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Why couldn’t Hitler bring Spain into World War II? From Hendaye in October 1940 to the failed plans for Operation Felix, this documentary follows Franco’s demands for supplies and territory, the danger to Spain’s overseas connections, and Germany’s conflicting priorities in French North Africa.
Contemporary diplomatic records explain why sympathy for the Axis never became an executable agreement on Spanish entry. The Blue Division, naval cooperation and wartime trade also show why staying outside general war did not mean impartial neutrality.
Archival credits :
Pascual Marin / CC BY 3.0
Wisniewski / CC BY-SA 3.0 de
Studnitz, von H.G. / CC BY-SA 3.0 de
Unknown Unknown / CC BY-SA 3.0 de:
Unknown author Unknown author / CC BY-SA 3.0 de:
Pascual Marín / CC BY-SA 3.0
Agustina Zugasti / CC BY-SA 3.0
Heinrich Hoffmann / CC BY-SA 3.0 de
Unknown Unknown / CC BY-SA 3.0 de
Unknown author Unknown author / CC BY-SA 3.0 de
Vicente Martín / CC BY-SA 3.0:
Bundesarchiv item catalogue numbers and exact credits are also displayed with each corresponding image. Kutxa Fototeka / GureGipuzkoa partnership photographs credited by photographer above.
CC0: Biblioteca Virtual de Defensa; Nationaal Archief/Spaarnestad. US government Torch photograph: National Archives 195516.
Documents: US Department of State, The Spanish Government and the Axis (GPO 1946), UC San Diego Library ; Directive 18 prosecution translation, Harvard Nuremberg Trials Project
Film: US War Department / Army Signal Corps, The Battle of Britain (1943) ; Army Service Forces (1944) ; Casablanca Conference (January 1943), 111-ADC-3053
Chapters
00:00 Hendaye and the missing agreement
01:46 The Civil War inheritance
03:33 Neutrality changes meaning
05:15 The price of intervention
07:05 Bread, fuel and distribution
08:57 What Gibraltar could change
10:43 An ally bought at France’s expense
12:36 The September bargaining
14:22 Inside the Hendaye problem
16:19 Felix was a plan
18:07 The date Franco would not accept
20:04 Who had to move first
21:55 Helping without general entry
23:57 Spanish soldiers in Germany’s war
26:00 The balance turns
27:57 What actually kept Spain out
