In March 1937, the Nationalist invasion of Biscay began, which was supported by the German Condor Legion carrying out bombing raids on Durango and Guernica. The attack on Guernica on April 26, 1937, which destroyed three-quarters of the town, shocked the international community and generated widespread condemnation against Germany. With Bilbao’s fall on June 19, Biscay Province came under Nationalist control.
(Taken from Spanish Civil War – Wars of the 20th Century – Volume 3)
Background In January 1930, General Miguel Primo de Rivera, Spain’s military dictator, was forced to step down from office. His ambitious infrastructure programs and socio-economic reforms had failed, and the ongoing Great Depression was devastating Spain’s economy. Spain’s unpopular monarch, King Alfonso XIII, formed two governments in succession, but both collapsed after failing to calm the growing unrest among the Spanish people. Consequently, new elections were called.
In the past, Spain’s politics had been monopolized by the political elite belonging to the Conservative and Liberal parties. In Spain of the early twentieth century, however, the emergence of many factors, including industrialization, labor unions, radical ideologies, public discontent, anti-monarchical and anti-cleric sentiments, and separatist movements, were all converging to radically transform Spain’s political climate.
In the municipal elections of April 1931, an anti-monarchical political coalition of leftist republicans and socialists came to power and formed a republican government (called the Spanish Second Republic**). The military regime ended and King Alfonso XIII was forced to step down and leave for exile abroad. Thus, the Spanish monarchy ended.
The now ruling political left blamed the Church and the monarchy for Spain’s many ills, including the socio-economic inequalities, loss of the empire’s vast territories, and backwardness compared to other more industrialized European countries.
Then in general elections held in June 1931, leftist republicans and socialists again won a majority, this time for parliament, and thereafter convened the Cortes Generales (Spanish legislature). The new government, wanting to secularize the state, passed a new constitution in December 1931, which removed the Catholic Church’s pre-eminence over the country’s social and educational institutions. The new constitution promoted civil liberties and guaranteed free speech and the right to assembly, as well as universal suffrage, where women, for the first time, were allowed to vote.
The constitution also nationalized industries and began an agrarian reform program. The right to regional self-determination was upheld; as a result, the regions of Basque and Catalonia, both hotbeds of separatism, gained political autonomy. The libertarian atmosphere generated by the new regime encouraged violent anti-clericalism: starting in May 1931, many churches, monasteries, convents, and other religious buildings in Madrid and across Spain were burned down, destroyed, or vandalized.
Spain’s traditional political elite, which constituted and defended the interests of the upper classes and the Catholic Church, looked on with great alarm, as the changes threatened to destroy long venerated Spanish institutions. In the countryside, tensions rose between peasants and landowners, destabilizing the quasi-feudalistic agrarian system of the latifundia, i.e. the vast agricultural plantations owned by the small upper class. In August 1932, army officers, led by General Jose Sanjurjo, carried out an unsuccessful uprising because of his opposition to the government’s reforms in the military establishment.
Concerned by the rising instability, the government slowed down the peace of reforms, which then drew the indignation of labor unions and peasant sector. The economic devastation caused by the ongoing Great Depression also eroded popular support for the regime. In general elections held in November 1933, centrist and right-wing political parties emerged victorious. A center-right government was formed, which reversed or stalled the previous regime’s reforms. Then in October 1934 when the right-wing party CEDA (or Confederación Española de Derechas Autónomas) put pressure on the center-led coalition government that saw the appointment of CEDA into Cabinet positions, the Unión General de Trabajadores, a powerful workers’ union associated with the socialist party, launched a nationwide general strike. The strikes failed in most areas.
However, the strikes were successful (initially) in Catalonia, and more spectacularly carried out in Asturias. In the latter, in the event known as the Asturias miners’ strike of 1934, thousands of miners took over many towns and villages, including Oviero, the provincial capital, where the Catholic cathedral and government buildings were burned down, and local officials and clergy were executed. Units of the Spanish Army were called in, led by two commanders one of whom was General Francisco Franco. After two weeks of fighting, the revolt was crushed and thousands of workers were executed or imprisoned.
