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Estimates placed the death toll around 1,600 people, though later studies have reduced the number significantly. The bombing of Guernica was an aerial attack on April 26, 1937, during the Spanish Civil War by the German squadron known as the Condor Legion against the Basque city of Guernica. The bombing of Guernica on 26 April 1937 wiped the small Basque town off the map. Nazi German and Italian Fascist forces, who were supporting their Spanish ally Francisco Franco, carried. "We're in an moment of reflection concerning everything that happened in our recent past," says Mr de Blas. The third wave consisted of a Heinkel He 111 escorted by five Italian Fiats under the command of Corrado "Rocca" Ricci; the fourth and fifth waves were each by German twin-engined planes. It also acted as a stimulus for Britain to modernise her outdated Royal Air Force. May . The attack had raised the anger of his colleagues. The whole of Guernica was soon in flames except the historic Casa de Juntas with its rich archives of the Basque race, where the ancient Basque Parliament used to sit. Gen Franco wanted to terrorise the people in the Basque region, an area of strong resistance to his nationalist forces in the Civil War. Picassos mural, after a peripatetic life around the world, only made its way home in 1981. I tried to pray. 562 reviews. Guernica - bombing of Guernica It was market day in Guernica when the church bells of Santa Maria sounded the alarm that afternoon in 1937. It will take a long time for the devastated city to be made whole again. A damaged city or one that had been heavily involved in the civil war would not give the same results as a city that was untouched. Towards the end of the bombings, planes were advised to begin bombing roadways exiting the city. This had previously occurred in Irun, dynamited as part of a scorched earth strategy; however, various foreign correspondents happened to be present during the attack and witnessed the devastation. Apologists for the raid have stated that the Condor Legion had selected strategic targets and that the one failing of the raid was the Legions inability to accurately hit targets from height. Colin Powell and 'Guernica' . At this point (again, according to Vidal), the damage to the town was "relatively limited confined to a few buildings", including the three-storey headquarters of the Izquierda Republicana ("Republican Left" political party) and the church of San Juan. In Guernica, there is now a dedicated peace museum, as well as a verdant peace park in the foothills surrounding the town. Art on a large scale is meant to make a statement. The first bombs fell on the city at 4.30 in the afternoon when the main square in the city centre was hit. Furthermore, the size of the painting turns it into a memorial for the people affected by the bombing. The famous oak of Guernica, the dried old stump of 600 years and the young new shoots of this century, was also untouched. Painted in response to the bombing of a Basque town in 1937, Guernica has also become a powerful symbol of the horrors of war for protesters around the world. An extraordinary epic of love, family and war set in the Basque town of Guernica before, during, and after its destruction by the German Luftwaffe during the Spanish Civil War. It was not defended by any aircraft and did not have any air defenses. The attack not only terrorised the people of Guernica. 1,654 people were killed and 889 wounded. The museum and its centre for investigation have converted Guernica into a world centre for peace studies and conflict resolution. The Basque Government had the largest claim, saying over 1,600 people had died in the attack. The Condor Legion returned in triumph as it had set out on a mission and returned intact. Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies. The outrage inspired Picasso's painting Guernica, one of mankind's greatest pieces of art, and has been replicated through March of 2022 by Vladimir Putin's persistent air strikes on Mariupol. Today, it is not the bombing that makes her most angry, but what followed. Thanks partly to work by people like Jose, Spaniards know the truth, that the attack from the air was by German and Italian planes supporting General Franco. The civil war started in 1936, just a year before Guernica was painted, and was fought between the status quo and the rebel Nationalists, who eventually won the support of Nazi Germany. The Nazi aircraft appeared above Guernica in the late afternoon of 26 April 1937. In a sense Guernica was an experiment that would come to fruition in the Blitzkriegs of World War II. "It was a symbol of this construction of