), as well as by the vast majority of urban workers, who were often members of Socialist, Communist and anarchist groups.

Although the British government proclaimed itself neutral, its diplomats in Spain urged support for the Nationalists. Britain froze all Spanish assets, an act that affected primarily the loyalist side because the government had transferred its gold reserves to Britain for safe keeping at the start of the war. Similarly, the Anglo-French arms embargo hit the Republicans disproportionately and did not prevent the Nationalists from getting weapons from Italy and Germany. Britain also discouraged activity by its citizens supporting the Republicans. The last Republican prime minister, Juan Negrín, hoped that a general outbreak of war in Europe would compel the European powers (mainly Britain and France) to finally help the republic, but World War II would not commence until months after the Spanish conflict had ended. Ultimately neither Britain nor France intervened to any significant extent. Britain supplied food and medicine to the Republic, but actively discouraged the French government of Léon Blum from supplying weapons.

Both Fascist Italy under Benito Mussolini and Nazi Germany under Adolf Hitler violated the embargo and sent troops (Corpo Truppe Volontarie and Legión Cóndor), aircraft, and weapons to support Franco. The Italian contribution amounted to over 60,000 troops at the height of the war, and the involvement helped to increase Mussolini's popularity among Italian Catholics, as the latter had remained highly critical of their ex-Socialist fascist Duce. Italian military help to Nationalists against the anti-clerical and anti-Catholic atrocities committed by the Republican side, worked well in Italian propaganda targeting on Catholics. On July 27, 1936 the first squadron of Italian airplanes sent by Benito Mussolini arrived in Spain.Speech delivered by Premier Benito Mussolini. Rome, Italy, February 23, 1941. It has been speculated that Hitler used the Spanish Civil War issue to distract Mussolini from Hitler's own designs on and plans for Austria (Anschluss), as the authoritarian Catholic, anti-Nazi Väterländische Front government of autonomous Austria had been in alliance with Mussolini since 1922 and in 1934 during the assassinnation of Austria's authoritarian president Engelbert Dollfuss had already successfully invoked Italian military assistance in case of a Nazi German invasion.

In addition, there were a few volunteer troops from other nations who fought with the Nationalists, such as the Irish Blueshirts under Eoin O'Duffy, and including such romantic Catholic intellectuals as the poet Roy Campbell. Although these volunteers, primarily Catholics, came from around the world (including Ireland, Brazil, and the USA), they are not nearly as famous as those fighting on the Republican side, and were generally less organized and hence embedded in Nationalist units.

Due to the Franco-British arms embargo, the Government of the Republic could receive aid and purchase arms only from the Soviet Union, which was thousands of miles away and in economic disarray itself. These arms included 1,000 aircraft, 900 tanks, 1,500 artillery pieces, 300 armored cars, hundreds of thousands of small arms, and 30,000 tons of ammunition (some of which was defective). To pay for these armaments the Republicans used US$500 million in gold reserves. At the start of the war the Bank of Spain had the world's fourth largest reserve of gold, about US$750 million [2], although some assets were frozen by the French and British governments. The Soviet Union also sent more than 2,000 personnel, mainly tank crews and pilots, who actively participated in combat, on the Republican side. [3] Nevertheless, some have contended that the Soviet government was motivated by the desire to sell arms and that they charged extortionate prices [4]. Later, the "Moscow gold" was an issue during the Spanish transition to democracy. They have also been accused of prolonging the war because Stalin knew that Britain and France would never accept a communist government. Though Stalin did call for the repression of Republican elements that were hostile to the Soviet Union (e.g. the anti-Stalininst POUM), he also made a conscious effort to limit Soviet involvement in the struggle and silence its revolutionary aspects in an attempt to remain on good diplomatic terms with the French and British.Paul Preston, "A Concise History of the Spanish Civil War", (London, 1986), P.107 Mexico also aided the Republicans by providing rifles and food. Throughout the war, the efforts of the elected government of the Republic to resist the rebel army were hampered by Franco-British 'non-intervention', long supply lines and intermittent availability of weapons of widely variable quality.

