The Civil War 1936-39 and After

International Activity.

The story of the efforts made by the London Committee to prevent, or at least lessen, foreign in tervention is too long and complicated to relate in full. Though the entry of foreign combatants was made illegal (Feb. 21, 1937) they continued to enter, despite a coastal control scheme inaugu rated on March 7. As all the Powers but Britain and France soon withdrew from this, Britain proposed its supersession by port con trol, and the granting to both parties of belligerent rights as soon as the withdrawal of foreign combatants already in Spain should have made substantial progress. Actually General Franco never withdrew more than 10,000 of these during the war, and the Re publicans, though more amenable, had not completed withdrawal at its close. Belligerent rights were therefore never granted.

In the summer of 1937 intensified Nationalist submarine war fare in the Mediterranean led to a nine-Power conference at Nyon, which (September 14) organized a new system of zone patrols and agreed that any submarine attacking a non-Spanish merchant ship should itself be attacked. As the war moved more and more toward eastern Spain, attention became increasingly centred on the bombing of Mediterranean ports, often with great harm to neutral shipping and much loss of life among civilians. Protests were made by several Powers and by the Vatican, against the re peated bombing of open towns (the small town of Granollers, for example, suffered 700 casualties in one raid, and Falset, near Gandesa, was almost entirely destroyed) ; and, though the Na tionalists protested that they confined themselves to military ob jectives and a British commission sent to Republican Spain found that (e.g.) 41 of 46 raids on Alicante had as their aim the port or the railway station, it also described one of the remaining five, and several other raids, as intentional attacks on civilian areas.

Peace Moves and the Ebro Stalemate.

The idea of peace negotiations, which the Powers would have supported, was re jected throughout by General Franco, who insisted upon the un conditional surrender which he eventually obtained. Signs that the Republicans were envisaging defeat first came in April 1938, when Dr. Negrin formulated thirteen "points" as an irreducible minimum on which he would insist. At the time of the Munich conversations (September 1938) these were given great publicity and there was talk of a more moderate government which might canvass for an armistice. That this was not formed may have been due to the success of a hold-up of the Nationalists on the Ebro (July 26 to Nov. 18, 1938) which lost them the summer and en

abled the Republicans to cherish hopes of an indefinite prolonga tion of the struggle. But these were vain : their army was ex hausted; their people half-starved; their territory swollen by some three million refugees from the West. When at length the Na tionalists were able to re-cross the Ebro, even the severe winter could not hold them back from their final sweep to victory.

The End of the War.

This war of lightning offensives and wearisome delays conformed to type until its very end. Save for the usual repeated air-raids, December was quiet until, two days before Christmas, the last great offensive began. A general ad vance in Catalonia soon developed into an attack on Barcelona, which, menaced from both north-west and south-west, fell on Jan.

26, 1939, after a campaign of only 34 days. The government fled north to Figueras, where, on February 1, 62 members of the Re publican Cortes held a meeting in the castle vault, and Dr. Negrin hurled defiance at the enemy—but also announced that his thir teen points were now reduced to three. Pursued northwards along the three main roads to France, they quickly lost the rest of autonomous Catalonia. Hundreds of thousands of refugees poured into France, able-bodied men of military age being at first sent back and eventually admitted and interned. When Gerona fell (February 4) the government moved to a village adjacent to the French frontier, which, on the next day, was crossed by a small procession of presidents—President Azaria, President Companys and the Basque president, Sr. Aguirre.

On February 28, Sr. Manuel Azaria resigned his office, but Dr. Negrin and his Cabinet returned to Madrid, once more the capital of Republican Spain, while the Nationalists prepared to move southward to attack it. But mercifully for that city, where, with no heating and only two ounces of food daily, hundreds were dying weekly of starvation, attack proved unnecessary. On March 5, all parties but the Communists, formed a Council of Defence, under General Miaja, ousting Dr. Negrin and his Cabinet, who fled to France. Forty-eight hours had elapsed when the Com munists and the late premier's supporters revolted against the Council. In a week, after heavy fighting, the revolt was put down but the Council at once set to work to prepare surrender. On March 28, 200,000 Nationalist troops marched into the capital without resistance; by the next day the rest of Spain had surren dered ; and that same afternoon the Burgos radio station announced that, after two years and 254 days, the Civil War was over.