Hitler. 1936-1945: Nemesis

Festival, he warned two of his most ardent English devotees, the good-looking daughters of the British aristocrat Lord Redesdale, Unity Valkyrie Mitford (who said that sitting next to Hitler was ‘like sitting beside the sun’) ⁴⁸ and her sister Diana (divorced from a member of the wealthy Guinness family and on the verge of marrying — in a ceremony attended by Hitler and Goebbels — the leader of the British Union of Fascists, Oswald Mosley), of the ‘Jewish and Bolshevik danger’.⁴⁹ By this time, events in Spain were also focusing Hitler’s attention on the threat of Bolshevism. Until then, he had scarcely given a thought to Spain. But on the evening of 25 July, following a performance of Siegfried conducted by Wilhelm Furtwangler, his decision — against the advice of the Foreign Office — to send aid to General Franco committed Germany to involvement in what was rapidly to turn into the Spanish Civil War.⁵⁰

The refusal of the Spanish Right to accept the narrow victory of the left-wing Popular Front in the elections of February 1936 had left Spain teetering on the brink of civil war. During late spring and early summer, horror stories of terroristic outrages, political murders, violent attacks on clergy, and burning churches had started to pour out of a country rapidly descending into political chaos. Europe was alarmed. For the Spanish Right, there was little difficulty in portraying it as the work of Marxist revolutionaries and evoking the image of a country on the verge of Communist takeover.⁵¹ Between May and July, army plans for a coup took shape.⁵² On 17 July army garrisons in Spanish Morocco rose against the elected government. The Commander-in-Chief of the army in Morocco, General Francisco Franco, put himself next morning at the head of the rebellion. But a mutiny of sailors loyal to the Republic denied him the transport facilities he needed to get his army to the mainland, most of which remained in Republican hands. The few planes he was able to lay hands upon did not amount to much in terms of an airlift.⁵³ In these unpropitious circumstances, Franco turned to Mussolini and Hitler. It took over a week to overcome Mussolini’s initial refusal to help the Spanish rebels. Hitler was persuaded within a matter of hours. Ideological and strategic considerations — the likelihood of Bolshevism triumphing on the Iberian peninsula — were uppermost in his mind. But the potential for gaining access to urgently needed raw materials for the rearmament programme — an aspect emphasized by Goring — also appears to have played its part in the decision.⁵⁴

Good luck was on Franco’s side in his approach to Germany to send transport planes. His initial request for German aid had been coolly received by the Foreign Office. He decided to make a direct appeal to Hitler. A German businessman, Johannes Bernhardt, the head of an export firm which had close dealings with the Spanish army in Morocco and a member of the Nazi Party Foreign Organization (the Auslandsorganisation, or AO), had offered his help in mediation to Franco. As late as 22 July, Franco had not had a plane at his disposal capable of reaching Germany. But the following day a Lufthansa Junkers Ju-52/3m mail plane, sequestered by the rebels in Las Palmas amid German protests, arrived in Morocco, carrying the rebel General Orgaz. Franco now took up Bernhardt’s offer of help. Carrying a written request from Franco to Hitler — and in all probability a similar one to Goring⁵⁵ — Bernhardt flew to Berlin, accompanied by the sixty-year-old branch leader of the AO in Tetuan, Adolf Langenheim, arriving on the evening of 24 July at Tempelhof aerodrome.⁵⁶

Meanwhile, the German Foreign Office had been increasingly worried about the deteriorating situation in Spain. A number of attacks on German citizens by Communists and anarchists led to two warships being dispatched into Spanish coastal waters. Concern grew that a victory of the government forces would pave the way for a Communist takeover. The prospect of Bolshevik dominance also in the south-west of Europe — compounding the victory of the left-wing Popular Front in France earlier in the year — seemed a real one.⁵⁷ Even so, the Foreign Office thought direct involvement in Spain too risky. Gauleiter Ernst Wilhelm Bohle, the head of the AO, who had advanced the case of Franco’s emissaries, was told in no uncertain terms to take the matter no further.⁵⁸ Ignoring the warning, however, Bohle telephoned Rudolf He?, Deputy Head of the Party, who immediately arranged for the emissaries to fly in his personal plane to meet him in Thuringia. After a two-hour discussion, He? rang Hitler. A meeting with the Fuhrer was fixed for the evening of the following day, 25 July, in Bayreuth.⁵⁹

