Summary

In her study, The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939 and Europe: International Aspects of Conflict, V.Malay for the first time in Russian historiography has made an attempt to analyze a complex of the international aspects of the Spanish Civil War. The authors looks at history of the Spanish Civil War in the context of international relations on the base of rich sources including archives, published diplomacy documents of main European countries as well as press of all colors.

In this research most of the materials from the Archives of foreign policy of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (13 founds) are used for the first time. The study is also based on extensive usage of archival sources from Russian Federation’s State Archives as well as Russian State’s Archives of social-political history.

The European policy with the beginning of the Spanish Civil War was quitе complete. The author compares main tasks of leading European countries in this context and then studies theirs tactics. The birth of so-called policy of non-intervention has come into view quite detailed. Appealing to the new archive’s founds Malay V.V. reveals the unknown pages of the Soviet policy in the Spanish War.

The materials of the book elucidate many myths relating to the Spanish Civil War. The diplomatic maneuvers of great powers leaders are shown. Most European countries tried to keep the USSR out of Western Europe. Such policy became apparent from the time of signing Non-Intervention Agreement and continued through the whole Spanish Civil War. Malay V.V. reveals new moments of the struggle between the British, fascist and the Soviet diplomacy in the Non-Intervention Committee and behind their scenes and analyses its consequences for the fate of the Spanish Republic as well as for two-sided and international relations. The tactics that ignore the Soviet initiatives in the NIC are illustrated with many examples. Such tactics made the task of defeat of the Spanish Republic easer. Great Britain and France refused an alliance with the Soviet Union on the Spanish and European questions against fascism. The author analyses maneuvering of the European diplomacy for a united front against the USSR in the NIC. 

The problems of the usage of the Spanish Civil War topic in all-European propagandist struggle are revealed in a separate chapter where main directions of this struggle are emphasized. Considerable attention is given to the most serious consequences of the propagandist war. There’s special emphasis on the picture of anti-Soviet company in European mass media (1936-1939) with the secretion of its concrete reasons and main directions.

There are many new moments in this book in studying of war aspects of the Spanish event. The role of the Spanish war’ experiment for the leading European countries is considered in Ch.3.

The Mediterranean aspect is studied especially through Italian, British and Soviet policy. Nyon conference (1937) is considered in the study as an area of the acute diplomatic struggle and as one of attempts to isolate the USSR on the international area before the World War II.

 In conclusion the author concentrates on serious consequences of European contradictions in the Spanish problem for the fate of the Spain as well as for the international relations before World War II. Malay V.V. illustrates a role and place of every international aspects of the Spanish Civil War by means of a table.

The text can serve as a new research to all those interested in the history of the Spanish Civil War as well as international relations.

CONTENTS

To the reader (S.P. Pojaskaia)………………………………………………………………….4

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………….7

Part I 

THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR (1936-1939) AND GLOBAL EUROPEAN POLICY  …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….11

1.1. The Beginning of the Spanish War: Strategic Interests of Leading European Countries…………………..…………………………..……………………………………11

1.2. The Spanish Conflict and Formation of War-Political Alliances before the World War II…………………………………………………………………………………………..29

Part II

NON-INTERVENTION” IN SPAIN IN THE CONTEXT OF THE INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS OF THE PRE-WAR PERIOD ………………………….……………………… 43

2.1. The Non-Intervention Policy’s Birth………………………………………… …………..43

2.2. Europe and Spain (September 1936 – May 1937): the Strategy of the Non-Intervention………………………………………………………………………… .54

2.3. The Non-Intervention Committee (June 1937 – Autumn 1938): the Price of Opposition…………………………..……………………………………………………….…..72

Part III

INFORMATION PROVISION OF THE POLICY OF NON-INTERVENTION……………93 

3.1. The International Aspects of the Spanish War: Propaganda Foreshortening ……………93

3.2. Spain (1936-1939) in Anti-Soviet  omponent  of  European Propaganda ………… 111 

Part ІV

THE WAR COMPONENT of THE INTERNATIONAL ASPECTS OF THE SPANISH CONFLICT: ………………………………………………………………………………….127

4.1. The Foreign War Intervention …………………………… …………………………….127

4.2. The Military - technical Lessons of the War in Spain …………………..………… 144

4.3. The Spanish Experience: evolution of the European military doctrines? ……………….157

Part V

THE SPANISH WAR AND MEDITERRANEAN’S PROBLEMS………….………………………………………………………………………… 173

5.1. Mediterranean Region in Foreign Policy Plans of the European States (the middle of 30th years of XX century) …………………………………………………………………… 173

5.2. The Spanish Question in the Mediterranean policy of Europe (July, 1936 - August, 1937) ……………………………………………………………………………………..……… 185

5.3. Nyon International Conference (1937): Collective Security or Concealed Confrontation?……………………………………………………………………..……………………199

5.4. The European Countries in the Mediterranean at the Closing Stage of War in Spain (the end of 1937 – beginning of 1939)………….……………………………………………… 214

CONCLUSION……………………………………………………………………………. 224

COMMENTS ……………………………………………………………………………. 230

SOURCES and LITERATURE………………………………………………………… … 264

LIST OF NAMES………………………………………………………………………….. 291

THE APPENDIX……………………………………………………………………………296

SUMMARY…………………………………………………………………………………300

CONTENTS…………………………………………………………………………………301

* Прим -.По пятибалльной системе суммированы по годам значения указанных аспектов для каждой из ведущих европейских стран (Великобритания, Франция, Германия, Италия, Советский Союз).