Helping the Nationalist forces from the start of the conflict, the Italian government assembled troops, composed of "volunteers" for legal purposes, since the Kingdom of Italy never declared war against the Spanish Republic. A poster of the Republican forces urges Spaniards: "Rise up against the Italian invasion of Spain!".

Volunteers from many countries fought in Spain, most of them on the Republican side. 60,000 men and women fought in the International Brigades, including the American Abraham Lincoln Brigade and Canadian Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion, organised in close conjunction with the Comintern to aid the Spanish Republicans. Others fought as members of the CNT and POUM militias. Those fighting with POUM most famously included George Orwell and the small ILP Contingent.

'Spain' became the cause célèbre for the left-leaning intelligentsia across the Western world, and many prominent artists and writers entered the Republic's service. As well, it attracted a large number of foreign left-wing working class men, for whom the war offered not only idealistic adventure but also an escape from post-Depression unemployment. Among the more famous foreigners participating on the Republic's side were Ernest Hemingway and George Orwell, who went on to write about his experiences in Homage to Catalonia. Orwell's novel Animal Farm was loosely inspired by his experiences and those of other members of POUM, at the hands of Stalinists when the Popular Front began to fight within itself, as were the torture scenes in 1984. Hemingway's novel For Whom the Bell Tolls was inspired by his experiences in Spain. The third part of Laurie Lee's autobiographical trilogy ('A Moment of War') is also based on his Civil War experiences, (though the accuracy of some of his recollections has been disputed). Norman Bethune used the opportunity to develop the special skills of battlefield medicine. As a casual visitor, Errol Flynn used a fake report of his death at the battlefront to promote his movies. Despite the predominantly leftist attitude of the artistic community, several prominent writers such as Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, and Evelyn Waugh all sided with Franco.

The Nationalists received substantial overt aid in the form of arms and troops from Germany and Italy. The Republicans received no aid from any major world power other than the Soviet Union, from whom they could purchase arms, thanks to their control of the Spanish gold reserves located in Madrid at the beginning of the war. At this time, Britain and France were deeply divided politically and had weak governments, while the United States was isolationist, neutralist, and was little concerned with what it largely saw as an internal matter in a European country. Nevertheless, from the outset the Nationalists received important support from some elements of American business. The American-owned Vacuum Oil Company in Tangier, for example, refused to sell to Republican ships and the Texas Oil Company supplied gasoline on credit to Franco until the war's end. Many in these countries were also shocked by the violence practiced by anarchist and POUM militias - and reported by a relatively free press in the Republican zone - and feared Stalinist influence over the Republican government. Reprisals, assassinations and other atrocities in the rebel zone were, of course, not reported nearly as widely.

Germany and the USSR used the war as a testing ground for faster tanks and aircraft that were just becoming available at the time. The Messerschmitt Me-109 fighter and Junkers Ju 52 transport/bomber were both used in the Spanish Civil War. The Soviets provided Polikarpov I-15 and Polikarpov I-16 fighters. The Spanish Civil War was also an example of total war, where the bombing of the Basque town of Guernica by the Legión Cóndor, as depicted by Pablo Picasso in Guernica, foreshadowed episodes of World War II such as the bombing campaign on Britain by the Nazis and the bombing of Dresden by the Allies.

The extent of foreign involvement in the conflict has led some commentators (most notably Paul Preston) to view it as part of a wider integrated European Civil War.

As war proceeded in the Northern front, the Republican authorities arranged the evacuation of children.These Spanish War children were shipped to Britain, Belgium, the Soviet Union and other European countries.Those in Western European countries returned to their families after the war, but many of those in the Soviet Union, from Communist families, remained and experienced the Second World War and the fall of the Soviet Union.

Like the Republican side, the Nationalist side of Franco also arranged evacuations of children, women and elderly from war zones. Refugee camps for those civilians evacuated by the Nationalists were set up in Portugal, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium.

