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Spain and the Axis During World War II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Donald S. Detwiler
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Extract

In March, 1939, less than two weeks after Hitler marched into Prague, betraying the desperate hope of Munich and crushing the forlorn Czech republic, Franco marched into Madrid, concluding the grim Civil War and extinguishing the last faint hope for the survival of the Spanish Republic. With war clouds gathering over Europe, it seemed only too clear that Nationalist Spain was little more than an Axis satellite, for as Hitler himself a year later observed, without German and Italian aid during the Civil War, “there would today be no Franco.” Yet there was far less gratitude in Spain than there might have been, had the Germans not so avidly sought economic and political returns on their investment in goods and manpower. By the end of the Civil War, German economic interests had penetrated Spain and Spanish Morocco as never before, thanks to a ruthless policy of exacting contractual concessions from the Nationalists as the price of continued support. Moreover, there had been bitter dissension between Hitler and Franco over the latter's declaration of neutrality during the Sudeten Crisis, and an acrimonious discussion over his reluctance to publicize Spain's accession to the Anti-Comintern Pact, which was only brought to an end when the matter was leaked to the press without Spanish approval.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 33 , Issue 1 , January 1971 , pp. 36 - 53
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1971

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References

1 The point of departure for this article, a revision of a paper which was presented at a session of the 1968 meeting of the American Historical Association on the topic of “Spanish-German Relations During the Second World War,” is the author's monograph Hitler, Franco und Gibraltar. Die Frage des spanischen Eintritts in den Zweiten Weltkrieg, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Europäische Geschichte Mainz, Vol. 27 (Wiesbaden, 1962)Google Scholar. The author's work on Spanish-German relations from 1936 to 1945 has been supported in part by grants from his university and from the American Philosophical Society.

2 On September 28, 1940, to the Italian Foreign Minister, Documents on German Foreign Policy, Series D, Vol. XI (Washington, D.C., 1960), Doc. No. 124Google Scholar; henceforth cited DGFP, D, XI, 124.

3 DGFP, D, III, 435, 440, 455, 463, 464, 469–475, 478–480, etc.; Merkes, Manfred, Die deutsche Politik gegenüber dem spanischen Bürgerkrieg, 1936–1939, Bonner Historische Forschungen, Vol. 18 (Bonn, 1961), 128–132Google Scholar, 137–142, 148–150. For a German view of the Spanish economy after the Civil War, see Ackermann, Georg, Spanien wirtschaftlich gesehen (Berlin, 1939)Google Scholar.

4 On the Sudeten Crisis, see Merkes, , op, cit., pp. 142–48Google Scholar; on the Anti-Comintern Pact, DGFP, D, III, 767, 768, 770, 772, 775–79, 781, 782, and 786, and VI, 241.

5 See, for example, Franco's, address on receiving the credentials of the papal nuncio in the summer of 1938, Palabras del Caudillo, 19 abril 1937 — 7 diciembre 1942 (Madrid, 1943), pp. 67–70Google Scholar.

6 Early in December, 1940, German Under State Secretary Woermann reported that when Franco was presented a draft protocol on the settlement of the Spanish debt from the Civil War, he was amazed (erstaunt) to note that the costs of the Legion Condor were being charged to Spain (Aktennotiz vom 12. Dezember 1940, Büro des Staatssekretärs: Akten betreffend Spanien, not published in DGFP but excerpted in Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 144–45, n. 49Google Scholar, and available on National Archives microfilm serial 136, frames 74521–22). Total German expenditures amounted to about 500 million Reichsmark, those of the Italians to the equivalent of 700 million Reichsmark (DGFP, D, III, 783; I Documenti Diplomatici Italiani, Nona Serie, Vol. II, Appendice V).

7 At the Brenner Conference of October 4, 1940 (DGFP, D, XI, 149). In Berlin on September 28, 1940, Hitler had said much the same thing to Mussolini's foreign minister, Count Ciano: “When now the Germans demand [repayment].… this is often interpreted by the Spanish as a tactless confusing of economic and idealistic considerations, and as a German, one feels toward the Spanish almost like a Jew, who wants to make business out of the holiest possessions of mankind” (DGFP, D, XI, 124).

