Final Paper
Marked the “Little World War” by various historians (Beevor, 2001, pg 17), the Spanish
Civil War (1936-1939) stood as the most significant conflict in Europe in the Interwar period. It allowed Fascists Italy and Germany to demonstrate the prowess and precision of their growing militaries. Likewise it stood as a last stand for the left, a hope for the anarchists and socialists as growing powers in the right looked to crush the common man in Western Europe. With the significance of Franco’s takeover of Spain noted, this piece will investigate the revolutionary changing of the guard following the departure of Primo de Rivera prior to the Civil War that put the Republicans, a coalition of Socialists, Anarchists, and …show more content…
By 1920 the National Confederation of Labor, an anarchist labor group, had 750,000 members. Similar growth trends were present in the Spanish Socialists Party and the Spanish
Communist Party as organized labor and the intelligentsia began to push back against the restrictive old guard regimes.
Two additional elements contributed to the growing grievances between the Republicans and the Nationalists. First was the fact that the military had been growing increasingly aggressive with respect to protests. The military crushed protests in Morocco in 1928 with many casualties.
The second was the growing anti-clerical movement in Spain and throughout Europe. The
Church had always held a powerful position in governmental affairs and the intelligentsia was growing to resent it upon a “separation of church and state” standard. Conflicts with the church would come to center stage in 1931 when hundreds of Churches across the country were burned to the ground, highlighting the extreme positions of political