The battle for Spain: the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939 (68 page)

The Battle of the Ebro

A
fter the collapse in Aragón during the spring, the republican government had set out to reconstitute an army from the formations pushed back into the isolated eastern zone. They had the River Segre to the west and the Ebro to the south as reasonable defence lines behind which they could reorganize. They also had the 18,000 tons of war matériel which came over the French frontier between March and mid June. And they had more time to reorganize than they could have reasonably expected, thanks to Franco’s ill-judged offensive towards Valencia.

During the late spring and early summer the call-up was extended to the classes of 1925–9 and 1940–1. Twelve new divisions were formed. The conscripts ranged from sixteen-year-olds (which veterans called the
quinta del biberón
, the baby’s bottle call-up) to middle-aged fathers. To these were added nationalist prisoners of war and many skilled technicians, who were now drafted because the loss of the hydroelectric plants in the Pyrenees had cut Catalonian production dramatically. Yet since there were insufficient rifles to go round, the government’s militarization decrees seem to have had more to do with creating an impression of resolute resistance than with military requirements. The new war matériel was of most use to the air force, special arms and machine-gun companies. The small arms did no more than replace those lost by front-line divisions at Teruel or in Aragón.

After the failure of his peace overtures Negrín, supported by the communists, felt that international attention must be aroused by a great heroic action. If it were successful the Republic could negotiate from a position of greater strength. This reasoning, however, contained several basic flaws. European attention was much more preoccupied with events in the east, especially Hitler’s designs on Czechoslovakia. There was no prospect of Franco changing his refusal to compromise,
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nor of Chamberlain coming to the aid of the Republic.

The military justification for the project consisted of a vain plan to recapture the nationalists’ corridor to the sea and link the two republican zones again. But this was wildly optimistic and demonstrated that the government and the communists still refused to learn from their own disastrous mistakes. The pattern was entirely predictable. Even if the republican attackers achieved surprise, the nationalist armies, with their American trucks, would redeploy rapidly to halt the offensive. And once again nationalist air and artillery superiority would crush them in the open. In addition, this attack across a major river, with all the problems of resupply that entailed, represented a far more dangerous risk than even the offensives of Brunete and Teruel. The loss of aircraft and equipment would also be far more catastrophic than before, since there was little chance of any further replacements arriving, now that the French border had closed again. Negrín also refused to see that another battle involving heavy casualties would damage republican morale irretrievably. Altogether it was a monumental gamble against very unfavourable odds and bizarrely incompatible with Negrín’s hope that the Republic would still be resisting strongly when a European war broke out.

An Army of the Ebro was specially formed for this offensive. As at Brunete, it was communist dominated and received nearly all the armour, artillery and aircraft. Modesto was the army commander, with V Corps under Líster, and XV Corps under the 26-year-old communist physicist Manuel Tagüeña. His right flank was covered by XII Corps, which defended the bottom part of the River Segre from Lérida to where it joined the Ebro opposite Mequinenza.
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The curve of the Ebro between Fayón and Cherta was the sector chosen for the main assault, with XV Corps on the right and V Corps on the left. Two subsidiary actions were added–the 42nd Division crossing to the north, between Fayón and Mequinenza in order to impede a counter-attack from the right flank, and the French XIV International Brigade crossing downriver at Amposta. The total strength of the assault force was about 80,000 men.
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The greatest weakness was in artillery as a result of losses in Aragón. The whole army had no more than 150 guns, some of which dated from the last century. In addition, the 76mm anti-aircraft ammunition was known to be defective, although the soldiers were not informed ‘for reasons of morale’.
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The nationalist troops facing them from the right bank of the Ebro consisted of the 50th Division commanded by Colonel Luis Campos Guereta, who had his headquarters in Gandesa, Barrón’s 13th Division in reserve and the 105th Division, which covered the front from Cherta to the sea.
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These divisions of Yagüe’s Moroccan Corps consisted of about 40,000 men. Over the last few days before the republican attack, Colonel Campos passed back intelligence reports to Yagüe, warning that his men had observed troop movements and preparations on the opposite bank of the Ebro. These observations were confirmed by air reconnaissance, but the nationalist high command did not take the threat seriously. It seemed unthinkable to them that the republican army, which had been so severely mauled in Aragón, would be ready to undertake any sort of offensive, especially one across a broad river.

