Madrid Starving

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 49, 13 March 1937, Page 5

Madrid Starving

> Tolegrapk— Press Asse

DEFEAT EXPECTED Trade Unions at Odds With Government CITY BOMBARDED

(Bj

i.—Copyright.)

(Received 13, 12.15 p.m.) LONDON, Mareh 12. tfhe Aiistralian Associated Press learas that practically the whole of the civilian population o£ Madrid to-night is starving and the capital, whose early fall seems .possible, laees disaster, accompanied by the Government's extinctioh. Non-combatants, who are most severely hit, are unable to force the surrender because the militia possess the foodstuffs and are not eoncerned about the civilians, whose plight is so desperate that British residents are sharing rations with them. Bisturbances at Valencia suggest the disruption of the Government forces. The trade unions have forcibly resisted the Government forces, resulting in considerable fighting. » The insurgents have opened _a heavy bdmhardment on the capital, shells exploding in several quarters. One big insurance bnilding was partially wrecked. The intensity of the rebel pressure co ihe Guadalajara front, which is a key positioa. for the defence, ean be gauged from General Miaja's diversion of two international brigades from th© Jaraixia 8ector to th© Guadalajara wxth orderS to hold. it at all costs. The International Brigades, always at their own request, ar© placed in positions of the greatest danger, in which they have acquitted themselves gallaixtly at heavy cost, as is poihted out in the vivid nar* rative by Mr» Geoffrey Cox, a Kew Zealander, whose hook "The Defence of Madrid," Vicfcor Gollanoz has just published. Mr Cox was the NewsChronicie's representativ© in Madrid from October fo December. Meaixwhile, bitter eold and snow are hampering the rebels' efforts. A captured Itaiian major declares that 80,000 Italians and 40,000 Germans are now fighting for th© rebels as a xmified army under a single ccmmand- Itaiian prisoners frankly jfcold correspondents that they had been brought to Spain to establish Fascism, which their ofBcers believed possible within three months. The majority of the troops received fi-tir 3nc'nths, iraining ostensibly ior Abyssifiia, but were sent to Spaiu. The dlscovery of a Fascist plot to kidnap General Miaja and assawinate the leaders oh the workers* unions has resulted in many arrests.