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p The Popular Front victory in the elections to the Spanish Cortes in February 1936 alarmed the German monopoly bourgeoisie. German imperialism at once gave its backing to the Spanish reactionaries, who, after recovering from their first fright, set about organising a military conspiracy against the Democratic Republic. Hitler wanted a fascist Spain not only because the German military and monopolies sought control of that country’s mineral wealth, particularly her strategic raw materials. That had been their goal earlier. German capital had begun penetrating the Iberian Peninsula at the turn of the century and by the mid-1930s it had seized a considerable portion of the Spanish production of zinc, copper, silver and mercury. But with the establishment of a regime in Spain subservient to Berlin German imperialism would complete the strategic encirclement of France and be in a position to threaten the sea lanes linking Britain with her colonies. As conceived by the nazis, Spain would be a bridgehead in a future war for domination in Europe. Further, the nazis feared that a strong Popular Front regime in Southwestern Europe would inevitably foster the growth of anti-fascist forces in other European countries, including Germany.

p Hardly a month passed after the February elections than Pravda, the central newspaper of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, reported that the notorious Spanish monarchist General Sanjurjo was in Berlin negotiating for aid to the counterrevolutionary military organisations in Spain that were again plotting against the government.  [157•1  This report was fully consistent with the facts. Hitler, Goering and representatives of Metall-AG, one of the largest monopolies, promised Sanjurjo German assistance for a counter-revolutionary revolt.

p The smoothly functioning nazi machine in Spain was put into high gear. In Madrid the German General Faupel was Hitler’s 158 liaison man with the Spanish conspirators. When the rising started Admiral Canaris, the chief of the German military intelligence, made sure that General Franco was put in command of the revolt in place of Sanjurjo, who died in an air crash. On July 27, 1936 the nazis sent 20 Junkers-52 transports to Morocco to help Franco rush troops to the south of Spain and thereby avert the destruction of the isolated centres of the revolt during the first days of the civil war.

p In 1939, recalling this first act of open intervention in Spain, the nazi Air General Sperrle, who commanded the Condor Legion in 1936-37, said: “Within a few days German pilots airlifted by J-52s 15,000 Foreign Legionnaires and Moroccan troops and also military equipment to Jerez."  [158•1  German warships, including the torpedo-boat Leopard, escorted transports that carried insurgent troops and military equipment from Africa. The nazi intervention in Spain mounted with the spread of the war.

p On July 25, after armed workers and loyal troops had crushed the fascist revolt in Madrid, Barcelona and other cities, Karl Schwendemann, counsellor of the German Embassy in Madrid, telegraphed to Berlin: “Unless something unforeseen happens, it is hardly to be expected that in view of all this the military revolt can succeed."  [158•2  These words contained not only alarm and a sober assessment of the situation but also a plea for assistance for the Spanish putschists. This SOS signal was heard in Berlin. The secret “Sonderstab W”, which took charge of the organisation of direct military intervention in Spain, was set up on Hitler’s orders. On July 31, 1936, six days after the receipt of the SOS signal, the nazi General Milch sent the first units of the Condor Legion to Spain. Dressed in civilian clothes, army pilots secretly sailed to Cadiz in the S. S. Usaramo, whose holds carried aircraft, bombs and anti-aircraft guns.

p This and all subsequent acts of intervention were doggedly denied by the German authorities. In August, when Franco already had most of the Condor Legion and German military supplies, Dr Bielfeld, the German charge d’affaires in London, glibly assured the British Foreign Office that Germany was giving no assistance to the insurgent Spanish generals, that she had not and would not send them military supplies.

p At the Nuremberg trial, Hermann Goering, chief of the nazi Air Force, admitted: "With the permission of the Fuhrer, I sent (to Spain.—Ed.} a large part of my transport fleet and a number of experimental fighter units, bombers, and anti-aircraft guns.... In order that the personnel, too, might gather a certain amount 159 of experience, I saw to it that there was a continuous flow, that is, that new people were constantly being sent and others recalled."  [159•1 

p As soon as the fascist-led revolt started, the real, people’s Germany sided with Republican Spain. Led by the brutally persecuted Communist Party, which operated deep underground, the working class and other democratic and progressive elements went to the assistance of the Spanish people. “We admire the courage of the fighters for a free and happy Spain, against fascist barbarism,"  [159•2  the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Germany wrote in a telegram to the Spanish Government.

