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An archaeological study of a Republican bunker constructed in 1937 during the siege on Oviedo, Asturias

The Spanish Civil War was a major conflict that devastated Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939. It began after an attempted coup d'état by a group of Spanish Army generals against the government of the Second Spanish Republic, then under the leadership of president Manuel Azaña. The nationalist insurgency was supported by the conservative Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right (Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas, or C.E.D.A), monarchists known as Carlist groups, and the Fascist Falange (Falange Española de las J.O.N.S.). The war ended with the victory of the rebel forces, the overthrow of the Republican government, and the founding of a dictatorship led by General Francisco Franco. In the aftermath of the civil war, all right-wing parties were fused into the state party of the Franco regime.

Republicans (republicanos) were supported by the Soviet Unionmarker and Mexicomarker, while the followers of the rebellion, Nationalists (nacionales), received the support of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, as well as neighbouring Portugalmarker. Although the United Statesmarker was officially neutral during the conflict, major American corporations such as Texaco, General Motors, Ford Motors and The Firestone Tire and Rubber Company greatly assisted the Nationalist rebels with their constant supply of trucks, tires, machine tools and fuel.

The war increased international tensions in Europe in the lead-up to World War II, and was largely seen as a proxy war between the Communist Soviet Union and Fascist states Italy and Germany. In particular, new tank warfare tactics and the terror bombing of cities from the air were features of the Spanish Civil War which played a significant part in the later general European war.

The Spanish Civil War has been dubbed as "the first media war", with several writers and journalists covering it wanting their work "to support the cause". Foreign correspondents and writers covering it included Ernest Hemingway, Martha Gellhorn, George Orwell and Robert Capa.Like most civil wars, it became notable for the passion and political division it inspired, and for atrocities committed on both sides of the conflict. The Spanish Civil War often pitted family members, neighbors, and friends against each other. Apart from the combatants, many civilians were killed for their political or religious views by both sides, and after the war ended in 1939, Republicans were persecuted by the victorious Nationalists.

Prelude to war

Historical context

There were several reasons for the war, many of them long-term tensions that had escalated over the years.

The 19th century was turbulent for Spain. The country had undergone several civil wars and revolts, carried out by both reformists and the conservatives, who tried to displace each other from power. A liberal tradition that first ascended to power with the Spanish Constitution of 1812 sought to abolish the absolutist monarchy of the old regime and to establish a liberal state. The most traditionalist sectors of the political sphere systematically tried to avert these reforms and to sustain the monarchy. The Carlists—supporters of Infante Carlos and his descendants—rallied to the cry of "God, Country and King" and fought for the cause of Spanish tradition (absolutism and Catholicism) against the liberalism and later the republicanism of the Spanish governments of the day. The Carlists, at times (including the Carlist Wars), allied with nationalists (not to be confused with the nationalists of the Civil War) attempting to restore the historic liberties (and broad regional autonomy) granted by the fueros (regional charters) of the Basque Country and Cataloniamarker. Further, from the mid-19th century onwards, liberalism was outflanked on its left by socialism of various types and especially by anarchism, which was far stronger in Spain than anywhere else in Europe.
Spain experienced a number of different systems of rule in the period between the Napoleonic wars of the early 19th century and the outbreak of the Civil War. During most of the 19th century, Spain was a constitutional monarchy, but under attack from various directions. The First Spanish Republic, founded in 1873, was short-lived. A monarchy under Alfonso XIII lasted from 1887 to 1931, but from 1923 was held in place by the military dictatorship of Miguel Primo de Rivera. Following Primo de Rivera's overthrow in 1930, the monarchy was unable to maintain power and the Second Spanish Republic was declared in 1931. This Republic soon came to be led by a coalition of the left and center. A number of controversial reforms were passed, such as the Agrarian Law of 1932, distributing land among poor peasants. Millions of Spaniards had been living in more or less absolute poverty under the firm control of the aristocratic landowners in a quasi-feudal system. These reforms, along with anticlericalist acts, as well as military cutbacks and reforms, created strong opposition.

Constitution of 1931 and anticlericalism

Niceto Alcalá Zamora in 1931

The Second Republic began on 14 April 1931 when King Alfonso XIII left the country following local and municipal elections in which Republican candidates won the majority of votes in urban areas. The departure led to a provisional government under Niceto Alcalá Zamora, and a constituent Cortes to draw up a new constitution, which was adopted on 9 December 1931, after being passed by a referendum three days earlier. The Spanish Constitution of 1931 meant the legal beginning of the Second Spanish Republic, in which the election of both the positions of Head of State and Head of government was meant to be democratic.

The 1931 Constitution was formally effective from 1931 until 1939; however, by the spring of 1936, just prior to the effective onset of the Spanish Civil War, it had been largely abandoned, the extreme left having taken power, disenfranchising the centre and conservatives.

The constitution provided for universal suffrage and generally accorded thorough civil liberties and representation, a major exception being Catholic rights. The Constitution proclaimed religious freedom and a complete separation of Church and State, but in actuality provided for governmental interference in church matters. Namely, it excluded the Church from education (prohibited teaching by religious orders, even in private schools), restricted Church property rights and investments, provided for confiscation of and prohibitions on ownership of Church property, and banned the Society of Jesus. The revolution of 1931 that established the Second Republic brought to power an anticlerical government.

