As dusk fell on 17 July in Spanish Morocco, the commanders of the Legion and the
The only remaining centres of resistance at dawn in Morocco on the 18th were the high commissioner’s residence and the air force base at Tetuán; both surrendered a few hours later when threatened with artillery. All those who had resisted were executed, including the high commissioner and Major de la Puente Bahamonde, whose fate was approved by his first cousin, General Franco. In a single night the rebels had killed 189 people.7
Colonel Beigbeder, who spoke Arabic, approached the Caliph Muley Hassan to secure his support. He warned him that the republican government could declare Morocco independent in order to undermine the rebel cause. And any encouragement of Moroccan nationalism would put him in danger after his collaboration with the colonial power.
In Madrid the republican government had been aware of the rising since the evening of 17 July. The next morning it issued the following communiqué: ‘The government states that the movement is confined to certain areas in the Protectorate and that no one, absolutely no one, on the mainland has joined this absurd venture.’ At 3 p.m. on 18 July Casares Quiroga firmly rejected offers of aid from the CNT and UGT. He urged everyone to carry on as normal and to ‘trust in the military powers of the state’. He claimed that the rising in Seville had been suppressed, still believing that General Queipo de Llano would secure central Andalucia for the Republic. In fact, Queipo de Llano had already done precisely the opposite. ‘Thanks to preventative measures taken by the government,’ Casares Quiroga proclaimed, ‘it may be said that a vast anti-republican movement has been wiped out.’ He again refused to arm the workers, saying that ‘anybody who hands out weapons without my approval will be shot’.8
That night the CNT and UGT declared a general strike over Unión Radio. It was the nearest they could get to ordering mobilization. The news coming in showed the administration’s statements to be a mixture of contradictions, lies and complacency. The workers began to dig up weapons hidden since the Asturian events of October 1934 and, although Casares Quiroga’s government finally began to understand what it faced, its basic attitude did not change. ‘His ministry is a madhouse,’ an observer remarked, ‘and the maddest inmate is the prime minister. He is neither sleeping nor eating. He shouts and screams as if possessed. He will hear nothing of arming the people and threatens to shoot anybody who does it on his own initiative.’9
When the rising was successful in a town, the pattern of events usually started with the seizing of strategic buildings, such as the town hall. If there was no military garrison, the rebel forces would consist of civil guards, Falangists, and right-wing supporters armed with hunting rifles or shotguns. They would proclaim a state of war in official terms, and in several places confused townsfolk thought that they were carrying out the orders of the Madrid government.
The response of the CNT and UGT was to order a general strike and demand weapons from the civil governor. Arms were either refused them or were unobtainable. Barricades were rapidly constructed, but workers who resisted the rebels were massacred, and potential opponents who survived, from the civil governor down to the lowest union official, were executed. On the other hand, if the troops wavered or delayed in coming out of their barracks, and the workers were ready, the outcome was usually very different. An immediate attack, or an encirclement of the barracks, was enough to ensure the rebels’ surrender.