p When the German intervention in Spain had become a fact, the CC CPG declared that solidarity and the struggle of Germans who opposed Hitler for the freedom of Spain were not only a manifestation of proletarian internationalism but the national duty of every German patriot, for the only way to save the German people from the threat of another world war was to defend the Spanish Republic. In a document of the CC CPG of November 26, 1936 it was stated: “Hitler’s role as the chief warmonger in Europe and in the whole world places with us, German anti-fascists, an immense responsibility. We have to do everything we can to help smash Hitler in Spain. For this there are two ways: direct assistance to the Spanish freedom fighters and a broad movement of the people in Germany."  [159•3 

p Speaking to the German people over Radio Barcelona on December 20, 1936, Walter Ulbricht, member of the Political Bureau of the CC CPG, outlined a programme of struggle against the Hitler regime. His concluding words were: “Honour and glory to the Spanish fighters, who have gallantly defended Madrid against the enemy! Honour and glory to the International Brigades, the Thaelmann, Edgar Andre and Chapayev battalions that stood their ground at Madrid with the battle-cry The fascists shall not pass!’ We shall pass. We shall defeat Hitler and Franco at Madrid in the name of peace, liberty and democracy.”

p The new conditions of the anti-fascist struggle created by Hitler’s intervention in Spain and the international movement of solidarity with the Spanish people thus added a new content to the programme for the overthrow of the Hitler regime and to the Popular Front policy that had been charted at the Brussels Conference of the CPG in October 1935. The heroic resistance of the Spanish people and the participation of German volunteers in the fighting in Spain raised the morale of the anti-fascists in Germany 160 and stimulated the fortitude and confidence of factory, mine and dock workers. On October 18, 1936, the Social-Democratic newspaper Neuer Vorwdrts carried a banner headline reading “Unrest at the Factories”. The German people’s indignation was aroused by the sending of German troops to Spain. Protest leaflets were circulated in Duisburg and Diisseldorf in southwestern Germany. In Munich the wives and mothers of soldiers sent to Spain staged a protest demonstration in front of the nazi party headquarters. Throughout Germany—in Berlin, Bavaria, Silesia, the Rhineland, Saxony and the Ruhr area—action by the workers mounted steadily, and money was collected secretly for Spain. Communists, SocialDemocrats and non-party people frequently took joint action urging solidarity with the Spanish people. Many pamphlets containing speeches by Wilhelm Pieck, Walter Ulbricht and other leaders of the Communist Party were disseminated through underground channels all over the country.

p German Radio Freedom, founded near Madrid by the German Communists with the help of Spanish comrades, was also an organ of the Committee for the Creation of a German Popular Front. This station, which operated on 29.8 metres, kept the Hitlerenslaved German people abreast of political developments and broadcast practical advice for the illegal anti-fascist organisations. Its guest speakers included Georg Branting, Heinrich Mann, Thomas Mann, Arnold Zweig, Ernest Hemingway, Paul Robeson, Frans Masereel and other leading personalities of the German and foreign anti-fascist movement.

p There was a quick response in many towns and factories in Germany to the call for a united Popular Front. Communists and Social-Democrats formed Popular Front groups in Berlin, the Saar region and other parts of the country. This was soon brought to the notice of the Gestapo. In a report from Wilhelmshaven it was stated: “The Popular Front idea has certainly caught on among the former members of the Social-Democratic Party of Germany (at the navy yard). It is easy to note that in many cases they openly show their sympathy for the Bolsheviks in Spain and hope for their victory."  [160•1 

p The successes of the Popular Front in Spain also influenced the attitude of some Social-Democratic leaders—Erich Kuttner, Paul Hertz and Erich Ollenhauer—inducing them to visit the Spanish Republic. They toured the International Brigades and spoke favourably of the Popular Front. Addressing the llth International Brigade in May 1937, Erich Kuttner said: “We hope that Spain may be and will become the bridge that will reunite the sundered forces of the German proletariat.” Paul Hertz, who 161

Soldiers of the Thaelmann Centuria at Tardienta. August 1936
was a member of the SDPG Executive, subscribed to the united front policy and repeatedly stated his disagreement with the attitude of his party’s leadership. In a speech in Madrid on July 4, 1937, Erich Ollenhauer, who represented the Socialist Youth International, spoke in favour of united action and solemnly pledged to work for unity. Regrettably, he soon betrayed his pledge, siding with the enemies of unity between the Socialist and Communist youth of Spain.