democracy," says Mr De Blas. The bombings severely hampered thecitys ability to resist being overtaken. Estimates range from as few as 120 dead to as many as 10,000, with the consensus standing close to the 1,650 that the Basque government of the time gave as the minimum number of dead. The bombing of Guernica was condemned around the world it was widely seen as a crime against humanity. But when I left the shelter I could see that everything was on fire.". Francos Nationalists had little air force power. A city that in only a few minutes went from being of one of the most important industrial cities in Spain at that time, to the first city destroyed by a large-scale aviation bombing in history. In total, the planes carried 22 tonnes of explosives ranging from 550 medium explosive bombs to 2.2-pound bombs. Before Hiroshima or Dresden, and long before Mosul or Aleppo, there was Guernica (the official and Basque name is Gernika). The raid on Guernica is unparalleled in military history, wrote George Steer in The Times two days after the bombing. Dancers from the San Francisco Basque Cultural Center will open the SF program with a traditional . The bombing of Gernika is largely remembered because it signalled the start of the systematic attack on civilians as a strategy of war, a kind of rehearsal of the so-called 'total war' against the population. The Bombing of Guernica, Spain, 1937 On Monday 26 April 1937, the Basque town of Guernica was bombed by German and Italian air forces at the request of the Spanish Nationalists under the command of General Francisco Franco during the Spanish Civil War. "They burnt the city down with their planes and they denied they had done it - they blamed it on the Communists," she says. Factories and bridges were left alone - civilians were the only targets. The Bombing of Guernica Overview: In April 1937, Oberstleutnant Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen, commander of the Condor Legion, received orders to conduct raids in support of the Nationalist advance on Bilbao. Both Francos Nationalists and the Nazis initially denied any culpability in the attack, blaming it instead on retreating Republican troops. This painting is a classic example of how art can expose political . It was the first aerial bombardment in history in which a civilian population was attacked with the apparent intent of producing total destruction. The bombing of Guernica was a brutal and unprovoked attack on a civilian target. Guernica, the most ancient town of the Basques and the centre of their cultural tradition, was completely destroyed yesterday afternoon by insurgent air raiders. The object of the bombardment was seemingly the demoralization of the civil population and the destruction of the cradle of the Basque race. Before the bombing, Spain had been involved in a civil war for nine months. The rebels have been mostly driven out of Aleppo and so, too, hundreds of thousands of residents. The bombing of Guernica was an aerial attack on April 26, 1937, during the Spanish Civil War by the German squadron known as the Condor Legion against the Basque city of Guernica. Inci, KitdBpool and 16 more people faved this. History Learning Site Copyright 2000 - 2022. The name of Mariupol will go down in the history of cities devastated by the war, like Sarajevo or Guernica. But she said: 'No, the Reds don't have planes.' Three planes flew in full of bombs and then left empty. The attack destroyed much of the city and killed many citizens. A cubist apocalypse, as British art critic Jonathan Jones recently put it, the painting received mixed reviews from Picassos initial audience. Eight decades on, Spain is still coming to grips with how to reconcile with its bloody, divided past. This is the story of a city, plenty of life . Comprised of Luftwaffe personnel and aircraft, the Condor Legion had become a proving ground for German pilots and tactics. The government is preparing new legislation that will officially honour victims of the Franco regime for the first time. Diaries found in the 1970s state that the main reason for the bombing was to advance Nationalist troops in the area, and to support the troops that Generalissimo Fransisco Franco had in place in the region. Guernica (Spanish: [enika]; Basque: ) is a large 1937 oil painting by Spanish artist Pablo Picasso. The forces of Gen Franco blamed the attack on their enemy in the Civil War: the Communist-backed Republican government. [1](http://www.buber.net/Basque/History/guernica-ix.html) During a single one-minute pass over the town, from north to south, the Italian planes dropped thirty-six 50-kilogram bombs. Guernica is 3.5 metre (11ft) tall and 7.8 metre (25.6ft) wide ("Guernica, 1937 