In 1936, the Spanish Foreign Legion was the most well equipped, thoroughly trained, and battle-tested unit in the Spanish Army, and with its fearsome reputation for brutality and savagery, the Legion was not only critical to the eventual victory of Franco and the Nationalists, but was also a powerful propaganda tool the Nationalists used to intimidate and terrorize its enemies. Drawing upon Spanish military archival sources, the Legion’s own diary of operations and relevant secondary sources, Alvarez recounts the pivotal role played by the Spanish Foreign Legion in the initial months of the Spanish Civil War, a war that was not only between Spaniards, but that pitted the political ideology of Communism and Socialism against that of Fascism and Nazism. “An indispensable read for anyone interested in the political history of the Second World War.”— The NYMAS Review “Through use of extensive military records, Álvarez provides readers with an excellent sense of the constant battles that were fought from the outbreak of the Civil War; the movement and success of the forces of the Nationalists, led by General Francisco Franco; and the role of the legion in this first, and most violent, stage of the conflict.”— H-Net “Students of the Spanish Civil War have long awaited Álvarez’s continuation of his seminal Betrothed of Death , and this [book] offers the core of an even more significant contribution to the literature on the Civil War, and to the general field of 20th century military history.”— Dennis Showalter , Professor of History, Colorado College, author of Hitler’s Panzers “Although the war has attracted the attention of countless scholars and other writers, there are relatively few studies of the military operations themselves, especially in English. Hence this [book] helps fill a major gap in scholarship about the Spanish Civil War.”— Geoffrey Jensen , Professor of History, Virginia Military Institute, author of Irrational Triumph: Cultural Despair, Military Nationalism, and the Ideological Origins of Franco´s Spain José E. Álvarez is Associate Professor of History at the University of Houston–Downtown. He is the author of The Betrothed of Death: The Spanish Foreign Legion During the Rif Rebellion and co-editor of A Military History of Modern Spain: From the Napoleonic Era to the International War on Terror . The Spanish Foreign Legion In The Spanish Civil War 1936 By José E. Álvarez University of Missouri Press Copyright © 2016 The Curators of the University of Missouri All rights reserved. ISBN: 978-0-8262-2083-7 Contents List of Illustrations, List of Maps, Foreword, Acknowledgments, Introduction, In Spanish Morocco, The Legion Arrives in Andalusia, On the Road to Madrid, Mérida, The Breach of Death: Badajoz, The Battle of the Sierra de Guadalupe, September 1936, The Battle for the Alcázar of Toledo, From Toledo to Madrid, October 1936, The Madrid Front, November 1936, The Madrid Front, December 1936, With the Second Bandera on the Guipúzcoa-Aragón Front, With the Third Bandera on the Asturian Front, Conclusion, Notes, Bibliography, Index, CHAPTER 1 In Spanish Morocco On Sunday, July 12, 1936, the Army of Africa assembled on the Llano Amarillo (Yellow Plain) in Ketama, Spanish Morocco, for a massive parade and military review. Ketama is located in a mountainous and forested region halfway between the principal Spanish coastal presidios of Ceuta and Melilla. The parade not only capped off the just completed summer maneuvers, it also allowed those in Morocco who were conspiring to overthrow the Second Spanish Republic an opportunity to finalize their plans. Among the dignitaries present was the acting high commissioner, Artillery Captain Plácido Álvarez Buylla Godino, who was joined by General Manuel Romerales Quinto, the commander of the eastern zone (Melilla); General Agustín Gómez Morato, the commander of the Army of Africa; and adjutants, members of the General Staff, and a few military attachés, mostly French. The parade, comprising eighteen thousand men and their materiel, began at eleven o'clock in the morning and lasted roughly two hours. The units that marched past in review were the six banderas of the Spanish Foreign Legion (then officially known as El Tercio) and the five grupos de Regulares (Moroccan soldiers led by Spanish officers), along with Moroccan police (the Mehal-las), cavalry, artillery, engineers, signals, a quartermaster, medical personnel, motor transportation, and aviation. The dignitaries were greatly impressed with the martial spirit and professionalism of the troops they had reviewed. That evening in Pamplona, General Emilio Mola Vidal, the principal conspirator in Spain, sent Captain Gerardo Imaz with a message for the main conspirator in Africa: the veteran africanista and pro-Falangist (fascist party), Lieutenant Colonel Juan Yagüe Blanco. The message called for the Alzamiento (uprising) to take p