The government was unwilling to control the anti-Catholic sentiment and deadly mob attacks on churches and monasteries. That caused Catholics to muster their forces in opposition, exacerbating the conditions that led to the war.

On 3 June 1933, in the encyclical Dilectissima Nobis (On Oppression Of The Church Of Spain), Pope Pius XI condemned the Spanish Government's deprivation of the civil liberties on which the Republic was supposedly based, noting in particular the expropriation of Church property and schools and the persecution of religious communities and orders.

Commentators have posited that the "hostile" approach to the issues of church and state was a substantial cause of the breakdown of democracy and the onset of civil war. Since the far left considered moderation of the anticlericalist aspects of the constitution as totally unacceptable, commentators have argued that "the Republic as a democratic constitutional regime was doomed from the outset".

1933 election and aftermath

In the 1933 elections to the Cortes Generales, the Spanish Confederation of the Autonomous Right (Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas or CEDA) won a plurality of seats; however, these were not enough to form a majority. Despite the results, then President Niceto Alcalá-Zamora declined to invite the leader of the CEDA to form a government and instead invited the Radical Republican Party and its leader Alejandro Lerroux to do so. CEDA supported the Lerroux government; it later demanded and, on 1 October 1934, received three ministerial positions.

Lerroux's alliance with the right, his suppression of the revolt in 1934, and the Stra-Perlo scandal combined to leave him and his party with little support going into the 1936 election; Lerroux lost his seat in parliament.

Rising tensions and political violence

Hostility between the left and the right increased after the 1933 formation of the Government. Spain experienced general strikes and street conflicts. Noted among the strikes was the miners' revolt in northern Spain and riots in Madrid. Nearly all rebellions were crushed by the Government and political arrests followed.

Tensions rose in the period before the start of the war. Radicals became more aggressive, and conservatives turned to paramilitary and vigilante actions. According to official sources, 330 people were assassinated and 1,511 were wounded in political violence; records show 213 failed assassination attempts, 113 general strikes, and the destruction (typically by arson) of 160 religious buildings.

1936 Popular Front victory and aftermath

In the 1936 Elections a new coalition of Socialists (Socialist Workers Party of Spain, PSOE), liberals (Republican Left and the Republican Union Party), Communists, and various regional nationalist groups won the extremely tight election. The results gave 34 percent of the popular vote to the Popular Front and 33 percent to the incumbent government of the CEDA. This result, when coupled with the Socialists' refusal to participate in the new government, led to a general fear of revolution.

Azaña becomes president

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 with Azaña. The removal of Zamora was made on specious grounds and in violation of the constitution. Although the right also voted for Zamora's removal, this was a watershed event which inspired many conservatives to give up on parliamentary politics. Leon Trotsky wrote that Zamora had been Spain's "stable pole", and his removal made the climate revolutionary.

Azaña was the object of intense hatred by Spanish rightists because he had pushed a reform agenda through a recalcitrant parliament in 1931–1933. Joaquín Arrarás, a friend of Francisco Franco, called him "a repulsive caterpillar of red Spain." The Spanish generals particularly disliked Azaña because he had cut the army's budget and closed the military academy while 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.

Murder of Calvo Sotelo

José Calvo Sotelo was the leading Spanish monarchist and a prominent parliamentary conservative. He protested against what he viewed as escalating anti-religious terror, expropriations, and hasty agricultural reforms, which he considered Bolshevist and anarchist. He instead advocated the creation of a corporative state.

On 12 July 1936, in Madrid, a far right group murdered Lieutenant José Castillo of the Assault Guards (a special police corps created to deal with urban violence) and a Socialist. The next day, Assault Guards with forged papers "arrested" Sotelo and abducted him in an Assault Guard van. Leftist gunman Luis Cuenca, who was operating in a commando unit of the Assault Guard led by Captain Fernando Condés Romero, is said to have murdered Sotelo. Condés was close to the Socialist leader Indalecio Prieto.

The murder of such a prominent member of parliament, with involvement of the police, aroused suspicions and strong reactions among the Center and the Right.Although the Nationalist generals were already in advanced stages of planning an uprising, the event provided a catalyst and convenient public justification for their coup.

Outbreak of the war

Nationalist military revolt

The monarchist General José Sanjurjo was the 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 as the man who suppressed the Socialist uprising of 1934.

Fearing a military coup, Prime Minister Casares Quiroga sent General Manuel Goded Llopis to the Balearic Islandsmarker and Franco to the Canary Islandsmarker. On 17 July 1936, the plotters signaled the beginning of the coup by broadcasting the code phrase, "Over all of Spain, the sky is clear." Llopis and Franco immediately took control of the islands to which they were assigned. Warned that a coup was imminent, leftists barricaded the roads on 17 July, but Franco avoided capture by taking a tugboat to the airport.

Two British MI6marker intelligence agents, Cecil Bebb and Major Hugh Pollard, then flew Franco to Spanish Morocco to see Juan March Ordinas, where the Spanish Army of Africa, led by Nationalist officers, was unopposed.

