The Battle for Spain

by Antony Beevor

  One of the main problems in the relationship between Soviet personnel and their Spanish allies stemmed from a clash of very different cultures, political as well as social. Soviet soldiers had never had the opportunity to mix with foreigners, especially with ones who disagreed with Stalinist policy, and this was clearly a shock. A commissar with a Soviet tank battalion reported that the first ‘specific feature of the local situation which we had failed to take into account’ was the fact that ‘people around us belong to different political parties’. Another problem was the ‘practice of a completely open consumption of alcohol (wine is served with meals)’. Perhaps predictably, a number of Soviet advisers tended to over-exploit the opportunity. An aviation commissar reported that alcohol ‘was also a great threat’ for the Soviet pilots. ‘A local tradition is to drink wine with meals. There is always a lot of wine in our canteens. At first, our men got carried away.’

  The tank battalion commissar was also shocked by the existence of legalized brothels in republican Spain. ‘I have to mention that it took a while for a number of our comrades to understand how disgraceful it is to visit brothels. About twenty men have visited prostitutes without permission before 3 December. After the party collective stopped these visits to brothels, discipline has changed dramatically for the better.’ Clearly few precautions were taken, since 22 men were infected with venereal diseases. He also reported on a ‘carefree and offensive attitude towards women: Morkevich, a Komsomol member and commander of a tank, offered 200 pesetas to one woman, who refused and reported this to the Antifascist Women’s Committee’.25

  The small detachment of Soviet naval advisers, led by Kuznetsov, had one overriding priority. It was to organize the safe arrival of ships bringing armaments and ammunition from the Soviet Union. Each vessel was identified by a cypher, consisting of Y followed by a number, and given a different route. Those leaving the Crimea would pass through the Dardanelles, then find an island in the Aegean to carry out a superficial refit to change identity, including the name of the ship and flag of convenience. A fake funnel or superstructure would be added to camouflage the ship’s profile. Some pretended to carry tourists, with members of the crew strolling around in hats and pretending to take photographs. The captain was instructed to avoid crossing dangerous stretches in daylight.

  Once into the central Mediterranean, the Y ships would keep close to the coast of Africa. They turned north towards Cartagena only when level with Algeria. The most dangerous part of the journey came towards the end, with Italian submarines as well as aircraft patrolling the blockade area. When 48 hours from their destination, Kuznetsov’s staff, who had been tracking the progress of each ship, arranged for Spanish republican warships to escort them in.26

  One young Soviet sailor was clearly fired up with his mission, to judge by the poem he wrote:

  I am a brave sailor from the Red Navy

  I am exactly twenty years old.

  I am sailing out into the vast expanse of the sea

  To bring the Great October to the whole of the world.

  Oh, our noise and uproar,

  Resound against the bourgeois shores,

  Our Soviet fleet is the stronghold.

  All the working people, forward!27

  The first ship with Soviet military supplies to reach Spain was the Campeche, which berthed in Cartagena on 4 October 1936. The second ship, the Soviet vessel Komsomol, reached Cartagena eight days later with the first shipment of T-26 tanks. These two shiploads arrived just in time to play a major part in the imminent battle for Madrid.

  17

  The Battle for Madrid

  The success of the Army of Africa in putting to flight the militias had greatly raised the optimism of the nationalists and the expectations of their allies. Reports were sent to Germany that Madrid had no food reserves, no anti-aircraft defences and no fortifications. The militia were badly armed with old rifles of varying calibres and they had few machine guns that worked. The republican fighters and bombers, consisting mainly of French Dewoitines and Potez, were no match for the Heinkel and Fiat fighters. It was the combination of artillery fire and air attacks which had completely demoralized the militia columns. Even many regular officers began to shake uncontrollably when they heard aero engines.