8 I Documenti Diplomatici Italiani, Ottava Serie, Vol. XIII, Doc. Nos. 128 and 642.

9 Bonnet, Georges, La déefense de la paix, 1936–1940, Vol. II, De Munich àa la guerre. La fin d'une Europe (Geneva, 1948), p. 260Google Scholar; SirPeterson, Maurice, Both Sides of the Curtain (London, 1950), p. 194Google Scholar. Cf. Detwiler, , op. cit., p. 145, n. 53Google Scholar.

10 Bulletin of Spanish Studies, Vol. XVII (Liverpool, 1940), 36Google Scholar; DGFP, D, VII, 479 and 524; Doussinague, Josée M., España tenla razóon (1939–1945) (Madrid, 1949), pp. 11–13Google Scholar.

11 DGFP, D, VIII, 173.

12 Suner, Ramóon Serrano, Entre Hendaya y Gibraltar: Noticia y refiexióon, frente a una leyenda, sobre nuestra politica en dos guerras (Madrid, 1948), pp. 151–52 (author's translation)Google Scholar.

13 This interpretation is convincingly argued by Burdick, Charles B. in Germany's Military Strategy and Spain in World War II (Syracuse, 1968), pp. 1–33Google Scholar; see also Hillgruber, Andreas, Hitlers Strategic: Politik und Kriegführung 1940–1941 (Frankfurt am Main, 1965), pp. 144–277Google Scholar.

14 Weinberg, Gerhard L., Germany and the Soviet Union, Studien zur Geschichte Osteuropas, Vol. I (Leiden, 1954), 106–121Google Scholar. A central question is precisely when Hitler decided to attack the Soviet Union. For a keen discussion of the issue and its implications, see Weinberg, Gerhard L., “Der deutsche Entschluss zum Angriff auf die Sowjetunion,” Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte, I (1953), 301–318Google Scholar; Hans-Günther Seraphim and Andreas Hillgruber, “Hitlers Entschluss zum Angriff auf Russland (eine Entgegnung)” with Professor Weinberg's “Schlusswort,” ibid., Vol. II (1954), 240–254; and the section headed “Hitlers Entscheidung für die militärische Ost-Lösung” in Hillgruber's book cited in the previous note, pp. 352–377.

15 DGFP, D, IX, 488.

16 SirHoare, Samuel (Viscount Templewood), Complacent Dictator (New York, 1947), p. 31Google Scholar.

17 Medlicott, W. N., The Economic Blockade, Vol. I, History of the Second World War, United Kingdom Civil Series (London, 1952), 529–548Google Scholar.

18 On September 15, 1940, 60 planes were lost. By the end of October, German losses totalled 1,733 planes to 915 for the British. German flyer who parachuted to safety were, of course, lost for the rest of the war, whereas their British counterparts might fly again. Cf. Jacobsen, Hans-Adolf, 1939–1945: Tier Zweite Weltkrieg in Chronik und Dokumenten (Darmstadt, 1959), pp. 24–25Google Scholar; Schramm, Percy E. et al. , Geschichte des Zweiten Weltkriegs, I (2nd ed.; Würzburg: A. G. Ploetz-Verlag, 1960), 45Google Scholar; Klee, Karl, “Die Luftschlacht um England 1940,” Entscheidungsschlachten des zweiten Weltkrieges, ed. Jacobsen, Hans-Adolf and Rohwer, Jürgen (Frankfurt am Main, 1960), pp. 61–89Google Scholar.

19 For Serrano's account, see the tenth chapter of Entre Hendaya y Gibraltar, pp. 165–198. For his conversations with Hitler on September 17 and 25, 1940, see DGFP, D, XI, 66 and 116 (cf. “Editor's Note,” p. 184).

20 DGFP, D, XI, 124.

21 Generaloberst [Franz] Halder, , Kriegstagebuch: Tägliche Aufzeichnungen des Chefs des Generalstabes des Heeres, 1939–1942, ed. Jacobsen, Hans-Adolf, II (Stuttgart, 1963), 124Google Scholar; Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 51–53 and 158, n. 5Google Scholar.

22 For this Hitler-Mussolini conference, see DGFP, D, XI, 149; on Spanish-Italian relations, see Serrano, , op. cit., pp. 194–98Google Scholar, and Ciano, Galeazzo, The Ciano Diaries, 1939–1943, ed. Gibson, Hugh (Garden City, 1946), pp. 296–99Google Scholar.