p The German people’s sympathy for the struggle of the Spanish people was evidenced by the growing Gestapo terror. In a single day 70 workers were arrested in Aachen at the Talbot- WaggonAG and Gerbe und Lohmeyer factories for collecting money for the Spanish Republic. Twenty-one workers of the Aachen power station were sentenced to prison for terms ranging from two to eight years. At the Weser-AG works the Gestapo seized many workers for collecting signatures in support of the Spanish freedom fighters: two of these workers were shot without trial. Large-scale arrests were made by the Gestapo also at the IG Farbenindustrie factories and at the automobile factories in Frankfurt-On-Main. At the close of 1936 it arrested 90 workers of the Adlerwerke in Frankfurt and 40 at the Rodelheim factories, sending many of them to concentration camps. Himmler himself admitted that up to 3,000 persons had been arrested for showing sympathy for the Spanish Republic.

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p Despite persecution by the Gestapo, active groups of anti- fascists, notably the Communists, did not confine themselves to moral and material support for the Spanish people. They rendered direct support to the Spanish people, organising sabotage at munitions factories and disrupting supplies for the insurgents. Juli Jiirgensen, an underground official, reported to the anti-fascist centre in October 1936: "Ships are being loaded at Hamburg. Cranes are filling the holds of vessels with mysterious crates. The work is proceeding day and night. The docks are guarded by the police and the Gestapo. The dockers have found out that this freight is bound for Spain—-They know that their brothers are fighting in Spain. Disturbed by the news they are determined to disrupt the loading."  [162•1  In Hamburg and Bremen the seamen and dockers set up a communication system that kept them informed of the movement of military supplies to Spain.

p The crews of the ships sailing to Spain informed the branch offices of the International Transport Workers Federation in foreign ports of suspicious freight in their ships. Protest actions were staged on freighters in the second half of 1936 on the initiative of anti-fascist groups. The crews of the German ships Henrika, that put in at Rotterdam, the Netherlands, and the Konigstein refused to transport arms for the insurgents in Spain. The crews of the ships Melilla, Lasbek, Poseidon and Preussen went on strike. Each of these actions was followed by arrests and other repressions.

p The highest form of aid by the German anti-fascists for the Spanish Republic was their direct participation in the armed struggle against the insurgents. At first this aid was episodic and unorganised. Some German political emigres with Reinhold Hoffmann at their head helped to defend Irun as members of the Republican Militia. Other German anti-fascists, resident in Spain, and Germans who had come for the People’s Olympiad (among them were Max Friedemann, Werner Hermlin and Franz Lowenstein) helped to crush the rising in Barcelona. Within a few days, joined by volunteers of other nationalities, they formed the Thaelmann unit of the People’s Militia and on July 24 fought their first battle against the fascists near Huesca.

p The formation of the Thaelmann International Centuria was started in Barcelona on August 7 on the initiative of the German Communists Hans Beimler, Albert Schreiner, Hermann Geisen and Willi Wille with the assistance of the United Socialist Party of Catalonia.

p Meanwhile the Political Bureau of the Communist Party of Germany appealed to all German anti-fascists living abroad and 163

The banner presented to the Thaelmann Centuria by the Central Committee of the Catalan United Socialist Party
having military training to place themselves at the disposal of the Spanish Popular Front.

p Volunteers arrived in Barcelona from different countries singly and in groups. On August 29, the Thaelmann Centuria was sent to the Aragon Front. Commanded by Albert Schreiner and Hermann Geisen, this unit of over 100 men distinguished itself in the battles at Huesca, Tardienta and Alcubierre.

p For the courage and valour displayed by its men, the Thaelmann Centuria was presented with a banner by the Catalonian Government. In the course of two months’ fighting the centuria lost nearly half of its strength. The first casualties included the German Social-Democrat Wilhelm Pfordt and a young Frenchman named Robert Vigier. Sepp Hirsch, Rudolf Gemmel, Wilhelm Engelmann and many others lost their lives during an assault on a hill near Tardienta.

p In the first issue of their newspaper Die Rote Sturmfahne on October 15, 1936, the German volunteers wrote: “We are a fighting unit of the German Popular Front. Among us there are Communists, Social-Democrats and non-party men. All are united by the great goal of completely smashing fascism.”

