The army that won Franco's war was Moroccan, and it came by air | WHO OWNS THE STRAIT? Part 4

History Onion · Part 4 The Last Army · 2:59

In 1497, five years after Granada fell, a Spanish captain named Pedro de Estopiñán took the North African port of Melilla. The raiders came from that shore, so Spain would hold that shore. Spain holds it still. For four centuries that meant garrisons and little else. Then in 1912 Spain took a protectorate over northern Morocco — Moroccan rule on paper, Spanish control in practice. A protectorate has to be occupied to exist, so Spain put an army into the Rif and fought a decade to hold it. That war built two things: the Regulares — Moroccan troops in Spanish uniform under Spanish officers — and the officer class that commanded them. Francisco Franco was one of them, promoted young in exactly that war. In July 1936 the army rose against the Spanish Republic, and the rising began in Melilla, Ceuta and Tetuán. Franco took command of the Army of Africa, the best troops Spain had. Then the navy stayed loyal to the Republic and blockaded the strait, and the best army in Spain was stranded on the wrong side of fourteen kilometres of water.