| Catalonia Offensive | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of theSpanish Civil War | |||||||
 Map of Spain in November 1938, right after the end of theBattle of the Ebro and immediately before the start of the Catalonia Offensive. Territory still controlled by the Republic is depicted in pink | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Strength | |||||||
| Thomas: 300,000[1] Beevor: 220,000[2] Jackson: 90,000[3] Thomas: 360 artillery pieces[4] Beevor: 250 artillery pieces[2] Thomas: 200 tanks and armoured cars[4] Beevor: 40 tanks and armoured cars[2] Thomas: 80 aircraft[4] Beevor: 106 aircraft[5] | Jackson: 350,000[3] Beevor: 340,000[6] Thomas: 300,000[1] Beevor: 1,400 artillery pieces[6] Thomas: 565 artillery pieces[1] 300 tanks[6] 500 aircraft[7] | ||||||
| Casualties and losses | |||||||
| Unknown dead 10,000 wounded 60,000 captured[8] 220,000 disarmed in France[9] | Unknown | ||||||
TheCatalonia Offensive (Catalan:Ofensiva de Catalunya,Spanish:Ofensiva de Cataluña) was part of theSpanish Civil War. TheNationalist Army started theoffensive on 23 December 1938 and rapidly conqueredRepublican-heldCatalonia with Barcelona (the Republic'scapital city from October 1937).[10] Barcelona was captured on 26 January 1939. The Republican governmentheaded for the French border. Thousands of people fleeing theNationalists also crossed the frontier in the following month, to be placed ininternment camps.Franco closed the border with France by 10 February 1939.
After its defeat at theBattle of the Ebro theRepublican Army was broken and would never recover. The Republicans had lost most of their armament and experienced units.[11] Furthermore, in October 1938 the Republican government agreed to withdraw the volunteers of theInternational Brigades.[12] On the other hand, the Nationalists received new supplies of ammunition, weapons and aircraft from Germany.[13] Furthermore, after theMunich Agreement, the hope of an intervention of the Western democracies in order to aid the Republic againstGermany andItaly vanished.[11]France had closed the frontier again in mid-June 1938 and frozen Republican financial assets in French banks.[14]
At the beginning of December, thenationalist faction concentrated anArmy Group, the Army of the North, of 300,000[1]–340,000[6] men led by the generalFidel Dávila in order to conquerCatalonia. The Nationalists assembled their best divisions all along the front from thePyrenees to theMediterranean. Along theSegre the Nationalists deployed Muñoz Grandes'sArmy of Urgel, Garcia Valiño's Army of Maestrazgo and Moscardo's Aragon Army; in the confluence of the Segre with theEbroGambara's ItalianCuerpo Legionario Italiano of four divisions (55,000 men) and Solchaga's Army Corps of Navarra; and in the Ebro the Yagüe's Moroccan Corps.[1] The Nationalists also had, according to Beevor, 300 tanks, more than 500 aircraft (among them theBf 109E andHeinkel 112 fighters) and 1,400 cannon.[15]
Opposing the Nationalists, the Republicans had ColonelPerea Capulino'sEastern Army and ColonelJuan Modesto'sEbro Army, united under the command of GeneralJuan Hernandez Saravia, commander of theEastern Region Army Group, with 220,000[2]–300,000[1] men, many unarmed (Hernandez Saravia said that the Republican army had only 17,000 rifles for all Catalonia),[16] 106 airplanes[5] (most of themChatos), 250 cannons and 40tanks (many of them unserviceable due to shortage of spare parts).[2]
TheSoviet government agreed to send to Catalonia a shipment of 250 aircraft, 250 tanks and 650 cannons,[1] but the shipment did not reachBordeaux until 15 January and only a small part of it crossed the border.[17] Furthermore, because of the international isolation of the Republic and the lack of food (according to Beevor, in Barcelona the ration per day was down to 100 grams of lentils)[5] the morale of the government troops and civil population in the Republican zone was very low. The people only wished the end of the war: "...just let it be over, it doesn't matter how it ends, but let it end now."[18]
The Nationalist offensive was planned for 10 December but was postponed to 23 December.[1] On 23 December the Italians and the Navarreses crossed the Segre atMequinenza, broke the Republican lines, and advanced sixteen kilometres, but they were stopped by the V and XV Republican corps led byLister on 25 December. On the left flank, Muñoz Grandes and Garcia Valiño advanced towardsCervera andArtesa, but they were blocked by the26th Republican Division. On the south, Yagüe's troops were held back by the Ebro's floodwater. The Republicans had stopped the first Nationalist attack; nevertheless, they had lost 40 aircraft in the first ten days of the battle.[19]
On 3 January Solchaga attackedLes Borges Blanques, Muñoz Grandes and Garcia Valiño occupied Artesa, and Yagüe crossed the Ebro. Moscardo attacked from Lleida and the Italians occupied Les Borges Blanques on 5 January. The same day, the Republican army started asurprise attack inExtremadura towardsPeñarroya in order to divert Nationalist forces, but the offensive was halted after a few days and the Nationalist offensive in Catalonia continued.[20] On 9 January the Moscardo's Aragon Army Corps joined Gambara atMollerusa and broke the northern part of the front. The V and XV Republican Corps collapsed and retreated in disorder. On 15 January the Aragon and Maestrazgo Corps conquered Cervera and the Moroccan Corps after a one-day march of 50 km occupiedTarragona. By this day, the Nationalists had conquered a third of Catalonia, had taken 23,000 prisoners, and had killed 5,000 Republican soldiers.[21]
