SPAIN: Everybody's War

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Roles Reversed. A glance last week at Spain (see map, p. 25) showed that after eight and one-half months of civil war, the offensive has passed for the first time to the Leftists. Rightist Spain, which proclaimed its Government at Burgos on the sixth day of the war and is recognized as a nation by Germany and Italy, had never lost territory it had once conquered until the recent rout of Italians in the Guadalajara sector in "un piccolo Caporetto" (TIME, April 5). By last week the Rightists had lost strips and snippets of territory here & there along most of their fronts as the Leftists proved able for the first time to get out in the open and launch sustained attacks. They pressed their offensive northeast of Madrid for a gain of twelve miles, hurtled through in the Cordoba sector 13 miles, and delivered their first major blows outside of Spain proper by sending a fleet of bombers and the battleship Jaime Primero across the Straits of Gibraltar to shell and strafe Ceuta, important supply base in Spanish Morocco which, ever since the war began, has been Rightist. Snug in Gibraltar last week Britons saw dense clouds of smoke erupt from Ceuta, suggesting Leftist success in setting fire to Rightist docks and warehouses crammed with food and munitions.

Rightist troop morale in southern Spain, according to the Leftists, was ebbing, partly because of military factors but even more because Rightists were being tempted by every means of expert Leftist propaganda to drop their rifles, come on over and share Spain. Leaflets dropped from airplanes and shot over no-man's land in Leftist skyrockets read: "Brothers, among us everyone owns everything in Spain collectively! The proof is that every man behind our lines gets all the land he can till free. Is that true behind your lines? We promise 'Bread, Land and Liberty for All!' and we keep our promises!"

Similar slogans were used in the Russia of 1917 to sow disaffection among soldiers opposing the Red Army, and daily last week Spain supplied a dossier of facts to show that it was Soviet assistance, ably coordinated by Moscow's General Emilio Kleber and the fleets of Russian bombing planes and tanks at the disposal of Madrid which were enabling the Leftists to succeed last week, just as previous sweeping Rightist drives relied enormously on Italian and German bombers and tanks. Nearly every night last week Madrid put on wild celebrations. Its Defense Junta voted to decorate its chairman General José Miaja "for valor." This wise, owl-bald Spanish professional soldier had to exert himself afresh to check the "overoptimism" against which he is so tart.

Meanwhile 500,000 Rightist propaganda leaflets were fluttering down among the Basques against whom General Mola was driving. They urged everyone who disapproved of "sharing everything in Spain collectively" to hustle over to the Rightists and, according to dispatches from Rightist territory, these leaflets had considerable effect, numbers of devout Basques deserting their Radiorator. Advices from Bilbao reaching France were that many middle-class citizens favored joining the Rightist cause as the only alternative to "sharing everything" with Bilbao mobsters and blast furnace stalwarts.