23 Geschke, Günter, Die deutsche Frankreichspolitik 1940 von Compièegne bis Montoire. Das Problem einer deutsch-französischen Annäherung nach dem Frankreichfeldzug, Beiheft 12–13 der “Wehrwissenschaftlichen Rundschau” (Frankfurt, 1960), 86–89; DGFP, D, X I, 212Google Scholar.

24 Ciano, Galeazzo, L'Europa verso la catastrofe (Verona, 1948), p. 604Google Scholar.

25 Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 56–66 and 160–62, nn. 18–46Google Scholar. A copy of the summary of the author's conversation on March 28, 1960, on Spanish-German relations, with Hitler's interpreter, Dr. Paul Otto Schmidt (as edited and approved by him) has been deposited in the archives of the Foreign Office in Bonn. For the incomplete records of the Hendaye conference, see DGFP, D, XI, 220 and 221.

26 For an English translation of the long-lost Treaty of Hendaye, together with an account of how it was found, see DGFP, D, XI, “Editor's Note,” pp. 566–67, and n. 4 to Doc. 221. For the German text, see Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 118–19 and 179, nn. 8–10Google Scholar.

27 The full text of article 4: “In fulfillment of her obligations as an ally, Spain will intervene in the present war of the Axis Powers against England after they have provided her with the military support necessary for her preparedness, at a time to be set by common agreement of the three Powers, taking into account military preparations to be decided upon. Germany will grant economic aid to Spain by supplying her with food and raw materials, so as to meet the needs of the Spanish people and the requirements of the war.”

28 DGFP, D, XI, 227; Geschke, , op. cit., pp. 91–102Google Scholar.

29 When Hitler learned of Mussolini's plans, he hastily arranged to meet him in Florence before returning to Berlin from Hendaye and Montoire, but arrived too late, for several hours before the October 28th meeting, the Italian invasion of Greece had begun. For the Florence conference, at which Hitler reported on his meetings with Franco and Petain, see DGFP, D, XI, 246.

30 The Second Vienna Award, in which the Axis powers arbitrated a dispute between Hungary and Rumania, had been negotiated only two months earlier (DGFP, D, X, 413 and 415).

31 Roskill, S. W., The War at Sea, 1939–1945, The Defensive, History of the Second World War, United Kingdom Military Series (London, 1954), I, 300–304Google Scholar; Ciano, , Diaries, p. 310Google Scholar; for the campaign in Greece in particular, Ehrengard Thadden, Schramm-von, Griechenland und die Grossmächte im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Europäische Geschichte Mainz, Vol. 9 (Wiesbaden, 1955), 92 ff.Google Scholar

32 Burdick, , op. cit., pp. 35–95Google Scholar.

33 Serrano, , op. cit., p. 235Google Scholar.

34 DGFP, D, XI, 352 and 357.

35 On the particularly important question of Anglo-American cooperation to control the flow of oil to Spain, see, in addition to Medlicott, , op. cit., pp. 534–38Google Scholar: Supplementary Note Two, “On the Spanish Oil Situation in 1940,” in Feis, Herbert, The Spanish Story: Franco and the Nations at War (New York, 1948), pp. 272–75Google Scholar.

36 In 1958, Serrano spoke of Franco having been amazed how “despite the dramatic Nazi march of victory, Canaris kept insisting to him that Germany would lose the war in the end.” Deutsch, Harold C., The Conspiracy Against Hitler in the Twilight War (Minneapolis, 1968), p. 355, n. 7Google Scholar.

37 This treatment is based on four interviews with the late retired German navy captain Wilhelm Leissner, who was head of German intelligence in Spain during the Second World War and was present at several key conferences with Vigón and Franco, including the one on December 7, 1940. Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 84–88, 134–35, n. 6, and pp. 169–171, nn. 21–33Google Scholar; Leissner also read the manuscript of this section of the cited manuscript before it was published; for the text of the official report of the conference, see DGFP, D, XI, 500.

