MI6 spent a fortune bribing Spanish top brass to keep Spain out of WW2

[Johnny Canuck3]

Patton was a committed anti-Communist and would have quite happily fought the Russians once the Axis were finished off. He openly advocated continuing the advance through Germany, into Eastern Europe and on to Moscow.

There were also Polish generals with a similar idea: Anders was one.

 

[JHE]

i always though franco was very keen to stay out of the war...

After the war, Francoists liked to push the line that Franco had succeeded in keeping Spain out of WW2. Not so! He just failed to get the deal he wanted.

 

[butchersapron]

i always though franco was very keen to stay out of the war because spains forces frankly aughable for anything that invoved people who could shoot ack.

Why did you think that? Close reading of the situation and evidence?

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

i always though franco was very keen to stay out of the war because spains forces frankly aughable for anything that invoved people who could shoot ack.

There were probably more men at arms in Spain with combat experience in 1939 than there were in most countries.

 

[likesfish]

Yes but they lacked a modern navy or modern armour or an air force and far from a high state of readiness

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Yes but they lacked a modern navy or modern armour or an air force and far from a high state of readiness

I haven't really looked into it, but I suspect that Spain could have acquitted itself at least as well as Rumania or Hungary [which may be damning with faint praise...]

Spaniards did informally fight on the side of the Nazis, in some of the foreign-comprised SS formations [the Blue Division, I think]

eta: I might be wrong about the Blue Divison being part of the SS, as opposed to the Wehrmacht.

 

[likesfish]

Yes and a lot of republicans fought with the french.
Frnco offered to join with the Nazis but made the offer on condition he got a large chunk of vichy france making the whole thing way to expensive for what was on offer.
Alternative history genrally goes meh spain doesnt really offer enough military to be useful and probably can take gibaltar due two the two infantry brigades massive minefield and 300 guns dug into a hollow mountain.
Theirs a reason the uk has kept gib for 300 years.

 

[JHE]

I see no reason to describe the Blue Division as 'informal'.

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

I see no reason to describe the Blue Division as 'informal'.

What I mean is that Spaniards didn't fight in WW2 as part of the Spanish army. They were allowed by Franco to volunteer to fight in the German forces.

 

[JHE]

Frnco offered to join with the Nazis but made the offer on condition he got a large chunk of vichy france making the whole thing way to expensive for what was on offer.

He didn't demand France. He wanted a free hand to carve out a new north African empire (which would involve taking Algeria from France). Hitler was unimpressed by Franco and didn't think the war effort needed whatever little Spain had to offer.

 

[likesfish]

Yeah I got that wrong

 

[Johnny Canuck3]

Hitler was unimpressed by Franco .

I don't know much about the relationship between the two; but considering the amount of help that the Nazis gave to Franco during the Civil War, one would think that the two got along somewhat, or saw that they had common interests, or both.

 

[JHE]

They only met once, in Hendaye in October 1940. The meeting was not a great success. Allegedly, Hitler said afterwards that he would rather have a tooth extracted than meet Franco again.

Franco's style of negotiation didn't please Hitler and, for someone who waged 'lightning war' as Hitler did, there was little about Franco's generalship that would impress.

Indeed, earlier the Italians were also unimpressed by Franco's generalship. They wanted a quicker victory during the Civil War and a more dynamic strategy to achieve that.

Franco, on the other hand, was in no hurry. He preferred a long slow war, which allowed him to claim that his never lost any territory (almost true) and allowed plenty of time for his brutes to carry out a murderous repression in areas his armies conquered. This repression aimed to eliminate all that Franco hated: socialists, communists, anarchists, trade unionists, republicans, democrats, atheists, Freemasons... The Spanish Civil War, at least in some places, was a war of extermination. The little Galician wasn't the most dynamic general, but he was serious about wanting to wipe out what he called 'anti-Spain'.