Customer Reviews

The Spanish Civil War: Revised Edition (Modern Library Paperbacks)

5 star:		(20)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is a 1000+ page-turner. When I picked it up, I knew nothing about the Spanish Civil War. This book definitely remedied that. Hugh Thomas begins shortly before the outbreak of the war and tells the story through to its completion (essentially 1936-1939). It is somewhat long, but the story itself is so compelling and Thomas' writing so good that it sucked me in and moved along nicely.

I have only a couple of gripes. First, if someone wants a short introduction, this may not be the book. I am sure there are other titles out there that will give you the basic facts in less time. As I said, however, reading the book was entertaining enough that I did not mind at all. As an example of an interesting factoid that emerges from this book, it seems that a substantial portion of the treasure from America that Spain won in the 16th century was given to the Soviets for safe-keeping. It is still there.

Second, while the book is strong on narrative, it is a little bit weak in analysis. What is especially lacking is an understanding of the factors that led to the outbreak of war in the first place. The books starts with a short chapter describing Spain in the early 20th century and plunges directly into the events leading up to the war. While the suspense before the outbreak of the war is palpable, the basic question of why a country would degenerate into civil war is hardly touched. In fairness to the author, he may have deliberately chosen to focus on the war itself rather than its causes. On the other hand, the discussion about why the Nationalists defeated the Republicans is fairly good. Two factors stand out. First, the Republicans were crippled by in-fighting amongst the factions, a fact that is admirably discussed. Second, the Nationalists received substantial help from abroad.

Author background: I am not a historian, but have read a handful of books on Spanish history.

This 1994 edition (a 2nd or 3rd revision of the first edition put out c. 1980 I believe) is apparently not available because a newer revised edition is coming out in November 2001 with updated information no doubt--you should pick up this latest coming edition. Understanding the subject of the Spanish Civil War has been plagued by two major obstacles: 1) The use of the Spanish Civil war as merely a prelude to WWII by historians of the English speaking world, i.e., crudely lumping in Franco and the Nationalists as just a Spanish variation of Facism; this ignores the study of Spanish history in its own right and the unique and tragic facets of Iberian history; 2) The use and abuse of the Spanish Civil War as an ideological forum for anarchists and "Trotskyite" anti-Stalinist communists, again, mostly from the English speaking world. The biased accounts of Anglo/American/Canadian leftists of this period (as well as Hemingway's romanticized fiction) have distorted and confused the event in the eyes of the English-speaking world. Its good to see an English scholar clear up this mess. Thomas' account clearly delineates the various factions and their goals on both sides, pointing out that lack of unity and in-fighting of the various factions of the left-of-center Republican side (if "Republican" is even a proper term to use by the time the Stalinists were done with it) was probably more decisive in leading to its downfall than the outside pressure of the Nationalists (who were by no means unified in ideology, but greatly more cooperative amongst themselves than the Republicans). The "cowardly" stance of the Democratic Western countries is made understandable and must be seen in the context of their own instability and weakness of the time. In retrospect, any aid to Republican Spain would have probably only helped the Stalinist-controlled communists complete their strangle-hold on the Republican coalition government, the other factions--especially the anarchists--being severely and savagely purged by them (my own opinion). In any case, Thomas' outstanding research and balanced account of the event allows each reader to draw their own conclusion without undue ideological bias. If you read only one history of the Spanish Civil War, this is the one to have.

THe Spanish Civil war is apparently one of the most written on moments of the 20th century, and even if this is true, this book stands out as one of the best full, one volume, histories of the event, which began in 1936 and ended in 1939. The war is fascinating because it pitted so many competeing ideologies against one another. It was a war of secular versus religious. Of Rural versus urban. Of fascist versus communist. of democracies(sort of) verus autocracy. It was in some ways a popular war versus militarism. It was a 'world war in minature' and a war of 'two revolutions'. Thomas is the best chronicler of this, and his higly readable account is must read for everyone interested in the origins of world war two or Spain, or world history in the 20th century.

The Spanish civil war was a defining experience not just for Spain but for the various administrations across Europe in the 30s. It saw the mass intervetnion of both Stalins Russia and Mussoluni and Hitler. it saw international brigades raised across Europe to fight for one side or another and one found in Spain German communists, having come from exile in spain, fighting against the German condor legion. Thomas's is slightly weak on his exploration of the origin of the war, perhaps because he does not weight the sheer chaos that was taking place, in part this is due to hsi non-judgemental method of writing, and he should be praised, but one wonders, why he does not give a better detail of just how total chaos had gripped the countyrside in 1936. He seems to underestimate the red terror, but in the end he is quick to see that both Franco and the Communists wanted only dictatorship in the end, their was no good in the war, only bad, and the end could only be negative. A fascinating account about a fascinating topic.
The military anlalysis is good as are the character descriptions, with a fast lucid style and standard British whit, the text is good for the historian or the laymen.