Government reaction

The rising was intended to be a swift coup d'état, but was botched in certain areas allowing the government to retain control of parts of the country. At this first stage, the rebels failed to take any major cities—in Madridmarker they were hemmed into the Montaña barracks. The barracks fell the next day, with much bloodshed. In Barcelonamarker, anarchists armed themselves and defeated the rebels. General Goded Llopis, who arrived from the Balearic islands, was captured and later executed. However, the turmoil facilitated anarchist control over Barcelona and much of the surrounding Aragonesemarker and Catalanmarker countryside, effectively breaking away from the Republican government and establishing anarchism in Catalonia. According to Noam Chomsky:
When the coup came, the Republican government was paralyzed. Workers armed themselves in Madrid and Barcelona, robbing government armories and even ships in the harbor, and put down the insurrection while the government vacillated, torn between the twin dangers of submitting to Franco and arming the working classes. In large areas of Spain effective authority passed into the hands of the anarchist and socialist workers who played a substantial, generally dominant role in putting down the insurrection.

The Republicans held on to Valenciamarker and controlled almost all of the Eastern Spanish coast and central area around Madrid. Except for Asturiasmarker, Cantabriamarker and part of the Basque Countrymarker, the Nationalists took most of northern and northwestern Spain and also a southern area in central and western Andalusiamarker including Seville.


The war was cast by Republican sympathizers as a struggle between "tyranny and democracy", and by Nationalist supporters as between Communist and Anarchist "red hordes" and "Christian civilization". Nationalists also claimed to be protecting the establishment and bringing security and direction to an ungoverned and lawless society.

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

Spanish politics, especially on the left, were quite fragmented and spread out. At the beginning, socialists and radicals supported democracy, while the communists and anarchists opposed the institution of the republic as much as the monarchists. There were internal divisions even among the socialists: a group that adhered to classical Marxism, and a more progressive Marxist group. The former was the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party , one of whose delegates to the Soviet Union challenged Lenin regarding his use of the CHEKA to rein in dissidents, and upon his return to Spain convinced the PSOE to reject affiliation with the 5th to 7th Comintern. From the Comintern's point of view the increasingly powerful, if fragmented, left and the weak right were an optimum situation. Their goal was to use a veil of legitimate democratic institutions to outlaw the right, converting the state into the Soviet vision of a "people's republic" with total leftist domination, a goal repeatedly voiced in Comintern instructions and in the public statements of the PCE (Communist Party of Spain). The left and Basque or Catalan nationalist conservatives had many conflicting ideas. The Cortes (Spanish Parliament) consisted of 16 parties in 1931. An attempt by the communists to seize control resisted by anarchists resulted in the massacre of hundreds of rebels and civil war between communists and anarchists in Catalonia.

The actions of the Republican government slowly coagulated the different people on the right.

The Nationals included the majority of the Catholic clergy and of practicing 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.


Republicans (also known as Spanish loyalists) received weapons and volunteers from the Soviet Union, Mexico, the international Socialist movement and the International Brigades. The Republicans ranged from centrists who supported a moderately capitalist liberal democracy to revolutionary anarchists and communists; their power base was primarily secular and urban, but also included landless peasants, and it was particularly strong in industrial regions like Asturiasmarker and Cataloniamarker. This faction was called variously the "loyalists" by its supporters; the "Republicans", "the Popular Front" or "the Government" by all parties; and "the reds" by its enemies.

The conservative, strongly Catholic Basque countrymarker, along with Galiciamarker and the more left-leaning Cataloniamarker, sought autonomy or even independence from the central government of Madrid. This option was left open by the Republican government. All these forces were gathered under the People's Republican Army (Ejército Popular Republicano, or EPR) .


The Nationalists (also called "insurgents", "rebels" or by opponents "Francoists" or overinclusively as "Fascists") fearing national fragmentation, opposed the separatist movements, and were chiefly defined by their anti-communism, which galvanized diverse or opposed movements like falangists or monarchists. Their leaders had a generally wealthier, more conservative, monarchist, landowning background, and they favoured the centralization of state power.

One of the Nationalists' principal stated motives was to confront the anti-clericalism of the Republican regime and to defend the Church, which had been the target of attacks, and which many on the Republican side blamed for the ills of the country. Even before the war religious buildings were burnt and clergy killed without action on the part of the Republican authorities to prevent it, and many of the massacres perpetrated by the Republican side targeted the Catholic clergy. Franco's Moroccan Muslim troops found this repulsive as well, and for the most part fought loyally and often ferociously for the Nationalists. Articles 24 and 26 of the Constitution of the Republic had banned the Jesuits, which deeply offended many within the conservatives. The revolution in the republican zone at the outset of the war, killing 7,000 clergy and thousands of lay people, drove Catholics, left then with little alternative, to the Nationalists.

Other factions

Catalan and Basque nationalists were not univocal. Left-wing Catalan nationalists were on the Republican side. Conservative Catalan nationalists were far less vocal supporting the Republican government due to the anti-clericalism and confiscations occurring in some areas controlled by the latter (some conservative Catalan nationalists like Francesc Cambó actually funded the rebel side). Basque nationalists, heralded by the conservative Basque nationalist party, were mildly supportive of the Republican government, even though Basque nationalists in Álavamarker and Navarremarker sided with the uprising for the same reasons influencing Catalan conservative nationalists. Notwithstanding the religious matters, the Basque nationalists, who nearly all sided with the Republic, were, for the most part, practicing Catholics.

