The third body of opinion, a minority one held by militants such as Durruti, Camillo Berneri, Jaime Balius, and so on (and one which I incidentally agree with) also anticipated a lengthy war because of the involvement of Germany and Italy - but held that war and revolution were inseparable.
It was a fatal strategy that quickly absorbed them, undermined their principles and transformed what had hitherto been a great instrument of the working class into just another rigid bureaucratic institution. Their argument was that such a strategy would prevent a situation developing wherein a victorious but exhausted CNT might be overwhelmed by another political force which had been more sparing with its forces ie, the Spanish Communist Party.
They opted instead for compromising alliances with the bourgeois Republican, Catalanist and Stalinist parties. They anticipated a lengthy war and opposed implementing Libertarian Communism until the war was won. The second position was that held by members of the regional, national and peninsular committees of the CNT-FAI, the so-called ‘notables’, office holders such as such as Horacio Prieto, Mariano Rodriguez, Federica Montseny, Diego Abad de Santillan, García Oliver, etc. Thus, the movement should proceed immediately to socialise the factories, the land and their communities. The first, probably the majority view, was that the war would be over in a matter of weeks, after all, a few days had been enough to rout the army in Barcelona and other industrial centres, and that the social revolution and Libertarian Communism as debated and adopted by the CNT’s national congress at Zaragoza in February, five months previously, was an inseparable aspect of the struggle against economic and social oppression. Within the Spanish anarchist and anarcho-syndicalist movements there were three distinct points of view on the question of war and revolution. June: Anarchist Intelligence and Security Services Pierre Besnard’s reply to ‘ Catastrophic Revolution ′ September: The international debate on war and revolution May: Unpublished Letter to Max Nettlau from Emma Goldman Militarisation - March 1937: Dissolution of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Councilsįebruary 1937: Memorandum from War Committee of the Iron Column, 16 February 1937Īpril 1937 -An Open Letter to Federica MontsenyĪpril 1937: Confidential letter from an agent of Negrín, 15 April 1937 Protest before the libertarians, of present and future regarding the capitulations of 1937 by an ‘uncontrollable’ from the Iron ColumnĪddress by Federica Montseny, 3 January 1937 The staffing and specialities of Companies, Regiments and Divisions and the formation of a single collective command for the Aragón front To the comrades, to the confederal columns Operation ‘Free Commune’: The Taking of Zaragoza
Summer 1936: Why did we fail to take Zaragoza?įrom Barcelona to Zaragoza, a walk in the park, militarily? CNT entry into Madrid Government November 1936
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