Consequently, military officers who were thought to be supportive of the government (i.e. right-wing) were promoted, including General Franco, who became commander-in-chief of the armed forces. Politically and socially, the country had become polarized into two opposite, mutually hostile forces: the left and the right. The left targeted rightist sectors: the church with executions and arson, employers with militant actions, and agricultural landowners with seizure of farmlands. In turn, the political right killed and jailed union leaders and left-leaning intellectuals and academics.
At this time, thousands of youths from right-wing and monarchist organizations joined the Falange Española de las Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional Sindicalista or simply Falange, a fascist party influenced by founding movements in Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany. Many leftists also began to embrace more radical and violent ideas, including armed revolution.
In general elections held in February 1936, the Popular Front, a coalition of leftist republicans, socialists, and communists, emerged victorious, only edging out the combined right-wing and centrist votes but gaining a clear majority in parliament. The leftist victory came about in large part because of the electoral participation of the anarchists who, represented by the anarchist labor union Confederación Nacional del Trabajo or CNT, were infuriated by the right-wing government’s anti-anarchist policies. With the leftist electoral victory, a wave of lawlessness took place, as leftist elements forced the release of jailed political prisoners (without judicial proceedings) and peasants seized farmlands.
A leftist government was formed, which demoted or re-assigned military officers who were deemed to be right-wing; among these officers was General Franco, who was dismissed as commander-in-chief and transferred to the distant Canary Islands. Also affected by the restructuring was General Emilio Mola, who was transferred to the northern province of Navarre, a monarchist stronghold, from where he began to conspire with other officers in a plot to overthrow the government. The motivation for the plot was the perceived need to save the country from self-destruction and/or communism. By early July, many military commands in Spain were ready to carry out the coup; General Franco wavered for some time before also opting in.
In the plan, Spain’s forces in Spanish Morocco would launch a revolt on July 17, to be followed by the Spanish Army in the mainland the next day. Then on July 18, Spanish Moroccan Army would arrive in mainland Spain and together with the peninsular forces, would overthrow the government.
In Madrid on July 12, 1936, an Assault Guard police officer, who also belonged to the Socialist Party, was shot and killed by Falangists. The next day, Assault Guards arrested and killed Jose Calvo Sotelo, a monarchist politician and the leading right-wing parliamentarian. Retaliatory killings followed these two incidents. Sotelo’s murder served as the tipping point for the military officers to launch the coup.
War On July 17, 1936, Spain’s forces in Spanish Morocco declared in a radio broadcast a state of war against the central government in Madrid, an act of rebellion that opened the Spanish Civil War. These overseas forces, called the “Army of Africa”, were the Spanish Army’s strongest fighting units and consisted of the Spanish Legion and Moroccan regiments. The Army of Africa would contribute significantly to the outcome of the land operations in the coming war.
Earlier, local authorities in Spanish Morocco had learned of the plot. As a result, the rebels were forced to move forward the uprising from the previously planned schedule of 5 AM on July 18. Shortly after the rebellion was broadcast, the Army of Africa gained control of Spanish Morocco, in the process also killing dozens of persons, including pro-government army officers and civilian leaders.
By this time, General Franco, who previously had commanded the Army of Africa and from whom he drew great respect, arrived from the Canary Islands (which also had risen up in rebellion) and took over-all command in Spanish Morocco. As agreed, the next day, July 18, many military commands in mainland Spain also declared war; thus, a large-scale army rebellion was underway.
Many other military commands, however, did not revolt or were put down while doing so. The uprisings succeeded in the southwest and in a large swathe from the coastal northwest to northern central Spain, Spanish Morocco, the Canary Islands, and most of the Balearic Islands – in total, about one-third of the country.