Spanish Forces in WW2

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#1

Ok. The Spanish army didn´t fought in the war, but we send men for the Blue Division, his real name was 250 infantry division (spanish). The gobernment send troops becausea lot of peoplewantedto fight against Russia,which had helped the Republicans during our Civil war.

There were spaniards in the free french forces, and in the Red forces.

There were also spaniards in the british army.

The most important battle in which the Blue Division was involved was the battle of Krasny Bor (10th February 1943)

Onthe othern side, the first compnyentering Paris was called “la novena”, (the 9th),and wasaspanish coy. of the Leclerc´s forces.

Ther were also a great amount of Spaniards at Bir-Hackeim.

#2

Spanish fought also in Luftwaffe?

Edited: Blue squadron?
It seems an interesting book:
http://www.ospreypublishing.com/title_detail.php/title=Q3593~ser=MAA~per=47

#3

The Blue Squadron was equiped with Bf-109 and Fw-190 planes. There were plans for a bomber unit wich never went ahead. Against the voluntaries of the ground forces, the pilots where members of the Spanish Air Force, with experience in combat during our Civil War.

#4

What about Spaniards on the Allied side?
Were they individuals or units?

#5

There were a great amount of Spaniards in the French Foreign Legion. Some of them were at Norway, France, North of Africa, Middle East, and France again. There were no great units. Just companies and the so called Guernica Battalion,wich was a french battalion formed with basque nationalist. A great amount of Spanish soldiers were also in the Franc Corps of Africa.

#6

In the Red Army. They were individuals and really small units. There were pilots, soldiers( there was a monument at Stalingrad for an spanish soldier)and officers. Some Republican Generals, like Líster, were used as experts and public symbols and were promoted to generalsat theRed Army, Yugoslav Army and Polish Army. I don´t know anybody with such an account of ranks.

#7

Probably individuals as refugees from fascism. Many republican soldiers left Spain in spring 1939 for Russia, when Franco’s troops finaly captured Catalunia. Of these many fought in the Red Army. Most of the republicans, who managed to escape into France though were interned by the French government and later handed over to the German (ending up in concentration camps) by the Vichy government.
AFAIK, though the 13e Demibrigade REI of the French Foreign Legion consisted for a big part of anti fascist survivors of the Spanish civil war and therefore joined De Gaulle’s free French right away to fight for the Allies.

Many of those who escaped to Britain tried to join the British forces, but were rejected as politically suspect and in some countries (Netherlands) even imprisoned.
The highest rank a veteran of the international brigades could reach in the British Army during WW2 was corporal, no matter what his experience and qualifications were.

Jan

#8

Spanish WW2 medals:
http://users.skynet.be/hendrik/eng/39spain.html

#9

Another unit in the German service was the Blue Legion, instituted after the disolution of the division.

There are also acounts by a “Mayor Ezquerra” who was ina special operations unit formed by spanish soldiers during the Battle ofthe Bulge, a who ended the war fighting in Berlin.

#10

blue division troops

mark of blue division:

blue division volunteer:

blue squadron:

blue legion:

a great page about spain during ww2 is:
http://www.balagan.org.uk/war/1939/spanish_in_ww2.htm

#11

the site says that there were 4 units for the axis and 6 for the allies,so,spanish helped more the allies.

tenes alguna pagina de la division azul en español natxo?

gracias.
erwin

#12

Quoted from: http://www.feldgrau.com/InfDiv.php?ID=163

Beginning:
The 250.Infanterie-Division was formed in Spain during the last week of June 1941, immediately after the German attack on the Soviet Union. The unit was an offical Spanish sponsered formation created to partially repay the debt owed Germany for its vitally important assistance during the Spanish Civil War during 1936-1939. It was formed with Spanish volunteers from across Spain who flocked en masse to serve in the unit, originally named simply the Spanish Division of Volunteers, or more properly, Division Espanola de Voluntarios (DEV). The division was exclusively a foreign volunteer unit, designed for service within the German Wehrmacht, but to consist soley of Spaniards and to be led soley by Spanish officers.

