The landing in Normandy and the question of Spanish tungsten

On June 6, 25 heads of state and government celebrated the 80th anniversary of the landing of the Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy. It was “the beginning of the end of the beginning of the end” – as Robbie Robertson, the leader of The Band, said in The last waltz (Martin Scorsese, 1978) – from Nazi Germany. I missed the presence of Russia – the defunct Soviet Union contributed to the defeat of Hitler with 23 million lives –, marginalized for its aggression against Ukraine, and of Spain, which was not invited to the festivities on Omaha Beach, the main beach. of the five of Operation Overlord. The only Spanish representation were two Piper L-4 aircraft from the Infante de Orleans Foundation museum, to remember the Grasshopper (“Grasshopper”) or L-Birds (“Link Birds”, the L is for liasion) of the North American Army that performed these functions and observation for the ground forces and to correct the artillery fire.

It is true that Spain at that time, subjugated by Franco’s dictatorship, aligned itself with the ‘bad guys’, with Hitler’s Nazism and Mussolinian fascism, but the leaders of today’s Germany and even Giorgia Meloni, president, were present at the celebration. of the Council of Ministers of Italy and direct heir to the fascism that then bloodied Europe. However, thousands of Spaniards of the 450,000 exiles of the Second Spanish Republic defeated by the traitorous coup of July 18, 1936, were with the ‘good guys’ on those memorable dates. Thousands of them were used by the Nazis as slave labor: from 30,000 to 40,000 in the fortification of the Atlantic Wall, more than 15,000 defensive constructions along 1,500 kilometers, from Norway to the English Channel.