Foreign involvement

The Spanish Civil War had large numbers of non-Spanish citizens participating in combat and advisory positions. Foreign governments contributed large amounts of financial assistance and military aid to forces led by Franco. Forces fighting on behalf of the Republicans also received limited aid, but support was seriously hampered by the arms embargo declared by France and the UK. These embargoes were never very effective however, and France especially was accused of allowing large shipments through to the Republicans (but the accusations often came from Italy, itself heavily involved for the Nationalists). The clandestine actions of the various European powers were at the time considered to be risking another 'Great War'.

The League of Nations' reaction to the war was mostly neutral and insufficient to contain the massive importation of arms and other war resources by the fighting factions. Although a Non-Intervention Committee was created, its policies were largely ineffective. Its directives were dismantled due to the policies of appeasement of both European democratic and non-democratic powers of the late 1930s: the official Spanish government of Juan Negrín was gradually abandoned within the organization during this period.

Support for Nationalists

Despite the Irish government's prohibition against participating in the war, around 700 Irishmen, followers of Eoin O'Duffy known as "Blueshirts", went to Spain to fight on Franco's side. The Nationalists received weapons and logistical support from Portugal. In addition approximately 8,000 Portuguese volunteers, known as Viriatos after an aborted national legion that failed to get off the ground in the early months of the war, fought in Franco's forces. Romanian volunteers were led by Ion I Moţa, deputy-leader of the Legion of the Archangel Michael (or Iron Guard), whose group of seven Legionaries visited Spain in December 1936 to ally their movement to the Nationalists. Moţa was killed in action at Majadahonda on January 13, 1937.


Francisco Franco asked Adolf Hitler from Nazi Germany and Benito Mussolini from Fascist Italy to aid the Nationalists. Hitler agreed and ordered three major military operations in Spain during the Spanish Civil War. He authorized Operation Feuerzauber ("Fire Magic") in late July 1936. He mobilized 20 three-motor Junker 52 planes with six escort fighters, 85 Germans on the SS Usaramo ship to work on the planes, and transferred German troops stationed in Morocco to Spain. A few months later in late September, Hitler again mobilized men and materials to aid Franco for Operation Otto. He sent 24 more Panzer I light tanks, a flak, and some radio equipment. German commander Major Alexander von Scheele also converted the Junkers 52s to bombers. By October, there were an estimated 600–800 German soldiers in Spain. Hitler’s largest and last move was the Condor Legion (Legion Condor). Initiated in November 1936, he sent an additional 3,500 troops into combat and supplied the Spanish Nationalists with 92 new planes. Hitler kept the Condor Legion in Spain until the end of the war in May 1939. At its zenith, The German force numbered about 12,000 men, and as many as 19,000 Germans fought in Spain.


After Franco’s request and in response to Adolf Hitler's encouragement, Benito Mussolini joined the war, partly because he did not want to be outdone by Hitler. While Mussolini sent more ground troops than Hitler, he initially supplied fewer materials. At the beginning of war in September 1936, Mussolini had only supplied 68 aircraft and several hundred small arms to the Nationalists. However, the Royal Italian Navy (Regia Marina Italiana) played a major role in the Mediterranean blockade and ultimately Italy supplied machine guns, artillery, aircraft, tankettes, the "Legionary Air Force" (Aviazione Legionaria), and the "Corps of Volunteer Troops" (Corpo Truppe Volontarie, or CTV). The Italian CTV reached a high of about 50,000 men and, by rotation, more than 75,000 Italians were to fight for the Nationalists in Spain.

Support for Republicans

International Brigades

Flag of the Hungarian International Brigades.
Many non-Spanish persons, often affiliated with radical, communist or socialist parties or groups, joined the International Brigades, believing that the Spanish Republic was the front line of the war against fascism. The troops of the International Brigades represented the largest foreign contingent of those fighting for the Republicans. Roughly 30,000 foreign nationals from up to 53 nations fought in the brigades. Most of them were communists or trade unionists, and while organised by communists guided or controlled by Moscow, they were almost all individual volunteers. About 3,000 Poles volunteered for the International Brigades. American volunteers such as the Abraham Lincoln Brigade and Canadians in the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion also fought in the International Brigades.

Over five hundred Romanians fought on the Republican side, including Romanian Communist Party members Petre Borilă and Valter Roman.

Soviet Union

The Soviet Unionmarker primarily provided material assistance to the Republican forces.In total the USSR provided Spain with 806 planes, 362 tanks, and 1,555 artillery pieces.
The Soviet Union ignored the League of Nations embargo and sold arms to the Republic when few other nations would do so; thus it was the Republic's only important source of major weapons. Stalin had signed the Non-Intervention Agreement but decided to break the pact. However, unlike Hitler and Mussolini who openly violated the pact, Stalin tried to do so secretly. He created a section X of the Soviet Union military to head the operation, coined Operation X. However, while a new branch of the military was created especially for Spain, most of the weapons and artillery sent to Spain were antiques. Stalin did not want the arms to be traceable to the Soviet Union, so most were taken from museums from around the country. He also used weapons captured from past conflicts.

