Jump to content

Asturian miners' strike of 1934: Difference between revisions

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Browse history interactively
← Previous editNext edit →
Content deleted Content added
VisualWikitext
→‎Asturian miners' strike: Ochoa was the highest officer involved
added bit from Mary Vincent and added tag - just because vincent says ' CNT and UGT fought together'
Line 32: Line 32:


==Background==
==Background==
Following the victory of the parties of the right in the General Election of 1933, the new government, led by [[Alejandro Lerroux]], met a stiff resistance from the leftist parties. As a result, the anarchists and communists called a general strike. However the strike immediately exposed differences on the left between the [[Spanish Socialist Workers' Party]] (PSOE) linked [[Unión General de Trabajadores]] (UGT), which organised the strike and the anarcho-syndicalist union, the [[Confederación Nacional del Trabajo]] (CNT), which was sceptical of the value of strike action as a political tactic. As a result, the strike failed in much of Spain.
Following the victory of the parties of the right in the General Election of 1933, the new government, led by [[Alejandro Lerroux]], met a stiff resistance from the leftist parties. As a result, the anarchists and communists called a general strike. However the strike immediately exposed differences on the left between the [[Spanish Socialist Workers' Party]] (PSOE) linked [[Unión General de Trabajadores]] (UGT), which organised the strike and the anarcho-syndicalist union, the [[Confederación Nacional del Trabajo]] (CNT), which was sceptical of the value of strike action as a political tactic.{{fact}} As a result, the strike failed in much of Spain. A 'Catalan republic' lasted just ten hours, and despite an attempt at a general stoppage in Madrid, other strikes did not endure and Asturias was left to fight alone. <ref> Spain 1833-2002, p.133, Mary Vincent, Oxford, 2007 </ref>


==Asturian miners' strike==
==Asturian miners' strike==

Revision as of 19:31, 17 May 2012

Asturian miners' strike of 1934
Location of Asturias within Spain
Date4 to 19 October 1934
Location
Asturias, Spain
Caused byAsturian miners strike
Resulted inStrike supressed
Parties
Asturian miners
Lead figures

Belarmino Tomás
Ramón González Peña

Casualties and losses
1,700 dead
260 dead

The Asturian miners' strike of 1934 was a major strike action, against the entry of the CEDA into the Spanish government on October 6,[1] which took place in Asturias in northern Spain, that developed into a revolutionary uprising. It was crushed by the Spanish Republican Navy and the Spanish Republican Army, the latter using mainly Moorish troopers from Spanish Morocco.[2]

Franco controlled the movement of the troops, aircraft, warships and armoured trains used in the crushing of the revolution. Visiting Oviedo after the rebellion had been put down he said; " this war is a frontier war and its fronts are socialism, communism and whatever attacks civilization in order to replace it with barbarism." [3] Though the colonial units sent to the north by Franco consisted of the Spanish Foreign Legion and the Moroccan mercenaries of the Regulares Indigenas, the right wing press portrayed the Asturian rebels in xenophobic and anti-Semitic terms as the lackeys of a foreign Jewish-Bolshevik conspiracy. [4]

Background

Following the victory of the parties of the right in the General Election of 1933, the new government, led by Alejandro Lerroux, met a stiff resistance from the leftist parties. As a result, the anarchists and communists called a general strike. However the strike immediately exposed differences on the left between the Spanish Socialist Workers' Party (PSOE) linked Unión General de Trabajadores (UGT), which organised the strike and the anarcho-syndicalist union, the Confederación Nacional del Trabajo (CNT), which was sceptical of the value of strike action as a political tactic.[citation needed] As a result, the strike failed in much of Spain. A 'Catalan republic' lasted just ten hours, and despite an attempt at a general stoppage in Madrid, other strikes did not endure and Asturias was left to fight alone. [5]

Asturian miners' strike

In several mining towns in Asturias, local unions gathered small arms and were determined to see the strike through. The strike began on the evening of October 4, with the miners occupying several towns, attacking and seizing local Civil and Assault Guard barracks.[6] The following day saw columns of miners advancing along the road to Oviedo, the provincial capital. With the exception of two barracks where fighting with government troops continued, the city was taken by October 6. The miners proceeded to occupy several other towns, most notably the large industrial centre of La Felguera and set up town assemblies or 'revolutionary committees', to govern towns they controlled.[7]