Seth J. Frantzman

When I moved to Barcelona, Spain in 1980, people were still talking about the Civil War. They had only recently been allowed public discussion of such topics since the death of the dictator, Franco. So, the war was still very recent for a lot of people.

I couldn't understand who all the factions were and what the background of this conflict was when listening to people talk about it. I found this book, read it and it told me everything I wanted to know. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in this era of Spanish history. Very well-written and readable.

If all that you know about the Spanish Civil War comes from the works of Papa Hemingway or Pablo Picasso, this well researched history is for you. Thomas' work is well researched and librally cited throughout. He reviewed the surviving documents for both sides and interviewed many of the surviving players including Germans and Russians involved in a War which was a training ground for the European Dictatorships in preparing for World War II.

Thomas lays out the causes of the war in part one. He gives us a breif history of the various parties of the Left and Right and their grievances which lead to the revolt against the Spanish Republic and Franco's Right Wing Dictatorship which ruled Spain until the 1970's.

His review of the campaigns and international intrigue make for a good review of the events for non Spaniards who may not be familiar with this bloody period of European History where tanks, terror bombing, and blitzkreig were used for the first time.

His discussion of European diplomacy in the book shows all the major players including the Germans and the Russians looking for a way to leave Spain without losing face and without triggering another World War before anyone was ready. In the end World War 2 nearly started a few years early and would probably been a two front war at once.

He looks without judgement at the atrochities committed by both sides Republican and Nationalists which were horrendous enough to make their Nazi and Stalinist Soviet advisors cringe.

A very Good History of the Period Leading to World War 2.

As the 70th Anniversary of the beginning of the Spanish Civil War is approaching this writer is reviewing some important works that militants should read in order to draw the lessons of the defeat of the Spanish revolution. The writer has been interested, as a pro-Republican partisan, in the Spanish Civil War since he was a teenager. What initially perked my interest, and remains of interest, is the passionate struggle of the Spanish working class to create its own political organization of society, its leadership of the struggle against Spanish fascism and the romance surrounding the entry of the International Brigades, particularly the American Abraham Lincoln Battalion of the 15th Brigade, into the struggle.

Underlying my interests has always been a nagging question of how that struggle could have been won by the working class. The Spanish proletariat certainly was capable of both heroic action and the ability to create organizations that reflected its own class interests i.e. the worker militias and factory committees. Of all modern working class revolutions after the Russian revolution Spain showed the most promise of success. Bolshevik leader Leon Trotsky noted that the political class-consciousness of the Spanish proletariat was higher than that of the Russian proletariat in 1917. Yet it failed in Spain. Mr. Thomas' history of the period, if only indirectly, gives some answers to the reasons for that failure.

When I say indirectly I mean just that. Mr. Thomas's history is strong on the main events, actions and points of the struggle. Militants, unfamiliar with the events of the Spanish Civil War can profitably use this history as a basic reader. However, if a militant is seeking to draw the lessons of the Spanish Civil War this book is not an adequate source and he or she must look elsewhere. Furthermore, Mr. Thomas makes no pretense to offer such a perspective and this writer would argue that he was hostile to any perspective but the view of high European, especially British, governmental politics. Fair enough. There is still plenty of basic information to be gleaned from this work.

The Spanish Civil War of 1936-1939 has been the subject of innumerable works from every possible political and military perspective possible. A fair number of such treatises, especially from those responsible for the military and political policies on the Republican side, are merely alibis for the disastrous policies that led to defeat. Mr. Thomas' work analyzes those policies. Unfortunately, he is not sensitive to the base of society that actually fought, endured or fled the war. What Mr. Thomas does find is the furious nature of the struggle in Spanish society between the old agrarian- based economy and the newer capitalist- based economy; the religious tensions caused by the breakup of the old agrarian society and the tensions between believers and church-burners; the struggle between centralizers and federalists which formed the core of the unresolved national questions, especially in Catalonia; the intense political struggles within the broad sections that supported both left and right, especially the role of the Stalinist police apparatus; the international ideological political factors that played a role, if not as erroneously assumed the decisive factor; and, finally, the burning personal antagonisms that in a civil war pit brother against brother, family against family, town against town, etc.. With the caveat mentioned above-read on.

Simply put, the best account there is of the Spanish Civil War, the bloodiest ideollogical conflict of the 20th century. Mr. Thomas' book is both unbiased and committed. Full of facts, few maps, no photographs (none that I remember), and spellbinding reading! Don't miss it!

By the way, why do you rate some books with stars and others not? Just asking.

