division "azul"

[Ebusitanus]

Yeah, I guess some might have found the Blue Division as a place to make money. I would think that such individuals might have been among the "regular" Army Non-coms and Officers that had to go there sent by Franco to bolster and control such a mass of germanophilic Falangist volunteers. Such pay-per fight elements would have been the last contingents sent there as reeplacements for the veterans there as "more willing" noncoms and officers had begun to dry out.
Many a Spaniard went to work at the German war industry to make some money and I have not heard much about them being mistreated to much. Perhaps their different origin as volunteers and not conscripted workforce (Like Italian POWs or French) would have granted them a better treatment. Among those workers did people like Ezquerra also look for volunteers for his Waffen-SS outfit.
I read recently about this Blue Div. veteran who, after his tour of duty at the front, went to work at the German war industry to make Torpedoes. He eventually settled after the war in Germany and recently joined the general war reparations fun when demanding compensation from the German goverment as "slave worker". Quite justly his shameless request was turned away.

[Graf von Dracula]

I fully agree with you Ebusitanus.

My sources about the motivation of the Spanish volunteers come from an article (quite good) from the Spanish magazine "Historia y Vida", in the number 405 comes a 7-page article about the Division.

Surely 18,000 men can't have the same motivation to fight. Some found it a way to get some money, and seems like others (although seems there were some few who deserted to the Russians) tried to join the Division to encover their past or the past of their relatives as "Rojos", as people loyal to the Republica. It is the case of the Spanish cinema director Jose Luis Garcia Berlanga, or the actor Luis Ciges.

About the Spanish PoWs, the numbers are quite not reliable, but looks like 1/3 of the Spanish PoWs died while they were in captivity. I saw in a documentary that the soldiers who deserted to the Russians were incarcerated together with the prisoners loyal to the Franquist Regime, so the riots were quite usual in the gallows where Spanish PoWs were trapped.

About the Waffen-SS Ezquerra Unit, all the information I have comes from a magazine called "Eurouniformes". Do you know where I could get more info about that unit (both in Spanish or in English)?

Best regards

[Ebusitanus]

It is just a kind of sad tendency of these political correct days to drag through the mud a great idealistic combat archivement of 45.000 men by just pointing out the "flaws" of a few. Be it those who joined for sheer profit, those to cover up past republican inclinations in a new franquist Spain or those communist elements outright wanting to desert. On the other side it seems that International Brigades who aided the Republicans during their fight wouldn´t possibly fall under such, obvious, fascist flaws.

On the side of the "deserters". Those who deserted were normally just procesed by the Soviets into their tasks. Those "communist" elements in the POW camps were not mainly deserters but a common ocurrence as with German POWs. Some of those prisoners just "converted" to the delicacies of Soviet doctrine, some brainwashed, some out to get some material favors (food, better lodgement, etc..) much like these Komitee Freies Deutschland. Since the Soviets themselves were not very convinced about the "conversion", they kept them in the Camps among their fellow countrymen..Thus the inevitable riots.

On the Waffen SS. I have several sites, some in Spanish and some in English.

http://www.geocities.com/divazul/divisionazul2.html

http://visantain.iespana.es/visantain/secreala.htm

[Graf von Dracula]

Thanks a lot for the links Ebusitanus!

I think that never has been dropped to the mud the achievements of the Division. The main bulk of the division fought for an anticommunist ideal, and they fought with bravery. If others fought for different motivations, I think the bravery remains there, and the good concept about the Spanish troops that had the Germans remains there.

They were Spaniards, and they wrote a page of spanish bravery in that war, as did the men who fought with the French Foreign Legion both in Europe and Asia, the British Army or the USMC Company made up of Basque volunteers that fought in the Pacific. Many forget that many of the first fighters of the French "Resistance" were in fact former Republicans, and that the first unit to enter in the liberated Paris was an Spanish Unit, with her Halftracks named after Spanish villages like "Guernika" in the first place.

They may have defended different ideologies, but the units with Spaniards between their men were always known for their bravery, whether which side fought.

I've many times wondered about writting a book about the exploits of the Spaniards in WWII, from all the sides. Surely that would be interesting.

[Parsifal]

Found a nice video of the Division. I'd never seen General Emilio Infantes on video!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JdMqICTi ... re=related

[Armia Krajowa]

Hi everybody

With googleearth I have just created a geographical proyect about the Division Azul or Blue Division

The information is in spanish but anyway if you wanna load the .kmz file into you google earth to surf through the historical places it's quiet easy.

http://www.google-earth.es/index.php?na ... pic&t=4581










Greetings!!

[Armia Krajowa]

I have update the projekt... can be downloaded here

http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.p ... 270&page=1

[jenofonte]

Awesome.

[Armia Krajowa]

Thanks jenofonte... soon, new versions are comming (as I read more about the spanish division)

[Camp Upshur]

"the USMC Company made up of Basque volunteers that fought in the Pacific" posted by 'Graf von Dracula'

BS flag going up...way way way up!

R/S
Camp Upshur (US Marine-Euskaldun)