The government responded by organising troops led by Eduardo López Ochoa to retake the towns from the miners. These troops were carried on the CNT-controlled railways to Asturias without resistance by the anarchists. During the operations, an autogyro made a reconnaissance flight for the government troops, in what became the first military employment of a rotorcraft.[8] On October 7, delegates from the anarchist controlled seaport towns of Gijón and Avilés arrived in Oviedo to request weapons to defend against a landing of government troops. Ignored by the socialist UGT controlled committee, the delegates returned to their town empty handed and government troops met little resistance as they recaptured Gijón and Avilés the following day.[9] The capture of the two key ports effectively spelled the end of the strike.

Aftermath

In the armed action taken against the uprising some 3,000 miners were killed in the fighting with another 30,000[10]-40,000 taken prisoner,[11] and another thousands sacked from their jobs.[12] The repression of the uprising carried out by the colonial troops was very harsh including looting, rape and summary executions.[13][14] According to Hugh Thomas, 2,000 persons died in the uprising: 230-260 members of the army forces, 33 priests, 1,500 miners in combat and 200 killed in the repression (among them the journalist Luis de Sirval, who pointed out the tortures and executions and was arrested and killed by three officers of the Legion).[10] The government suspended Constitutional guarantees, almost all the left's newspapers were closed as they were owned by the parties which promoted the uprising, hundreds of town councils[15] and mixed juries were suspended and the torture in prisons was widespread as it was during all the Republic's lifetime.[16]

Franco was convinced that the workers uprising had been 'carefully prepared by the agents of Moscow' , fed by material he gathered from the Entente Anticommuniste of Geneva. Franco believed that he was justified in the brutal use of troops against Spanish civilians. Historian Paul Preston: "Unmoved by the fact that the central symbol of rightist values was the reconquest of Spain from the Moors, Franco did not hesitate to ship Moorish mercenaries to fight in Asturias, the only part of Spain where the crescent had never flown. He saw no contradiction about using the Moors because he regarded left-wing workers with the same racialist contempt he possessed towards the tribesmen of the Rif." [17]

References

  1. ^ Unearthing Franco's Legacy, p.61, University of Notre Dame Press, 2010
  2. ^ The Splintering of Spain, p.54 CUP, 2005
  3. ^ Unearthing Franco's Legacy, p.62
  4. ^ Sebastian Balfour, Deadly Embrace:Morocco and the Road to the Spanish Civil War, 252-254 OUP 2002
  5. ^ Spain 1833-2002, p.133, Mary Vincent, Oxford, 2007
  6. ^ Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and the Civil War,1931-1939. Princenton University Press. Princenton. 1967. pp.154-155
  7. ^ Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. 2001. London. p.131
  8. ^ Payne, Stanley G. (1993). Spain's first democracy: the Second Republic, 1931–1936. Univ of Wisconsin Press, p. 219. ISBN 0-299-13674-4
  9. ^ Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and the Civil War,1931-1939. Princenton University Press. Princenton. 1967. p.157
  10. ^ a b Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. 2001. London. p.136
  11. ^ Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and the Civil War, 1931-1939. Princeton University Press. Princeton. 1967. p.161
  12. ^ Beevor, Antony. The battle for Spain. The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939. Penguin Books. 2006. London. p.32
  13. ^ Beevor, Antony. The battle for Spain. The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939. Penguin Books. 2006. London. pp.31-32
  14. ^ Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and the Civil War, 1931-1939. Princeton University Press. Princeton. 1967. pp.159-160
  15. ^ Graham, Helen. The Spanish Civil War. A very short introduction. Oxford University Press. 2005. p.16
  16. ^ Jackson, Gabriel. The Spanish Republic and the Civil War,1931-1939. Princeton University Press. Princeton. 1967. p.160
  17. ^ Unearthing Franco's Legacy, pp61-62

Bibliography

  • García Gómez, Emilio. Asturias 1934. Historia de una tragedia. Pórtico. 2010. Zaragoza.
  • Thomas, Hugh. The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. 2001. London. ISBN 978-0-14-101161-5
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Asturian_miners%27_strike_of_1934&oldid=493074741"