Tangier as International Zone: A Multicultural Free Port at Africa’s Doorway

Cinema, Inter-ethnic relations, Popular Culture, Regional History

Tangier is a coastal city in northern Morocco that looks out across the Strait of Gibraltar to Tarifa, Spain, a distance of just 20 miles, hence its sobriquet, “the Door to Africa”. Strategically located at the cusp of Africa and Europe, Tangier has a long history of interactions with foreign cultures and civilisations – having been occupied at different periods by Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans❈, Vandals, Arabs, Moors and Berbers (Islamic and pre-Islamic), Byzantine Greeks, Spanish, Portuguese and English.

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Tangier in the scramble for Africa
By the beginning of the 20th century, during the “Scramble for Africa”, the territory of Morocco (which Tangier falls within) was divided up between Spain and France (and held as “protectorates”). The clandestine deal between the two prompted objections from Germany demanding a “slice of the (African) cake”. A provocative response by impetuous and volatile emperor Wilhelm II in Tangier precipitated an international crisis in 1905. Tensions were dampened down by the ensuing Act of Algeciras: Germany was appeased with a portion of the French Congo, but at the same time Britain and France consolidated their alliance.

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Tangier’s special status
Under an agreement (the Tangier Convention) signed by France, Spain and the UK in 1923, Tangier became an International Zone (TIZ), effective from 1924. The tripartite administration of TIZ was later extended to include the US, Belgium, Portugal, Netherland, Sweden and Italy. Forms of everyday official life in the enclave reflected its new internationalised nature, although limited to a very select band of foreign countries. As CG Fenwick described it at the time, TIZ was ”a condominium of select states, a limited board of trustees acknowledging no political responsibility to the nations of the world at large“ (Fenwick, C. G. “The International Status of Tangier.” The American Journal of International Law, vol. 23, no. 1, 1929, pp. 140–143. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2190247. Accessed 14 Apr. 2020).

The judiciary adopted a mixed court comprising two English judges and one each from France and Spain, and the type of law adhered to, analogous to French law (Brown, R. Weir “International Procedure under the Tangier Convention.” Journal of Comparative Legislation and International Law, vol. 7, no. 1, 1925, pp. 86–90. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/753030. Accessed 14 Apr. 2020).
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🔺 Tangier, 1924
(Photo: www.pinterest.com)

TIZ was neutral and demilitarised, retaining for zonal security a small force comprising 250 native Moroccan gendarmes under the command of a Spanish major assisted by other subordinate officers from the vested-interest countries. If needed, there was a provision to call on the sultan of Morocco to bolster security strength (Delore, Gabriel. “The Violation by Spain of the Statute of Tangier and Its Consequences as They Affect the United States.” The American Journal of International Law, vol. 35, no. 1, 1941, pp. 140–145. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/2192608. Accessed 14 Apr. 2020).

The various international diplomatic corps in Morocco were consolidated in the city of Tangier (apparently the sultan preferred that they be accommodated there rather than Fez, Morocco’s principal city),  together with other municipal services, further reflecting the special character of TIZ (Brown).

Political authority in TIZ
The Zone’s political structure (from 1928) had as its basic unit of governance a Legislative Assembly (membership: 4 from France, 3 each from Spain, GB and Italy, 1 each from the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal and the US). Real power however lay with the Committee of Control – with consuls representing Belgium, France, GB, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. The Committee had the power to veto the Legislative Council and to dissolve it. At a grass-roots level there was an administrator in charge. Under the TIZ Statute the authority of the sultan, acting through a mandūb (proxy), was recognised (though the sultan’s sovereignty over TIZ was nominal) (Graham H Stuart, (1945). The Future of Tangier. Foreign Affairs, 23(4), 675-679, www.foreignaffairs.com)◘.

