Sanjurjada () was a military coup staged in Spain on August 10, 1932. It was aimed at toppling the government but not necessarily at toppling the Spanish Republic. Following brief clashes it was easily suppressed in Madrid. Hardly any action was recorded elsewhere except Seville, where local rebel commander general José Sanjurjo took control for some 24 hours but acknowledged defeat when faced with resolute governmental response. Due to his brief success and attention given during following trials, the entire coup was later named after him.
Background
The Spanish military greeted the advent of the Republic with ambivalence. The officer corps was generally made up of conservative monarchists, but following the tumultuous last years of Primo de Rivera’s military dictatorship, which had compromised and discredited the army, most military men preferred to stay clear of politics.Stanley G. Payne, Spain's First Democracy: The Second Republic, 1931–1936, Madison 1993, , p. 96 It was only when the new regime was set on a firmly leftward course and started to target the army for serious reform that voices of dissent started to be heard.Payne 1993, p. 96 A series of reforms, introduced since 1931 by the Prime Minister and the minister of war at the same time, Manuel Azaña, was aimed at scaling down an overgrown officer corps, structural reform and bringing the armed forces firmly under the civilian control.Payne 1993, pp. 90-95 This, combined with Azaña's patronising, if not contemptuous, rhetoric, proved fertile soil for growth of corporative disenchantment. The government confronted the dissent with few arrests, a number of personal reassignments and a handful of new regulations, which tightened its grip on the army further on.one of the regulations adopted in the spring of 1932 authorized the government to retire any general who remained for 6 months with no assignment; another empowered the cabinet to cancel the salary of military guilty of activity proscribed in Law on the Defense of the Republic; yet another ordered review of sentences decreed by the army court of honor prior to 1931, a move intended to counter supposed purges of left-wing officers, Payne 1993, p. 97
There is little indication that growing opposition among some of the generals was fuelled by ongoing political controversies, especially the problems of agrarian reform, relations between state and church, re-defining labor regulations and ambitions of peripheral nationalisms. It was rather politicians who attempted to bank on frustration of the military, some of them second-rank Alfonsist monarchists, some of them Republicans and some of them Carlists. A contemporary scholar distinguished between 3 different lobbying groups pursuing 3 paths: a "constitutional" revolt aimed at installing a new less radical regime, a coup leading to monarchist restoration and a technical "rectification" of the Republic, equidistant between the former two.Payne 1993, p. 97 Another author suggests there were 2 strands, an Alfonsist one and a "constitutionalist" one,Nigel Townson, The Crisis of Democracy in Spain: Centrist Politics Under the Second Republic, 1931–1936, Brighton 2000, , p. 131 though initially all that was rather secondary to generally corporative nature of the growing dissatisfaction.
Conspiracy and counter-action
Since the late 1931 a number of officers have been discussing a possible coup. The talks, carried out in private and in public, until the early summer of 1932 were a loose sequence of meetings.Payne 1993, p. 98 The conspirators holding highest positions were chief of staff Manuel GodedJosé Manuel Martínez Bande, Los años críticos: República, conspiración, revolución y alzamiento, Madrid 2011, , p. 61 and head of Carabineros, José Sanjurjo; others commanded field units or garrisons, like generals Emilio Fernández Pérez,in the plan supposed to lead the insurgency in Madrid, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 61 Miguel Ponte,to lead in Valladolid, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 60 Manuel González Carrasco,to lead in Granada, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 60 José Fernández de Villa-Abrille,Townson 2000, p. 144 Rafael Villegascommander of the 1. infantry division, Antonio Atienza Peñarrocha, Africanistas y junteros: el ejercito español en Africa y el oficial José Enrique Varela Iglesias [PhD thesis Universidad Cardenal Herrera – CEU], Valencia 2012, p. 897 and José González y Fernández.mayor of seville, Townson 2000, p. 143 The remaining plotters were retired generals José Cavalcanti and ,Martínez Bande 2011, p. 61 some lower-rank officers,e.g. colonel Varela to lead in Cádfiz, see Atienza Peñarrocha 2012, pp. 897-899, colonel Ricardo Serrador to lead assault on ministry of war, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 60, or colonel Sanz de Lerín to lead the requetés in Pamplona, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 60 a handful of second-rate politicians, chiefly Manuel Burgos y Mazo,Payne 1993, p. 97 and possibly few industrial tycoons.the first to be named is a tobacco tycoon Juan March; his direct involvement has never been proven, though it is considered almost certain, Townson 2000, pp. 141-2 Stanley Payne estimates that only around 5% of the officer corps supported the coup.Browne, Harry. Spain's civil war. Routledge, 2014, p.15