Many of the Soviet’s deliveries were lost or smaller than Stalin had ordered. He only gave short notice, which meant many weapons were lost in the delivery process. Lastly, when the ships did leave with supplies for the Republicans, the journey was extremely slow. Stalin ordered the builders to include false decks in the original design of the boat. Then, once the ship left shore it was required to change its' flag and change the color of parts of the ship to minimize capture by the Nationalists. However in 1938, Stalin withdrew his troops and tanks as government ranks floundered.

The Republic had to pay for Soviet arms with the official gold reserves of the Bank of Spainmarker, in an affair that would become a frequent subject of Francoist propaganda afterward (see Moscow Gold). The cost to the Republic of Soviet arms was more than US $500 million, two-thirds of the gold reserves that Spain had at the beginning of the war.

The Soviet Union also sent a small number of military advisers to Spain. While Soviet troops amounted to no more than 700 men, Soviet "volunteers" often operated Soviet-made Republican tanks and aircraft. In addition, the Soviet Union directed Communist parties around the world to organize and recruit the International Brigades.


Unlike the United States and major Latin American governments such as those of Argentinamarker, Brazilmarker, Chilemarker, and Perumarker, the Mexican government supported the Republicans. Mexico refused to follow the French-British non-intervention proposals, but Mexican aid meant little compared to the quantities supplied to the Nationalists by Italy and Germany. Mexico furnished $2,000,000 in aid and provided some material assistance, which included 20,000 rifles, 28 million cartridges, 8 artillery pieces and small number of American-made aircraft such as the Bellanca CH-300 and Spartan Zeus that served in the Mexican Air Force.

However, Mexico's most important contributions to the Spanish Republic were diplomatic and to provide sanctuary for Republican refugees including many Spanish intellectuals and orphaned children from Republican families.



Situation of the fronts in August-September 1936.

Coup leader Sanjurjo was killed in a plane crash on 20 July, leaving an effective command split between Mola in the North and Franco in the South. On 21 July, the fifth day of the rebellion, the Nationalists captured the main Spanish naval base at Ferrolmarker in northwestern Spain.A rebel force under Colonel Beorlegui Canet, sent by General Emilio Mola, undertook the Campaign of Guipúzcoa from July to September. The capture of Guipúzcoamarker isolated the Republican provinces in the north. On 5 September, after heavy fightingmarker the force took Irúnmarker, closing the French border to the Republicans. On 13 September, the Basques surrendered San Sebastiánmarker to the Nationalists, who then advanced toward their capital, Bilbaomarker. The Republican militias on the border of Viscaya halted these forces at the end of September.

Franco was chosen overall Nationalist commander at a meeting of ranking generals at Salamancamarker on 21 September. Franco won another victory on 27 September when they relieved the Alcázarmarker at Toledomarker. A Nationalist garrison under Colonel Moscardo had held the Alcázarmarker in the center of the city since the beginning of the rebellion, resisting thousands of Republican troops who completely surrounded the isolated building. The Republic's inability to take the Alcázar was a serious blow to its prestige in view of its overwhelming numerical superiority in the area. Two days after relieving the siege, Franco proclaimed himself Generalísimo and Caudillo ("chieftain"), while forcibly unifying the various and diverse Falangist, Royalist and other elements within the Nationalist cause.

In October, the Francoist troops launched a major offensive toward Madridmarker, reaching it in early November and launching a major assault on the city on 8 November. The Republican government was forced to shift from Madrid to Valenciamarker, out of the combat zone, on 6 November. However, the Nationalists' attack on the capital was repulsed in fierce fighting between 8 November and 23 November. A contributory factor in the successful Republican defense was the arrival of the International Brigades, though only around 3,000 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.


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

On 21 February the League of Nations Non-Intervention Committee ban on foreign national "volunteers" went into effect. The large city of Málagamarker was taken on 8 February. On 7 March, the German Condor Legion equipped with Heinkel He 51 biplanes arrived in Spain; on 26 April the Legion Bombed the town of Guernica, killing hundreds. Two days later, Franco's army overran the town.

After the fall of Guernica, the Republican government began to fight back with increasing effectiveness. In July, they made a move to recapture Segoviamarker, forcing Franco to pull troops away from the Madrid front to halt their advance. Mola, Franco's second-in-command, was killed on 3 June, and in early July, despite the fall of Bilbaomarker in June, the government launched a strong counter-offensive in the Madrid area, which the Nationalists repulsed with difficulty. The clash was called "Battle of Brunete" after a town in the province of Madridmarker.

Franco invaded Aragónmarker in August and then took the city of Santandermarker. With the surrender of the Republican army in the Basque territory and after two months of bitter fighting in Asturias (Gijón finally fell in late October) Franco had effectively won in the north. At the end of November, with Franco's troops closing in on Valenciamarker, the government had to move again, this time to Barcelonamarker.


Situation of the fronts in November 1938.

The Battle of Teruelmarker was an important confrontation. The city belonged to the Nationalists at the beginning of the battle, but the Republicans conquered it in January. The Francoist troops launched an offensive and recovered the city by 22 February, but in order to do so Franco relied heavily on German and Italian air support and repaid them with extensive mining rights.

