"A FIGUREHEAD”

Waikato Times, Volume 122, Issue 20509, 27 May 1938, Page 9

"A FIGUREHEAD”

FRANCO IN SPAIN CONTROL IN FASCIST HANDS NEW ZEALANDER’S OBSERVATIONS “Franco is a figurehead; the German and Italian High Commands are the real forces behind the Nationalists in the Spanish conflict,” said Mr T. Spiller, a New Zealander, to a Waikato Times representative to-day. Mr Spiller, who is now touring the Waikato to raise funds for the New Zealand Spanish Medical Aid Committee, has returned after Aghting for nine months with the Loyalist forces in Spain, being wounded on three occasions. Yesterday he addressed the men at Horotiu freezing works and last night he spoke at Taupiri. The aim of Mr Spiller’s committee is to keep the three New’ Zealand nurses in Spain supplied with medical equipment. Mr Spiller quoted the enormous number of casualties which had to be dealt with and mentioned that troops from both sides were treated alike, as they were looked upon as noncombatants when wounded. Not a Civil War “At Arst the conflict in Spain may have been a civil war. but it is now a struggle between the forces of democracy and Fascism,” said Mr Spiller. “Fascists looked round for a likely place to strike, and Spain was the weakest link in the chain. If democracy is defeated in Spain, Fascist activity will spread to Czechoslovakia, t.o the whole of Western Europe, and then once more the youth of the British Empire will be called upon to defend the ideals of democracy,” he declared.

The ruthless methods adopted by the insurgents in Spain were described by Mr Spiller, who said that the death-roll in the conflict had been the greatest per head of combatants in any war in history. Thousands of children had been killed or maimed in air raids carried out to terrorise the defenders into submission. It was typical of Fascist regimes that they focussed the minds of the people outside the routine of daily life, and the action of the Germans and Italians in Spain had had this effect* on the people of the two countries.