On 24 June Colonel Franco-Salgado, the Generalissimo’s aide, had been informed that the republicans were preparing rafts to cross the river as well as pontoon bridges, and that the majority of the International Brigades were concentrated in Falset.
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This intelligence was confirmed by the interrogation of deserters and prisoners, but Franco did no more than tell Yagüe to maintain a state of alert.
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The crossing of the Ebro was prepared in minute detail for a whole week, with the republican troops practising in ravines, rivers and on the coast. The engineer corps mocked up the crossing with bridges built in Barcelona or bought in France. Meanwhile, reconnaissance troops from the specialist XIV Corps of commandos slipped across the river at night. They made contact with peasants on the other side to obtain information on nationalist positions. The seventeen-year-old Rubén Ruiz, the son of La Pasionaria, was one of them. He was finally killed as a major in the Red Army in 1942 during the retreat into Stalingrad.

In the very early hours of 25 July commandos went across silently and knifed the sentries on the far bank. They also fastened lines for the assault boats to follow. Six republican divisions then began to cross the Ebro, with the point units in assault boats, guided by local peasants who knew the river. The bulk of the forces followed using twelve different pontoon bridges set up by the engineers. Above Fayón, the 226th Brigade from the 42nd Division cut the road from Mequinenza, and the rest of XV Corps crossed the river at Ribarroja and Flix to establish a bridgehead along the line of Ascó–La Fatarella. At the same time V Corps crossed near Miravet to take Corbera d’Ebre on their line of advance to Gandesa, and also near Benissanet to attack Móra d’Ebre and link up with the flank units of XV Corps.

Much further downriver, almost on the sea, XIV International Brigade tried to cross the river, but only a small number reached the other shore alive. The Riffian Rifles of the 105th Division inflicted heavy casualties. XIV International Brigade lost 1,200 men in 24 hours, shot or drowned. Pierre Landrieu of the Henri Barbusse Battalion, recorded that it was not possible to cross the river to help their comrades trapped on the far bank, who yelled for help in vain.
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In the centre the republican troops advanced rapidly and captured some 4,000 men from the 50th Division. On the following day they approached Vilalba dels Arcs and Gandesa, after occupying Puig de L’A

` liga, between the sierras of Pàndols and Cavalls, the key to the Terra Alta, as this dry mountainous region was called. It included the infamous Point 481, which became known as ‘the heights of death’, or the ‘pimple’, as the International Brigades called it.
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In a little more than 24 hours, Modesto’s troops had seized 800 square kilometres. But Yagüe, who had not forgotten Modesto’s mistakes at Brunete and Belchite, ordered Barrón’s 13th Division to move at greatest speed to the defence of Gandesa. The forced march of 50 kilometres under the July sun killed a number of men through heat exhaustion. The feet of many others were in a pitiful, bloody mess after this feat.
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Nevertheless, by the early hours of 26 July, the 13th Division was deployed to defend the town. General Volkmann, the new commander of the Condor Legion, who visited Yaguë was at his headquarters at this point, observed how calm he was. Yagu undoubtedly the nationalists’ most capable field commander.

