THE WAR IN SPAIN [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR]
SIR,—Now that with many unedifying contortions the greater part of the British Press is hastening to make up for lost time by shifting its ground and looking on the bright side in Spain—while still, of course, enjoying a good cry over spilt milk—it is a genuine relief to read The Spectator's unhypo- critical view of the Spanish situation expressed in the leading article of your last issue. As you rightly say, it is idle to pretend that we foreigners have thought of the conflict first in terms of Spain. It was inevitable that we should all fight our own battle there, actively or under a guise of impar- tiality. And now, how provoking it is that the Nationalists should win, with only our grudging consent and against our political wishes! How ignominious to have to bank on General Franco's ingratitude towards his allies to re-establish the status quo ante! One wonders whether, despite our far- flung humanitarianism, it would not have suited us better for the war to go on indefinitely. At worst, some feel it would be advisable to rob the winning side of victory by substituting for it the other's " conditional cessation of hostilities."
What matters now, for a chang•-, is the Spanish point of view. Let us hope that money and diplomacy can save our face.. It would be sanctimonious and typical of us to assume that it does not need saving, though we happen, I think, to have interpreted the war's development more or less correctly by the successive labels we have given to each faction: Government, Reds, Republicans — Rebels, anti-Reds, Nationalists.
Yet with one flat statement in the above-mentioned article —that " without the support of German and Italian material and men General Franco would not have won at all "—I must beg flatly to disagree. All propagandist exaggeration and minimising apart, no one can say what would have happened if no outside aid had been given to the Nationalists. They reached Madrid almost entirely without it—and were met bs
the International Brigade. Even if the Republicans, who were rich, had continued to get considerable help from abroad (as they have) and Franco had had none, it is very far from
certain whether the war would not merely have been pro- longed. His Spaniards, too, would have " maintained an almost unbelievable resistance against overwhelming odds "- as, in fact, they did at Toledo, Oviedo, Belchite, Teruel, Sta. Maria de la Cabeza and elsewhere. Their militant spirit and superior leadership might very probably have turned the tide in their favour.—I am, Sir, yours truly, JOHN MARKS. 46 Fitzroy Street, W. r.
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