In our recent video on Swiss neutrality in the Second World War, we concluded that Switzerland
played its hand pretty smoothly, managing not to piss off either side too much and,
ultimately, surviving.
Spain, on the other hand, wasn't quite so smooth.
It had just come out of a devastating civil war and definitely wasn't psyched about a
world war.
In this video, we're going to talk about what Spain got up to during World War II as a supposedly
neutral state.
To set the scene, a little on the Spanish Civil War, a 32-month conflict beginning in
July 1936 and fought between the Republicans and the Nationalists for control of Spain.
Of course, it was a little more nuanced than that, with multiple factions grouped under
the left-leaning Republicans and multiple under the right-leaning Nationalists.
Notably, the Republicans enjoyed support from the USSR and France, while Germany and Italy
bolstered the Nationalists.
Hitler was, of course, head honcho in Germany at this time and basically used the civil
war as live-fire training for the recently formed Wehrmacht.
He also helped Spain accrue a massive wartime debt of some 215 million US dollars, to be
paid out to Führer as soon as possible.
After two years and eight months and around half a million deaths, of which many were
the result of massacres and mass executions, the Nationalist leader General Franciso Franco
took charge of the country and established Francoist Spain on the 1st of April 1939,
with himself as its almighty dictator.
With that, it's safe to say that Franco was stoked to be number one and more than a little
grateful for Hitler and Mussolini's money, weapons, and men.
When World War II broke out in September later that year, however, and after Britain declared
war on Germany, the Spanish people and government were torn.
Some were into the Brits, while others were into the Germans.
With the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar standing on the southern tip of the Iberian
Peninsula, just south of Spain, things were a little tricky for Franco.
On the one hand, the Allies might invade Spain through Gibraltar.
On the other, the Axis might march on Gibraltar through Spain.
So what Franco essentially decided to do was take a stance of strict neutrality until he
could strike a sweet deal with Hitler, whom he still owed a fair bit of cash.
In June 1940, Franco said he'd sign on with Hitler if Hitler could give him the French
colony of Cameroon, but Cameroon had been Germany's before World War I, so Hitler wasn't
keen.
In August that same year, Hitler was more interested in what Franco and Spain could
do for him, but also demanded too much of Franco.
Hitler wanted to set up military bases in Spanish Morocco and the Canary Islands, and
Franco was probably wise to decline.
In October, Hitler and Franco met in Hendaye, France, near the Spanish border and tried
to iron out a partnership.
It didn't go well, with Franco demanding too much of the Führer and the Führer becoming
absolutely furious with Franco, about whom he later said, "I prefer to have three or
four of my own teeth pulled out than to speak to that man again!"
This put a spanner in the works for Hitler, who had hoped to win Franco to his side so
he could carry out the proposed Operation Felix, a joint Spanish-German attack on Gibraltar.
If this had come to pass, it might have drastically changed the war.
In the words of German Field Marshal and war criminal Wilhelm Keitel, "Instead of attacking
Russia, we should have strangled the British Empire by closing the Mediterranean.
The first step in the operation would have been the conquest of Gibraltar.
That was another great opportunity we missed."
Beginning in this same year, Franco stationed much of the Spanish Army in southern Spain
in anticipation of an Allied attack through Gibraltar, which didn't come to pass.
As the war dragged on, Franco moved these men to the Pyrenees Mountains at the French
border, fearing Hitler would say, "Screw it," and march through Spain without Franco's permission.
Despite Franco's concerns, however, he still dealt with the Germans without explicitly
signing up for the Axis.
The German war machine was ravenous for raw materials, especially wolfram ore, known also
as tungsten.
By mid-1941, the only country Hitler could buy it from was Spain, so naturally, Franco
started handing it to Hitler to pay off his debt.
This, however, didn't fly so well with Britain and the United States, which tacked an oil
embargo to Franco's forehead.
If Franco didn't want his oil shipments limited and their prices to go through the roof, he
needed to chill out on feeding the German war machine tungsten.
Britain and the US couldn't straight-up cut Franco's supplies, however, as that may have
pushed Franco into Hitler's arms, so they also bought out as much of the rare metal
as they could.
Another way Franco backed Hitler was through replenishing German submarines.
In essence, German submarines would swim up alongside German ships anchored in Spanish
ports to receive fuel and other supplies, then skulk away.
When the British caught wind of this 1941, having captured German sailors from U-434
after it had refuelled in the port of Vigo, they said it was in breach of Spanish neutrality.
Franco slowed the operation down, though he didn't bring it to a full stop, allowing the
Germans to resupply their submarines in emergency situations only.
From 1940 to 1944, at least 23 cases of German subs resupplying in Spanish ports were documented.
Among Franco's other under-the-table plays was letting Abwehr agents and Abwehr-backed
Spanish saboteurs run amok in Gibraltar.
The Abwehr was, of course, the Wehrmacht's intelligence service, and throughout the war
they trained and equipped Brit-hating Spaniards to mess with the British in Gibraltar, destroying
British vessels, such as the HMT Erin and HMT Honju, and blowing up ammo dumps and other
important things.
Abwehr agents also stalked the coast with binoculars, spying on the Strait of Gibraltar
and reporting on Allied shipping movements.
The British counteracted the Abwehr agents with double agents of their own and then confronted
Franco, who raised his hands defensively and said, "No hablo Inglés!"
But Franco's BS didn't end there.
While the Spanish Army didn't march against the Allies, Franco didn't necessarily stop
his people doing it.
If a Spaniard wanted to volunteer to fight alongside the Germans, they totally could,
so long as they only fought against the Soviets and never the Western Allies.
Hitler gave this initiative the thumbs-up in June 1941, and soon División Azul or the
Blue Division was formed, growing to a divisional strength of 18,000 men and including an air
force squadron known as the Blue Squadron.
The Blue Division trained with the Germans in Germany and fought along the Eastern Front,
serving with distinction and suffering a casualty rate of 70 to 75% in the February 1943 Battle
of Krasny Bor, near Leningrad.
In late 1943, the Allies gave Franco yet another slap on the wrist, encouraging him to pull
the surviving Spanish volunteers out of the Eastern Front, so Franco said he was sorry,
that he'd really, truly learned his lesson this time, and that he'd have them withdraw
at once.
But around 3,000 of the Blue Division's members refused to go home, instead joining Wehrmacht
and Waffen-SS units, throughout which they were known collectively as the Blue Legion.
These were the most die-hard anti-communists, pro-German Spaniards that Spain had to offer,
and they met their bloody end with Germany.
All in all, some 45,000 to 47,000 Spanish volunteered to fight on the Eastern Front,
with some 4,500 to 5,000 perishing.
As we said earlier, though, not every Spaniard was pro-German.
Some actually fought for the Allies, such as Republican veterans who ended up in French
refugee camps after the Spanish Civil War.
Some of these men signed up for the French Foreign Legion during World War II, while
as many as 60,000 fought in the French Resistance and thousands more the Free French Forces.
The Free French 9th Armoured Company, for example, included many Spaniards and fought
in the Liberation of Paris in August 1944.
Some other Spanish Republicans ended up in the USSR after the Spanish Civil War and went
on to serve in the Red Army.
Perhaps they even fought against other Spaniards in División Azul.
There's so much more to Spain's story than that, however, so what didn't we cover that
you think we should have?
Can you think of any specific stories pertaining to the Blue Division?
What about the 9th Armoured Company or any other Spanish unit that fought for the Allies
in the war?
Why do you think our buddy Franco pulled so many dodgies?
Why do you think the Allies let him get away with so much for so long?
Please feel free to share your thoughts in the comment section below.