WI: People's Republic of Spain?

If the communists had won the Spanish Civil war how what effect would this have had on the Cold War? The Soviets were providing aid to the Spanish communists so wouldn't it follow that the Spanish would want to repay them in kind later on? What advantages would this allow the USSR?
 
Well... Unfortunatly, I don't think the PRS would have made it to the Cold War. Why?

1) If the communists win the Civil War, I think Germany might see the country as a possible threat. (Commies and nazis don't like each other)
Despite its neutrality (let's face it, Spain is completly wrecked) in the upcoming war, Germany could possibly invade Spain (with the complicity of Vichy France or no) in Fall/Winter 1940 and install a nazi-puppet government (and also capturing Gibraltar, having total control over the Mediterranean Sea).
2) With Europe (except for Britain) under the nazis, the US might starts to worry about this and will declare war on the Axis (But after Pearl Harbor gets bombed by Japan). We can imagine a D-Day occuring in Southern Spain by 1943/44 with Allied troops landing in Andalucia. Fascist Spain would fall within 6-8 weeks. Spoiler: The Allies win WW2.
3) With the fall of the Iron Curtin, the US will do everything in its power to avoid having Spain communist again. With the doctrines and the Marshall Plan, Spain is rebuild (with US help) and we could see either the return of the republic (The Third one, I believe?) or the monarchy.

So that's the big picture: Spain would be a People's Republic for +300 days before being a Fascist state (like Franco's Spain OTL) and with US support for the rebuilding, it becomes a Republic or a Monarchy.
 
The problem with invading Spain, from Germany's perspective, is the Pyrenees. A Nazi takeover of Spain will be stalled there and, if Hitler invades the Soviet Union at the same time as OTL, the German armed forces will be stretched from one end of the continent to the other. How Germany makes a logistic success of simultaneously invading Spain and the USSR is beyond me.
 
If the communists had won the Spanish Civil war how what effect would this have had on the Cold War? The Soviets were providing aid to the Spanish communists so wouldn't it follow that the Spanish would want to repay them in kind later on? What advantages would this allow the USSR?
Well....
This turns out to be a good question.

There are multiple threads discussing how the Republicans can win the Civil War, but no serious discussion on the long term results.

The best TL in the general direction is
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/no-spanish-civil-war-in-1936-my-new-timeline.86718/
which is an excellent TL, and well worth reading, but involves NO war, not a Republican victory.

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In large part, the answer to your question would depend on HOW the Republicans win, how much the Communists end up in control (because originally they weren't), how much of a rôle the USSR played, etc.

IF Spain is a puppet state of the USSR, the US would try to, and quite possibly succeed in, destabliz(e/ing) the régime, or overthrow it.
 
Would the Nazi's even be able to take on an invasion of Spain? Not only are the Pyrenees in the way, but that would stretch their forces even thinner than they already were so why would they want to do that? I understand that they don't care for communists, but I still don't see how the 3rd Reich would be able to garner enough support on the home front for the invasion of yet another country. The Spanish wouldn't be dumb enough to jump into the war when they're still in a state of reconstruction so Spain doesn't pose any immediate threat to the Germans.
 
A Nazi invasion of Republican Spain would have two potential advantages. Firstly, it would allow them to strike at Gibraltar. Secondly, it would deny the Allies a potential staging ground for an invasion of Nazi-occupied Europe.
 
I don't think an invasion of Republican Spain would be hard for the Nazis to accomplish. The Pyrennes are an imposing obstacle, yes, but the Germans have experienced mountain troops at their disposal and Spain will be in no position to resist invasion effectively after the civil war. The Germans would easily roll over Spain and probably nab Gibraltar with it. They would probably execute the operation around Fall of 1940 or sometime in January to April of 1941. (IOTL Operation Felix was scheduled to start on January 10, 1941).
 