p A steady stream of freedom volunteers hastened to the assistance of the Spanish people. Most of the German volunteers were political emigres, but many managed to come from nazi Germany 164 despite the obstacles and the torture chambers of the Gestapo prisons. After untold suffering and humiliation in hard labour prisons and concentration camps they were determined to fight fascism till their last breath.

p The German volunteers went to Spain by different and often tortuous roads. The assembly point was in Paris, from where the further transportation to Spain was arranged by the Central Committee of the CPG with the active assistance of the French Communist Party.

p During the early stages of the war the volunteers had little difficulty in leaving Paris for Spain in large groups. One of these groups of German volunteers was headed by Gustav Szinda, who was later Chief of Staff of the llth International Brigade (today he is a Major-General of the National People’s Army of the German Democratic Republic), and a worker named Albert Denz, who was a Party official in Hagen. Subsequently, when the French police set up check-points on the frontier with Spain it became much more difficult to send volunteers across the frontier. They now had to go to Perpignan by train, then travel by bus to the foothills of the Pyrenees and cross the frontier by foot along steep mountain trails in order to avoid encountering French frontier guards. Tired but happy in the knowledge that they had reached their destination, they came down the mountains to the fortress of Figueras, where the reception centre for foreign volunteers was situated.

p On October 9, 1936, the ship Ciudad de Barcelona brought 650 anti-fascists from many countries to Alicante, from where they were sent to Albacete where a headquarters had been set up to organise International Brigades. Among the newly-arrived Germans there were many experienced Party functionaries and activists, including Hans Kahle, Fritz Rettmann, Heinrich Wieland, Josef Zettler, Wilhelm Bahnik, Artur Becker, Christian Wolf, Hermann Gartmann, Richard Gladewitz, Albert Hossler, Heinz Hoffmann, Erich Hoffmann, Gustav Gundelach, Fritz Dickel, Arthur Dorf, Walter Sehlmann, Franz Klamm, Erwin Kramer, Bruno Kuhn, Otto Kiihne, Erich Mielke, Ewald Munschke, Alfred Neumann, Heinrich Rau, Max Roscher, Gustav Szinda, Karl Thoma (Ernst Blank), Paul Verner, Kurt Hager, Wilhelm Zeisser, Richard Staimer, Richard Stahlmann, George Stibi, Erwin Strohmeier and Hermann Schuldt.

Along with Communists and non-party men there was a small group of Social-Democrats, who included Paul Bergmann, Ernst Braun, Kurt Braun, Kurt Brottinger, Kurt Garbarini, Hermann Drumm, Herbert Seifert, Hans Martens, Franz Schneider, Paul Feller and Otto Jiirgensen. Unlike the evasive official leadership of the German Social-Democratic Party, they joined in the struggle for the Spanish Republic without hesitation.

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German guerrilla fighters (second left—Richard Stahlmann)

p The volunteers were representatives of all strata of Germany’s working population. Intellectuals fought shoulder to shoulder with workers. Many eminent authors, poets, composers, painters and sculptors went to Spain where they placed their talent in the service of the Spanish people. Among them were Willi Bredel, Ernst Busch, Erich Weinert, Walter Gorrisch, Peter Kast, Heinz Kiwitz, Hans Marchwitza, Maria von Osten, Ludwig Renn, Bodo Uhse, Eberhard Schmidt, Jeanne Stern and Kurt Stern. The songs written by Erich Weinert and sung by Ernst Busch rallied the international volunteers. To this day they are a revolutionary call in all the countries of the world.

Dedicated German women contributed to the cause of the Spanish people. Among them were the doctors Ursula Aman and Rosa Coutelle, the nurses Elisabeth Bier, Emmy Dorfel, Anni Schmidt and Olla Ewert, the courageous anti-fascists Kathe Wohlrath, Kathe Dahlem, Lotte Moller, Golda Friedemann and Sabine Hager, who worked in the Commissariat for International Brigades or in the editorial offices of radio stations. Young Gerda Taro, a photoreporter from Leipzig, died in Spain.

p .

p Altogether there were nearly 5,000 German volunteers in bpain.