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Tangier International Zone
Area: 373 km. Pop Est.(ca 1936) approx 50,000 (Muslims 30,000, Jews 12,000, Europeans 8,000-something).
Currency: £ pounds sterling

Casablanca or Tangier?
By this time Tangier had acquired a reputation for cosmopolitanism and diversity,  being a destination for international businessmen, black marketeers, smugglers, diplomats, military men, refugees, writers and spies. It is widely thought that the classic war espionage film Casablanca (1942) was “inspired by the international ambience of Tangier” (Rachid Tafersiti, L’image de la Ville entire Cinema et Urbanisme, quoted in “The bar at Cinema Vox in Tangier”, Cinema Vox, www.cinemavox.ma)◍. More transparently, Tangier was the subject (or the mood-creating backdrop) for a spate of American mystery/thriller B-movies in the Forties and Fifties with titles like Tangier (reviewed by Variety, 1946: as “spy melodrama with plenty of hokum”) and The Woman from Tangier.

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Franco’s takeover 
In 1940, with France totally blindsided by the immediate, existential threat to Paris from the German Wehrmacht, General Franco, using the pretext that  he was protecting Tangier from a possible Italian invasion launched a surprise invasion of Tangier (‘Spanish protectorate in Morocco’, Wikipedia, http://en.m.wikipedia.org). With Spain in military occupancy of the city, its soldiers tried to turn TIZ into a garrison town, imposing themselves, stopping citizens, checking their IDs, etc. The invasion and aftermath brought protests from UK and US and the Francoist state had to give assurances that the city would not be fortified and that the international institutions would be restored  (‘U.S. Protests Step of Spain in Tangier’, New York Times, 16-Nov-1940, www.nytimes.com). At the end of the war the Allies forced the Spanish to withdraw…the TIZ continued until 1956 when the independent Kingdom of Morocco was created with Tangier subsumed within the new Maghreb nation.

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PostScript: About a decade after its international status was terminated, Tangier became a sought-out destination for a whole new category of outsiders, the ”beat generation”, Western writers and artists like William S Burroughs. Within a few years other counterculture devotees were flocking to Tangier as it became part of the Moroccan hippie trail (although soon upstaged  by Marrakech as the preferred ‘Mecca’ for Western non-conformists in Morocco).

⇿———-———⇿⇿———-———⇿⇿———-———⇿

❈ Tangier first acquired the status of a free city in 38 BC under imperial Rome
◍ gambling was not permitted in Moroccan cities, whereas the activity flourished in nightclubs in the International Zone, so the fact that it is featured in Casablanca gives further credence to the idea that Tangier was the template for the movie (Cinema Vox)
◘ the Statute was criticised for several shortcomings – including a lack of democracy, Tangierinos were disenfranchised; and TIZ’s economic interests were neglected (Stuart)

Canfranc Railway: Nazi Gold Train, Spanish Ore and War-time Border Espionage

International Relations, Military history, Regional History

(((((((((((((((((o)))))))))))))))))

At the commencement of the world war in 1939, Francisco Franco’s authoritarian Spain was officially a neutral state in the global conflict※, this despite the Spanish dictator’s pro-Axis leanings and his debt of gratitude to Hitler and the Axis for its invaluable contribution to the Falangists’ victory in the recently-ended civil war in Spain. 

The Spanish Caudillo
Because of Franco’s neutrality path, Hitler was not able to make Spain and the Iberian Peninsula a base of war operations for the Axis side [L. Fernsworth (1953). ‘Spain in Western Defense’, Foreign Affairs, 31(4), 648-662, doi: 10.2307/20030996]. Notwithstanding this Franco’s Spain still proved a useful and even vital ‘ally’ to the Axis powers, especially to Nazi Germany, during the war. This was nowhere more evident than in the role played by a single railway which linked southern France to northern Spain. 

