{ "slug": "guadalajara", "title": "Battle of Guadalajara", "status": "draft", "era": "WWII and later", "date_text": "8–23 March 1937", "start": "1937-03-08", "end": "1937-03-23", "war": "The Spanish Civil War", "cdb90_war": "THE SPANISH CIVIL WAR", "place": { "name": "Guadalajara, Brihuega and Trijueque, north-east of Madrid, Spain", "lat": 40.63, "lon": -3.17, "wikidata": "Q1641241" }, "lede": "In March 1937 Mussolini's motorised Italian corps drove north-east of Madrid to close a pincer on the capital, only to be stopped in sleet and mud and thrown back by Republican tanks and aircraft. It was Fascist Italy's worst defeat of the Spanish Civil War.", "result": "Republican victory", "result_cdb90": "attacker loss", "belligerents": [ { "role": "attacker", "name": "Italian Corpo Truppe Volontarie (CTV), with the Nationalist Soria Division", "commanders": [ "General Mario Roatta", "General Annibale Bergonzoli", "General José Moscardó (Nationalist troops)" ], "strength": { "value": 35000, "low": 35000, "high": 50000, "source": "s1" }, "casualties": { "value": 17400, "low": 3700, "high": 17400, "source": "s1" } }, { "role": "defender", "name": "Spanish Republican Army (12th, 11th, 14th Divisions and reinforcements, with International Brigades)", "commanders": [ "Colonel Vicente Rojo (chief of staff)", "General José Miaja", "Colonel Enrique Jurado (IV Corps)", "Enrique Líster", "Cipriano Mera" ], "strength": { "value": 20000, "low": 10000, "high": 20000, "source": "s1" }, "casualties": { "value": 6258, "low": 6258, "high": 6258, "source": "s1" } } ], "sections": { "background": "After the failed Nationalist drives on Madrid in 1936 and the bloody battle of the Jarama in February 1937, Franco's armies were exhausted. Franco nevertheless planned a fourth offensive, this time to close a pincer around the capital from the north-east. Italy was optimistic after the fall of Málaga earlier that winter, Mussolini endorsed the plan, and he committed Italian units to it.\n\nGeneral Mario Roatta, commanding the Italian Corpo Truppe Volontarie, planned an advance along a front of some 25 kilometres between Guadalajara and Alcalá de Henares, where five good roads ran towards Madrid. The Republic's defence on that sector was thin: the 12th Division under Colonel Lacalle, with about 10,000 men and no prepared positions. Republican staff expected the next Nationalist attack to come from the south, where the Jarama fighting had been.\n\nThe Italians' great advantage was mobility. Their plan relied on tankettes and speed along the good roads, and on a quick march on Madrid. Their weakness was less obvious beforehand. They underestimated Madrid's defenders after the walkover at Málaga, they were unprepared for the cold, wet weather of a Castilian March, and their aircraft depended on airfields that turned to mud. Paul Preston calls Roatta's failure to entrench grossly negligent. Meanwhile Nationalist inaction at the Jarama had also let the Republic concentrate its forces.", "forces": "The attacker was a mixed Italian corps of motorised infantry, tankettes, artillery and aircraft, supported by a Nationalist division. Published figures put the Italian side at about 35,000 men with 270 guns, 140 armoured vehicles (mostly light CV33 tankettes) and 62 aircraft, plus 15,000 Nationalists, though another account of the same battle gives a different picture, with 35,000 Nationalists, 222 guns, 108 tankettes and 60 CR.32 fighters. The Italian units were not uniformly good. John Gooch, writing about the aftermath, described the corps as a motley crew, with 25 per cent having criminal records and 15 per cent over forty. Many men were in colonial uniforms that were poor protection against sleet.\n\nThe Republic began with the thin 12th Division, but it brought in reinforcements within days. They included the XI and XII International Brigades, Líster's division, Mera's troops, the 14th Division, Soviet T-26 tanks with rotating turrets, and perhaps 100 I-15 and I-16 fighters and Katiusha bombers operating from Albacete's concrete runway. Colonel Vicente Rojo, the chief of staff, supplied much of the planning; Miaja was among the senior commanders. Italian tankettes were outclassed by the Soviet T-26, and the Republican air force, flying from a hard runway, held the sky when the Italians were grounded by mud.", "course": "**The Italian advance, 8–10 March.