Page 174 - Il Mediterraneo quale elemento del Potere Marittimo - Atti 16-18 settembre 1996

160 WILLARD C. FRANK

while milicary means lagged behind expansionist ends, hoping co puc off che day
of reckoning unti! massive new conscruction might better undergird imperia! aspi·
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rations < >.
France, facing che threacening behemoth of Nazi Germany in the northeast,
developed a stracegy of a long defensive war of attrition, for which reinforcement
and supply from French North and W est Africa, by Aclantic or Mediterranean routes,
were criticai. Generai Gamelin hoped to restare strategie maneuver co oucflank Ger·
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many to che souch and east via ltaly and eascern allies < >. By June 1936 the ltalian
link in this scheme, which looked so promising just a year before, had been thrown
into serious doubt by che Echiopian and Rhineland crises, che coming inco power
in France of the anti·Fascist Popular Front, traditional Franco·ltalian naval rival·
ry, and Mussolini's ambitions. Thus by mid·1936 France faced a second danger
in the Medicerranean. The French navy held an edge over the ltalian, but a likely
stalemate on the Corsica·Sardinia·Sicily line blocked Gamelin·s eastern scrategy by
sea as by land. The navy, in any case, focused on convoy procection, especially in
che Adantic. Further, as dangers multiplied, so dependence on unreliable Britain
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deepened < >. France, therefore, also found itself in politica! and strategie quandaries.
In 1936, Bricain, cautiously unaligned, indulged Hitler and Mussolini co pro·
vide securicy in Europe, while che fleet faced the Far East. British leaders viewed
theJapanese Navy as cheir greatesc maritime threat and we;e prepared co abandon
che Medicerranean, Britain·s principal but most vulnerable arcery, in order to send
che bulk of the fleet co Singapore. Given che prioricy assigned Far Eastern over
Mediterranean threats and with t4e state of British disarmamene in 1936, there
seemed no ocher remedy, despite the slowness of che Cape roure and che likely ad·
verse effect on British influence in Egypt and che Near Eastern mandates. Yet Eu·
ropean storm clouds began co raise the specrer of a cl1ree·front war, for which Britain
was totally unprepared. Therefore, Britain became increasingly dependent on France,
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which British leaders w ere very loathe to admit < >.
Germany, in the early stages of rearmament, bega n to think beyond defensive
strategies. By 1936 German naval strategy against prime adversary France cente·
red on disrupting Adantic and Mediterranean communications, including by a new
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generation of U·boats < >. This strategie direction, clear and coherenc, served unti!
1945.
In this fluid situation exploded he Spanish Civil War in July 1936, just as
the League of Nations abandoned sanctions over Ethiopia and che concentrateci
British naval power in Alexandria was dispersing to return to peacetime routine.
Tension in the Mediterranean quickly shifted from East to West.
The strategie geography of Spain had long absorbed che attendo n of naval staffs
and writers. Iberia divided French naval forces. Bases in che Peninsula, Spanish
Marocco, che Balearics, and che Canaries were poised to interdice French Mediter·
ranean and Aclantic strategie routes and che heavily·travelled Aclantic·Mediterranean
passage. Thus it was in the interest of che orher powers to maintain a weak and