The Battle for Spain: The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939

The first batch of Russian aid, which arrived in October, included 42 Illyushin 15 (Chato) biplane fighters, and 31 Illyushin 16 (Mosca) monoplane fighters. On 29 October a squadron of Katiuska fast bombers, which had just arrived, raided Seville, and on 3 November Chato fighters were seen over Madrid. A day later they dispersed a formation of Fiat fighters and held their own against the Heinkel 51s. The streets of Madrid were thronged with crowds staring up into the skies and cheering whenever an aircraft was hit; it was always assumed to be an enemy. They did not know, however, that Soviet ‘fighters over the Madrid sector were ordered to conduct air battles over their own territory, and to enter enemy territory only so far that they would be able, should the engine stop, to glide back to our own lines’.¹⁴ The arrival of this modern Soviet weaponry, especially the tanks and the stubby I-16 Mosca monoplane, made the Nazis decide to increase their aid. With Franco’s agreement it was to be organized within an independent German command and named the Condor Legion.

Having advanced the last few kilometres to the south-western outskirts of the city, Varela began to make probing attacks on 5 November as he tried to decide the best approach. The western side of Madrid had no suburb buffer because the old royal hunting ground of the Casa de Campo stretched down to the River Manzanares. Madrid’s centre and key buildings all lay within a kilometre of this exposed triangle, bound by the Corunna road running north-west, and the Estremadura road stretching to the south-west. On the north of the wedge lay the new university city with its widely spaced modern blocks. Varela, who had some 15,000 men altogether, wanted to make a left-flanking attack round the northern tip of the Casa de Campo, in the area of the San Fernando bridge, but Franco insisted on attacking straight on. He wanted to reduce street fighting, especially in working-class districts, to a minimum. Nationalist troops were clearly superior in open country while the majority of their casualties, especially among the regulares, had been sustained in house clearing.

The next day Varela issued his orders for the attack scheduled for 7 November. There would be feint attacks against the Segovia and Princesa bridges to distract the defenders, while the main thrust would take place towards the sector which ran from the University City to the Plaza de España. Castejón’s column would protect the left flank and occupy Garabitas hill and part of the Casa de Campo. Asensio, with his column, was to advance from the centre of the wedge towards the sector of Rosales and Princesa. Delgado Serrano was ordered to head for the Plaza de España. He would be supported by the Italian Ansaldos and the Panzer Mark Is of Colonel von Thoma.

Miaja had established his military headquarters in the finance ministry on 6 November, the day the government left for Valencia. His chief of staff was Colonel Vicente Rojo, described by his opponents as ‘one of the most competent members of the Spanish army’.¹⁵ But not all agreed. General Alonso Baquer wrote later that Rojo was a ‘mixture of Russian populism and French scholasticism’, which meant in the latter case, that as a graduate of the Ecole Supérieure de Guerre, he was anchored in the French doctrines of the First World War. Curiously, the republican army’s slavish respect for French military doctrine later convinced Franco and his Axis allies that officers from the French army were secretly directing operations.¹⁶

Neither Miaja nor Rojo, however, knew what forces they had under their command, nor who was on their staff. Many officers had taken advantage of the confusion to flee the city and some of them, including the former chief of operations, had joined the nationalists. Even Miaja’s orders from the central government were contradictory, for he was told to hold Madrid at any cost yet also given detailed instructions for retreat towards Cuenca.

General Goriev, the man said by many to be the real commander in Madrid, was established in the ministry as well. One of his officers, Colonel Nikolai Voronov, controlled the artillery, although few batteries had any shells because of incompetence at the ministry of war. (Six years later Voronov commanded the artillery at Stalingrad and took Paulus’s surrender.) He and his Spanish counterpart established their observation post at the top of the Telefónica, a building which later attracted more nationalist artillery fire than any other. Ironically, this skyscraper belonging to the American corporation International Telephone and Telegraph, ITT, became the symbol of left-wing resistance during the course of the battle. Downstairs its chairman, Sosthenes Behn, entertained journalists with brandy while awaiting the arrival of General Franco. According to Hitler’s interpreter, Paul Schmidt, he had prepared a banquet to greet the conquerors.¹⁷