AHC/WI: Republicans Win Spanish Civil War

Could have happened early on if the Italians dither over sending support at the start. Either Britain or France lending unambigious support to the Republic would help. If no unifying leader emerges on the rebels side, & they fail through disagreements & poor coordination/cooperation.
 
there was wide public support for arming the republicans in the US if I remember something like 75%, but nothing came of it. maybe if that happens early the republicans can win and not become a soviet proxy.
 
Hugh Thomas in *The Spanish Civil War*, p. 209, gives a very simple POD for a Republican victory:

"Nearly everywhere, the civil governors followed the example of the government in Madrid, and refused to cooperate with the working-class organizations who were clamouring for arms. In many cases, this signed the death warrants of the civil governors themselves, along with local working-class leaders. Had the rebels risen in all the provinces in Spain on 18 July, they might have been everywhere triumphant by 22 July. *But had the government distributed arms, and ordered the civil governors to do so too, thus using the working class to defend the republic at the earliest opportunity, the rising might have been crushed.* [my emphasis--DT] https://books.google.com/books?id=4a5RAQAAQBAJ&pg=PA209
 

Dorozhand

Banned
One of the reasons the republic failed was because it alienated the workers early on. If the republic had embraced socialism in its early stages and armed itself accordingly in full preparation for counterrevolution, organizing an army of people's liberation, then the reactionary military revolt could have been easily crushed. All that needs to be in place is the ascension of a socialist government early on, successfully opposing the capitalist oligarchy of the early years which alienated the reactionaries (fomenting the revolt in the first place) and the powerful and popular left, which could have unified the Spanish people in fighting off reaction and fascism and decisively begun th process if building socialist industry. Spain could have been the main bulwark of Communism in western Europe and possibly a bloc capable of resisting Stalinism if that comes about fully.
 

TinyTartar

Banned
The Germans keep going south after France surrenders. The British rush troops to Southern Spain to guard Gibraltar.

Germans? I'd wager the Italians and French would get in on this too. I'd imagine that Hitler might start to see the Soviets as a problem for another day and the Spanish as a problem for today.
 
The revolt was very tightly timed, throw a few monkey wrenches in the plan and you might have the Republicans gain the upper hand. Maybe have even less of the navy revolt so that the veteran troops in Morocco (and I believe Franco as well) can't get to Spain proper.

It might not strangle the revolt in the cradle, but the war could be much shorter and result in a Spain that is less socialist and reliant on the Soviet Union.
 
If somebody with a bit more sympathy for the democratically elected government is in a position to do something in either Whitehall or Gibraltar, then the Royal Navy can stop the army in Africa getting back to Spain proper. If memory serves, the KM vessels sent to escort them (was one of them Deutschland?) were under strict instructions to turn back if the RN challenged them.
 
The Republic demonstrated laughable ineptitude in its initial response to the 1936 putsch. The CNT's intelligence network was able to detect a coup in the works weeks before the whole sorry thing was initiated, but the government felt such confidence in its own institutions as to ignore their warnings. This lack of real unity came to pretty much characterise the Republican war effort over the course of the next four years. Getting Sanjurjo, Franco and the rest of the gang arrested and shot early would go a long way to nipping the threat in the bud.
If somebody with a bit more sympathy for the democratically elected government is in a position to do something in either Whitehall or Gibraltar, then the Royal Navy can stop the army in Africa getting back to Spain proper. If memory serves, the KM vessels sent to escort them (was one of them Deutschland?) were under strict instructions to turn back if the RN challenged them.
There was zero will among the British political classes to support the Spanish government, a factor officially attributed to the advancement of 'peace' and 'neutrality' in Europe but which basically boiled down to the Republic's association, in the minds of prominent Tories, with godless Marxism. If the French Popular Front was unready to take action in its support, there's absolutely no hope of London doing so.
 
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