  It is often forgotten that the Spanish metropolitan army had no battle experience and the majority of its officers had not handled troops even on manoeuvres. This lack of training, as much as the instinctive dislike which most officers felt for the militia system, contributed to the chaotic retreat of the republican forces from Estremadura. As headquarters’ staff frequently retreated without attempting to warn their forward units, it was not surprising that militia groups, feeling abandoned, should make a run for it before they were cut off. In fact, with communications virtually non-existent, a formalized command structure could not have co-ordinated the different sectors, even if it had been run efficiently. General Carlos Masquelet attempted to establish defences close to Madrid, with four concentric defence lines, roughly ten kilometres apart. They were not continuous, but concentrated on the most important road junctions.1

  The nationalist advance on the capital started at the end of the first week of October. The Army of Africa began a three-pronged attack: northwards from Toledo, north-eastwards along the Navalcarnero road and eastwards from San Martín de Valdeiglesias. Mola was given official command of the Madrid operation, which appears to have been a calculated ploy by Franco, in case anything went wrong,2 while Colonel Varela was in command of the colonial troops. Yagüe was back with the Army of Africa, but in a subordinate position. The columns, composed of around 10,000 men each, were commanded by Lieutenant-Colonels Carlos Asensio, Fernando Barrón, Heli Rolando de Tella, Delgado Serrano, and Major Castejón while Colonel Monasterio commanded the cavalry. The left flank of the attack was strengthened by 10,000 men from Mola’s army, made up of Carlist requetés, Falangist militia and regular soldiers. The plan was for the nationalist forces to enter the capital on 12 October, the day of the Feast of the Spanish Race. Mola claimed that he would drink a cup of coffee that day on the Gran Vía and, although the attack on Madrid was delayed, even Franco’s staff began to prepare for a triumphal entry. The seemingly inevitable capture of Madrid would not only mean a crushing psychological blow to the republicans. It should guarantee belligerent rights, if not de facto recognition, from foreign powers.

  After Navalcarnero on the north-east axis had fallen, Illescas on the Toledo road was occupied on 19 October. Torrejón, also on the Toledo road and some 30 kilometres from the capital, was taken several days later. The nationalists were not alone in believing that Madrid would fall to them rapidly. Foreign journalists and diplomats were sure that the advance of the Army of Africa, backed by squadrons of the Luftwaffe and Italian air force, could not be stopped. The Republic’s administration seemed paralysed by a strange mixture of frantic activity and inertia. Many blamed ‘sabotage by reactionary civil servants’, but however true, such charges did little more than divert attention from the government’s own chaos.

  In the second half of October Largo Caballero began to issue decrees extending mobilization in an effort to improve Madrid’s defences; yet for much of the capital’s population the war still seemed remote. Militiamen, criticized for being on ‘excessive guard duty’ in the capital rather than at the front, tended to ignore official communiqués. Nor could the prime minister himself forget old rivalries. He refused to assign UGT construction workers to the digging of trenches in case they defected to the CNT. And yet the speed of the nationalist advance was such that on 18 October, when Caballero had tried to telephone the republican commander in Illescas, he had found himself talking to the nationalist commander who had just occupied the town.

  Of the government decrees issued at this time, the one on 18 October was to have the most far-reaching effect. This announced the establishment of ‘mixed brigades’ of 4,000 men each. Although not implemented immediately, it marked the first major step a
way from militia columns towards a formalized army. The brigades were to consist of four battalions, with supporting artillery.3 A few days later, XI and XII International Brigades were formed at Albacete under the command of Kléber and Lukács. The Republic soon had 80,000 men under arms, most of whom were to bear the brunt of defending Madrid.

  Aleksandr Rodimtsev, one of the key commanders at Stalingrad six years later, described his arrival at the Madrid front at this inauspicious moment. He had come from Albacete by truck. Each time they had stopped on the way, village boys had admired their uniforms and stroked their pistol holsters. There had been an air attack on the convoy, and everyone had jumped out cursing in different languages. In Madrid he had reported to the war ministry, accompanied by an interpreter. He was taken to meet General Pozas, commander of the Army of the Centre, who was about to become a member of the Communist Party. Pozas warned him that discipline was weak in the militias. Soldiers went home from the front on their own accord.

