Franco. Paul Preston
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was announced. The strength of the Italian contingents that arrived in late December and early January was, according to a report by Faupel, based presumably on information from Roatta, ‘determined not by previous agreement with Franco but according to independent Italian estimates’.68 Nevertheless, he hastened to use them as soon as they disembarked and, on 12 January, he would request another nine thousand Black Shirts.69
Such external assistance was necessary to enable Franco to go forward from the deadlock in Madrid. On 28 November, General Saliquet had written to the Generalísimo with a proposal for an encircling operation, against the Madrid-La Coruña road to the north-west and a dual thrust from the south-west of Madrid and from Soria in the north-east towards Alcalá de Henares.70 Franco mused over this proposal for three weeks and it was not until 19 December that he issued orders which would break the stalemate prevailing since he had called off the frontal assault on Madrid at the Leganés meeting on 23 November. They envisaged a refinement of Saliquet’s plan, implementing it closer to Madrid by three thrusts outwards from the exposed wedge which the Nationalists had driven into the capital’s defences.71
In heavy rain and fog, across muddy terrain, costly and sterile battles were fought for villages like Boadilla del Monte which was virtually destroyed. Varela was wounded on Christmas Day and field command was assumed by Orgaz. After crippling losses in the fighting, the attack was briefly called off. Roatta telegrammed the Ufficio Spagna on 27 December complaining of apathy at Franco’s headquarters and reporting that the Generalísimo’s staff was incapable of mounting an operation appropriate to a large-scale war.72 On 3 January, the assault was renewed with increased ferocity and reached the important crossroads at Las Rozas on the road to El Escorial and La Coruña. On 7 January, Pozuelo and Húmera fell. In six days, scarcely ten kilometres of road had been taken by the Nationalists. They had eased the pressure on their troops in the Casa de Campo and the Ciudad Universitaria but at enormous cost. When the fronts had stabilized by 15 January, each side had lost in the region of fifteen thousand men.73 The various efforts to take Madrid had severely depleted Franco’s forces. The Republicans were now solidly dug in and Franco was fortunate that they were unable to seize the unique opportunity to launch a counter-attack to break through his severely overstretched lines.
In the midst of the reverses around Madrid, Franco was relieved to discover that his cultivation of the Church was bearing fruit. On 22 December, Cardinal Gomá returned from Rome where he had been frantically working for Vatican recognition of Franco. The cautious Curia held back but, in order to demonstrate the Church’s sympathy for Franco’s cause, Gomá was appointed the Vatican’s confidential Chargé d’Affaires in Nationalist Spain. It was the crucial first step towards full diplomatic recognition.74 Gomá and the Generalísimo met on 29 December and agreed on a joint statement to the Vatican, in which it was made clear that, in the interests of eventual recognition, Franco was ready to do everything possible to favour the Church’s position in Spain.75
The clinching of relations with the Vatican was of immense long-term political importance to Franco. In immediate terms, even more welcome was the military help promised by Mussolini. With the attacks around Madrid stalling, Franco had been relieved by the fact that in mid-December, the Duce had begun sending the first of what, by mid-February 1937, would be nearly fifty thousand fascist militiamen and regular troops masquerading as volunteers.76 Whatever gloss Franco would put on it later, the arrival of Italian reinforcements was of crucial importance to his military survival. Inevitably, once the Duce had committed his own prestige to a Nationalist victory in Spain, the stalemate around Madrid quickly intensified his impatience with Franco. At the end of the year, he requested Hitler to send to a meeting in Rome in mid-January someone ‘with full powers’ to discuss Italo-German co-operation to bring about ‘a real decision in Spain’.77 In fact, it was becoming ever more apparent that the Italians were going to be left by Hitler to make the decisive contribution to Franco’s success. Roatta reported to Rome on 12 January that Canaris had told him that Sperrle was pessimistic about both the initial efficacy of the Condor Legion and the state of the Nationalist forces. Sperrle, in turn, told Roatta that the real problem was German fear of provoking a premature war with France.78
At the meeting held at the Palazzo Venezia on the evening of 14 January 1937, Hitler’s representative was Hermann Göring.* Mussolini was irritated that Italo-German aid, rather than spurring Franco on to greater efforts, merely permitted him to indulge his natural inclination to wear down the Republic by a slow campaign of attrition. Göring agreed that, if Franco had known how to use it properly, the Italo-German material and technical assistance was enough to have permitted him to win already. The Air Minister declared bitterly that the recognition of Franco before the capture of Madrid had been a major error to remedy which it was agreed that he would have to be subjected to ‘energetic pressure’ to accelerate his operations and make full use of the lavish means put at his disposal.
Despite his expressions of solidarity with Mussolini, fear of international complications impelled Göring to say that Germany could not send a division to Spain. This left the immediate task of preventing Franco being defeated to the Duce who was disappointed but not unhappy to be the senior partner in Spain. Declaring that Franco must win, he said that there were no longer any restraints on his actions in Spain. To ensure that Franco adopt a more energetic policy, it was decided to oblige him to accept the joint Italo-German general staff. Mussolini and Göring agreed that to ensure Franco’s victory before, as they wrongly imagined would happen, the British erected an effective blockade to stop foreign intervention,* substantial additional aid would have to be sent to Spain by the end of January. Mussolini suggested telling Franco that thereafter there would be no more help.79
On the day after the meeting in the Palazzo Venezia, the chiefs of staff of the Italian military ministries met at the Palazzo Chigi with the staff of the Ufficio Spagna and Ciano’s representative Anfuso to discuss the minimum programme of aid to Franco. Partly out of contempt for Franco’s generalship and partly out of a desire to monopolize the anticipated triumph for Fascism, it was agreed that the Italian contingent must be used as an independent force under an Italian general only nominally responsible to Franco’s overall command. Three possibilities were outlined for the decisive action by which Italian forces would win the war for Franco. Mussolini favoured a massive assault from Teruel to Valencia to cut off Catalonia from the rest of Spain. This was to be preceded by the terror bombing of Valencia. However, it was acknowledged that such an operation required the full co-operation of Franco. A second option was a march from Sigüenza to Guadalajara to tighten irrevocably the Nationalist grip on Madrid. The third more limited possibility was the capture of Málaga to provide a seaport nearer to Italy and a launching pad for an attack on Valencia from the south-west.80
After his failures around Madrid, Franco had little choice but to grit his teeth and acquiesce in the demeaning Italo-German suggestions which were communicated to him by Anfuso on 23 January. The document presented by Anfuso made it clear that international circumstances prevented aid being continued indefinitely.81 At first, the Generalísimo seemed perplexed.82 However, on the following day, he gave Anfuso a note expressing his thanks for Italo-German help and a desperate plea for it to continue for at least another three months.