It was close to ten o’clock in the evening when Bernhardt and Langenheim were ushered into Hitler’s presence in the Wagner residence, ‘Haus Wahnfried’. Hitler had by then been well briefed on the situation in Spain. He knew the rebels’ position had worsened. The last report from the German Embassy in Madrid that morning had warned that a long civil war was in prospect, and that a Republican victory would have damaging consequences for German interests. The report raised the spectre of a Spanish soviet regime closely bound into the French-Soviet alliance.⁶⁰ Goring had by this time also had the opportunity to brief Hitler on the economic advantages to be gained from supporting Franco, were the rebel cause to succeed.⁶¹

That, however, was far from a foregone conclusion. Bernhardt reinforced the message that Franco’s struggle against Communism was lost without German aid.⁶² The talk moved on to the question of payment for the aid. Noticing that Hitler looked ‘somewhat shocked’ when he mentioned purely nominal sums, Bernhardt stressed the ‘rich sources’ to be gained from Andalusia, almost certainly going on to indicate benefits to Germany from increased raw material imports in exchange for armaments.⁶³ Hitler was still hesitant. But once he had turned the audience into another lengthy monologue, in which he praised the idealism of Spanish nationalists and ranted endlessly about the dangers of Bolshevism, the outcome was little in doubt. In contrast to the position of the Foreign Ministry, he had convinced himself that the dangers of being sandwiched between two Bolshevik blocs outweighed the risks of German involvement in the Spanish crisis — even if, as seemed likely, it should turn into full-blown and protracted civil war. War against the Soviet Union — the struggle for Germany’s ‘living space’ — was, in his view, at some point inevitable. The prospect of a Bolshevik Spain was a dangerous complication.⁶⁴ He decided to provide Franco with the aid requested. It was an indication both of Hitler’s own greatly increased self-confidence and of the weakened position of those who had advised him on international affairs that he took the decision alone. Possibly, knowing the reluctance of the Foreign Office to become involved, and aware that Goring, for all his interest in possible economic gains, shared some of its reservations, Hitler was keen to present doubters with a fait accompli?⁶⁵ Possibly, too, Hitler was also still under the influence of Wagner’s Siegfried, which he had come from earlier in the evening. At any rate, the operation to assist Franco came to be dubbed ‘Unternehmen Feuerzauber’ (‘Operation Magic Fire’), recalling the heroic music accompanying Siegfried’s passage through the ring of fire to free Brunnhilde.⁶⁶

Only after Hitler had taken the decision were Goring and Blomberg summoned. Goring, despite his hopes of economic gains from intervention, was initially ‘horrified’ about the risk of international complications through intervention in Spain. But faced with Hitler’s usual intransigence, once he had arrived at a decision, Goring was soon won over.⁶⁷ Blomberg, his influence — not least after his nervousness over the Rhineland affair — now waning compared with the powerful position he had once held, went along without objection.⁶⁸ Ribbentrop, too, when he was told on arrival in Bayreuth that Hitler intended to support Franco, initially warned against involvement in Spain. But Hitler was adamant. He had already ordered aircraft to be put at Franco’s disposal. The crucial consideration was ideological: ‘If Spain really goes communist, France in her present situation will also be bolshevised in due course, and then Germany is finished. Wedged between the powerful Soviet bloc in the East and a strong communist Franco-Spanish bloc in the West, we could do hardly anything if Moscow chose to attack us.’⁶⁹ Hitler brushed aside Ribbentrop’s weak objections — fresh complications with Britain, and the strength of the French bourgeoisie in holding out against Bolshevism — and simply ended the conversation by stating that he had already made his decision.⁷⁰

Twenty Junkers Ju-52 transport planes — ten more than Franco had asked for — supported by six Heinkel He 51 fighters were to be provided and were soon en route to Spanish Morocco and to Cadiz, in southern Spain, which had rapidly fallen to the insurgents. Subsequent aid was to follow through a barter system of German equipment for Spanish raw materials under cover of two export companies, one German and one Spanish.⁷¹ Despite the warnings he had received that Germany could be sucked into a military quagmire, and however strongly ideological considerations weighed with him, Hitler probably intervened only on the assumption that German aid would tip the balance quickly and decisively in Franco’s favour. ‘We’re taking part a bit in Spain. Not clear. Who knows what it’s good for,’ commented Goebbels laconically the day after the decision to help Franco had been taken.⁷² Short-term gains, not long-term involvement, were the premiss of Hitler’s impulsive decision. Significant military and economic involvement in Spain began only in October.⁷³ By then, Goring — spurred by his role as head of the new Four-Year Plan as well as chief of the Luftwaffe — was the driving-force. Hitler agreed to substantial increases in German military assistance to