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The Battle for Spain

The Spanish Civil War 1936-1939

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The Battle for Spain

By: Antony Beevor
Narrated by: Sean Barrett
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About this listen

 The civil war that tore Spain apart between 1936 and 1939 and attracted liberals and socialists from across the world to support the cause against Franco was one of the most hard-fought and bitterest conflicts of the 20th century: a war of atrocities and political genocide and a military testing ground before WWII for the Russians, Italians and Germans, whose Condor Legion so notoriously destroyed Guernica.

Antony Beevor's account narrates the origins of the Civil War and its violent and dramatic course from the coup d'etat in July 1936 through the savage fighting of the next three years which ended in catastrophic defeat for the Republicans in 1939. And he succeeds especially well in unravelling the complex political and regional forces that played such an important part in the origins and history of the war.

Read by Sean Barrett

(p) 2011 Isis Publishing Ltd©2006 Antony Beevor 20th Century Europe Military Modern Spain War Russia Civil War

Critic Reviews

Fascination lies in the human drama, superbly captured by Beevor ... a vivid chronicle of a dreadful time and place (Max Hastings)
In many ways it's his most impressive book to date because he coolly makes sense of such a complicated story: the narrative sweep is consummate, the seamless use of so many sources masterful, and the eye for details makes it a superb read (Simon Sebag Montefiore)
An admirably clear-sighted account ... a great achievement (Miranda France)
A moving masterpiece of the indictment of war (Felipe Fernández-Armesto)
A gripping, revelatory account
This is an enthralling book. The narrative is masterly, wonderfully clear as a guide through the labyrinth. It is even-tempered and full of good sense ... It is admirable
It is an admirably clear-sighted account. What Beevor does so well is to place the war in the context of Spanish history and world politics ... Beevor's understanding of warfare and tactics is second to none ... This is a great achievement
A very different book, which displays all Beevor's exceptional narrative skills and literary flair. The story he tells is grimly familiar, but he presents it with a freshness, an eye for detail and a degree of detachment that makes this one of the best accounts to date of the Spanish crisis
Antony Beevor's revised history of the Civil War, which vividly anatomises a state and a society in the process of disintegration, is a tract for our times ... Above all, he has Beevorised the book, given it the richness of detail and the narrative drive that made Stalingrad such a success
For the big picture of the war, all the more powerful for its blending of narrative intensity with emotional restraint, there is no rival to Antony Beevor's masterly The Battle for Spain
The Battle for Spain looks likely to become the standard account of the conflict for at least the next generation
All stars
Most relevant
Well researched description of the Spanish Civil War that describes the complexity of all parties, their motivations and dilemmas. It went into detail about the civil war within the civil war as various communist and leftist groups fought each other, as well as the nationalists. As one commentator described it, the Spanish Civil War could have been seen as the 2nd World War, while 1939-1945 could have been seen as the 3rd World War.

Comprehensive insight into the Spanish Civil War

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I have read a lot of Beevor’s work and, like in those other books, I find his approach to this complicated and multifaceted conflict sober, insightful and compelling.

Insightful, deliberate, excellent.

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It was not only the Treaty of Versailles that contributed to WW2, nor the rise of the Soviet Union, but the weakness of so called democratic nations to wash their hands of events in Spain in the 1930s. Beevor 's concluding remarks are sobering in their analysis of this inevitable tragedy. The Spanish Civil War was a disaster waiting to happen assisted ably by the Catholic Church. And we now fear Islam!

Essential reading to understand why WW2 occurred.

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This book is for those truly interested in history...not the simplistic tale-telling rendition of history, but the authentic hard-yards of interwoven complexity. The Spanish civil war retold meticulously and so very well by Beevor, reflects the massively complex interactions and interrelationships that characterise human conflicts. This is not a book reporting 'broad sweeps' of occurrences. It is an authoritative record of what happened in detail... who, where, when and why. Beevor adds flesh to the sparse bones of what most of us know about the Franco period. The Battle for Spain is told in connection to post-revolution Russia and many elements of pre-WW2 Europe. Beevor weaves the competing ideologies in foundations which go some way to explain how the participants justified their appalling actions. I recommend this book to anyone interested in what really happened in and to Europe in the 20th century. It is an excellent companion to Beevor's 'Everest' of a book titled 'World War 2'. Bravo Beevor!

Beevor's authority on war-history is unsurpassable

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The book is stunningly researched and very detailed. It's a complex story. Thus hard going.

A Complicated Civil War

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