On 7 March, the Nationalists launched the Aragon Offensive. By 14 April, they had pushed through to the Mediterranean, cutting the Republican-held portion of Spain in two. The Republican government tried to sue for peace in May, but Franco demanded unconditional surrender; the war raged on. In July, the Nationalist army pressed southward from Teruel and south along the coast toward the capital of the Republic at Valenciamarker but was halted in heavy fighting along the XYZ Line, a system of fortifications defending Valencia.

The Republican government then launched an all-out campaign to reconnect their territory in the Battle of the Ebro, from 24 July until 26 November. The campaign was unsuccessful, and was undermined by the Franco-British appeasement of Hitler in Munich with the concession of Czechoslovakiamarker. This effectively destroyed Republican morale by ending hope of an anti-fascist alliance with the Western powers. The retreat from the Ebro all but determined the final outcome of the war. Eight days before the new year, Franco threw massive forces into an invasion of Cataloniamarker.


Franco's troops conquered Catalonia in a whirlwind campaign during the first two months of 1939. Tarragonamarker fell on 14 January, followed by Barcelonamarker on 26 January and Gironamarker on 5 February. Five days after the fall of Girona, the last resistance in Catalonia was broken.

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

Franco declares the end of the war.
However, small pockets of insurgents fight on.
Only Madridmarker and a few other strongholds remained for the Republican forces. Then, on 28 March, with the help of pro-Franco forces inside the city, Madrid fell to the Nationalists. The next day, Valenciamarker, which had held out under their guns for close to two years, also surrendered. Franco proclaimed victory in a radio speech aired on 1 April, when the last of the Republican forces surrendered.

After the end of the War, there were harsh reprisals against Franco's former enemies; thousands of Republicans were imprisoned and at least 30,000 executed. Other calculations of these deaths range from 50,000 to 200,000. Many others were put to forced labour, building railways, drying out swamps, digging canals, etc.

Hundreds of thousands of Republicans fled abroad, some 500,000 to France. Refugees were confined in internment camps of the French Third Republic, such as Camp Gursmarker or Camp Vernetmarker, where 12,000 Republicans were housed in squalid conditions. Of the 17,000 refugees housed in Gurs, the farmers and ordinary people who could not find relations in France were encouraged by the Third Republic, in agreement with the Francoist government, to return to Spain. The great majority did so and were turned over to the Francoist authorities in Irúnmarker. From there they were transferred to the Miranda de Ebromarker camp for "purification" according to the Law of Political Responsibilities. After the proclamation by Marshal Philippe Pétain of the Vichy regime, the refugees became political prisoners, and the French police attempted to round up those who had been liberated from the camp. Along with other "undesirables", they were sent to the Drancy internment campmarker before being deported to Nazi Germany. About 5,000 Spaniards thus died in Mauthausen concentration campmarker.

After the official end of the war, guerrilla war was waged on an irregular basis well into the 1950s, being gradually reduced by military defeats and scant support from the exhausted population. In 1944, a group of republican veterans, who also fought in the French resistance against the Nazis, invaded the Val d'Aranmarker in northwest Cataloniamarker, but were defeated after ten days.

Evacuation of children

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, other European countries and Mexico. 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 its effects on the Soviet Union.

The Nationalist side 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.


At least 50,000 people were executed during the war. In his updated history of the Spanish Civil War, Antony Beevor writes, "Franco's ensuing 'white terror' claimed 200,000 lives. The 'red terror' had already killed 38,000." Julius Ruiz concludes that "although the figures remain disputed, a minimum of 37,843 executions were carried out in the Republican zone with a maximum of 150,000 executions (including 50,000 after the war) in Nationalist Spainmarker." César Vidal puts the number of Republican victims at 110,965. In 2008 a Spanish judge, Socialist Baltasar Garzón, opened an investigation into the executions and disappearances of 114,266 people between 17 July 1936 and December 1951. Among the executions investigated was that of the poet and dramatist Federico García Lorca.

In the early days of the war, executions of people who were caught on the "wrong" side of the lines became widespread in conquered areas. The outbreak of the war provided an excuse for settling accounts and resolving longstanding feuds. In these paseos ("strolls"), as the executions were called, the victims were taken from their refuges or jails to be shot outside of town. The corpses were abandoned or interred in graves dug by the victims themselves. Local police just noted the appearance of the corpses.


Nationalist aircraft bomb Madrid in late November 1936.
The atrocities of the Nationalists, frequently ordered by authorities in order to eradicate any trace of leftism in Spain, were common. Many such acts were committed by reactionary groups during the first weeks of the war. This included the execution of school teachers (because the efforts of the Second Spanish Republic to promote laicism and to displace the Church from the education system by closing religious schools were considered by the Nationalists side as an attack on the Roman Catholic Church); the massive killings of civilians in the cities they captured; the execution of unwanted individuals (including non-combatants such as trade-unionists and known Republican sympathisers etc). An example of this kind of tactics on the Nationalist side was the Massacre of Badajoz in 1936.(1) Rafael Tenorio, Las matanzas de Badajoz ("The massacres of Badajoz"), originally in Tiempo de Historia, Number 56, July 1979.

(2) Other stories of people who were murdered by the nationalists because of their beliefs: Víctimas del fascismo en la Fosa Común de Oviedo ("Victims of Fascism in the Mass Grave of Oviedo"),; see also many articles (also in Spanish) at Asociación para la recuperación de la memoria histórica.

