Manuel Azaña

Manuel Azaña Díaz (January 10, 1880–November 3, 1940) was a prominent Spanish leftist politician before and during the period of the Second Republic. He was the first Prime Minister of the Second Republic, serving 1931 to 1933, and again in 1936. He was also the second and last President of the Republic (1936–1939). The Spanish Civil War broke out during his presidency. With the defeat of the Republic in 1939, he fled to France and resigned his office, an act that has marred his subsequent reputation. He suffered a heart attack in France early in 1940, and was still recovering when Germans invaded. He died in November, 1940 after being moved to Mountauban.

Manuel Azaña in The War That Came Early
Manuel Azaña served of President of the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil which began in 1936, and which was subsequently folded into the Second World War II which began in October, 1938.

Initially, the Spanish Nationalists under Marshal José Sanjurjo were able to make tremendous gains. By 1938, Sanjurjo's forces held roughly half the country. This did not include Madrid, and so the Republic and the Nationalists were in a stalemate. And while Sanjurjo received support from Germany and Italy, the Republic received solid support from the Soviet Union, and less fervent support from Britain, France. When the broader war broke out in October, 1938, Britain and France began supplying the Republic more aggressively, gaining them a short-term advantage and eventual victory on the Battle of the Ebro, after which the coastal town of Vinaroz was reconquered and the previously divided Republican-held territory was unified again.

However, by early 1939, foreign aid to both sides dried up, as Germany and the Allies were concentrating all their efforts on the fighting in France. Nonetheless, in March, 1939, Sanjurjo decided to concentrate on taking Madrid.

Initially, the Nationalists gained some momentum, taking the University City District within a few weeks. However, they could not get into Madrid proper. The Republicans succeeded in pushing the Nationalists out of University City by the middle of the summer.

Sanjurjo maintained the offensive on Madrid for the remainder of the year, and into the next, but the line outside Madrid continued to hold on into 1940. Things looked particularly bleak for Azaña and the Republic after the "big switch" of Summer of 1940 saw Britain and France align with Germany and cease supplying the Spanish Republic; however Germany was not in a position to help the Nationalists much more than they had been. The Republic also gained one unexpected advantage: the arrival of a regiment of Czechoslovak troops who had been fighting in France, and refused to join the war against the Soviet Union.

As fighting dragged on into 1941, the Spanish Civil War was once again a stalemate. Gradually, things began to turn in favor the Republic 1941. The British military launched a coup that deposed the appeasement-minded government of Horace Wilson in the spring. Britain promptly withdrew from the Soviet Union, and began bombing German territory while fighting Italy in North Africa. While France continued its alliance with Germany for the time being, the French government also began supplying weapons to the Republic. And in December, Czech sniper Vaclav Jezek killed Francisco Franco, one of Sanjurjo's most talented generals.

Fall, 1943 was the watershed year for Azaña and the Republic, when Vaclav Jezek finally killed Sanjurjo. Azaña had Jezek brought to Barcelona where he publicly thanked Jezek for not "despairing of the Republic". He also made Jezek a Spanish citizen, captain in the Army of the Republic, and paid Jezek the bounty that had been placed on Sanjurjo's head.