The track through the Pyrenees 
Before that story, first some background on the railway line and its remarkable ‘central’ station. The idea of a train line between France and Spain via the rugged and formidable Pyrenees mountain chain goes back to the mid-point of the 19th century. The first step to turn the dream into actuality started on the French side in 1904. World War I held things up, as did the fact that the project was an enormously hard, almost Herculean challenge to the railway engineering and building methods of the day.  To complete the line, in excess of 80 bridges, 24 separate tunnels and four viaducts had to be hacked out of the rocky terrain of the middle Pyrenees, as well as a massive deforestation of the regional landscape [‘Urban Exploration: Canfranc Railway Station’, Forbidden-Places, www.forbidden-places.net/].

The enormity of the Canfranc rail line earned it the sobriquet, “The Titanic of the Mountains”.  Finally, by 1928, it had become a reality. The line ran from Pau in France to the village of Canfranc not far inside the Spanish border▣.

Canfranc-Estacíon
Canfranc was the jewel in the crown of the whole international rail network. The railway station (designed by Fernando Ramírez de Dampierre), architecturally a mix of Art Nouveau and Neo-Classicism, was built on an XXL scale. Boasting some 365 windows, a linear monolith of concrete, glass, steel and marble, it had space for living quarters for both Spanish and French customs officials, an infirmary, restaurants and bars, and (later) a hotel. Effectively, the station’s “French section” functioned as a French embassy [‘3rd Reich’s Abandoned “Highway” For Stolen Gold’, George Winston, War History Online, 17-Jul-2019, www.warhistoryonline.com]. The platforms extended for over 200 metres in length! The station has been described as “perhaps the world’s most beautiful disused railway station” [‘The most beautiful abandoned train station on the planet’, The Telegraph (UK), 02-Oct-2017, www.telegraph.co.uk]. 

The train line’s commercial fatal flaw: the irregular Iberian gauge
Despite Canfranc’s imposing and glamorous edifice, the Pau to Canfranc line’s history is a tarnished and diminished one. Some have called it’s history jinxed. Right from the start of operation there were problems and drawbacks. The biggest structural flaw for a supposedly international railroad was that the gauges were different! Spain retained its broad-gauge rails cf. the standard-gauge in France and elsewhere on the Continent. Passengers had to change trains once inside the border, this proved even more disruptive for goods cargo…the need to move the load to another rail vehicle meant that ultimately the line was too slow (and therefore too costly) to transport goods freight. The Wall Street collapse and the Depression occurring just one year after the Canfranc line commenced didn’t help business either. And to complete the ‘cursed’ thesis, in the early years there was a devastating fire affecting the line. 

Throughout its lifetime the Canfranc railway always fell short of achieving economic viability. By the early 1930’s there were as few as 50 passengers a day using the service [‘Is Europe’s ghostliest train station about to rise again?’, Chris Bockman, BBC News, 01-Oct-2017, www.bbcnews.com]. To compound matters, during the civil war Franco had the line’s tunnels sealed off to prevent arms smuggling to the Republican side from France. 

(Photo source: www.canfranc.pagesperso-orange.fr)

The Nazi “Gold Highway” 
Following upon Hitler’s conquest of Western Europe the railway got a new lease of life, albeit one inspired by less than the purest motives. Franco reopened the tunnels to the Nazis and in 1942 deals were struck between the interested parties. Hitler and the German Wehrmacht needed the “Spanish (and Portuguese) ore”, tungsten (AKA wolfram), for producing metal and steel for the Nazi war machine—as much as they could get their hands on! And after the neutralising of France, the Canfranc line became a vital conduit for its delivery. The arrangements were mutually advantageous with plundered Nazi gold from Switzerland and French grain wending it’s way in the opposite direction to Spain and Franco⊡. US documents declassified during the Clinton years reveal that Franco returned only a portion of the stolen gold in 1948 (described as a “marginal amount”)—and that only after pressure was applied by the Allies [‘Secrets of the Railways: “Nazi Gold Highway”‘, (SBS Television, aired 03-Nov-2019)].

The reopened train line was advantageous not only to the Nazis and Spain. Refugees (Jews, communists, leftist artists like Max Ernst and Marc Chagall) and allied soldiers used the train and the Somport Tunnel route into Spain (and thence to safe destinations beyond) to escape Nazism.