p Most of them were in the llth International Brigade that was formed on November 1, 1936. At first the brigade consisted of_ the Edgar Andre, Paris Commune and Dabrowski battalions. These 166 battalions were usually called German, French and Polish, after the nationality of the bulk of the men in them, but in each there were men of different nationalities. For instance, in the Edgar Andre Battalion, in addition to Germans there were Hungarians, Poles, Frenchmen, Yugoslavs, Englishmen, Czechs, Slovaks and Irishmen. Men of the Thaelmann Centuria, who arrived in Albacete from Catalonia with Hans Beimler, formed the nucleus of the Thaelmann Battalion, which was first part of the 12th International Brigade and then transferred to the llth. There were German groups and units in the 12th and 13th brigades and in other international units. Franz Dahlem, member and representative of the Central Committee of the CPG and an authorised representative of the Comintern Executive, was a member of the political leadership of the international units from December 1936 onwards.

p There were German volunteers in special units of the Republican Army: in a tank brigade, in anti-aircraft and field artillery units, in guerrilla detachments and in transport and medical units. A large group of doctors, among them Walter Blank, Giinter Bodeck, Heilbrunn and Feldmann, who gave their lives in the struggle, fought for the lives and health of the men of the Republican Army in hospitals and directly at the firing lines.

p The llth International Brigade engaged the enemy for the first time on November 9, 1936. Confident that the regular units of the Foreign Legion and the Moroccan battalions would have an easy victory over the inexperienced and poorly armed detachments of the People’s Militia, the fascists, supported by nazi and Italian aircraft, tanks and artillery, began the assault of the Spanish Republic’s capital in early November 1936.

p The International Brigades, welcomed by the people of Madrid, went to the assistance of the capital’s heroic defenders. In the Casa de Campo and in the University City volunteers from many countries shed their blood together with the Spanish freedom fighters. In a battle lasting many days the 11th Brigade lost nearly half its strength. Many Germans fell in that battle. The following is only one of the innumerable acts of heroism by the freedom volunteers.

During one of the murderous attacks of the fascists in the University City the commander of a machine-gun team Fritz Dietrich, a metalworker from Wuppertal, went from floor to floor, from window to window of a ruined building, firing his machine-gun at the enemy troops that had surrounded the building. Hand grenades and shells exploded around but he held his ground. When a part of the building collapsed, he dragged his machine-gun out and opened fire at the attacking groups of fascists from the flank. The assault was beaten back. Fritz Dietrich fell in this battle, but the company’s positions were saved.

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German volunteers arrive at the Madrid Front, November 8, 1936

p On December 1, 1936, enemy bullets cut down Hans Beimler and the commander of the Thaelmann Battalion, Franz Vehlow (Louis Schuster). The men who were killed in the first battles at the walls of Madrid included the German Communists Kurt von Appen, Georg Meyer, Paul Baumgarten, Philipp Mayer, Josef Graf, Richard Wagner and Willi Wille, the Social-Democrats Otto Volkmann, Paul Lose and Hans Schwindling and the non-party men Maslow and Karl Katz.

p The blood of the fallen cemented the unity of the anti-fascist front that had become a reality in the trenches in Spain. Wide sections of the public in the Spanish Republic saw in the death of Hans Beimler a symbol of the anti-fascist unity and self-sacrifice of the men of the International Brigades. The hero’s funeral was attended by hundreds of thousands of people. The poet Rafael Albert! conveyed these feelings of the Spanish people and their grief for the fallen freedom volunteers in a poem entitled Hans Beimler, Communist and Defender of Madrid.

p In early January 1937 the International Brigades halted an enemy offensive and destroyed two fascist battalions at Villanueva del Pardillo, northwest of Madrid. This victory was followed by a tragic day: in a battle against an overwhelmingly superior enemy force of infantry and tanks on the fringe of a forest at the village of Remis on January 7 the Thaelmann Battalion suffered heavy losses. Only 30 men remained but they held their positions.

p During a short rest at Murcia at the close of January, the llth Brigade, which had lost 1,230 men since November 9, 1936, received 168

Hans Kahle, Ernest Hemingway, Ludwig Renn and Joris Iwens at the
Guadalajara Front. March 1937
replenishments—international volunteers and Spaniards, most of whom were People’s Militia volunteers with combat experience. Now almost half of the brigade consisted of Spaniards.

p On February 6, 1937 the fascists mounted an offensive with the objective of cutting the Madrid-Arganda-Valencia motor road. The llth Brigade went into action on February 11. In the difficult conditions caused by the cold weather and the rough terrain it fought a well-armed enemy continuously until February 27. One of the objectives of the furious attacks of the Moroccans and the counter-attacks of the volunteers in the sector of the llth Brigade was the Casa Blanca, a solitary white house in an olive grove.

