World War II Database

1. Clayton says:
20 Jun 2014 11:07:49 AM

I have not come across many readings regarding the Aid that various countries sent to aid both sides in the Spanish Civil War. However, it is very important beacuse of how it was a testing ground for many different types of tanks that hadnt't seen service yet. Specifically, Soviet Bt-7's and T-26's(like the one above) were pitted agiasnt german tanks for the first time during this pre-war period. Here, the Soviets were led to believe that even their obsolete tanks were better than what the Germans posseded. However, the Germans really only sent PzKpFw. I's, and this experiance gained taught them that they were indeed very far behind technologically.

2. Andrey says:
8 Sep 2016 05:15:05 PM

This is a quite famous photo. Yes, Republicans with their light tank T-26 mod. 1933. Note the tank machine-gun DT on anti-aircraft mount, which was mounted on some T-26s since 1937 (so the photo is, most probably, from 1937).

The first batch of 15 Soviet T-26s came to Spanish port Cartagena on 26 September, 1936 and on 29 September this tank company participated in the first combat already. Since the beginning of December 1936 larger batches of tanks began to arrive from USSR as well as personnel, headed by brigade commander D. Pavlov. The 1st Republican tank brigade (crews were Russian and Spanish) was formed soon. In summer 1938 there were two Republican armored divisions already. Soviet Union sent 297 T-26s (all were mod. 1933) to Republican Forces till the end of the Spanish Civil war. The T-26s performed very well against German Pz.Is and Italian CV3/33s armed with only MGs, but that war demonstrated also that Soviet T-26s (not obsolete that time by the way, even for 1941 their 45-mm gun was very good against all German tanks) had a weak armor as all light tanks of 1930s which was easily penetrated by anti-tank guns.

To Clayton - no any BT-7 was sent to Spain, only BT-5s!