Page 177 - Il Mediterraneo quale elemento del Potere Marittimo - Atti 16-18 settembre 1996

THE MEDITERRANEAN, THE NAVAL STRATEGIES OF THE MI\JOR POWERS 163

or securing Spanish bases, whieh Mussolini assured Goering in April that he would
do. France, ·Goering warned, would quickly occupy the Balearics if ltaly did not.
Two months later, Admiral Raeder also prodded Admiral Cavagnari in the same
terms 09). Yet, in the end Mussolini, despite his boasts, resisted the pressures to
force o n his Spanish allies Italia n strategie positions for a European war.
German war planners, too, coveted Spanish bases for German submarines and
surface raiders. The influential Heye Memorandum of 25 October 1938 expressed
the ''decisive advantage'' ltalian and Spanish bases would present for German com-
merce war. lt would be best for these states to be active belligerents, but even a
neutra! Spain might '• make a secret agreement officially to provide Germany with
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a wartime base" < >. This carne to pass in the secret German submarine use ofVigo
in the coming war.
French strategie planners for good reason took the threat of a hos~ile use of
Spanish bases very seriously, for .that would gready imperil both the Atlantic and
Mediterranean strategie routes and virtually prevent the concentrati o n of the Atlanric
and Mediterranean squadro ns. Periodie scares of Germans occupying Spanish Mo·
rocco or of an ltalian invasion of Menorca kept French nerves on edge and rninds
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alert< n. The Mediterranean had to remain a top strategie priority, but uncerta.inty
about Spain produced a corresponding uncertainty in French strategie direction
in the Mediterranean. In the event of a three-front war with Spain as an enemy,
French forces could harass Spanish coasts while the main fleet fought ltaly for. the
command of the Western basi n, or, alternatively, la n d in the Baleari es, Spanish
Marocco, and the Canaries, while remaining on the defensive on land fronts and
along the Corsiea-Sardinia line. If Spain coul_d be kept neutra! and Britain were
an ally, France could mount a major offensive against ltaly, including landings on
Sardinia and Sicily to reopen Mediterranean routes, or remove shipping from the
Western Mediterranean while combined British and French forces landed at Salo-
nika to link up with Eastern allies. Spain thus greatly reduced the chance of imple-
menting Gamelin's and Darlan's preferred strategie direction in the Mediterranean
toward the East (22).
Of course, any French maritime offensive in the Eastern Mediterranean would
require the dose cooperation ofBritain. From early in the Spanish Civil War, France
sought dose politica! and military ties with Britain to check attempts of ltaly and
Germany to take advantage of the Spanish problem to weaken French and British
security. Britain, with the eyes of its admirals set o n Japan and its statesmen labo-
ring not to antagonize the dictators, rebuffed every French ovèrture. Rather, Bri-
tain relied for security in the Western Mediterranean on ltalian promises to respect
the status quo. Only in 1939 did Britain awake to the necessity of joint resistance.
Anglo-French military staffs finally developed an embryonie coalition strategy, in
which, barring an attack by Japan, the Mediterranean would be the theater of the
first allied offensive. Yet strategie direction in the Mediterranean remained uncer-
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tain, the pian calling for an invasion of Spanish Marocco if Spain were involved <3>.