The war: 1936

:''For a fully detailed chronology see Spanish Civil War chronology 1936.In the early days of the war, over 50,000 people who were caught on the "wrong" side of the lines were assassinated or summarily executed. The numbers were probably comparable on both sides. In these paseos ("promenades"), as the executions were called, the victims were taken from their refuges or jails by armed people to be shot outside of town. Probably the most famous of these was the poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca. The outbreak of the war provided an excuse for settling accounts and resolving long-standing feuds. Thus, this practice became widespread during the war in areas conquered. In most areas, even within a single given village, both sides committed assassinations.

Any hope of a quick ending to the war was dashed on July 21, the fifth day of the rebellion, when the Nationalists captured the main Spanish naval base at El Ferrol in northwestern Spain. This encouraged the Fascist nations of Europe to help Franco, who had already contacted the governments of Germany and Italy the day before. On July 26, Axis Powers cast their lot with the Nationalists. Nationalist forces under Franco won another great victory on September 27 when they relieved the Alcázar at Toledo.

A Nationalist garrison under Colonel Moscardo had held the Alcázar in the center of the city since the beginning of the rebellion, resisting for months against thousands of Republican troops who completely surrounded the isolated building (the inability to take the Alcázar was a serious blow to the prestige of the Republic, as it was considered inexplicable in view of their numerical superiority in the area). Two days later Franco proclaimed himself Generalísimo and Caudillo ("chieftain") while forcibly unifying the various Falangist and Royalist elements of the Nationalist cause. In October, the Nationalists launched a major offensive toward Madrid, reaching it in early November and launching a major assault on the city on November 8. The Republican government was forced to shift from Madrid to Valencia, out of the combat zone, on November 6. However, the Nationalist's attack on the capital was repulsed in fierce fighting between November 8 and 23. A contributory factor in the successful Republican defence was the arrival of the International Brigades -though only around 3000 of them participated in the battle. having failed to take the capital, Franco bombarded it from the air and in the following two years, mounted several offensives to try to encircle Madrid. (See also Siege of Madrid (1936-39))

On November 18, Germany and Italy officially recognized the Franco regime, and on December 23, Italy sent "volunteers" of its own to fight for the Nationalists.

The war: 1937

For a much more detailed chronology see Spanish Civil War chronology 1937

With his ranks being swelled by Italian troops and Spanish colonial soldiers from Morocco, Franco made another attempt to capture Madrid in January and February of 1937, but failed again.

The frequent and violent attacks by Republican forces on clergy, laity, and property of the Catholic Church led the Nationalist side to call the Spanish Civil War a modern-day Crusade. This Nationalist poster proclaims: "CRUSADE. Spain, spiritual guide of the world".

On February 21 the League of Nations Non-Intervention Committee ban on foreign national "volunteers" went into effect. The large city of Málaga was taken on February 8, and on April 28, Franco's men entered Guernica, in the Basque Country, two days after the bombing of that city by the German Condor Legion equipped with Heinkel He 51 biplanes (the legion arrived in Spain on May 7). After the fall of Guernica, the government began to fight back with increasing effectiveness.

In July, the government made a move to recapture Segovia, forcing Franco to pull troops away from the Madrid front to halt their advance. Mola, Franco's second-in-command, was killed on June 3, and in early July, despite the fall of Bilbao in June, the government actually launched a strong counter-offensive in the Madrid area, which the Nationalists repulsed with some difficulty. The clash was called "Battle of Brunete" (Brunete is a town in the province of Madrid).

After that, Franco regained the initiative, invading Aragon in August and then taking the city of Santander (now in Cantabria). Two months of bitter fighting followed and, despite determined Asturian resistance, Gijón (in Asturias) fell in late October, which effectively ended the war in the North.

Meanwhile, on August 28, the Vatican recognized Franco (possibly under pressure from Mussolini), and at the end of November, with the Nationalists closing in on Valencia, the government moved again, to Barcelona.

The war: 1938

For a much more detailed chronology see Spanish Civil War chronology 1938-1939

The battle of Teruel was an important confrontation between Nationalists and Republicans. The city belonged to the Republicans at the beginning of the battle, but the Nationalists conquered it in January. The Republican government launched an offensive and recovered the city, however the Nationalists finally conquered it for good by February 22. On April 14, the Nationalists broke through to the Mediterranean Sea, cutting the government-held portion of Spain in two. The government tried to sue for peace in May, but Franco demanded unconditional surrender, and the war raged on.

The government now launched an all-out campaign to reconnect their territory in the Battle of the Ebro, beginning on July 24 and lasting until November 26. The campaign was militarily successful, but was fatally undermined by the Franco-British appeasement of Hitler in Munich. The concession of Czechoslovakia destroyed the last vestiges of Republican morale by ending all hope of an anti-fascist alliance with the great powers. The retreat from the Ebro all but determined the final outcome of the war. Eight days before the new year, Franco struck back by throwing massive forces into an invasion of Catalonia.

The war: 1939

For a much more detailed chronology see Spanish Civil War chronology 1938-1939

Franco declares the end of the war.

The Nationalists conquered Catalonia in a whirlwind campaign during the first two months of 1939. Tarragona fell on January 14, followed by Barcelona on January 26 and Girona on February 5. Five days after the fall of Girona, the last resistance in Catalonia was broken.

On February 27, the governments of the United Kingdom and France recognized the Franco regime.

Only Madrid and a few other strongholds remained for the government forces. On March 28, with the help of pro-Franco forces inside the city (the "fifth column" General Mola had mentioned in propaganda broadcasts in 1936), Madrid fell to the Nationalists. The next day, Valencia, which had held out under the guns of the Nationalists for close to two years, also surrendered. Victory was proclaimed on April 1, when the last of the Republican forces surrendered.

After the end of the War, there were harsh reprisals against Franco's former enemies on the left, when thousands of Republicans were imprisoned and between 10,000 and 28,000 executed. The historian Anthony Beevor has estimated that Franco's regime ultimately killed 200,000 political opponents. Many other Republicans fled abroad, especially to France and Mexico.

Social Revolution

In the anarchist-controlled areas, Aragon and Catalonia, in addition to the temporary military success, there was a vast social revolution in which the workers and the peasants collectivised land and industry, and set up councils parallel to the paralyzed Republican government. This revolution was opposed by both the Soviet-supported communists, who ultimately took their orders from Stalin's politburo (which feared a loss of control), and the Social Democratic Republicans (who worried about the loss of civil property rights). The agrarian collectives had considerable success despite opposition and lack of resources, as Franco had already captured lands with some of the richest natural resources. This success survives in the minds of libertarian revolutionaries as an example that an anarchist society can flourish under the right conditions — or at least under siege, opponents may argue.

As the war progressed, the government and the communists were able to leverage their access to Soviet arms to restore government control over the war effort, both through diplomacy and force. Anarchists and the POUM were integrated with the regular army, albeit with resistance; the POUM was outlawed, falsely denounced as an instrument of the fascists. In the May Days of 1937, many hundreds or thousands of anti-fascist soldiers killed one another for control of strategic points in Barcelona, as George Orwell relates in Homage to Catalonia.

Puente Nuevo, the bridge that links together the two parts of Ronda in Spain. Behind the window near the center of the bridge is a prison cell. It is said that during the Civil War the nationalists threw people who supported the republicans from the bridge to their deaths many meters down at the bottom of the El Tajo canyon

People

Figures identified with the Nationalist side

* Francisco Franco
* Miguel Cabanellas
* José Sanjurjo
* Emilio Mola
* Gonzalo Queipo de Llano
* Juan Yagüe
* José Enrique Varela
* Rafael García Valiño
* Luis Carrero Blanco
* Fidel Dávila
* José Millán Astray
* Roy Campbell
* Juan March Ordinas
* Eoin O'Duffy
* José Antonio Primo de Rivera
* Mohamed Mizzian
* Salvador Dalí
* Juan de la Cierva

The bottom of the canyon.