The Republican government then attempted to organize a defense of Barcelona, ordering the general mobilization of all men to forty-five and militarized all the industry. Nevertheless, the successive defensive lines (L1, L2, L3) fell,[22] the Republican forces were outnumbered six to one and the Nationalist air force bombed Barcelona every day (40 times between 21 and 25 January).[23] It became clear that the defense of the city was impossible.[24] On 22 January Solchaga and Yagüe reached theLlobregat only a few miles west of Barcelona, Muñoz Grandes and Garcia Valiño attackedSabadell andTerrassa, and Gambara advanced toBadalona. The chief of staff of the Republican Army,Rojo told the Republican prime ministerNegrín that the front had ceased to exist so the government abandoned Barcelona after releasing most of its prisoners.[25] A large part of the Barcelona population fled from the city as well. On 24 January Garcia Valiño occupiedManresa,[4] and on 25 January the Nationalist vanguard occupied theTibidabo in the outskirts of Barcelona. The Nationalistsfinally occupied Barcelona on 26 January[26] and there were five days of looting by the Yagüe'sRegulares[27] and extrajudicial killings (paseos).[28]
After the occupation of Barcelona, the Nationalist troops, tired from the long marches, slowed their advance but soon resumed their offensive, pursuing the retreating columns of Republican soldiers and civilians.[25] On 1 February Negrín proposed, in the last meeting of theCortes in theFigueres Castle,capitulation with the sole condition of respecting the lives of the vanquished and the holding of a plebiscite so the Spanish people could decide the form of government, but Franco did not accept.[29] On 2 February the Nationalists enteredGirona, arrived within 50 kilometers of the frontier on 3 February, occupiedFigueres on 8 February and Rojo ordered the Republican troops to withdraw to the French frontier.[8] Hundreds of thousands of Republican soldiers, women, children and old men marched to the French frontier on foot and on carts, buses and trucks[26] through bitterly cold sleet and snow. Their retreat was covered by units of the Republican Army, which carried outhit and run attacks and ambushes.[30] The Nationalist air force and theCondor Legion bombed and strafed the roads leading to France.[31] On 28 January the French government announced that civilians could cross the frontier and, on 5 February, the Republican soldiers as well.[32] Between 400,000[33] and 500,000,[8] Republican refugees crossed the frontier, among them the president of the Republic (Manuel Azaña), the prime minister (Juan Negrín) and the chief of staff of the Republican Army (Vicente Rojo), as well the president of Catalonia (Lluís Companys) and the members of theCatalan government. Negrín returned to Spain on 9 February but Azaña and Rojo refused to return.[31] By 9 February the Nationalists reached the frontier, and on the following day the last units of Modesto'sArmy of the Ebro crossed into France and the Nationalists sealed the frontier.[1]
With the fall of Catalonia, the Republic lost the second largest city of the country, the Catalan war industry and a large part of its army (more than 200,000 soldiers).[32] On 2 February Azaña resigned and on 27 FebruaryFrance and theUnited Kingdom formally recognized theFrancoist government.[34] Further military resistance became impossible and the war was lost for the Republic, despite the fact that 30% of Spain was still under Republican control after the offensive and Prime MinisterJuan Negrín insisted that the Republic could continue to resist.[35]
The Catalonia autonomy was abolished. TheCatalan language, theSardana and Catalan Christian names were forbidden. All Catalan newspapers were requisitioned and the forbidden books retired and burned.[36] Even the inscriptions on tombs in theMontjuïc Cemetery commemoratingDurruti,Ascaso andFerrer i Guardia were removed.[37]
The Republican exiles were interned in fifteenimprovised camps (mostly barbed-wire enclosures on the sand, without basic shelter, sanitary or cooking facilities)[38] by the French government in places such asArgelès,Gurs,Rivesaltes andVernet.[39] The living conditions in the camps were very harsh: in the first six months, 14,672 refugees died from malnutrition or dysentery.[38] The French government encouraged the refugees to return and, by the end of 1939, between 70,000[40] and 180,000 refugees returned to Spain. However, 300,000 never returned.[41] Many sought asylum in other countries: the Soviet Union (between 3,000[41] and 5,000),[42] USA and Canada (about 1,000), Great Britain, Belgium and other European countries (between 3,000[43] and 5,000)[41] and Latin America (30,000 to Mexico, 10,000 to Argentina, 5,000 to Venezuela, 5,000 to Dominican Republic, 3,500 to Chile, etc.).[43][44] Nevertheless, at least 140,000 refugees remained in France while 19,000 went to theFrench colonies of North Africa.[43] After thefall of France 10,000[45]–15,000[46] refugees were detained by the Nazis and deported toconcentration camps. Another 10,000 joined theFrench Resistance[47] and more than 2,000 joined theFree French Forces.[42]
