Main bombings in the Spanish Civil War

During the course of the Civil War the various confrontations between the two sides left a trail of destruction in their wake, and on many occasions, civilian populations suffered such damage. In this lesson from a TEACHER we will mention the main bombings of the Spanish civil war, for which, not only were casualties caused on the enemy side, but also cities were destroyed and what is worse, the lives of the thousands of citizens who had nothing to do with the conflict that had exploded.

To begin with our lesson on main bombings of the Spanish civil warWe will divide the explanation into two large blocks starting with the Republican side.

After July 17, 1936, the central government ordered the Spanish aviation and navy to They will act on the protectorate and the rebellious cities of Africa, thus focusing the attacks on:

• Ceuta
• Melilla
• Larache
• Tetouan (capital of the protectorate)

Undoubtedly, although it was only intended to attack the military positions, the bombings carried out ended hitting the target of the Muslim civilian population, even destroying the main mosque of Tetouan. In this way, the Moroccan population jumped in arms against the Spanish, although the intervention of the Grand Vizier Ahmed Ganmia prevented the blood from reaching the river. However, all members of the protectorate began to support the rebel side.

Likewise, after these attacks, the Republican government would carry out effective bombardments on Saragossa (the basilica of the Pilar was bombed), Murcia, Getafe, Oviedo and Granada. These last two being the most affected during the bombings. In all the attacks carried out by the republican aviation civilians were killed.

Continuing with our lesson on main bombings of the Spanish civil war We will mention those carried out by the rebel army:

Madrid

Between August 27-28, 1936, the first bombardments of the capital began. Thanks to German and Italian aviation support, at first, the attacks were directed towards the Ministry of War and the North Station, to try cut off communications, during the course of these attacks it must be said that there was only one dead and some wounded.

However, the following attacks were becoming more and more followed, as General Francisco Franco's troops were approaching the capital. Thus we will see bombings on the famous Casa de Campo, the Prado Museum and even the Library National, we must say that the works and books were properly stored to avoid evils greater.

The bombings continued until April 1937 (because there were stoppages in between), at the end of the bombings, the government released the figures: 907 dead and 2800 wounded.

Guernica

Undoubtedly, the best known bombing of those carried out by Franco's army, it was the one produced on April 26, 1937 on the city of Guernica. At 6:00 p.m. there was a strong attack on the city, at the hands of German and Italian aviation, throwing explosive and incendiary bombs, which destroyed 70% of the city.

After that, there would be a real massacre, at the hands of the Italians and Germans, who with their machine guns fired on the civilian population, causing casualties of about 126 people, 5% of the population of the location.

The excuse of the assailants was to destroy the bridge to prevent the passage of Republican troops. This was reflected in the famous painting of Picasso, The Guernica.

Bilbao

It was another of the cities that ended up being bombarded by the German and Italian squads between May 12 and June 14 (it suffered 3 attacks during that time).

Barcelona

Finally, within the main bombings of the Spanish civil war, we will see what happened over the city of Barcelona:

• May 28, 1937: which caused about 64 deaths and 88 wounded.
• Between July 18-25, 1937
• October 1, 1937: it was the most serious of all and it centralized its force on the Barceloneta neighborhood, causing the loss of 55 lives.

To conclude with our lesson on the main bombings of the Spanish civil war, we will talk about those carried out during the battle of the Ebro between July and November 1938.

The attacks would focus on end the bridges that were in the Ebro and in this way prevent the republican refreshment troops from reaching the combat area, in addition to preventing the withdrawal of the other positions.

They bombarded a series of villages and towns in Tarragona, together with attacks carried out again on the city of Barcelona between 3-19 August. Similarly, the rebel side attacked the positions of Valencia and Murcia.

We can certainly say that almost the entire Spanish geography suffered the bombings from one side to the other, throughout the conflict, leaving hundreds of lives cut off and devastated cities, thus leaving a rather uncertain outlook for much of the period of postwar period.