Figures identified with the Republican / Loyalist side

* Manuel Azaña
* Claud Cockburn
* Joaquín Arderíus
* Norman Bethune
* Pedro García Cabrera
* Santiago Carrillo
* Buenaventura Durruti
* Federico García Lorca
* José Giral Pereira
* Valentin González ("El Campesino")
* Ernest Hemingway
* Miguel Hernández
* Dolores Ibarruri ("La Pasionaria")
* Francisco Largo Caballero
* André Malraux
* Diego Martínez Barrio
* José Miaja
* Juan Modesto
* Juan Negrín
* George Orwell
* Indalecio Prieto
* Melchor Rodriguez Garcia
* Vicente Rojo Lluch
* James Robertson Justice
* Henri Rol-Tanguy (leader of Free French Forces during Paris uprising in 1944)
* Laurie Lee

Journalists and spies

* Ernest Hemingway
* Emma Goldman (Anarchist Writer).
* Ilya Ehrenburg
* Samuel Krafsur
* Carl Marzani
* Robert Talbott Miller III
* Ture Nerman (Swedish Communist leader).
* Pablo Neruda
* Kim Philby
* Arthur Koestler
* Alexander Orlov
* Langston Hughes
* Nicolas Guillen

American pilots

* Eddie August Schneider (1911-1940)
* Bert Acosta
*Frank Glasgow TinkerGeorge Orwell

Political parties and organizations

The Popular Front (Republican)

The Popular Front was an electoral alliance formed between various left-wing and centrist parties for elections to the Cortes in 1936, in which the alliance won a majority of seats.
*UR (Unión Republicana - Republican Union): Led by Diego Martínez Barrio, formed in 1934 by members of the PRR who had resigned in objection to Alejandro Lerroux's coalition with the CEDA. It drew its main support from skilled workers and progressive businessmen.
*IR (Izquierda Republicana - Republican Left): Led by former Prime Minister Manuel Azaña after his Acción Republicana party merged with Santiago Casares Quiroga's Galician independence party and the PRRS (Socialist Radical Republican Party). It drew its support from skilled workers, small businessmen and civil servants. Azaña led the Popular Front and became President of Spain. The IR formed the bulk of the first government after the Popular Front victory, with members of the UR and the ERC.
**ERC (Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya - Republican Left of Catalonia): The Catalan faction of Azaña's Republicans, led by Lluís Companys.
*PSOE (Partido Socialista Obrero Español - Spanish Socialist Workers' Party): Formed in 1879, its alliance with Acción Republicana in municipal elections in 1931 saw a landslide victory that led to the King's abdication and the creation of the Second Republic. The two parties won the subsequent general election, but the PSOE left the coalition in 1933. At the time of the Civil War the PSOE was split between a right wing under Indalecio Prieto and Juan Negrín, and a left wing under Largo Caballero. Following the Popular Front victory it was the second largest party in the Cortes, after the CEDA; it supported the ministries of Azaña and Quiroga but did not actively participate until the Civil War began. It had majority support amongst urban manual workers.
**UGT (Unión General de Trabajadores - General Union of Workers): The socialist trade union. The UGT was formally linked to the PSOE and the bulk of the union followed Caballero.
**Federacion de Juventudes Socialistas (Federation of Socialist Youth)
*PSUC (Partit Socialista Unificat de Catalunya - Unified Socialist Party of Catalonia): An alliance of various socialist parties in Catalonia, formed in the summer of 1936, controlled by the PCE.
*JSU (Juventudes Socialistas Unificadas - Unified Socialist Youths): Militant youth group formed by the merger of the Socialist and the Communist youth groups. Its leader, Santiago Carrillo, came from the Socialist Youth but had secretly joined the Communist Youth prior to merger, and the group was soon dominated by the PCE.
*PCE (Partido Comunista de España - Communist Party of Spain): Led by José Díaz in the Civil War, it had been a minor party during the early years of the Republic but came to dominate the Popular Front after Negrín became Prime Minister.
*POUM (Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista - Worker's Party of Marxist Unification): A party of former Trotskyists formed in 1935 by Andreu Nin.
**JCI (Juventud Comunista Ibérica - Iberian Communist Youth): the POUM's youth movement.
*PS (Partido Sindicalista - Syndicalist Party): a moderate splinter group of CNT.