  Rodimtsev visited the front and encountered a young woman machine gunner and anarchist dinamiteros festooned with grenades. One of them fired a pistol in the air, demanding to see his documents. Rodimtsev was attached to Líster’s brigade and he found its headquarters in an abandoned village. Some of the staff were having a siesta. Others were out in a meadow singing a melancholy song. Their commander came over. ‘Líster was stocky and swarthy,’ wrote Rodimtsev. ‘He had a high protruding forehead, black hair which was long and its ends bleached by the sun. When he smiled, dimples appeared in his cheeks, which made his face look kindly and almost childlike. He said in Russian with a slight accent, “Hello, Pablito. I’ve been expecting you. I had a telephone call in the morning to say that you had left.” He introduced me to his commissar and officers. They clapped me on the shoulder, and shook my hand vigorously. All had a few words of Russian: “Come here. Have a coffee. Have a cigarette.”’ Líster warned him in a whisper that he must be careful. There were ‘people around from the “fifth column”.’4 The ‘fifth column’ was a phrase attributed to General Mola, who apparently claimed to a journalist that he had four columns attacking the capital and a ‘fifth column’ of sympathizers within the city ready to revolt.

  The rhythm of the nationalist advance was so fast that on 21 October, three days after reaching Illescas, the column of Heli de Tella, supported by Monasterio’s cavalry, occupied Navalcarnero, 30 kilometres from Madrid. The militiamen, faced with Ansaldo light tanks, had fled from their triple line of trenches on the western side of the town.

  In his final orders for the attack on Madrid, Franco emphasized the need to concentrate forces to provoke the fall of the city. On 23 October Junkers 52s bombed Getafe and Madrid itself for the first time. ‘Everyone who can flee the city is fleeing,’ wrote Koltsov in his diary the next day. ‘By means fair or foul, all the rich people, all top officials escape. Only four or five correspondents have stayed. The streets are completely dark in the evenings. Everywhere patrols are checking people’s passes, and it’s become dangerous to drive around unarmed. Aragon arrived suddenly from Paris. He came accompanied by Elsa Triolet.’5

  Four days later the nationalists took Torrejón de Velasco, Seseña, ˜ón. The next day, 28 October, Largo Caballero, in an astonishing radio broadcast designed to boost morale, revealed the republican plans: ‘Listen to me, comrades! Tomorrow, 29 October, at dawn, our artillery and our tanks will open fire on the enemy. Then our air force will appear, dropping bombs on them and machine gunning them. At the moment of the air attack, our tanks will attack the enemy’s most vulnerable flank sowing panic in their ranks…Now we have tanks and aircraft! Forward comrades of the front, heroic sons of the working people! Victory is ours!’6

  Next morning, as he had said, fifteen T-26 tanks commanded by Captain Pavel Arman of the Red Army attacked Seseña. They were the spearpoint of the first mixed brigade commanded by Líster. Pavel Arman was an adventurous character who, despite his heroism in Spain, later fell foul of the Stalinist authorities and died fighting on the Eastern Front. The crews were mainly made up of Russian instructors, with their Spanish trainees acting as gunners.7

  Taken by surprise, the nationalist infantry retreated and Monasterio’s cavalry suffered a number of casualties. But a detachment of regulares, having made a batch of petrol bombs, managed to knock out three tanks, a fifth of Arman’s force. The skirmish was claimed as a victory and Arman was made a Hero of the Soviet Union, but the attack had failed completely because Líster’s men could not, or would not, keep up with the tanks. Koltsov, who was present, wanted to find out what had gone wrong. ‘Líster was standing by the door of the little house in Valdemoro waiting for the group to return. He explained, a grimace upon his face, that his units had been moving well at first, but after 1,500 metres, they had felt tired and sat down. They began to “get stuck” in little groups among the hills. Once they lost sight of the tanks, the infantry on the main axis stopped, then they moved forward again, reached Seseña and after encountering a rather weak fire there, turned back…While the tankists were being congratulated, bandaged and fed, they kept asking quietly why the infantry had never caught up with them.’8

  At the beginning of November Largo Caballero again asked the anarchists to join the government, since they constituted the largest group involved in the fight against the nationalists. The other Popular Front parties supported this attempt to end the anti-state within the state. The only Torrejón de la Calzada and Grin prominent dissenter was President Azaña, whose intense dislike of the anarchists appears to have dated from the Casas Viejas incident, the event which had led to the fall of his first government.