** After half an hour of artillery and air raids on 8 March, Italian tankettes broke the line of the Republic's 50th Brigade. Fog and sleet limited visibility to about 100 metres. The Italians advanced 10 to 12 kilometres, taking Mirabueno, Alaminos and Castejón. On 9 March the weather bogged the attack down and the 50th Brigade withdrew without fighting; about noon the XI International Brigade halted the advance. The Italians made another 15 to 18 kilometres, reaching the outskirts of Brihuega, then paused. On 10 March Nationalist assaults on the XI and XII International Brigades failed, but Brihuega fell almost without opposition. Lacalle resigned and Nino Nanetti took over the 12th Division. This phase precedes CDB90's engagement, GUADALAJARA-BRIHUEGA (255), which begins on 11 March.\n\n**The advance stalls, 11–13 March.** On 11 March the Italians pushed on against the retreating International Brigades and stopped about three kilometres short of Torija. The Nationalist Soria Division took Hita and Torre del Burgo. On 12 March the Republic counterattacked under Líster, supported by about 100 fighters and bombers from Albacete. The Italian aircraft stayed on the ground in the mud. Tankettes stuck on the roads were strafed. The Republicans reached Trijueque. On 13 March they pressed on Trijueque and Palacio de Ibarra. Rojo's plan was for Líster's division and the armour to push along the Zaragoza road while the 14th Division crossed the Tajuña to attack Brihuega. Italian commanders ignored warnings.\n\n**Pause and counteroffensive, 14–18 March.** The International Brigade captured Palacio de Ibarra on 14 March, and the Republicans spent the next days concentrating about 20,000 men, 60 light tanks and 70 aircraft. On 18 March the 14th Division crossed a pontoon bridge over the Tajuña and attacked from about 13:30, surrounding Brihuega. The Italians retreated in panic. The Littorio Division slowed Líster but conducted an orderly retreat, and an Italian counterattack was repulsed by the Assault Guard Division. CDB90's engagement ends on 16 March, before this decisive blow.\n\n**Final phase, 19–23 March.** The Republicans retook Gajanejos and Villaviciosa de Tajuña. Their advance halted along the Valdearenas, Ledanca and Hontanares line after Franco sent in reserves.\n\n**What the Republic took.** Coverdale's list of captured materiel includes 65 artillery pieces, 500 machine guns, 13 mortars, 67 trucks and 10 tanks, as well as plenty of ammunition. The pontoon crossing of the Tajuña and the concentration of armour and aircraft on a hard-surfaced airfield, rather than any numerical superiority on the first days, are what the account in these sources turns on.", "aftermath": "The Republic prevented the encirclement of Madrid, and Franco turned to nibbling away at Republican territory, starting in the north. The battle's reputation far outran its military scale. Herbert Matthews wrote in the New York Times that it was to Fascism what the defeat at Bailén had been to Napoleon, the British press called it a new Caporetto, and Lloyd George mocked the Italian skedaddle, which angered Mussolini. Italian losses vary widely in the sources, from 600 to 3,000 dead, while Republican captures included artillery, machine guns, mortars, trucks and some tanks.\n\nThe defeat damaged Mussolini's image of iron military strength. Franco, fearing that the Italian corps might become independent, is said to have threatened to disperse it, but nothing came of this. The CTV's commander was replaced, two Blackshirt divisions were dissolved, and 3,700 unfit men were sent home to Italy. From December 1937 Mussolini limited the CTV to decisive battles rather than attrition. Guadalajara remained its only major defeat of the war.\n\nHistorians still argue over the lessons. The French general staff concluded that mechanised forces were not decisive, with Charles de Gaulle as an exception. The Germans blamed the Italian leadership and planning. The claim that Franco deliberately used the Italians as cannon fodder, or failed to launch a promised side offensive from the Jarama, is speculative.", "wargaming": "Guadalajara suits a regimental or battalion-level game, with one stand per company or tankette platoon and a map at about 500 metres to the hex. It is a road battle: five good roads, a handful of villages (Mirabueno, Brihuega, Torija, Trijueque, Palacio de Ibarra) and a river, the Tajuña, behind the Republican flank. The Italians are a motorised column that must keep moving along its roads, which makes traffic jams and bogged tankettes easy to model.\n\nWeather is the main mechanism. A rule that grounds Italian aircraft in sleet and mud while the Republican force flies from Albacete's concrete runway would reproduce the turning point on 12 March. A second rule, that unprepared Republican brigades hold only if reinforced by the International Brigades, sets the tempo of the first three days.