Following Mora's suggestion, Franco finally dispatched the 11 Spanish German weapon divisions requested by Germany in the name of volunteers.
First, Franco dismissed all officers of the German Arms Division from military status, and then followed the procedures and used special channels to let Ribbentrop change Mora's nationality to German nationality.
Afterwards, Mora bypassed the Spanish government and was "internally elected" by the Spanish Volunteer Army and became the commander of the Volunteer Army.
Of course, the fact that Mora became the Commander-in-Chief of the Volunteer Army was naturally not elected by an internal vote of the entire Volunteer Army. In that case, on the one hand, the workload would be quite large, and on the other hand, if we really wanted to elect a Commander-in-Chief,
Then you won't be able to meet the deadline set by Germany.
As for the officer hierarchy structure within the Volunteer Army, it also follows the internal command system of the previous German Arms Division. In this way, except for the name change, the Volunteer Army is the same as the regular army in other aspects.
According to the requirements given by Reinhardt, these German armorers will start all the way from Spain, pass the Eremo International Bridge directly to the West-France border, and then cross France with the assistance of the Vichy French government, passing through Saarbrün
Ken, Karlsruhe, Nuremberg, and finally arrived at Grafenwöhr, where he accepted the reorganization assignment from the German High Command.
These 11 Spanish volunteer divisions will officially join the German armed forces during the reorganization and receive the designation of the 250th Army Group personally awarded by Reinhardt. To distinguish them from other German army divisions, they are generally called the 250th Spanish Army.
The division also has an informal nickname, the Blue Legion.
This name is basically used internally by the Volunteer Corps, which is equivalent to a blue shirt that claims to be derived from the blue shirts worn by Falangists. As early as the Civil War, the Blue Corps had already distributed German-made equipment according to the standards of the German Army.
, uniformly wearing the red beret of the Carlists, the standard khaki trousers of the Spanish Foreign Legion, and the blue top of the Falangists. In addition, they have a red and yellow Spanish flag shield on the right sleeve of the uniform.
, the words "Spain" are inscribed at the top of the logo.
This gives these volunteer units a touch of Spanish character, which distinguishes them from the German Army.
Moreover, these armies are basically all elite troops. Unlike the Spanish Volunteer Army in history, there are also a large number of non-professional soldiers mixed in.
This time, the volunteers were all regular army troops who had experienced actual combat training in the Spanish Civil War and were well-equipped and well-trained.
Historically, there were a lot of conditions for Franco to join the war. His conditions included expanding Spain's North African colonies, expanding the area of Spain's mainland, operating on the French, and Germany providing military and economic assistance to the Spanish, etc.
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In the original history, these bargaining chips frightened the top German leaders. Hitler, the head of state at that time, even said privately: I would rather pull out my teeth than talk about cooperation with the Spaniards.
But in this life, Reinhardt didn't agree to any of Franco's requests at all, and instead won a new Azzurri that was ten times stronger in every aspect than the Azzurri in history.
The reason was that the Allied forces of Germany, France, and Norway, led by Germany, were marching forward in the British mainland and reached the city of London. The British Empire, which Franco feared most, was in danger and was about to be wiped out.
In North Africa, the German-Italian-French allied forces, also led by Germany, were not at a disadvantage at all and blocked the massive attack by Wavell's menacing Commonwealth forces. Anyone with a discerning eye could see that sooner or later the British forces in North Africa would compete with the local British forces.
Like the army, it is facing the end of disintegration.
On the Eastern Front battlefield, the German army not only relied on its own efforts to build an iron-clad defense line, causing the Soviet army to suffer a more bloody blow than the Soviet-Finnish battle, but also quickly mobilized the Delorfin Three-Nation Alliance.
, with the potential to completely defeat the Soviet army with one backhand blow.
This made Franco unable to sit still.
If Germany finally won the Soviet-German war and led a group of subordinates to destroy the Soviet Union, then Spain, which was a weakling throughout the whole process, would not only not be able to get any of the leftovers and spoils of victory in the war, but would probably be squeezed out by the victorious countries participating in the war and spit out a lot of money.
vested interest.
If he wanted to maintain Spain's position among the Allies, Franco had to show something, and at least participate in this war, so that the Allies could see that Spain also contributed.
At first, Franco planned to take the initiative to gather a volunteer army to show his loyalty. But he did not expect that before he opened his mouth, Reinhardt "helped" Spain to make a plan.
The one who opened his mouth asked for 11 of the most elite divisions in Spain.
Among them, it also includes the only armored division in Spain!
This made Franco, the most successful wallflower in history, begin to feel heartache.
If the British Royal Navy did not lose so miserably, Franco would still have reason to be conservative. He could claim that Spain is only a second-class power after all, and its land is surrounded by sea on three sides. If it openly becomes an enemy of the British, the already lonely Spanish Navy
It will definitely be crippled by the strong ships and cannons of the Royal Navy.
In Europe, although the Spanish Armada was the first to become famous, as the initially dominant Armada was defeated by the British Navy, Spain forever gave up its title of maritime supremacy and was suppressed by the British Navy several times.
century.
No matter how arrogant the Germans are, they cannot ask Spain to ignore the safety of their own territory and accompany them to fight against the Soviet Union. If Spain is forced to defect to the United Kingdom, the German navy may not be able to defeat the Anglo-Spanish combined fleet.
However, the British suffered a complete defeat, which deprived Spain of its capital to lean towards one of the two sides. Now Spain could only choose to defect to the German side, or be willing to stay on the same page and become a model for Germany to serve as an example to other Allied members.
Without Britain's food, oil, economic and trade ties, and Germany's military deals providing combat effectiveness, Spain will only become weaker and weaker in the future, becoming less and less able to join the international ranks.
Germany has basically taken over Europe, so who to block and encircle in the future is not the decision of the German government alone.
The most critical thing is that Spain's gold reserves of more than 500 tons were basically defrauded by the Germans during the civil war with a batch of old and backward weapons. After the civil war, the remaining population of Spain, let alone the Germans, was
Compared with the most populous European countries like Britain and France, even half of Italy's population was larger than the total population of Spain, which had a population of less than 20 million at that time.
There are no foreign exchange reserves, the country's population is not prosperous, and the local war has left everything in waste. This makes Spain inseparable from external material dependence, otherwise, it will be completely unable to develop.
For Germany, which used the Allied camp and the League of Nations to control the entire Europe, it had actually controlled the lifeline of Spain.