Supporters of the Popular Front (Republican)

*Unión Militar Republicana Antifascista (Republican Anti-fascist Military Union): Formed by military officers in opposition to the Unión Militar Española.
*Libertarian or Anarchist groups. The libertarians boycotted the 1936 Cortes election and initially opposed the Popular Front government, but joined during the Civil War, when Largo Caballero became Prime Minister.
**CNT (Confederación Nacional del Trabajo - National Confederation of Labour): The confederation of anarcho-syndicalist trade unions.
**FAI (Federación Anarquista Ibérica - Iberian Anarchist Federation): The federation of anarchist groups, very active in the Republican militias.
**Mujeres Libres (Free Women): The anarchist feminist organisation.
**FIJL (Federación Ibérica de Juventudes Libertarias - Iberian Federation of Libertarian Youth)
*Basque separatists.
**PNV (Partido Nacionalista Vasco - Basque Nationalist Party): A Catholic Christian Democrat party under José Antonio Aguirre, which campaigned for greater autonomy or independence for the Basque region. Held seats in the Cortes and supported the Popular Front government before and during the Civil War. Put its religious disagreement with the Popular Front aside for a promised Basque autonomy.
**ANV (Acción Nacionalista Vasca - Basque Nationalist Action): A leftist socialist party which at the same time campaigned for independence of the Basque region.
**STV (Solidaridad de Trabajadores Vascos - Basque Workers' Solidarity): A trade union in the Basque region, with a Catholic clerical tradition combined with moderate socialist tendencies.
*SRI (Socorro Rojo Internacional - International Red Aid): Communist organization allied with the Comintern that provided considerable aid to Republican civilians and soldiers.

Nationalists (Francoist)

:Virtually all Nationalist groups had very strong Roman Catholic convictions and supported the native Spanish clergy.
*Unión Militar Española (Spanish Military Union) - a conservative political organisation of officers in the armed forces, including outspoken critics of the Republic like Francisco Franco. Formed in 1934, from its inception the UME secretly courted fascist Italy. After the electoral victory of the Popular Front, it began plotting a coup with monarchist and fascist groups in Spain. In the run-up to the Civil War it was led by Emilio Mola and José Sanjurjo, and latterly Franco.
*Alfonsist Monarchist - supported the restoration of Alfonso XIII. Many army officers, aristocrats and landowners were Alfonsine, but there was little popular support.
**Renovación Española (Spanish Restoration) - the main Alfonsine political party.
**Acción Española (Spanish Action) - a fascist party led by Jose Calvo Sotelo, formed in 1933 around a journal of the same name edited by Ramiro de Maeztu.
***Bloque Nacional (National Block) - the militia movement founded by Calvo Sotelo.
*Carlist Monarchist - supported Alfonso Carlos I de Borbón y Austria-Este's claim to the Spanish throne and saw the Alfonsine line as having been weakened by Liberalism. After Alfonso Carlos died without issue, the Carlists split - some supporting Carlos' appointed regent, Francisco-Xavier de Borbón-Parma, others supporting Alfonso XIII or the Falange. The Carlists were clerical hard-liners led by the aristocracy, with a populist base amongst the farmers and rural workers of Navarre providing the militia.
**Comunión Tradicionalista (Traditionalist Communion) - the Carlist political party
***Requetés (Volunteers) - militia movement.
***Pelayos - militant youth movement, named after Pelayo of Asturias.
***Margaritas - women's movement, named after Margarita de Borbón-Parma, wife of Carlist pretender Charles VII (1868-1909).
*Falange (Phalanx):
**FE (Falange Española de las JONS) - created by a merger in 1934 of two fascist organisations, Primo de Rivera's Falange (Phalanx), founded in 1933, and Ramiro Ledesma's Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional-Sindicalista(Assemblies of National-Syndicalist Offensive), founded in 1931. It became a mass movement after the defeat of the PRR and the collapse of the CEDA in the 1936 General Election, when it was joined by José María Gil-Robles y Quiñones's Acción Popular, and Acción Católica, led by Ramón Serrano Súñer.
***OJE (Organización Juvenil Española) - militant youth movement.
***Sección Femenina (Feminine Section) - women's movement in labour of Social Aid.
**Falange Española Tradicionalista y de las JONS - created by a merger in 1937 of the FE and the Carlist party, bringing the remaining political and militia components of the Nationalist side under Franco's ultimate authority.

