End on the Sea

The Spanish War on the sea, only occasionally an active phase of the fighting, ended abruptly last week when the major part of the Loyalist fleet steamed into the neutral French port of Bizerte, Tunisia, and was interned. In parade formation, still flying the Spanish Republic's red, gold & purple flag, three cruisers, eight destroyers and a number of lesser ships sailed in from revolt-ridden Cartagena, the fleet's base, 600 miles across the Mediterranean. Met by the French cruiser Dupleix and a squadron of French destroyers, the ships were inspected for sanitation, then, their ammunition removed, allowed to pass through the channel into Bizerte Lake. They will be held at the Sidi Abdallah arsenal at Bizerte and their 4,000 men will be sent to concentration camps. The ships also carried 600 civilian refugees, mostly wives and children of the crew.

Although greater in tonnage and ships than the Franco Navy, the Loyalist fleet early in the war lost control of the strategic Strait of Gibraltar and with it the mastery of the Spanish waters. Reasons: 1 ) when the war started sailors on Loyalist ships killed most of their experienced officers, leaving only inexperienced men in command; 2) the Franco fleet was rein forced by Italian submarines, destroyers and lesser craft. Both sides lost heavily during the war. There were about eight engagements during which the Franco fleet's most notable losses were the battle ship Espana and the cruiser Baleares, Besides losing several submarines, the Loyalist battleship Jaime I, "pride of the fleet," was irreparably damaged, is now laid up at Cartagena.

Although outmatched early in the war, the Loyalist fleet continued to do some quiet, important convoying near the coastline. Last week, with the enemy ships out of the way, Generalissimo Franco declared a complete blockade. The Loyalist coastline was declared "closed to navigation for all classes of embarkation, regardless of their flag and merchandise." Ships were warned that at several points the Franco Navy had submarines waiting with orders to "sink every ship that tries to pass the three-mile limit, no matter what flag it may fly."

In London British Foreign Secretary Viscount Halifax perked up his ears, reminded General Franco that even though Britain had granted Franco Spain recognition, it had not granted belligerent rights. He announced to the House of Lords that "His Majesty's Government would regard as a very serious matter the sinking of a British merchant vessel even within territorial waters," that British warships had been instructed to "retaliate even inside territorial waters against any submarine taking such indefensible action."

He meant what he said. When a British food freighter, the Stangate, was intercepted by a Franco warship and escorted toward a Rebel port, the British destroyer Intrepid overtook the convoy and forced the freighter's release. The Erica Reed, U. S. relief ship to Loyalist Spain, moved out of Valencia unharmed.

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