The highly adaptable M. Le Lay

(Photo source: www.caminandoporlahistoria.com)

Spy and counterspy: Life imitating art
Despite the railway and the key Canfranc Station being in Nazi hands, the place was a hotbed of spying and smuggling activities. At parties and events held by Nazi officials stationed at the glitzy hotel, pro-Resistance railway workers gathered important intelligence and passed it on to the Allies. A figure instrumental in the espionage activities was the hotel proprietor Albert Le Lay. Le Lay had a dual role as congenial hotel host for the Nazi guests and as head of the local border control. This allowed him, in a fashion eerily reminiscent of the movie Casablanca with Le Lay the unsuspected Resistance spy resembling a real-life “Rick Blaine”, to undermine the Germans and help smuggle many Jews out of France [ibid.]. Le Lay’s dangerous game kept him one step ahead of the Gestapo, but in 1943 he too was forced to flee as the Nazi net was closing in on him.

Decline and fall…and rise again?
After the war the Canfranc railway stumbled on, still operating but never coming close to reaching the potential of its planners’ high hopes for it. An unfortunate mishap in March 1970—a train derailment on the French part of the line causing a bridge collapse—proved not just costly, but signalled the end of the road for the railway. The French authorities, despite the opprobrium heaped on them by their Spanish counterparts, flatly refused to rebuild it. The railway was discontinued, replaced by a bus service. The stock and buildings were left to be vandalised and run into the ground slowly—seemingly for good!

Recently though, a (belated) rescue plan of sorts has emerged. The Aragon municipality in Spain has signalled its wishes to resurrect the once grand Phoenix from the ashes. It has indicated it wants to open a new rail line on the location. There’s talk of a £350m restoration project to restore Canfranc to its long lost railroad glory. Encouragingly, the corresponding French provincial authority , Aquitaine, has offered to assist in the project. This life-line has prompted renewed interest in the rail relic from the public with new tourism accounting for more visitors to the train site than there had been passengers using the service in it’s heyday! [Bockman, loc.cit.; Winston, loc.cit.].

Footnote: Portugal in on the largesse

Portugal possessed the same raw material (wolfram) so prized by Hitler and Portuguese dictator Salazar was happily agreeable to a clandestine deal. Accordingly some of the stolen Nazi gold made its way to Lisbon via Canfranc and into the vaults of the Bank of Portugal. This is reflected in the figures which show a dramatic upsurge country’s gold reserves:

1939|63.4 tons|||1945|356.5 tons

[Neill Lochery, Lisbon: War in the Shadows of the City of Light, 1939-1945 (2011)]António Salazar

↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜↝↜
※ after the fall of France in June 1940 the official policy was modified to one of “non-belligerence”. Franco’s position of non-involvement was basically about not antagonising the western powers, especially the USA whose exports Spain depended on at a time its economy was still brittle after the civil war
✦ for instance Franco’s ‘neutrality’ didn’t prevent him from “green-lighting” Spanish volunteer brigades to fight for the German Nazi army (the Division Azul or Blue Division) against the Soviet forces (but not the Western Allies) 
▣ from Canfranc there was a further rail link to Jaca, and eventually to Zaragoza
⊡ estimated at close to 90 tonnes of gold (Winston)

The Peoples’ Olympics Vs the Nazi Olympics 1936: A Choice of Politics to go with your Sport

International Relations, Politics, Regional History, Social History, Society & Culture, Sport

imageEighty years ago this month the IOC’s most controversial Olympiad was held. 1936 was a momentous year for the Olympic movement – the official Summer Olympic Games were held by the Nazis in August in Berlin. Back in February of that year another part of Germany, Garmisch-Partenkirchen*, had hosted the Winter Olympiad[1]. And in July there had been, or should have been, an alternative, anti-Nazi Olympiad in Barcelona … more of that later.