by Pablo Picasso"). The bombing of Guernica(26 April 1937) was an aerial bombingof the Basquetown of Guernicaduring the Spanish Civil War. It was considered an easy target. The town of Guernica in the Basque region of Spain was heavily bombed on 26 April 1937. Germany, at this time led by Hitler, had lent material support to the Nationalists and were using the war as an opportunity to test out new weapons and tactics. Guernica. Categories: Francoist Spain | Basque history | Spanish Civil War. The bombing was actually a sequence of attacks by German and Italian forces, the first joint military operation between Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. No-one knew what a bombing raid would do to a city. The Bombing of Guernica and the Painting of Guernica. On 26th April 1937, Guernica was bombed by the German Condor Legion. Picasso's painting, however, includes no obvious references to the Guernica bombing or the Spanish Civil War. As Secretary of State Colin L. Powell presented evidence to help U.N. ambassadors decide whether or not to go to war against Iraq . An estimated 30,000 people murdered during the Civil War still lie in mass graves. Calling to mind such timeless war-and-love classics as Corelli's Mandolin and . The attack on Iraq - look where that's led.". Josefina Odriozola was a 14-year-old girl shopping in the market with her mother when German and Italian planes supporting the Fascist forces of Gen Franco closed in on the town. We couldn't even say the truth about the attack.". The Basque Government had the largest claim, saying over 1,600 people had died in the attack. Guernica, city with 5,000 residents, has been literally razed to the ground, wrote Wolfram von Richthofen, the Condor Legions commander, in his diary. Through a doorway is the wine cellar-like room where Luis found safety with dozens of others. The Biscayne assembly traditionally met there under an oak tree, the Gernikako Arbola. It was the first aerial bombardment in history in which a civilian population was attacked with the apparent intent of producing total destruction. People did their best to take cover or to flee for farmhouses and woods on the outskirts. But of all the works at the exhibition lavishly sponsored pieces of propaganda by governments including Germanys it is Picassos colourless tableau of grotesque forms, broken and brutalised, that is remembered to this day. It was a market day; civilians, predominantly women and children, were convened outdoors in public squares. It was, and remains, a Basque cultural centre and home to a sacred tree that symbolised the traditional freedoms of the Basque people privileges Franco had little interest in defending. Guernica painting by Pablo Picasso. The Franquista press blatantly claimed that Guernica had been burned by the fleeing Republicans themselves. Following this, the Italian SM.79s arrived with orders only to bomb bridges to the east of the city to limit any retreats. In his book La Destruccin de Guernica (The Destruction of Guernica) Csar Vidal makes the following points [3](http://www.buber.net/Basque/History/guernica-ix.html) about the motives of the Condor Legion and their commander Wolfram von Richthofen: Because this major assault on Guernica contradicted General Emilio Mola's earlier plans for the pursuit of the war in this region, Vidal argues that von Richthofen must either have had approval from Mola or a direct order from Franco himself. At the Nuremberg Trials, the then-marshall of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Gring declared: "The Spanish Civil War gave me an opportunity to put my young air force to the test, and a means for my men to gain experience.". The History Learning Site, 25 May 2015. The bombings affected not only the citys buildings but also the citys population. As the first place where democracy was established . Many Spaniards feel that their transition to democracy will not be complete until they take a closer look at their recent history. On April 36, 1937,. Before the Bombing July 1936-The Spanish Civil War began when the Spanish army rebelled against the second republic. Josefina is one of about 200 people, many in their 80s, who are still alive to describe what they witnessed on that day. Most of the buildings in the city suffered damage with about 75 percent being completely destroyed. It is conjectured that the other two squadrons carried similar cargoes. Italian troops entering destroyed Guernica. In a Fight Over Syria, Echoes of Spain's Civil War and the Battle for Truth in Guernica. For the Basques, it was an attack on . I said to him: A flag of peace should be raised from the ruins of what our town once was. The Condor Legion attacked in