p Company Commander Ernst Womper and Hermann Drumm, both of the Saar region, distinguished themselves in the fighting for the Casa Blanca. Leading a counter-attack, they fought their way into an enemy trench and silenced a fascist machine-gun with hand grenades. The enemy fled in panic, but the two friends were killed during the pursuit.

p A week after the battle of the Jarama, where the insurgents’ plan of encircling Madrid from the southeast was wrecked, the llth Brigade was one of the first units of the Madrid Front to re- engage the fascists. On March 8, 1937, an Italian expeditionary corps consisting of three Italian and a mixed Spanish-Italian division started an offensive in the direction of Guadalajara along the Zarogoza-Madrid highway. At Torija the llth Brigade joined the 169 Spanish brigades and the 12th International Brigade, said supported by Soviet volunteers—airmen and tankers—it brought a motorised Italian corps to a halt. The roles were now reversed: the boastful conquerors of defenceless Ethiopia had to go over to the defensive. After bitter fighting at Brihuega, Trijueque and Torija, during which the llth Brigade alone lost 220 men, the defenders of the Republic mounted an offensive. For the Italian fascists March 18 was a day of catastrophe: for some time their expeditionary corps ceased to exist as a fighting unit.

p In Spain nazi Germany committed one crime after another. Aircraft of the Condor Legion reduced two peaceful Basque towns to ashes: Durango on March 31, 1937, and Guernica on April 26. In Durango the raiders killed 248 women, children and old people. In Guernica, which was bombed for three hours, the casualties were 1,654 dead and 889 wounded. On May 31, 1937, the world was shocked by yet another crime: the battleship Admiral Scheer, escorted by four torpedo-boats and two submarines, shelled and destroyed the coastal town of Almeria. Thousands of people were killed. Expressing the indignation of the German people with the atrocity, Wilhelm Pieck sent a telegram to the Spanish workers on behalf of the Central Committee of the CPG, writing: “We shall redouble our efforts so that the anti-fascist front in Germany ... in its unremitting struggle against the brown dictatorship should be worthy of the glorious feats of heroism of the Spanish Popular Front and its gallant Army."  [169•1 

p The German volunteers of the llth Brigade and other international units took part in the first large-scale Republican offensive on the Central Front. The offensive commenced on July 6 and continued until July 28. Fighting shoulder to shoulder with the Spanish and international units, they displayed indomitable courage in the fighting for Brunete, Quijourna and Villanueva del Pardillo. The ’l 1th Brigade alone lost 600 men.

p A few days after that offensive all the International Brigades, except the 14th, were rushed to Aragon, where the Republican Command started a major offensive in the direction of Zaragoza. This offensive was spearheaded by Modesto’s 5th Army Corps, of which the llth and 15th International Brigades and the famous 11th Division were a part.

p In the sweltering heat the llth and 15th brigades stormed and liberated the towns of Quinto and Belchite, which had been powerfully fortified by nazi engineers. They captured many prisoners and large quantities of weapons.

Superior skill and courage were displayed by the men of the llth Brigade in the next major operation of the Republican Army: the defence of Teruel in early 1938.

170

Children from the Thaelmann Orphanage visit German volunteers

p “The llth Brigade,” wrote Karol Swierczewski, commander of the 35th Division of which the llth Brigade was a part, “had a particularly difficult assignment. From January 4 through 14 it fought at a hill named Concud, and then for six days, from January 17 through 22, withstood the furious attacks of the Navarra Division in the vicinity of the El Muleton hill. There ... the brigade displayed such daunless self-sacrifice and heroism that the Spanish Command acknowledged that in that period the division had held Teruel, and General Sarabia, commander of the Levante Front, promised to request Barcelona to institute a special badge for the participants in that battle."  [170•1 

p In March 1938 when the Franco troops broke through the Aragon Front and the Republican forces began a disorderly retreat, the llth and other International Brigades and picked Spanish brigades were ordered to contain the assaults of an enemy that was vastly superior in numbers and armaments and thereby enable the front command to bring up the necessary reserves. The brigade carried out this task under extremely difficult conditions: communication with the division and the battalions was frequently broken, and time and again it fought its way out of encirclement, using mountain trails. In less than a month the llth Brigade lost over a thousand officers and men. After the battle at Gandesa only 80 of the 171 450 men remained in the Thaelmann Battalion. Among the killed were Artur Becker, Chairman of the Communist Youth League of Germany. Seriously wounded, he was captured by the fascists and executed in Burgos. Also killed were Battalion Commander Wilhelm Pinnecke, Hans Erbe (Fernando), who was personnel department chief at Albacete, and Commissar Wilhelm Glaser (Richard Schenk).