Never before had a modern games been manipulated for propaganda purposes to the extent that the Germans under Hitler did at Berlin. When the Summer Games were awarded in 1931 Germany was still under the governance of the democratic (but ill-fated) Weimar Republic, but with Hitler coming to power two years later Germany swiftly took on a more unsavoury and increasingly sinister complexion. The Third Reich was soon savagely attacking the liberties of Jews, communists and the Roma (gypsies) … and much worse was to come!

(Image: www.olympic-museum.de)

As it got closer to the event there were questions asked within the Olympic community about whether the Games should go ahead in Berlin. The Nazi regime’s transparent violations of human rights at home, and it’s failure to behave like a good international citizen (eg, pulling out of the League of Nations in 1933, illegally occupying the Rhineland in March 1936, etc), prompted a number of nations to consider boycotting the event.

In America public opinion was far from consensual on the issue. 500,000 Americans signed petitions demanding an alternate site” to Berlin and several newspapers, including the New York Times registered objections to US participation [Peter Carroll, The Odyssey of the Abraham Lincoln Brigades, (1994)].

Berlin olympischstadion 1936
f=”http://www.7dayadventurer.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/image-18.jpg”> Berlin olympischstadion 1936[/capt
The US Olympic Committee debated the issue at great length. American Olympic association heavyweight, Avery Brundage (later controversial head of the IOC) was “gung-ho” for going ahead with participating, running the (now hackneyed) line that politics had no place in sport. The head of the American Amateur Athletic Union, JT Mahoney, and many others, were in favour of boycotting. The authoritarian patrician Brundage was widely thought to be anti-Semitic and racist (in 1935 he alleged there was “a Jewish-communist conspiracy” trying to prevent the US team’s participation in Berlin). Ultimately Brundage’s lobby narrowly carried the AAAU vote in favour of going. The American decision to participate in Berlin was pivotal in salvaging the Games for the host city[2].

Brundage, defender of the Nazi Olympiad
International opposition to the Nazi Olympics remained very vocal in the lead-up to the event. Spain and Barcelona in particular had a vested interest, having lost the bid to hold the 1936 Games to Berlin (the German city won easily, 43 votes to 16)♔. SASI (the international federation of workers’ sports) decided to hold the next instalment of its Workers’ Olympiads (see my previous post) in Barcelona in 1936. The Catalan Committee in Favour of Popular Sport (CCEP), boosted by the election of the leftist Popular Front in Spain in February 1936, worked with SASI to plan and prepare the Barcelona Olympiad♕, scheduled to begin just two weeks before the start of the official (Berlin) Games … clearly timed to steal Nazi Germany’s (and the Führer’s) thunder!

(Source: Bernard N. Danchik Papers; ALBA 033; Box 2; Tamiment Library / Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives, NYU)

In the end, although only two countries, the USSR and Spain, withdrew from the Berlin Games in favour of the Barcelona Olympiade, support for the Barcelona alternative games was widespread. The Olympiad was not state-sponsored in the fashion of the IOC carnival but backing came from progressive bodies and associations within western countries (trade unions, socialists, communists, anarchists, syndicalists, etc.). The Peoples’ Olympiad was also supported by various individuals – eg, dissident Germans with first-hand experience of the Hitler state and Jewish-American athletes opposed to Nazism[3].

SASI preached a cooperative and fraternal spirit to the 6,000 athletes from 22 countries who committed to participate. Whereas the Berlin Games were perceived as an affront to the Olympic ideals, Barcelona was intended to be based on a foundation of international solidarity that would elevate the “brotherhood of men and races” and “show the sport-loving masses (a Olympiad) that is neither chauvinistic or commercialised”, one devoid of the “sensational publicity of stars” that was characteristic of the IOC-run Games[4].

The organising committee for the Peoples’ Olympiad employed an emblem which reinforced the SASI themes of solidarity, brotherhood and world peace … three male athletes standing defiantly side-by-side, one white, one coloured and one (to all appearances) of mixed or Asian ethnicity (no females in the poster to be seen however … inclusiveness apparently hadn’t extended that far by then!)[5].