38 Hitler's dilemma is brought out very well by Burdick, , op. cit., pp. 114–19Google Scholar.

39 Detwiler, , op. cit., p. 151, n. 20Google Scholar.

40 DGFP, D, XI, 682 and 702, and XII, 22, 49, 61 and 95.

41 DGFP, D, XII, 28 and 73.

42 DGFP, D, VII, 524.

43 The “Blue Division,” named for the blue shirt of the Falange which its members wore, was a volunteer unit, jointly sponsored by the Falange and the Army, which fought on the Russian Front from 1941 until the end of 1943, when Anglo-American economic pressure forced its withdrawal — though on an individual basis a number of its former members continued fighting as a “Spanish Legion” under German command. In an authorized history by Teniente General Esteban-Infantes, Emilio, La División Azul (Donde Asia Empieza) (Barcelona, 1956), p. 53Google Scholar, Hitler's attack on the Soviet Union is seriously represented as a fully justified preventive war.

44 Interview with Charles Favrel, printed in Paris-Presse, October 26, 1945, as cited by Feis, , op. cit., p. 112, n. 4Google Scholar.

45 See, for example, Franco's letter to Churchill in October, 1944, reprinted in Hoare, op. cit., pp. 305–308.

46 Burdick, , op. cit., pp. 131–198Google Scholar.

47 This is brought out by Beaulac, Willard L., who served as U. S. Counselor of Embassy in Madrid from 1941 to 1944, in his memoirs, Career Ambassador (New York, 1951), p. 171Google Scholar, and also by Feis, , op. cit., p. 189Google Scholar, who reports that the Spanish foreign minister confidentially informed the Allies that the Germans had admitted sinking a Spanish merchant ship, and that this was interpreted in Madrid as a stiff warning from Berlin.

48 A detailed catalogue of Spanish services to Germany was compiled as a “Grand Remonstrance” by the British ambassador in Madrid, SirHoare, Samuel, in 07, 1943 (op. cit., pp. 190–97)Google Scholar. The U.S. ambassador, Professor Hayes, Carlton J. H., who in Wartime Mission in Spain, 1942–1945 (New York, 1945)Google Scholar, gives a far more positive picture than either Feis or Hoare, has summarized Spanish services to the Allies in The United States and Spain: An Interpretation (New York, 1951), pp. 150–53Google Scholar. For a semi-official Spanish reply to Hoare's highly contentious Spanish memoirs, see de Areilza, Jose Maria, Embajadores sobre España, 3rd ed. (Madrid, 1947), pp. 43–90Google Scholar.

49 For a clear, concise presentation of a complex subject, see Beaulac, , op. cit., pp. 172–175Google Scholar (in his excellent chapter on “Economic and Political Warfare,” pp. 169–178). More detailed: Hayes, , Wartime Mission in Spain, Chapter VII, “The Wolfram Crisis,” pp. 194–238Google Scholar; Feis, , op. cit., pp. 215–262Google Scholar; Hoare, , op. cit., pp. 258–266Google Scholar.

50 Hayes, , Wartime Mission in Spain, p. 86Google Scholar.

51 On German military plans for Spain at this time (Operation Gisela), see Burdick, , op. cit., pp. 157–188Google Scholar, particularly pp. 166 ff. On Allied apprehension concerning a possible German march into Spain, as well as plans to counter such an exigency by moving into Spanish Morocco and possibly even southern Spain (Operation Backbone), see ibid., p. 166, n. 21. Very perceptive also is Chapter Five, “The Axis and North Africa,” in Deakin's, F. W.The Brutal Friendship: Mussolini, Hitler and the Fall of Italian Fascism, Part I, revised (Garden City, 1966), particularly pp. 80–82Google Scholar.

52 For the text of the draft of Hitler's “War Directive No. 19: Operation Felix,” see Detwiler, , op. cit., pp. 120–23Google Scholar. Since Operation Felix was never implemented, the number 19 was later used for the directive for Operation Attila, the occupation of Vichy France. Cf. Trevor-Roper, H. R., Blitzkrieg to Defeat: Hitler's War Directives, 1939–1945 (New York, 1965), p. 44Google Scholar.

53 Conversation of the author on July 12, 1960, with General D. F. A. Weinknecht (Detwiler, , op. cit., p. 168, n. 6)Google Scholar. Cf. Halder, , op. cit., pp. 146 and 150Google Scholar.

54 Churchill, Winston, House of Commons Debates, 05 25, 1944Google Scholar, as cited by Hayes, in The United States and Spain, pp. 152–53Google Scholar.