The Nationalist side also conducted aerial bombing of cities in Republican territory, carried out mainly by the Luftwaffe volunteers of the Condor Legion and the Italian air force volunteers of the Corpo Truppe Volontarie (Madridmarker, Barcelonamarker, Valenciamarker, Guernicamarker, and other cities). The most notorious example of this tactic of terror bombings was the Bombing of Guernica.


An estimated 55,000 Nationalist-sympathizing civilians were killed by Republicans. Violent acts against civilians and property by the Republicans have been termed Spain's red terror. Particularly controversial were Republican attacks on the Catholic Church. Among clergy alone, nearly 7,000 were murdered.

Republicans initially reacted to the attempted coup by arresting and executing actual and perceived Nationalists. In the Andalusian town of Ronda, 512 alleged Nationalists were murdered in the first month of the war. Many repressive actions were committed by the Republican political police in detention centers nicknamed Checas after the then-renamed Cheka of the Soviet Union, whose advisers were apparently involved in setting up the detention centers. There were some 229 such checas in Madrid alone, and prisoners (both of the right and non-conformist leftists) were tortured, and many executed. Some 11,705 people were thus slain in Madrid.

Communist Santiago Carrillo Solares and members of his party were responsible for the murders of thousands of alleged Nationalists (including women and children) in Paracuellos del Jarama and Torrejón de Ardozmarker (the largest massacre performed by the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War). Communists committed numerous atrocities against fellow Republicans: André Marty, known as the Butcher of Albacete, was responsible for the deaths of some 500 members of the International Brigades, and Andreu Nin, leader of the POUM, and many prominent POUM members were murdered by the Communists.

6,832 priests, nuns and brothers were killed by the Republicans, and churches, convents and monasteries were attacked (see Martyrs of the Spanish Civil War). Some 13 bishops, 4172 diocesan priests, 2364 male religious (among them 114 Jesuits) and 283 nuns were killed.

Social revolution

In the anarchist-controlled areas, Aragónmarker and Cataloniamarker, in addition to the temporary military success, there was a vast social revolution in which the workers and 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 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, through both diplomacy and force. Anarchists and the Workers' Party of Marxist Unification (Partido Obrero de Unificación Marxista, or POUM) were integrated into the regular army, albeit with resistance; the POUM was outlawed and falsely denounced as an instrument of the fascists. In the May Days of 1937, many hundreds or thousands of anti-fascist soldiers fought for control of strategic points in Barcelonamarker.

The pre-war Falange was a small party of some 30–40,000 members. It also called for a social revolution that would have seen Spanish society transformed by National Syndicalism. Following the execution of its leader, José Antonio Primo de Rivera, by the Republicans, the party swelled in size to over 400,000. The leadership of the Falange suffered 60% casualties in the early days of the civil war and the party was transformed by new members and rising new leaders, called camisas nuevas ("new shirts"), who were less interested in the revolutionary aspects of National Syndicalism. Subsequently, Franco united all rightist parties into the ironically named Falange Española Tradicionalista de las Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional-Sindicalista (FET y de las JONS), or the Traditionalist Spanish Falange of the Unions of the National-Syndicalist Offensive.

The 1930s also saw Spain become a focus for pacifist organizations including the Fellowship of Reconciliation, the War Resisters League and the War Resisters' International. Many people including, as they are now called, the 'insumisos' ('defiant ones', conscientious objectors) argued and worked for non-violent strategies. Prominent Spanish pacifists such as Amparo Poch y Gascón and José Brocca supported the Republicans. Brocca argued that Spanish pacifists had no alternative but to make a stand against fascism. He put this stand into practice by various means including organizing agricultural workers to maintain food supplies and through humanitarian work with war refugees.