Most of the mainstream IOC sports had been slated for inclusion in Barcelona and one or two former ones like amateur rugby revived. Also tacked on to the Olympiad were a variety of cultural activities such as folk dancing, theatre, music, chess♚ and an “Art Olympiad” (the promoters advertised the event also as a “Folk Olympiad”)[6].

Avery Brundage and the IOC were not alone in condemning the ‘rebel’ Olympiad in Catalonia, the Spanish right-wing press slammed the idea saying, variously: it would be a “second class Olympics” because it was open to all-comers, it was a “Jewish-communist” games, etc.[7]. On the Left the Spanish Marxist Workers’ Party (POUM) opposed the Peoples’ Olympiad on two grounds – the preoccupation with sports was “a waste of time” distracting the working class from its ‘proper’ objectives, and they mistrusted the motives of the democratic socialists (ie, SASI)[8]. Another instance of the lack of unity of the European Left in the face of the threat from the totalitarian Right.

El Estadio de Montjuic

In July 1936 on the eve of the games opening, the Peoples’ Olympiad was thwarted when the Spanish military led by General Franco staged a coup against the republican government. The outbreak of a full-scale civil war in the country resulted in the Olympiad’s cancellation. It was a double blow for the city of Barcelona as it had earlier also lost out on the 1924 Olympic bid (to Paris). Some of the overseas athletes A number of the overseas athletes who had already arrived in Barcelona stayed, joining the Republic side and fighting in the International Brigades against Franco’s Falange forces. The Berlin Olympics kicked off as planned on 1st August with the politics indeed overshadowing the sport[9]. Barcelona and its Montjuïc Stadium had to wait another 56 years before it finally got its chance to hold the Olympic Games in 1992.

_________________________________________

* the infrastructure for the sports tournament was already in place – the main stadium and hotels (to be converted into a state-of-the-art Olympic village) had been constructed for the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition and upgraded for the city’s bid for the 1936 Games
♚ Chess has a long tradition (since 1924) of staging its own brand of international Olympics, the Chess Olympiads, now held biennially
─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─
[1] such was the furore that surrounded the Berlin Olympics, the Garmisch-Partenkirchen Games, comparatively, have been largely overlooked by history … Hitler did take a more low-key approach to the Bavarian event, however it was not entirely without controversy, eg, the “Jews not wanted” signs prominently displayed in the town had to be hastily removed from sight (albeit only temporarily); the German army undertook military manoeuvres in the vicinity during the Games, A Meyhoff & G Pfeil, ‘Garmisch-Partenkirchen’s Uncomfortable Past: German Ski Resort Represses Memory of 1936 Winter Olympics’, Spiegel International Online, 22-Jan 2010, www.spiegel.de
[2] H Gordon, Australia and the Olympics ; ‘The Movement to Boycott the Olympics of 1936’, (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum), www.ushmm.org
[3] British support of Barcelona (and opposition to Berlin) was formidable, promising a big representation of UK athletes for the Olimpíada Popular, TUC (Trade Union Congress), ‘Labor Chest – Opposition to the Nazi Games, British Workers’ Sports Associations’ (Press Release), 9-Jun 1936), in Documents on the Popular Olympiad from “Trabajadores: The Spanish Civil War through the eyes of organised labor”, BTU Congress (Modern Research Centre, University of Warwick), www.contentdm.warwick.ac.uk
[4] ibid.
[5] J Freedland, ‘The Anti-Nazi Games that never were’, Evening Standard (Lon.), 16-Jul 2012
[6] ‘The Peoples’ Olympics in Barcelona’, http://iberianature.com/
[7] G Calomé & J Sureda, ‘Sport and Industrial Relations’ (1913-1939): the 1936 Popular Olympiad’, (1995), www.ddd.uab.cat
[8] ibid.
[9] Photos of the Berlin Games at the time of the event capture how completely Nazi propaganda lorded it over the ideals of the Olympics – the massive Nazi swastika symbol is seen to dwarf the Olympic Rings at venues, ‘The Olympics: Playing Political Games’, (Modern Research Centre, University of Warwick), www2.warwick.ac.uk