…

Ending:
Finally, on October 5th and 6th, 1943, the division was ordered to fall back from its positions. Between October 6th and 12th, 1943, the division was relieved by the 81.Infanterie-Division and the 123.Infanterie-Division. The division was transfered to the region of Volosovo where soon after it was ordered to return to Spain, leaving in its place the Spanish Legion, a battalion-sized unit consisting of about 1,500 Spanish troops that choose not to return to Spain but to instead continue fighting the Soviets. The first troops began to arrive back in Spain on October 29th, 1943. The division had seen nearly 50,000 men serve within its ranks over the period of more than two years at or near the front, and 12,726 men had become casualties while in its service.

Also check: http://www.feldgrau.com/spain.html

#13

Well, it was sponsored by the fascist party, “Falange”, and officially the gobernment don´t wanted to send troops. In fact, the officers came from the army, but the ranks came fron the fascist militias. “The name División española de voluntarios” was the official one, but everybody used that of Blue Division.
The people who went to Russia believed the motto “Rusia tiene la culpa”, “Russia is guilty”, which tells that the communist gobernment was
responsible for the long civil war.

http://www.rumbos.net/cancionero/4245_002.htm
This are songs from “Falange” and from the Blue Division.

http://www.fundaciondivisionazul.org/
This is the web of the Blue Division Foundation. I´m sorry but it´s in spanish.

http://usuarios.lycos.es/christianlr/01d51a93a50f9c311/01d51a93f30063514.html
This is also in spanish.

http://militar.org/divazul.htm
Here are links to other interesting webs, some inenglish about the Blue Division.

I Have known only a few men who went to Russia, but all of them went because they thought that it was the correct choose. They were not nazis, and they had good relations with the russian population. I know about one russian woman who offered her house to the men who went to visit a cementery in Russia some years ago; she was a girl during the war but she remembered the spanish soldiers.

#14

“Es difícil poder imaginar a soldados más valientes. A duras penas se ponen a cubierto, desafían a la muerte. Sé, en todo caso, que nuestros hombres están contentos cuando tienen a los españoles por vecinos.”

ADOLF HITLER.

#15

:smiley: ,valerosos hombres los del ejercito español y el aleman,yo no se que hubiera pasado si españa se introducia en el eje.Tal vez las cosas hubieran sido mejores para Hitler.

#16

Incidentally, Spanish Civil War veterans were in great demand during the set up of the LDV/Home Guard in the UK in summer 1940, on the grounds they had actually fought the Germans. The enthusiasm for this dropped off once the Home Guard got proper weapons and training, but a bunch of Anarchist refugees were surprisingly popular for a few weeks :wink:

#17

Both George Orwell and the former commander of the British Battalion in the International Brigades, Capt. Tom Wintringham set up training centers for resistance fighters and guerillas to fight the German invaders.
After the battle of Britain though, their activities were soon curbed by the British government, which was afraid of armed leftwingers.

Jan

#18

:smiley: ,valerosos hombres los del ejercito español y el aleman,yo no se que hubiera pasado si españa se introducia en el eje.Tal vez las cosas hubieran sido mejores para Hitler.[/quote]

I don’t think so. Spain had just “finished” a civil war and its economy was not so good. There was an attempt made by dictator Franco to fully involve Spain in WwII at Hendaya (Basque Country) and Hitler was not silly to let Spain join the axis. If Spain had joined the axis, it would have happened the same that happened with Italy: no money, no well-made plans :arrow: surrender.

The Republican forces joined the British Army willing to reconquer Spain after liberating France. They wanted to fight Fascism and Nazism but the Allied Commanders didn’t want to go to Spain, not more war.
The First tanks entering Paris were named with Spanish Civil War Battles’ names and were driven by Spanish soldiers.

#19

:shock:
Excuse me, but common history (that written by spanis, english, german… writers) tell another version.
It´s true that a great amount of spaniards fought with the allies.

It´s not true that Franco wanted to enter the war. Hitler got really angry after the Hendaya interview.

Hitler was in fact needing allies, soldiers for new divisions, Gibraltar straight closed…

#20

http://visantain.iespana.es/voluntariosesp.htm
In Spanish