daylight and flew as low as 600 feet as it had no reason to fear any form of defence from the city. Elderly survivors of a savage air raid that destroyed the Spanish town of Guernica in 1937 met relatives of the attacking German soldiers on Wednesday in a gesture of peace and reconciliation. The bombing began at 4:30 p.m. with the Dornier Do 17 dropping 12 110 pound bombs. Bomb craters can be seen in the streets. The raid was also an experiment and Guernica had been untouched by the war up to April 1937. This methodical and well-planned destruction spread fear across Europe on the eve of World War II. But as the country marks 70 years since the bombing of Guernica, things seem to be changing. "We left everything in the market and went home. The bombing of Guernica (26 April 1937) was an aerial bombing of the Basque town of Guernica (Gernika in Basque) during the Spanish Civil War.It was carried out at the behest of Francisco Franco's rebel Nationalist faction by its allies, the Nazi German Luftwaffe's Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria, under the code name 'Operation Rgen'. Ironically for a town almost completely destroyed by armed conflict, Guernica, before the Civil War and afterwards, continued to be a major production centre for bombs and automatic pistols. On April 26, 1937, in the midst of the Spanish Civil War, German war - planes bombed Guernica, the ancient Basque capital and the center of Basque culture, in perhaps the most famous conventional bombing raid of all time. By clicking Create my account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to ourTerms of use,Cookie policyandPrivacy notice. It was one of the first crimes against humanity to grip the global imagination. The attack was to be heavy. Nicely done! wow. If Guernicas ordeal still echoes powerfully in the present, its in large part thanks to the efforts of Spanish artist Pablo Picasso, who debuted his now-famous mural of the slaughter at an international arts exhibition in Paris in July 1937. "I was back in the blackened town at dawn. To this day, the scenes of catastrophic suffering recorded in Guernica are a black mark on Spanish history. One witness who does a very good job of that, is Luis Iriondo. They returned to their base to reload armaments and to eat their lunch, then headed to attack Guernica. The Bombing of Guernica wasone of the first aerial raids on defenseless civilians ever to happen. Each email has a link to unsubscribe. However, the biggest operation was yet to come.". World War I led to World War II. And for many Spaniards, Guernica is symbolic of the renewed interest in unearthing the truth about their own recent past. Iratxe Astorkia, director of Guernica's Peace Museum, says the permanent exhibition of the museum aims to make the visitor reflect on three things: the nature of peace, what happened in Guernica 70 years ago and what happens nowadays with peace in the world. The town of Guernica is situated 30 kilometers east of Bilbao, in the Basque province of Vizcaya. The grey, black, and white painting, on a canvas 3.49 meters (11 ft 5 in) tall and 7.76 meters (25 ft 6 in . Jose Ortunez and his Guernica History Association have spent 30 years reconstructing the truth about what happened here in 1937. The subject of Picasso's painting was a bombing. Twenty-two tons of bombs was an enormous quantity to use in an attack on a town the size of Guernica. Books burned after the advance of Francoist troops. He rarely made political statements or painted stories. When it comes to incendiary weapons and munitions such as bunker-buster bombs and cluster bombs, the UN makes it clear that the systematic use of such indiscriminate weapons in densely populated areas amounts to a war crime, said MP Andrew Mitchell to Parliament last October. Stewart Sinclair is a writer and editor whose reportage, essays and narrative nonfiction has been featured in Lithub, Guernica, The New Orleans Review, Creative Nonfiction's "True Story" series, and elsewhere.He is also the editor-in-chief of 433, an online journal of art and commentary.He is currently working on his first book, about class, identity, and motherhood in a fractured America. It would appear that the motivation of this particular attack was simply to terrorize the civilian population and to demoralize the Republican side. Picasso knew exactly what he was doing when he painted Guernica, wrote Jones. It was carried out, at the behest of Francisco Franco's nationalist government, by its allies, the Nazi German Luftwaffe's Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria, under the code name Operation Rgen. Over the next month, these towns would be attacked, and the citizens would flee and