A number of political heavyweights were at least aware of the conspiracy but assumed an ambiguous stand, the key ones having been Alejandro Lerroux and Melquíades Alvares.the position of Lerroux is one of the greatest question marks related to the coup. It seems he was prepared to accept leadership if offered to him by victorious rebels, but until that moment he preferred to stay clear of conspiracy so that he could claim no involvement in case of failure, Townson 2000, p. 141-2 Some, also aware, have clearly refused to take part but took no action against the conspirators. The emerging centre-right leader José María Gil Robles rejected the scheme from the onsetdetailed discussion in Jesúa María Antelo Fraga, La incidencia del pronunciamiento de Sanjurjo sobre la formulación del accidentalismo político de Acción Popular, [in:] Anales de Historia Contemporánea 1 (1982), pp. 243-268 and the official Carlist executive withdrew from initial informal talks about requetés taking part,Martin Blinkhorn, Carlism and Crisis in Spain 1931–1939, Cambridge 2008, , pp. 88-9 though some Carlists individually pledged support.the Carlist requeté instructor, Sanz de Lerín, took part in the final meeting of the conspirators on August 8. According to some sources he pledged 6,000 Navarrese requetes in support of the insurgency, but other scholars claim this is „a myth”, Blinkhorn 2008, p. 90 The conspiracy climaxed in a meeting of August 8 in Madrid, when final decision to act was taken.in Palacio de conde de Moriles, Atienza Peñarrocha 2012, p. 901
Due to rather loose discipline among the conspirators their talks became sort of a public secret; the government was aware of the conspiracy also thanks to a well developed network of informers. Prime Minister Azaña judged that the plotters lacked extensive backing and that instead of mounting a pre-emptive strike, he would be better off allowing the coup to unfold, effectively setting up a trap.Payne 1993, p. 97-8 Apart from ensuring that loyal commanders were on alert and loyal units were stationed near key points, in late July he relieved a number of high-command officers, some of them conspiracy members, following the Carabanchel incident.Goded, when attending a ceremony at military school, concluded his address with „now there only remains for me to give a viva España, and nothing more”, which was widely perceived as an anti-republican snub. Following a brawl with pro-Republican colonel the latter was arrested and a scandal ensued. Goded received written support notes from a number of provincial commanding officers. It was exactly those officers that were later relieved from duty, Payne 1993, p. 98 Goded resigned himself in act of solidarity, replaced by a new fully loyal chief of staff. On August 9 Azaña was already fully informed about the decision taken the previous day by the plotters; he forewarned generals in provincial capitals, e.g. in Zaragoza, Barcelona, and Cadiz,Atienza Peñarrocha 2012, p. 901 and made sure loyal security units were located near the Ministry of War.Atienza Peñarrocha 2012, p. 902
Rebel plan
The rebel plan relied on decisive action of few determined officers in some key garrisons; Barrera would act as the supreme military authority. In Madrid, conspirators counted on two infantry regiments,1. Regimiento de Infantería (stationed at Cuartel del Pacífico barracks, commanded by colonel Pablo Martín Alonso) and 6. Regimiento (Cuartel de Rosales, colonel Francisco de Borbón) two cavalry regiments,2. and 3. Regimientos de Caballería of Alcalá de Henares smaller auxiliary unitsDeposito de Remonta and the staff manning military prison in San Rosario and one tercio of Guardia Civil.stationed at Hipódromo, Martínez Bande 2011, p. 60 Detached sub-units were supposed to take control of the Ministry of War building, declare state of war and move on to seize other key spots in the capital. At the same time, other military conspirators were tasked with taking control of a number of provincial garrisons, the key ones in Seville, Pamplona, Valladolid, Granada and Cádiz; in case of a stalemate in Madrid, they were supposed to send rebel reinforcements to the capital.Payne 1993, p. 99 The rebels did not expect major opposition; they assumed the government would give in, militant workers would be overwhelmed before they could take action and most of the army would remain passive. There was little if any bloodshed anticipated.Martínez Bande 2011, p. 58 Though some military thought the plan an outdated 19th-century-style pronunciamiento, others considered prestige of some participants, especially Sanjurjo and Barrera, sufficient to win the army.Atienza Peñarrocha 2012, p. 900
In April 1932 the conspirators sought support from the Fascist Italy, and their envoy Juan Ansaldo spoke with Italo Balbo. Little is known about outcome of these talks; some authors claim Ansaldo was promised 200 machine-gunsMichael Alpert, A New International History of the Spanish Civil War, New York 2004, , p. 36 and some suggest that a shipment from Italy might have been already sent;Gabriele Ranzato, El eclipse de la democracia: la Guerra Civil española y sus orígenes, 1931–1939, Madrid 2006, , p. 6 confirmed or not, no foreign impact on the future developments has been proven.