1936, the Year of the Olympics and the Alternative Olympics: a Cocktail of Sport and Politics

International Relations, Politics, Popular Culture, Regional History, Social History, Society & Culture, Sport

1936 was a momentous year for the Olympic movement, the official, IOC-sanctioned Olympic Games was hosted by Nazi Germany’s Berlin. Never before had a modern games been manipulated for propaganda purposes to the extent that the Germans under Hitler did in Berlin 80 years ago this month. When Berlin was awarded the Games in 1931, Germany was still under the governance of the democratic Weimar Republic, but with Hitler coming to power two years later Germany swiftly took on a more unsavoury and increasingly sinister complexion. The Third Reich was soon savagely attacking the liberties of Jews, communists, the Roma (gypsies) and other targeted groups of German society … and much worse was to come!

As it got closer to the event there were questions asked within the Olympic community about whether the Games should go ahead in Berlin. The Nazi regime’s transparent violations of human rights at home, and it’s failure to behave like a good international citizen (eg, pulling out of the League of Nations in 1933, illegally occupying the Rhineland in March 1936, etc), prompted a number of nations to consider boycotting the event.

The US Olympic Committee debated the issue at great length. American Olympic association heavyweight, Avery Brundage (later controversial head of the IOC) was “gung-ho” for going ahead with participating, running the (now hackneyed) line that politics had no place in sport. The head of the American Amateur Athletic Union, JT Mahoney, and many others, were in favour of boycotting. The patrician Brundage was widely thought to be anti-Semitic and racist (in 1935 he alleged there was “a Jewish-communist conspiracy” trying to prevent the US team’s participation in Berlin). Ultimately Brundage’s lobby narrowly carried the AAAU vote in favour of going. The American decision to participate in Berlin was pivotal in salvaging the Games for the host city[1].

Catalonia's Olympiad Stadium Catalonia’s Olympiad Stadium

International opposition to the Nazi Olympics remained very vocal in the lead-up to the event. Spain and Barcelona in particular had a vested interest, having lost the bid to hold the 1936 Games to Berlin (the German city won easily, 43 votes to 16)♔. SASI (the international federation of workers’ sports) decided to hold the next instalment of its Workers’ Olympiads (see my previous post) in Barcelona in 1936. The Catalan Committee in Favour of Popular Sport (CCEP), boosted by the election of the leftist Popular Front in Spain in February 1936, worked with SASI to plan and prepare the Barcelona Olympiad♕, scheduled to begin just two weeks before the start of the official (Berlin) Games (clearly timed to steal Nazi Germany’s thunder!).

Politics and sport, the National Socialist way

In the end, although only two countries, the USSR and Spain, withdrew from the Berlin Games in favour of the Barcelona Olympiade, support for the Barcelona alternative games was widespread. The Olympiad was not state-sponsored in the fashion of the IOC carnival but backing came from progressive bodies and associations within western countries (trade unions, socialists, communists, anarchists, syndicalists, etc.). The Peoples’ Olympiad was also supported by various individuals – eg, dissident Germans with first-hand experience of the Hitler state and Jewish-American athletes opposed to Nazism[2].

SASI preached a cooperative and fraternal spirit to the 6,000 athletes from 22 countries who committed to participate. Whereas the Berlin Games were perceived as an affront to the Olympic ideals, Barcelona was intended to be based on a foundation of international solidarity that would elevate the “brotherhood of men and races” and “show the sport-loving masses (a Olympiad) that is neither chauvinistic or commercialised”, one devoid of the “sensational publicity of stars” that was characteristic of the IOC-run Games[3].