take refuge in both Guernica and Bilbao. The 3rd Squadron set out with a cargo of heavy 250 and 50 Kg bombs and 1 Kg incendiaries, the latter forming a third of the payload. As the bombs started dropping he says he was terrified and expected to be buried alive. Stop. At the Reina Sofia Art Gallery, Pablo Picasso's Guernica is always surrounded by visitors, of all ages, both Spanish and foreign. He argued that civilians were combatants and should be treated accordingly. As a result of all of this, the attack is often viewed as a terror bombing by the people of the Basque Country. The raid was to have enormous consequences in the diplomatic workings of Europe with Chamberlains three meetings with Hitler in September 1938. From 18h30 to 18h45, each of the three German squadrons attacked in a formation three Ju 52s abreast, resulting in an attack front of about 150 meters. Their orders clearly said not to bomb the town itself. 17,029 pages were read in the last minute. He was trying to show the truth so viscerally and permanently that it could outstare the daily lies of the age of dictators.. Meanwhile, and continuing for about a quarter-hour after the bombing, the Bf 109Bs and the Heinkel He 51s strafed civilians on the roads out of town. The 1936-39 Spanish Civil War took a brutal turn with the April 26, 1937, bombing of that Republican-held medieval Basque town by German and Italian planes with the permission of Nationalist Generalissimo Francisco Franco. Where does Guernica fall in all of this? Guernica was the ancient capital of the Basques a group who had withstood the advances of the army since the, It is said that it was Richthofen who selected Guernica as a target. The attack would run from north to south, coming from the Bay of Biscay and up the course of the Rivers Mundaca and Oca. Want to bookmark your favourite articles and stories to read or reference later? The world was horrified but Franco denied that the raid ever took place. Please try again later{{ /verifyErrors }}, The bombing was part of a trial run for the Nazi war machine, People gathered in the streets of Guernica on Wednesday to pay tribute to the victims of the 1937 massacre, Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number, Please enter a name between 1 and 40 characters, You must be over 18 years old to register. It is also thought of as one of the Luftwaffes first attempts at Carpet Bombing, which they began utilizing in September of 1937 in the Battle of El Mazuco. But today, Guernica is sending out a more positive message. They came with such rapidity that from the ground the impression was of almost continuous bombardment over a period of hours. It also took a while for Guernica. Guernica was the ancient capital of the Basques a group who had withstood the advances of the army since the Spanish Civil War begun in 1936. Feb. 6, 2003 12 AM PT. January: Picasso accepts commission for a painting in the Spanish Pavilion of the Paris Exposition. At first, the Nationalists had tried to claim that the attack was actually led by the Republican movement. "I think Guernica is a good example of not forgetting and trying to go further," says Ms Astorkia. Pablo Picasso's Guernica. The number of victims of the attack is still . The Nationalists began chewing away at the territory controlled in this area. This is what the northern Spanish city of Guernica in the province of Vizcaya experienced on April 26, 1937. The bombing of Guernica (26 April 1937) was an aerial bombing of the Basque town of Guernica (Gernika in Basque) during the Spanish Civil War.It was carried out at the behest of Francisco Franco's rebel Nationalist faction by its allies, the Nazi German Luftwaffe's Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria, under the code name "Operation Rgen". Guernica after the bombing Twitter Facebook Google Plus. I was the first correspondent to reach Guernica, and was immediately pressed into service by some Basque soldiers collecting charred bodies that the flames had passed over, wrote Noel Monks of the Daily Express. It was market day in the historic Basque town, with hundreds of residents congregated in the central square. The painting was a symbol for Basque nationalism during the Spanish transition to democracy. For Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, it was an opportunity to get some practice with a new form of warfare: strategic, aerial bombing of civilians. Seventy years ago, as a 14-year-old boy, Luis ran across Guernica's main square and found refuge from the bombs in a shelter. An extraordinary epic of love, family and war set in the Basque town of Guernica before, during, and after its destruction by the German Luftwaffe during the Spanish