Franco had heard of the offensive within hours of it beginning on 25 July, the anniversary of the end of the battle of Brunete and the festival of Saint James: the day on which he had hoped to take Valencia. His reaction was typical. He rejected any idea of allowing the republicans to hold any territory, whatever the cost of winning it back. Operations on the Levante front were halted immediately and eight divisions were turned round to march against the republican bridgehead. The Condor Legion, the Italian Legionary Air Force and the Brigada Aérea Hispana were tasked immediately for operations on the Ebro front. By the early afternoon of the first day nationalist planes were over the Terra Alta and attacking the crossing points over the river. The pontoon bridges were given the highest priority. Altogether, 40 Savoia 79s, 20 Savoia 81s, 9 Breda 20s, 30 Heinkel 111s, 8 Dornier 20s, 30 Junker 52s and 6 Junker 87 Stukas, as well as 100 fighters, went into action. The republican air force was nowhere to be seen.
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Franco, having been assured by an engineer that no permanent damage would be done to industry in Barcelona,
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ordered the dams at Tremp and Camasara up in the Pyrenees to be opened. The flood water which resulted raised the river by two metres and swept away the pontoon bridges on which Modesto’s troops relied for supply and reinforcements. Republican engineers managed to repair them within two days, but the timing had been disastrous. Only a small number of tanks and guns had crossed the river. They were not enough to defeat Barrón’s troops in Gandesa.

Throughout the battle the constant bombing of the bridges taxed the republican engineers to the limit. Each night they repaired the damage done during the day, a veritable task of Sysiphus. The most useful weapon which the nationalists had against the narrow bridges was the Stuka dive-bomber, but the Condor Legion never used more than two pairs at a time, and then with a strong fighter escort. The Luftwaffe was extremely concerned about losing one on enemy territory and the remains being sent to the Soviet Union. Even nationalist officers were not allowed to go near them. Stukas had been used for the first time during the Aragón offensive, but there had been little danger then, with the republicans retreating rapidly, because a downed aircraft could be recovered.

At dawn on 27 July republican aircraft had still not appeared, yet Modesto ordered his few T-26 tanks to attack Gandesa. General Rojo was appalled at the inexplicable absence of republican air cover. On 29 July he wrote to his friend Colonel Manuel Matallana with the Army of the Centre: ‘The Ebro front is almost paralysed…Once again we are facing the phenomenon in all our offensives of people seeming to be deflated.’
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This was hardly surprising. The plan was deeply flawed from the start, and once the initial advantage of surprise had worn off, the communist field commanders had no idea how to handle the situation. They reverted to their usual practice of wasting lives for no purpose, because they could not admit that their operation had failed. In the first week alone their troops had suffered a huge number of casualties, decimated by bombing and strafing, but also by dysentery and typhus.
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There was, too, a problem of physical and moral exhaustion, especially among the International Brigades. Dimitrov reported to Voroshilov and Stalin, ‘The soldiers of the International Brigades are extremely exhausted by the continuous battles, their military efficiency has fallen off, and the Spanish divisions have significantly outstripped them in fighting value and discipline.’
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On 30 July Modesto reorganized the formations in the central sector and took personal command of operations. He concentrated the tanks and artillery which had managed to cross the Ebro around Gandesa. But the tanks presented an excellent target for the Condor Legion’s 88mm anti-aircraft guns, which had been ordered to take them on whenever there were no aircraft around. Meanwhile its
Kampfgruppe
of Heinkel 111 bombers concentrated on the bridges, with over 40 sorties that day. They destroyed two bridges and one footbridge from a height of 4,000 metres. One of the bridges was repaired and again destroyed in a night bombing run. And the Stuka flight attacked the bridges at Asco and Vinebre, with eight of their 500kg bombs, achieving a direct hit on the latter.
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But the Stukas had less luck next day when they attempted to smash the tunnel exit four kilometres east of Mora la Nueva.

Modesto ordered a relentless bombardment of Gandesa with his thirteen batteries and launched his infantry into the attack. They reached the cemetery and came close to the heavily defended building of the agriculture syndicate, but they could not get to grips with Barrón’s men.

Meanwhile the 3rd Division attacked Vilalba dels Arcs. But all during daylight hours nationalist and allied aircraft continued to strike at troop concentrations and supply lines, still without opposition from the republican air force. Only on 31 July did republican planes appear in an attack on Gandesa.