p The struggle, which cost so many lives, failed to halt the enemy advance towards the Mediterranean. In early April the llth Brigade together with the entire 35th Division occupied defensive positions on the left bank of the Ebro, receiving replenishments and reforming their ranks.

p The united front of the German Communists and Social- Democrats in the International Brigades was tempered in the flames of battle. On December 14, the Unity Committee of German Communists and Social-Democrats, that was set up in Albacete in November 1937, wrote to the Social-Democratic leadership in Prague and to the Central Committee of the CPG calling for joint action by the leaders of the two parties.

p A committee of German workers, consisting of the SocialDemocrats and Communists of the llth Brigade, was formed in February 1938. A conference of German volunteers, held in Valencia on March 13, 1938, adopted a manifesto, in which it was stressed: “We shall win if we are never again split, if we are always united. Then the days of the Hitler dictatorship will be numbered, and together we shall build a free democratic Germany, a Germany of peace, a Germany of freedom, a Germany of prosperity and social reform."  [171•1  Regrettably, the leaders of the Social-Democratic Party remained deaf to the appeals of the antifascists of all parties who were fighting in Spain.

p The war continued. On July 25, 1938 the Republican Army with the participation of five International Brigades launched one of its biggest operations, the battle on the Ebro. Two army corps under the overall command of Juan Modesto crossed the river at many points under cover of night. Before the enemy could recover from surprise, the battalions of the llth International Brigade headed by a Scandinavian assault group were on the right bank of the river, and with cries of "Long live the Republic!" they broke into the fortified positions of the fascists and captured the town of Asco. Within 48 hours the Spanish Republican Army liberated a territory of 600 square kilometres on the right bank of the Ebro.

p This was a major victory. The fascists had to halt their offensive on the Levante Front, where their objective was the 172 provincial centre and important port of Valencia. This victory was of immense significance in Spain itself and abroad. It dispersed the assertions of fascist propaganda that the Republican Army was utterly helpless after the catastrophe of March and April on the Eastern Front. Crossing the Ebro and holding the bridgehead on the right bank of the river for three and a half months, the Republicans displayed exceptional valour, courage and will for victory. The command of the insurgents and interventionists concentrated against this bridgehead a powerful artillery force and its entire air force, using a huge quantity of ammunition, showering virtually every metre of the Republican positions with steel. In its counter-offensive it used 15 infantry divisions, including four divisions of the Italian expeditionary corps. But it took them over 100 days of bitter fighting to recover the territory which Modesto’s army had captured in two days. For its action in the Ebro operation the llth Brigade was decorated with the Order of Valour, the highest military award of the Republic.

p On September 23, when the fighting on the Ebro was at its height, the Government of the Republic decided to withdraw the volunteers from the front. They left the field of battle with heavy hearts, taking away with them the memory of the touching farewell that was given them by the people of Barcelona.

p While some volunteers were returning home and others ( including Germans), whose homeland was ruled by tyrannical fascist regimes, remained in demobilisation camps in the north of the Republic, Hitler and Mussolini continued stepping up military supplies to Franco and reinforcing their troops in Spain. On September 30, Chamberlain and Daladier signed a disgraceful agreement with Hitler in Munich, throwing Czechoslovakia into the jaws of the German imperialists. The Munich deal was a heavy blow to the Spanish Republic. Fifth column activities were intensified, and capitulationist feeling mounted among the unstable elements in the Popular Front—the Right-wing Socialists, the bourgeois Republicans, the anarchists, and also among regular officers.

p On January 23, 1939, after Catalonia was invaded by a huge Franco army supported by interventionists, the volunteers who had not left Spain requested the Spanish Government to give them the possibility of engaging the fascists in battle again.

p Barcelona, capital of Catalonia, fell on January 26. In heavy rearguard fighting the volunteers covered the flow of refugees, who were fleeing to the French frontier. In this fighting the German volunteers again suffered large casualties. Karl Thoma (Ernst Blank), the last German political commissar of the llth International Brigade was killed. The last roll call of the international brigaders on Spanish soil was held on February 8 and 9. They crossed the French frontier at Perthus and Port-Bou.

p Of the 5,000 German anti-fascists who fought in Spain, 3,000 173

A part of the monument in Berlin to German members of the International
Brigades killed in Spain
did not return. They sacrificed their lives for Spain and for a truly democratic Germany. Those who survived continued the struggle wherever life took them.

p With the help of French patriots nearly 200 German international brigaders escaped from the concentration camps and the "labour companies”. After the nazi invasion of France they joined the French Resistance. Among them were Otto Riihne, Max Friedemann, Norbert Kugler, Ernst Buschmann, Werner Schwarze, Heinz Priess, Hans Kukowitsch, Kurt Weber, Fritz Fugmann, Max Brings, August Mahnke, Heinrich Schurmann, Walter Vesper and Franz Blume.

p Some of the German internationalists were sent to North Africa by the French authorities and held in a camp on the border of the Sahara. Later the Petain Government agreed to turn the internationalists in French concentration camps over to the nazis. Franz Dahlem and Heinrich Rau were among the first in the Vernet camp to be turned over to the Gestapo. When the nazis occupied Southern France the Gestapo put many of the Germans who had fought in Spain in concentration camps.

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p After enormous difficulties some of the German internationalists managed to reach the Soviet Union, where they continued the anti-fascist struggle on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War as soldiers of the Soviet Army or in partisan units. Among them were Erich Weinert, Willi Bredel, Gottfreid Griinberg and Giinther Tenner.

p Otto Heppner, Hermann Massinger, Richard Hoffmann, Hermann Salinger, Bruno Kiihn, Albert Hossler, Josef Zettler, Hermann Kramer, Ferdinand Greiner, Heinrich RoGkampf, Vincenz Porombka and Franz Zielasko fought the enemy in Poland and Germany. Most of them were seized by the nazi police or the Gestapo and executed. Josef Zettler did not lose his life only thanks to the solidarity of the prisoners in the concentration camp. Ferdinand Greiner and Vincenz Porombka were among the few that the Gestapo failed to find.

p Germans who had fought as members of International Brigades joined partisan units in Yugoslavia, Greece and other nazi- occupied countries. Among them distinction was won by Kurt Lobberger, who had been turned over to the Gestapo from a French internment camp. He was sent to Greece as a soldier of the 999 penal unit, went over to the partisans and became the commander of a German anti-fascist detachment in a regiment of the Greek People’s Liberation Army (ELAS).

p In many European countries and overseas (for instance, in Mexico) Germans who had fought in Spain took part in the Free Germany movement.

p Former members of the International Brigades Hermann Geisen and Kurt Garbarini, who in 1941 conducted anti-fascist agitation in the Wehrmacht in Belgium, were seized by the Gestapo, taken to Germany and beheaded in the Plotzensee prison in Berlin. Herbert Tschape escaped from the Sachsenhausen concentration camp in the spring of 1944 and worked in an underground organisation of the German Resistance under Anton Salfkow. He was captured by the Gestapo and executed. The same fate overtook Reinhold Mewes, a member of Beppo Rb’mer’s underground group.

p Wherever they found themselves—in the underground organisations of the Resistance, in hard labour prisons or in concentration camps—German international brigaders fought the nazi tyranny with selfless courage.

p After the nazi regime was smashed by the victorious Soviet Army, the former brigaders joined the ranks of the First Hour Activists.

p The men who fought the fascists in Spain may be proud of their contribution to the development of the new society. Today some of them are members of the Central Committee and Political Bureau of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany or hold posts 175 in the GDR Government. The National People’s Army of the GDR is headed by Heinz Hoffmann, veteran of the battles in Spain. Many of the generals and other senior officers of the GDR Armed Forces were members of International Brigades. Internationalist veterans hold leading posts in the national economy, the health service and cultural life in the GDR. The Committee of German Anti-Fascist Resistance Fighters and the Committee for Solidarity with the Spanish People support the fighters against the Franco regime morally and materially.

The true Germany fought, is fighting and will always fight on the side of the magnificent fraternal people of Spain, for the lofty ideals of humanity, national independence, peace, democracy and progress.