Olimpíada Popular poster: International worker-athlete brotherhood Olimpíada Popular poster: International worker-athlete brotherhood

The organising committee for the Peoples’ Olympiad employed an emblem which reinforced the SASI themes of solidarity, brotherhood and world peace … three male athletes standing defiantly side-by-side, one white, one coloured and one (to all appearances) of mixed or Asian ethnicity (no females in the poster to be seen however … inclusiveness apparently hadn’t extended that far by then!)[4].

Most of the mainstream IOC sports had been slated for inclusion in Barcelona and one or two former ones like amateur rugby revived. Also tacked on to the Olympiad were a variety of cultural activities such as folk dancing, theatre, music, chess♚ and an “Art Olympiad” (the promoters advertised the event also as a “Folk Olympiad”)[5].

Avery Brundage and the IOC were not alone in condemning the ‘rebel’ Olympiad in Catalonia, the Spanish right-wing press slammed the idea saying, variously: it would be a “second class Olympics” because it was open to all-comers, it was a “Jewish-communist” games, etc.[6]. On the Left the Spanish Marxist Workers’ Party (POUM) opposed the Peoples’ Olympiad on two grounds – the preoccupation with sports was “a waste of time” distracting the working class from its ‘proper’ objectives, and they mistrusted the motives of the democratic socialists (ie, SASI)[7]. Another instance of the lack of unity of the European Left in the face of the threat from the totalitarian Right.

Estadio Montjuïc Estadio Montjuïc

In July 1936 on the eve of the games opening, the Peoples’ Olympiad was thwarted when the Spanish military led by General Franco staged a coup against the republican government. The outbreak of a full-scale civil war in the country resulted in the Olympiad’s cancellation. Some of the overseas athletes A number of the overseas athletes who had already arrived in Barcelona stayed, joining the Republic side and fighting in the International Brigades against Franco’s Falange forces. The Berlin Olympics kicked off as planned on 1st August with the politics indeed overshadowing the sport[8]. Barcelona and its Montjuïc Stadium had to wait another 56 years before it finally got its chance to hold the Olympic Games in 1992.

유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유유
♔ a double blow for Barcelona as it also earlier had lost the 1924 Olympic bid (to Paris)
♕ the infrastructure for the sports tournament was already in place – the main stadium and hotels (to be converted into a state-of-the-art Olympic village) had been constructed for the 1929 Barcelona International Exposition and upgraded for the city’s bid for the 1936 Games
♚ Chess has a long tradition (since 1924) of staging its own brand of international Olympics, the Chess Olympiads, now held biennially
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[1] H Gordon, Australia and the Olympics ; ‘The Movement to Boycott the Olympics of 1936’, (United States Holocaust Memorial Museum), www.ushmm.org
[2] British support of Barcelona (and opposition to Berlin) was formidable, promising a big representation of UK athletes for the Olimpíada Popular, TUC (Trade Union Congress), ‘Labor Chest – Opposition to the Nazi Games, British Workers’ Sports Associations’ (Press Release), 9-Jun 1936), in Documents on the Popular Olympiad from “Trabajadores: The Spanish Civil War through the eyes of organised labor”, BTU Congress (Modern Research Centre, University of Warwick), www.contentdm.warwick.ac.uk
[3] ibid.
[4] J Freedland, ‘The Anti-Nazi Games that never were’, Evening Standard (Lon.), 16-Jul 2012
[5] ‘The Peoples’ Olympics in Barcelona’, http://iberianature.com/
[6] G Calomé & J Sureda, ‘Sport and Industrial Relations’ (1913-1939): the 1936 Popular Olympiad’, (1995), www.ddd.uab.cat
[7] ibid.
[8] Photos of the Berlin Games at the time of the event capture how completely Nazi propaganda lorded it over the ideals of the Olympics – the massive Nazi swastika symbol is seen to dwarf the Olympic Rings at venues, ‘The Olympics: Playing Political Games’, (Modern Research Centre, University of Warwick), www2.warwick.ac.uk