This is one of those massive, serious books you mean to read (to impress yourself as much as learn what's in it). I have had it for years on my list, but never had the courage to crack it until recently. Happily, once I started it, I simply could not put it down, even though it took me months to read.

The situation in Spain in 1936, when the civil war began, was dauntingly complex. On the right, there were the traditionalists, including monarchists, staunch catholics, industrialists, militarists seeking glory for Spain in Morocco, and various fascists and authoritarians opposed to the idea of a republic. They were divided into a multitude of parties, factions, charismatic leaders, and simple brutes. On the other side was a collection even more fractious of anarchists, communists, socialists, marxists, liberal democrats, atheists, and left-leaning regional liberation movements. Caught somewhere in the middle were separatists in the Basque regions and Catalonia - the only industrialized regions of Spain - and the emerging middle classes. This added up (perhaps) to more political parties than existed in Weimar Germany, along with Italy its coeval in poorly united nations that were seeking a clear identity in the 1920s.

At this time, many of the old certainties were in precipitous decline due to local historical factors. First, after the Inquisition and in spite of the many flowerings that sprung from the counter-Reformations (e.g. the Jesuits), the Catholic church had grown rigid and in many quarters was murderously despised. It could offer no leadership and little comfort in the face of the upheavals that the republic was experiencing. Second, the monarchy was decadent and incompetent, a shell that had been in decline since the apogee of the 17th C. It too offered nothing to address the increasing chaos. Third, the military was involved in a terribly costly colonial war, for some ill-defined glory of Spain, and was corrupted by bizarre notions of duty and privilege, embittered by lack of opportunity, and ignorant of the evolving society by its isolation. The enlightenment, it seems, had never taken root in Spain, nor had the popular revolution as in France.

The political configuration was similar to Weimar, a Parliamentary democracy that was unable to impose order or forge consensus, yet the country was for the most part appallingly poor and underdeveloped. As the world fell into economic crisis - Spain was prosperous during WWI as a supplier not fighting - the tensions of both class and generational conflict were added to the ideological crisis, provoking the left (mostly anarchists at the time) into mob violence that reached unimaginable excesses: churches were burned down, bourgeois were thrown off of cliffs, clerics murdered and raped, dignitaries and nuns were disinterred and mutilated, etc. This rightly evoked horror among the traditionalists as society appeared to be completely breaking down; they found champions in the military, including Franco, who was a hero general in Morocco, and quickly moved into a leadership position. Nonetheless, a dazzling array of social experiments were undertaken - money was abolished in some regions, collectives established that eliminated ruling elites and even managers, marriage was abolished in favor of free love and association, etc. It is a reminder that the narrow social-political spectrum that exists today - capitalist democracy - is only one way that societies might have chosen to organize themselves, an entirely different trajectory on which to evolve; this alone is worth the price of admission.

In 1936 in the name of order and traditional values, the military staged a country-wide coup, taking over about 2/5 of the country. The opposition republicans occupied the N and E of the country, with all of the industry and most of the international legitimacy. This is when Spain became a crucible testing ground for the battle of ideologies that culminated in WW II as well as military technology. The fascist powers backed the military and Franco, providing aid and, crucially, highly trained personnel. Not only did they test military strategies, refining among many techniques the Blitzkrieg (piercing lines with concentrations of tanks rather than using them as supporting supplements to infantry), but their men were "blooded", i.e. trained in killing in ways that would be applied on an industrial scale from 1939. The USSR did the same, but also required the republicans to pay with Spanish gold. As a result, both the fascists and the communists became unifying centers of power within their respective spheres, muscling out other factions and applying brutal force against erstwhile allies. Meanwhile, Britain and France attempted to stay neutral and keep the other powers from interfering in a "domestic" matter. Finally, to complicate matters, everyone was sending volunteers to fight for their causes, often arriving without clear contractual limits and hence becoming virtual slaves to their respective military establishments. The IRA, for example, sent volunteers to both the fascists and anarcho-communists!

The republic, in spite of its superior resources, was at a fatal disadvantage in their anarchic disarray before the unified command structures of the rightist military. As Thomas says, it cut like a knife through butter, with steady losses of territory before a final collapse in 1939. The brutal violence, arbitrary executions, ideological proscriptions, and simple murder are as frightening as they are unbelievable to those of us used to orderly lives based on rights and law. It is a reminder of the savagery that existed in places that we see today as orderly extensions of our cultures. Social experiments accelerated, on the left of course but also as patriarchal dictatorship on the right. Many participants acted like the war was just a day job: one combatant (a pilot and machine gunner) used to eat breakfast with his family, fight until lunch, take a siesta, fight again a bit in the afternoon, then retire the the cafes for late night conversation and drinking with his companions.