Archibald

Banned
Not only the Pyrénnées but the bulk of Spain in montainous, rugged terrain (Sierra Nevada right in the middle). Making a country invasion a major PITA. Just ask Napoleon :p
 
Not only the Pyrénnées but the bulk of Spain in montainous, rugged terrain (Sierra Nevada right in the middle). Making a country invasion a major PITA. Just ask Napoleon :p

Well, the Germans did have tanks and trucks so it would not be quite as bad as it was of Le Petit Emperor. However, I wonder if the UK might have tried to US Spain as a staging area and have committed most of their troops earmarked for North Africa in 1941-42 instead to help defend Spain, seeing as if Spain fell Gibraltar wouldn't be far behind and then Germany would control the entrance to the Mediterranean. If the Brits and Spaniards can hold out there until 1942 and 1943 we could see large amounts of American troops landed in Spain. Another question would be if Germany had an active land front in Spain with British troops, would he still have attacked Russia in 1941? Conversely, if Spain had been conquered and the British driven out, how much manpower would it take to hold, and how would this affect Barbarossa (the trade-off would be that you have effectively crippled the UK in the Mediterranean and shielded Italy).

A Spain with a government hostile to Germany at the start of WW2 would certainly be interesting POD in WW2. I am unsure how it would ultimately would have reshaped WW2.
 
It's worth to note, when this question arises, that the political posibilities of the PCE (Communist Party of Spain) and its catalan satellite the PSUC (United Socialist Party of Catalonia) to stablish their power as the one party are very limited. As proven in OTL by the coup fo Lt. Colonel Casado against Negrin in the last days of the war, with the support of all the other republican political forces, from the basque and catalan nationalists to the CNT, they had more support in Moscow than in Madrid. In the elections of 1936 the PCE got around the 5% of vote. Meanwhile the socialist union UGT and the anarcho-syndicalist union CNT had aroun 1'5 million affiliates each, for example. They got a prominet role during the Civil War and the anti-francoist resistance thanks to the help of Moscow. But, is the SU really that interested in spain, does Stalin cares about the other side of Eurasia? Specially once the war in Europe begins....

A republican victory can mean different political realities depending on the timing and circumstances of such victory. It could cenrtainly lead to a revolutionary state that implemented deep structural reforms virtually unopposed (land reform, secular state, military officers reduction,universal public education, sexual and moral freedoms, welfare....) but even in that case it would be hardly dominated by a political formation, but by a coalition of forces.
 

ben0628

Banned
If Axis invade Spain before Barbarossa, can it get bogged down enough that is sidelines the Soviet invasion altogether and prioritizes a Mediterranean strategy (I'm assuming Stalin wouldn't risk war with Germany over Spain)?

Also, would Portugal join the War with the Allies?
 
If the resulting Spain from the Spanish Civil War is a Spanish People's Republic (which would be the 3rd Spanish Republic) under control of the PCE, I think this would be as neutral Spain due the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact.

However, this Communist Spain could exploit the German invasion for even attack the French North Africa and the Portuguese Estado Novo claiming a struggle against fascism and colonialism, something like what the Soviet Union did after the pact, to create a large Ibero-African state formed by an union of several popular republics formed in the Maghreb, defending the speech that the three cultures peaceful during Al-Andalus times, claiming that the Berbers are the Spanish expelled after the Reconquista, etcetera; after all, the Spanish revolutionary movements have always supported the cause of the Iberian unification, it also involves the Spanish annexation of Andorra, Gibraltar, Roussillon and the Basque Country; and not forgetting the probable Communist revenge on the Moors who supported the Nationalists, may cause the official Spanish annexation of the Spanish Morocco and the international city of Tangiers.

Nevertheless, in this scenario, the most realistic possibility for me is the Iberian unification -including Azores, Cape Verde, Madeira and Sao Tome and Principe-, the Spanish annexation of the Morocco and Algerian region of Oran (whose European population was mainly of Spanish origin), besides the conquest Andorra, Gibraltar, Roussillon and the French Basque country when the Nazis or Vichy France decides to invade Spain when Operation Barbarossa occurs and the Spanish People's Republic is a new member of the Allies.
 
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