Spanish Incursion in WW2

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Not quite sure if Ive been insulting but I do concede communicating a degree of frustration over not hearing a legitimate argument countering a possible incursion (not whole scale invasion) into Spain especially when Franco (who would have some insight into the matter) contemplated such an scenario involving the Allies early on in the war.

No Vulture...when people ignore military fact and think only inside the box then the terms armchair general and prosaic probably are both reasonable descriptions.
It's kinda like how Canada contemplated an attack from the US
 
It's kinda like how Canada contemplated an attack from the US

Perhaps a bit less theoretical than that.

After all, troops were actually moved into position.
On the other hand, I presume that once it became clear that Torch was not going to land in Andalusia, the best place for the troops would be as close as possible to the French border. Just in case. After all if your "friends" are threatening you with invasion and your "enemies" are obviously not bothering with you, you better watch out for your "friends". Particularly if one of them is a methhead psychopath and the other is a megalomaniac loudmouth who looks like a disco bouncer.
 
To be blunt, there's two obvious reasons why it would be a bad idea. First, the Pyrenees will form a huge barrier for any incursion from Spain to France.

And to what extent. There's literally two places where you send material through. One at each end of the Pyrenees in fact. The rest is traversable only by men on foot. Even if you use the trains, the Spanish use broad gauge, so you're limited in how much gear you can move through easily. Of course there's the road. But the road network in Spain was dreadful.

Second, Spain passively supporting the Axis is much preferable to them actively supporting the Axis. Especially considering any Allied forces will likely be unable to get by the Pyrenees, and will be stuck in a hostile country.

Particularly if Spain passively supporting the Axis also includes passively supporting the Allies otherwise. Both British and German owned mines in Spain kept working.

I don't think Spain could realistically have helped the Axis more than they did. And probably wouldn't have been able to make do with helping them any less and not risk invasion.
 
Even if both Normandy and Husky fail their are other areas to attack before it gets desperate enough to attack Spain. Southern or Western France, or maybe reinvade Italy by bypassing Sicily (depends on how bad the first invasion failed).

But still it would be interesting to see how the western allies fair against Spain.
 
They would probably give up at some point because I don't think the idea to invade a neutral country ever came up just to take down Germany .

Well, tell Iran about it.
Any way, I agree this scenario is not plausible. Franco was one of these dictators that made the west powers feel comfortable (a la Pinochet). He was helped by Hitler in our civil war, but he also was London's choice in that conflict. He was an opportunist, and once he saw the germans were not going to win, he helped in his own way the allies. Torch could not have taken place without his agreement and subtile help. The only way he would be openly in the Axis side is if the UK stays out of the war or is defeated.
 
This is an interesting idea.

However, when I first saw this thread, I misread it as Spanish Inquisition in WW2.

I must admit I was slightly let down.

lol love it Septimus.:D Your comment fits in nicely in terms my own heresy of actually contemplating this oh so sacred cow topic...:rolleyes:.

Anyway thanks to the rest of you for at least entertaining the idea of an incursion before blowing it out of the sky. A logical arguement of why it couldnt happen/wasnt worth it was all I was after...thankyou!
 
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