Political parties and organizations

See also



Phase 1. 1930s–1980

Phase 2. 1981–1999

Phase 3. 2000–2008


  1. Payne, Stanley Fascism in Spain, 1923-1977, pp. 200-203, 1999 Univ. of Wisconsin Press
  2. Tierney, Dominic. FDR and the Spanish Civil War: Neutrality and Commitment in the Struggle That Divided America, pp. 67-8, Duke University Press, 2007
  3. [1]
  4. Torres Gutiérrez, Alejandro , Religious minorities in Spain: A new model of relationships? Center for Study on New Religions 2002
  5. Burleigh, Michael, Sacred Causes: The Clash of Religion and Politics, From the Great War to the War on Terror, pp. 128-129 HarperCollins, 2007. Burleigh says the constitution "went much further than a legal separation of Church and state".
  6. AnticlericalismBritannica Online Encyclopedia
  7. Dilectissima Nobis
  8. Stepan, Alfred, Arguing Comparative Politics, p. 221, Oxford University Press
  9. Martinez-Torron, Javier Freedom of religion in the case law of the Spanish Constitutional court Brigham Young University Law Review 2001
  10. The statistics on assassinations, destruction of religious buildings, etc. immediately before the start of the war come from The Last Crusade: Spain: 1936 by Warren Carroll (Christendom Press, 1998). He collected the numbers from Historia de la Persecución Religiosa en España (1936–1939) by Antonio Montero Moreno (Biblioteca de Autores Cristianos, 3rd edition, 1999).
  11. Trotsky, Leon, " The Task in Spain", April 1936.
  12. Preston, Paul, Franco and Azaña, Volume: 49 Issue: 5, May 1999, pp. 17–23
  13. Preston, Paul, op. cit.
  14. Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Civil War, (1987), p. 8.
  15. Zhooee, TIME Magazine, 20 July 1936
  16. Bullón de Mendoza, Alfonso Calvo Sotelo: Vida y muerte (2004) Barcelona. Thomas, Hugh The Spanish Civil War (1961, rev. 2001) New York pp. 196–198 and p.309. Condés was a close personal friend of Castillo. His squad had originally sought to arrest Gil Robles as a reprisal for Castillo's murder, but Robles was not at home, so they went to the house of Calvo Sotelo. Thomas concluded that the intention of Condés was to arrest Calvo Sotelo and that Cuenca acted on his own initiative, although he acknowledges other sources that dispute this finding.
  17. Preston, Paul, "From rebel to Caudillo: Franco's path to power," History Today Volume: 33 Issue: 11, November 1983, pp. 4–10
  18. Alpert, Michael BBC History Magazine April 2002
  19. Chomsky, Noam. "Objectivity and Liberal Scholarship (1969)" in Chomsky on Anarchism. AK Press, Oakland CA, 2005.
  20. Beevor, The Battle for Spain, (2006) ("Chapter 21: The Propaganda War and the Intellectuals")
  21. Antony Beevor, The Spanish Civil War, pp 32-3.
  22. Payne, Stanley George The Spanish Civil War, the Soviet Union, and Communism p. 118 (2004 Yale University Press)
  23. Antony Beevor, The Spanish Civil War, pp 42-43.
  24. Antony Beevor, The Battle for Spain (2006), pp 30-33
  25. Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Civil War, (1987), pp. 86–90.
  26. Payne, Stanley Franco and Hitler: Spain, Germany, and World, p. 13, 2008 Yale Univ. Press
  27. Business & Blood - Time, Monday, 19 April 1937
  28. Peace and Pirates, TIME Magazine, 27 September 1937
  29. Othen, Christopher. Franco's International Brigades (Reportage Press, 2008) p79
  30. Othen, Christopher. Op cit p102
  31. John R. Lampe and Mark Mazower, Ideologies and national identities, at p. 38
  32. Hitler and Spain Robert H Whealey
  33. The Spanish Civil War Antony Beevor
  34. Academy of Sciences of the USSR, International Solidarity with the Spanish Republic, 1936-1939 (Moscow: Progress, 1974), 329-30
  35. Arms for Spain Gerald Howson
  36. "Nazi Germany and Francoist Spain" by Christian Leitz, pp. 127–150, Spain and the Great Powers in the 20th Century Routledge, New York, 1999, edited by Sebastian Balfour and Paul Preston.
  37. Thomas, p. 820-821
  38. Beevor, Antony. The Battle for Spain; The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939. Penguin Books. 2006. London. p.405
  39. Film documentary on the website of the Cité nationale de l'histoire de l'immigration
  40. "Men of La Mancha". Rev. of Antony Beevor, The Battle for Spain. The Economist (22 June 2006).
  41. Julius Ruiz, "Defending the Republic: The García Atadell Brigade in Madrid, 1936". Journal of Contemporary History 42.1 (2007):97.
  42. César Vidal, Checas de Madrid: Las cárceles republicanas al descubierto. ISBN 978-84-9793-168-7
  43. Decision of Juzgado Central de Instruccion No. 005, Audiencia Nacional, Madrid (16 October 2008)
  44. Antony Beevor, The Battle for Spain; The Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2006), p.89.
  45. Antony Beevor, The Battle for Spain; The Spanish Civil War, 1936–1939 (Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2006), pp 88-89.
  46. Ealham, Chris and Michael Richards, The Splintering of Spain, p. 80, 168, Cambridge University Press, 2005, ISBN 0521821789, 9780521821780
  47. Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Civil War, (1961) p. 176
  48. Article that references the book on Checas history: 1
  49. Ian Gibson, "Paracuellos. Cómo fue". 1983, Plaza y Janés. Barcelona.
  50. Anthony Beevor, Battle for Spain p. 161
  51. Arnuad Imatz, "Espagne: la guerre des mémoires" (2009) 40 25-30, at 25
  52. Julio de la Cueva, "Religious Persecution, Anticlerical Tradition and Revolution: On Atrocities against the Clergy during the Spanish Civil War" Journal of Contemporary History 33.3 (July 1998): 355.
  53. Arnaud Imatz, "La vraie mort de Garcia Lorca" 2009 40 NRH, 31-34, at p. 32-33).
  54. Bennett, Scott, Radical Pacifism: The War Resisters League and Gandhian Nonviolence in America, 1915–1963, Syracuse NY, Syracuse University Press, 2003; Prasad, Devi, War is A Crime Against Humanity: The Story of War Resisters' International, London, WRI, 2005. Also see Hunter, Allan, White Corpsucles in Europe, Chicago, Willett, Clark & Co., 1939; and Brown, H. Runham, Spain: A Challenge to Pacifism, London, The Finsbury Press, 1937.

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