\n\nThe interesting decisions are the Italian commander's: press on from Brihuega towards Torija on the afternoon of 9 or 10 March, or consolidate and wait for the Nationalists. The Republican player decides when to commit Líster and the armour, and whether to wait for the 14th Division's crossing of the Tajuña. The what-ifs include a Nationalist attack from the Jarama at the right moment, a Roatta who entrenched, and the Italians reaching Torija first. A fair scenario is the Republican counterattack from 12 to 18 March, starting with the Italian advance halted and ending when Brihuega is surrounded." }, "images": [ { "file": "File:Battle of Guadalajara (March 1937).svg", "kind": "map", "caption": "The Battle of Guadalajara, March 1937.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fc/Battle_of_Guadalajara_%28March_1937%29.svg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/f/fc/Battle_of_Guadalajara_%28March_1937%29.svg/960px-Battle_of_Guadalajara_%28March_1937%29.svg.png?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Battle_of_Guadalajara_(March_1937).svg", "licence": "CC0", "licence_url": "http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/deed.en", "artist": "Rr016", "credit": "Own work Based on Revista de Historia Militar, nº 17 (1964) Monográfico dedicado a la Guerra de Liberación.", "width": 1100 }, { "file": "File:Corpo Truppe Volontarie 35.jpg", "kind": "map", "caption": "A 1:100,000 Italian military map of part of Guadalajara province, produced about 1937.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6e/Corpo_Truppe_Volontarie_35.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/6e/Corpo_Truppe_Volontarie_35.jpg/960px-Corpo_Truppe_Volontarie_35.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Corpo_Truppe_Volontarie_35.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "Unknown author Unknown author", "credit": "La Sezione Topocartografica dell'Istituto Geografico Militare in terra di Spagna con il Corpo Truppe Volontarie (1939)", "width": 4860 }, { "file": "File:Mario Roatta portrait.jpg", "kind": "portrait", "caption": "General Mario Roatta, commander of the Italian Corpo Truppe Volontarie.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Mario_Roatta_portrait.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/Mario_Roatta_portrait.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled", "page": "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mario_Roatta_portrait.jpg", "licence": "Public domain", "licence_url": "", "artist": "Italian government", "credit": "NorgesLexi", "width": 473 }, { "file": "File:General Vicente Rojo.jpg", "kind": "portrait", "caption": "Vicente Rojo Lluch, the Republican chief of staff who planned the counteroffensive.", "url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/General_Vicente_Rojo.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=original", "thumb": 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"licence": "CC BY-SA 3.0 de", "licence_url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/de/deed.en", "artist": "Unknown author Unknown author", "credit": "This image was provided to Wikimedia Commons by the German Federal Archive (Deutsches Bundesarchiv) as part of a cooperation project . The German Federal Archive guarantees an authentic representation only using the originals (negative and/or positive), resp. the digitalization of the originals as provided by the Digital Image Archive .", "width": 800 } ], "sources": [ { "id": "s1", "title": "Battle of Guadalajara (English Wikipedia)", "url": "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Guadalajara", "kind": "web" }, { "id": "s2", "title": "Hugh Thomas, The Spanish Civil War (Penguin, 2001), pp. 579, 585, seen only as cited in s1", "url": null, "kind": "book" }, { "id": "s3", "title": "John F. Coverdale, Italian Intervention in the Spanish Civil War (Princeton University Press, 1975), and 'The Battle of Guadalajara, 8–22 March 1937', Journal of Contemporary History 9(1), 1974, seen only as cited in s1", "url": null, "kind": "book" }, { "id": "s4", "title": "Paul Preston, Franco (Fontana, 1993), and A Concise History of the Spanish Civil War, seen only as cited in s1", "url": null, "kind": "book" }, { "id": "s5", "title": "John Gooch, Mussolini's War: Fascist Italy from Triumph to Collapse, 1935–1943 (Penguin, 2020), seen only as cited in s1", "url": null, "kind": "book" } ], "cdb90": [ 255 ], "order": 190, "url": "https://battles.georgewyrd.com/guadalajara/", "oob": [], "oob_lwtv": [], "scenarios": [], "orbat": null, "orbat_lwtv": null, "reading": { "prose": [], "history": [], "fiction": [], "poetry": [] }, "reading_lwtv": { "prose": [], "poetry": [] }, "photos": [], "photos_kind": "photographs", "newspapers": null }