See also

* Second Spanish Republic
* Anarchism in Spain
* Spanish Revolution
* International Brigades
* Ireland and the Spanish Civil War
* Bombing of Guernica
* Proxy war
* European Civil War

External links

* Documents on Irish involvement in the SCW 1936-39
* The Spanish Civil War, by George Orwell
* Constitución de la República Española (1931)
* Professor Marek Jan Chodakiewicz on The Spanish Civil War
* A collection of essays by Albert and Vera Weisbord with about a dozen essays written during and about the Spanish Civil War.
* Anarchism in the Spanish Revolution
* The Anarcho-Statists of Spain, a different view of the anarchists in the Spanish Civil War
* A reply to the above by an anarchist
* A description, according to the Vatican, of the religious persecution suffered by Catholics during the Spanish Civil War (in Spanish).
* A History of the Spanish Civil War, excerpted from a U.S. government country study.
* Spanish Civil War Info From Spartacus Educational
* La Cucaracha, The Spanish Civil War Diary, an excellent, detailed, chronicle of the events of the war
* American Jews in Spanish Civil War
*Ronald Hilton, Spain, 1931-36, From Monarchy to Civil War, An Eyewitness Account,
* Columbia Historical Review Dutch Involvement in the Spanish Civil War
* Noam Chomsky's Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship
* Civil War Documentaries made by the CNT
* Spanish Civil War and Revolution text archive in the libcom.org library
* Spanish Civil War and Revolution image gallery - photographs and posters from the conflict
*The Spanish Revolution and Civil War 1936-1939 Overview articles, Web sites, articles, books & pamphlets online, films (on Tidsskriftcentret.dk)
* Books on the Spanish Civil War Spanish Civil War Books

Notes

Further reading

*
*
* Carr, Raymond (Introduction; no editor named), Images of the Spanish Civil War, London (Allen & Unwin) 1986.
* Enzensberger,Christian,"The short summer of Anarchy"
*
*
* Moa, Pío; Los Mitos de la Guerra Civil, La Esfera de los Libros, 2003.
*
* Preston, Paul, A Concise History of the Spanish Civil War, London (Fontana Press) 1996.
*
*

External links

* With the Reds in Andalusia, By Joe Monks, 1985. An Irish member of the Int Brigade.
* Irish and Jewish Volunteers in the Spanish Anti-Fascist War Pamphlet by Manus O'Riordan

Related films

Raza (Jose Luis Saenz de Heredia, 1942)
For Whom the Bell Tolls (Sam Wood, 1943, from the Ernest Hemingway novel)
The Heifer (La vaquilla) (Luis García Berlanga, 1985)
*¡Ay, Carmela! (Directed by Carlos Saura, Spain/Italy 1990) The title is a reference to the song "Quinta Brigada", which boasts of the valor of the Republican troops and laments their lack of supplies and air support
*Land and Freedom (Ken Loach, 1995)
*Libertarias (Vicente Aranda, 1996)
* "Vivir la Utopia" (Living Utopia) by Juan Gamero, Arte-TVE, Catalunya 1997
*La Lengua de las Mariposas (The Tongue of the Butterflies), José Luis Cuerda, 1999)
*Soldados de Salamina'' (David Trueba, 2002)
*Website streaming a number of CNT-produced films

Related literature

For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway (1940)
The Living and the Dead by Patrick White (1941)
The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood (2000)

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