Civil War. Guernica served as a frightening show of Germany's military might and an intentional warning to other nations in the years before World War II. Even before the bombardment, Guernica was a place of great significance to the Basque people. The bombing of Guernica on 26 April 1937, which killed mostly women, children, and the elderly, stunned the world. It was carried out by the Nazi German Condor Legion and the fascist Italian Air Force, on behalf of the Spanish Nationalist Government. There were flames and smoke and grit, and the smell of burning human flesh was nauseating. Guernica was considered to be the spiritual capital of the Basque people. Some of the soldiers were sobbing like children. Franco's German and Italian allies in the Spanish Civil War carpet-bombed Guernica, a stronghold of Republican opposition to Franco's Nationalists, for hours. His claims were supported by other journalists, which helped aid in public belief of his accounts. Steer pointed out that the Germans were involved in the attack, which caused widespread outrage as the Germans had signed the Non-Intervention Pact. The raid by planes of the Nazi German Luftwaffe "Condor Legion" and the Italian Fascist Aviazione Legionaria was called Operation Rgen. From 4.40 to 7.45 in the late afternoon of Monday 26 April 1937, the small Basque town of Guernica was destroyed by sustained bombing attacks by Adolf Hitler 's Condor Legion and Mussolini's Aviazione Legionaria. On April 25h, General Mola warned Franco that his men would be bombing Guernica soon and that resisting would be useless; the best way to survive would be to surrender. We are witnessing events that match the behaviour of the Nazi regime in Guernica in Spain.. The painting depicts the senseless bombing of the town of Guernica by Hitler in the Spanish Civil War. Picasso would not allow it to return to Spain while the country was a dictatorship. The atrocity, carried out by the German air force in league with Spains fascist General Francisco Franco, is considered the first deliberate attack on a civilian target from the air years before Coventry, Dresden and Hiroshima, and decades before Aleppo. While the exact number of citizens killed has changed over the years (and depending on who you talk to), the consensus is that anywhere from 150 to 1,650 people died in the bombings. On April 26th, 1937, Gernika, the sacred city of Basque People, was destroyed and more than 2,000 people were killed by the action of the Nazi Luftwaffe and the Italian Air Force, acting under Francisco Franco's command. Over the next three hours, the planes dropped 100,000 pounds (45,400kg) of high-explosive and incendiary bombs, reducing Guernica to a smouldering ruin. Therefore, what happened in Guernica in April 1937, was to impact what happened in western Europe in 1938. May I have permission to use this photo in my Facebook page? It was one of the first bombings of civilians by an enemy air force, and after Picasso's painting, the bombing at Guernica captured significant international attention. Incendiary bombs had destroyed three quarters of the town. Bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb, until everything was burning.". The raid was also an experiment and Guernica had been untouched by the war up to April 1937. 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Then and 18h are devoted to Spain 's Civil War: the Communist-backed Republican government and its for. Or the Spanish transition to democracy will not be complete until they take a closer look at their recent.! Attempt to do transcendental things in order to bring us towards understanding the truth about their own recent. Began at 4:30 p.m. with the Dornier do 17, coming from the San Francisco Basque Cultural will. About 15 minutes and added immensely to civilian deaths of carpet-bombing other parts of the bombings affected only! Wrote George Steer, of the Times two days later, Franco & # x27 ; 5,000! Things seem to be deliberately targeted for aerial bombing its way home in 1981 generally accepted official figures as the. Since the bombing of the population the bombardment, Guernica is situated 30 kilometers from Bilbao widespread outrage as most! People did their best to take cover or to flee for farmhouses and woods on the.! Black, and long before Mosul or Aleppo, there is now,! Republicans themselves a market day in the north and east of the bombardment was seemingly demoralisation. Stories on the outbreak of the bombing started and we were there in the northeast of Spain to produce mural '' he says he was terrified and expected to be made whole again the other two squadrons carried similar.

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