I had read another of Thomas' books first, Rivers of Gold, which was a great disappointment, getting lost in detail with little narrative thread and seemingly meaningless asides. This book is so much better in narrative, focus, and evocation that there is absolutely no comparison. That being said, the book is encyclopaediac and simply too long, with so many references to obscure politicians that it is hard to follow and the names just fly out of the book. Indeed, the index (mostly proper names) is 100 pages! This makes it a slog, particularly at the beginning. But there is no doubt that this is the definitive masterpiece against which all subsequent histories will be judged. The principal failing of the book, in my reading, is that Thomas does not sum up and interpret the outcome of the war, which he leaves to the reader to find elsewhere. I expected more judgment or at least perspective.

Recommended as one of the most serious explorations into the 20C. This conflict, along with that in the USSR and Hitler's Germany, is absolutely necessary to study if one wants to understand the world today. The greatest thing I take away from this is that our experimentation with politico-social systems is probably far from over, even if we Americans like to flatter ourselves that we have achieved the right combination of stability and dynamism that others should emulate.

Hugh Thomas's book is a great source, but I found it a difficult read. If you need more information on various characters, this book is for you. If you want to get a greater understanding of the events and timeline, do NOT make this your first choice.
He does an excellent job tracking the changing faces on the republican side, and the international diplomacy around the war. But political backstabbing and diplomatic skulduggery get tedious after a while. He discusses the more significant campaigns in passing, but almost as though this was just a backdrop for the politics and diplomacy. He covers the high points and low points of both sides' conduct, but can't keep out his pro-republican sentiments - and won't admit them, either. The republicans might round up political prisoners, and eventually execute a lot of them on trumped-up charges, but the nationalists engaged in ruthless repression, murdering their political enemies. I would say that he does try to explain to the secularist how much of a threat many Spaniards felt from the attack on the Church. He downplays many of the statements from the republican government on this issue, and he treats the Church in most of the discussions as merely another political party, so it doesn't go as far as it might. And a favorite of mine, he does go into some economic figures which are, at least in my opinion, critical in understanding many wars. He clearly demonstrates the tough times the nationalists were having with their command economy and the republicans with their hodgepodge of independent states and collectivist ventures.
And there are then the quirks which I found made the book hard to read. He spells "jail" in the older English way -"gaol" - which, for an Englishman in the 1950's is understandable, but that takes a toll. He spells Hungarian names with umlauts, but not German ones, preferring the added -e. But then in footnots, the umlauts are there. Huh? He also uses some nearly-German grammar at times, with sentences like "on this day died Durrutti". He only roughly proceeds in chronological order, so one understands politics 8 months at a time, and then reads about two months of fighting, and then 14 months of diplomacy, and then the ninth month of politics. This makes for very difficult reading and understanding of the relationships between the events.
And finally, the lack of insight. A reporter is someone who goes and find facts and relays them. Historians show the relationship of those events in the sequence of time to other events. He keeps saying that there is always the threat of war and various actions were made to avoid greater war, but never explains how/why wider war might have resulted -- just trust him. He clearly shows how the collectivist venture failed in Spain, but then dismisses it with a wave of the hand, because the war detracted from work. Well, did it or does collectivism fail everywhere? And how did the nationalists become 'fascists', and how did their economic policies differ from the republic's? It seemed like a golden opportunity to point out that fascism is a form of socialism, but he missed it. And that the nationalists are 'fascists' is a given, with no proof nor with any examples of decisions that ideology made them take.

Overall, I'd have to say good reference, but poor reader. It really is more like a collection of newspaper clippings than like a history.

How can a book published such a long time ago be "revisionist?"

Simply, because Hugh Thomas revised it, and in the process has made a much more complete and unbiased book. In its original form, it had a definite pro-Republican bias, but each succeeding edition corrects a number of detail and prejudices. I read it a very long time ago, and it was enthralling, and as a young student in Spain, I just gobbled up the details, which are still relevant for Spain today: I wish the current Spanish (Socialist) government could have such a balanced viewpoint on the subject. In fact, in this book neither of the sides is particularly more in the right than the other... for me the worst and most prejudiced book is Paul Preston's, which shows only one side of the story. Anthony Beevor's book is perhaps easier to digest, if you don't want to know EVERYTHING about this conflict.

Just read the other reviews for the details; to sum it up, this book will help you to understand how the Civil War was a product of hundreds of years of Spanish history, and the relevancy of this conflict to more recent European and world history. In particular, this battle, and its healing by the years of the Transition here in Spain, are particularly relevant for Latin American countries which have emerged from dictatorship (an incomplete process, I fear), and even for Russia... I worked together with Gorbachov in the Madrid Conference on the Democratic Transition in Spain, and he takes an intense interest in the process.

An engrossing book, requiring a bit of effort for the non-historian, but a classic which will continue to be read for years to come.