  Once again CNT-FAI leaders were faced with a fundamental dilemma. They believed the state could not change its nature, whatever the politics of its leaders; yet they were extremely worried by growing communist strength. Federica Montseny, an FAI intellectual, later explained to the American historian Burnett Bolloten: ‘At that time we only saw the reality of the situation created for us: the communists in the government and ourselves outside, the manifold possibilities and all our achievements endangered.’9

  The CNT-FAI asked for five ministries including those of finance and war so as to protect themselves in the two areas where they felt most vulnerable. They settled, however, for four minor posts: health, which had previously only been a directorate-general, justice, industry and commerce. The ‘purists’ were persuaded to accept this compromise by the ‘reformist’ syndicalists, such as Horacio Prieto, the secretary of the CNT National Committee, Juan Peiró, the new ministry of industry, and Juan López, who took the ministry of commerce. Federica Montseny cast aside misgivings and the warnings of her father, to become Spain’s first woman minister. García Oliver proved an unconventional minister of justice. Legal fees were abolished and criminal dossiers destroyed.

  The CNT-FAI leaders had only just taken up their posts when, on the morning of 6 November, Largo Caballero called a cabinet meeting and stated that the government must move to Valencia. Azaña had already abandoned the capital for Barcelona without warning and most ministers, especially Largo Caballero and Prieto, were convinced that Madrid would fall immediately. It was argued in cabinet that if they were captured, the Republic would have no legal leadership and the rebels would instantly achieve international recognition. (In fact, the fall of the capital alone would have had much the same result and Barajas aerodrome to the east was not threatened if they had wanted to escape at the last moment.) The new CNT-FAI ministers opposed this plan strenuously, saying that the government should not abandon the defenders. But the anarchists were alone in their objections and it was decided that the capital would be ruled by a junta in the absence of the administration.

  While the government was preparing to quit the city, the streets were filled with peasants and their livestock. ‘Many refugees are moving through Madrid,’ noted Koltsov that day. ‘They are mostly from villages close to the capital. A big flock of sheep was driven past the “Palace” [Hotel], the pa
rliament buildings and the Castellana. Sheep in the streets and plazas of Madrid surprise no one now.’10

  General Pozas, the former commander of the Civil Guard and soon a Communist Party member, was given command of the Army of the Centre, while General Miaja was to lead the junta in charge of the capital. The orders to these two generals were put in the wrong envelopes, but luckily they opened them immediately instead of waiting as ordered. Pozas alleged that Miaja nearly wept with rage at what he saw as an attempt to sacrifice him in Madrid.

  Meanwhile, on that night of 6 November the government loaded its files on to an enormous convoy of lorries which set off for Valencia. Fears that the Valencia road might be cut at any moment by a nationalist thrust were misplaced; instead the convoy was stopped by CNT militia at Tarancón. For desertion in the face of the enemy, the anarchists arrested A

  ´ lvarez del Vayo, the foreign minister, General Pozas, Juan Lopéz, their own CNT minister, and General Asensio, the under-secretary of war, who was reputed to have discriminated against anarcho-syndicalist militias. They also stopped the Soviet ambassador to tell him what they thought of communism. Eventually Horacio Prieto of the CNT National Committee persuaded the militia to let the convoy pass.

  The effect of the government’s flight from Madrid was remarkable. The anarchist attitude immediately changed to ‘Long live Madrid without government!’ and the cry was echoed by others as a new feeling came over the capital. The sense of urgency which had marked the early days of the rising returned. The communists called for the formation of local committees, the very bodies which they had resolutely opposed before. The establishment of the Madrid junta was, in itself, a step back towards the fragmentation of power that had occurred in July. Slogans, which would have been taboo only a few days before, were now on the lips of every communist cadre. The gut instinct of defending the city against ‘the fascists and their Moors’ stirred the population. The parallel with the defence of Petrograd against the whites in the Russian civil war was repeatedly drawn and cinemas showed films like Sailors of Kronstadt and Battleship Potemkin. The communist deputy La Pasionaria was tireless in her exhortations to resistance, both on the radio and at mass rallies.