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The Labour Party and the Spanish Civil War, Part I

© Joseph Sramek

The "defining ideological conflict of the 1930s" [1] was the Spanish Civil War which took place between July 1936 and March 1939. The conflict, which began as a right-wing military revolt in July 1936 under the leadership of General Francisco Franco, threatened to become the Sarajevo of the Second World War. During the three years that followed, Franco's Spanish Nationalists, supported by Italy and Germany engaged in a civil war with the Loyalists, supported by the Soviet Union [although on a much smaller scale]. At the end of the three years, Franco was victorious. Yet, by the time the Second World War began in September 1939, the Labour Party was unified behind a policy of armed confrontation with Nazism and Fascism, something it was not in 1936. [2]

The Spanish Civil War was, perhaps, the most controversial foreign policy issue in 20th Century British politics. Initially, the question of whether arms should be sent to help the Loyalists deeply divided the Labour Party. [3] When the Spanish Civil War broke out, the Party's leader, Clement Attlee, was in Russia, and most of the other political leaders were outside the country as well. The only leaders who were able to make a decision were all from the right-wing, trade union, faction of the Party. [4] They decided to recommend a policy of non-intervention to the National Government, as long as it was "applied immediately, are [sic] loyally observed by all parties, and their execution is effectively co-ordinated and supervised....," a resolution that was approved at the 1936 Annual Party Conference held in Edinburgh. [5]

That conference was the most contentious of the entire decade. It was in many ways because, by October, it became obvious that the policy of non-intervention agreed to [by some of the Party leaders] in the Summer was a farce. There was growing evidence that the Germans and the Italians were not abiding by the Non-Intervention Treaty signed by them, as well as Great Britain, France, and the Soviet Union in late August.

The National Executive Committee [the chief policy-making body of the Labour Party] put forward a resolution the first day that supported non-intervention. Arthur Greenwood, the Deputy Leader of the P.L.P., apologetically defended the policy, saying that it was "a very, very bad second best." [6] Despite a great deal of idealistic opposition, the resolution was approved by a vote of 1,836,000 votes to 519,000 on the first day. [7] This vote, however, did not settle the issue, much to the chagrin of the Party leadership. Two days later [October 7, 1936], the Conference heard from two Spanish fraternal delegates: Señor de Asna and Señora de Palencia. Señor de Asna spoke first: