Twilight Spain

[Olefin]

Given the situation in southern Germany when the Italians suddenly invaded that would be the most likely time for them to be used. Have a mountain division slow down the Italians until the Germans and Dutch can redeploy but take heavy casualties in the process involves them in the war but not in a way that changes the overall canon.

I.e. the Spanish sent the division then after the Italians were stopped the survivors were pulled back to Spain. Spain gets hit in the nuclear exchange as detailed and after that the Spanish military is too busy at home especially after the Basques and Catalonians begin to rebel against the central government.

A very small change in the canon which has them involved in the general war but then unable to help further as Spain deteriorates into yet another civil war and what they have stays in Spain.

Adds some new info to the overall T2K story but in a way that doesnt change the canon in any way except to show how Spain might have been involved more than just sitting it out - which is basically not going to happen as I said. They fought too hard to get into NATO to sit out the war and do nothing.

[Legbreaker]

Which is probably why the GDW writers didn't include them in the main events

Makes sense to me.
Spain could well have been reserved for a future publication (or just ignored as irrelevant to the core play area). Given they don't appear to have participated in any serious fighting the area seems perfect for a book similar to Bangkok - suitable to either T2K or Merc with few alterations necessary.
Doesn't help they were effectively cut off from the rest of Nato by France and Italy pulling out and essentially becoming another set of enemies.

[Legbreaker]

They fought too hard to get into NATO to sit out the war and do nothing.

They very nearly left four years after joining. One of the main reasons they remained is because of their restrictions on deployment and maintaining their own separate command structure. Even when operating with other Nato countries, they still operate under their own officers who have no requirement to follow, let alone listen to another nations Generals - Spain is free to do their own thing which is basically protect their borders, the Canary and Balearic Islands, while providing logistic support to Nato. With the land corridor cut by France, the Mediterranean effectively a no go zone due to Italy and Greece, and the English Channel a risky proposition, Spain is essentially sidelined from making any real contribution and should really be considered more of a neutral country (as far as the impact they could have on the overall conflict).
With France blocking the land route, and Spain not having the necessary strength in either ships or ground troops to open a separate, unsupported front in Italy the only way Spanish troops are getting into the fight is the long way around the UK and into Germany.
With their national restrictions along with unavailability of additional transports (look at how long it took the US to deploy their units who've clearly got priority) it seems very unlikely more than just a few liaison officers and support staff would be in greater Europe. Just can't see how combat troops could be involved against Italy or the Pact.

Also keep in mind that IRL the Socialists were in control of the government right up until 1996 (they regained power in 2003). Pretty sure there would have been no political will to go against their own self imposed restrictions and go to war with politically like minded countries such as those of the Pact. Italy can arguably be included in that list.

[Ewan]

The Spanish Navy and Air Force could be used against Italian naval forces in the Med and also protect convoys going to Turkey. Also protecting convoys coming across the Atlantic, think there might be a Harpoon article somewhere about that.

In addition army units could be deployed to Yugoslavia or Turkey to aid these countries against Italian or Warsaw Pact forces.

[Ewan]

You might find this useful

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a127635.pdf

The section under Reinforcement Forces is a particularly interesting read.

[Legbreaker]

The Spanish Navy and Air Force could be used against Italian naval forces in the Med and also protect convoys going to Turkey. Also protecting convoys coming across the Atlantic...

That's basically what Spain suggested would be their role back in the mid 80's.
Worth noting that although they had a relatively large navy, most of their ships were quite old.

In addition army units could be deployed to Yugoslavia or Turkey to aid these countries against Italian or Warsaw Pact forces.

That goes against their declared position though.

"Observers later reported that Spain had offered to coordinate its national military missions with those of NATO, especially control of the sea between the Balearic Islands and the Canaries. Spanish forces were to be commanded only by Spanish officers, however, and no troops were to be deployed outside of Spain on a sustained basis."

[Legbreaker]

You might find this useful

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a127635.pdf

The section under Reinforcement Forces is a particularly interesting read.

Good find, however that details the situation in 1982, four years before they imposed their restrictions.

[mpipes]

Come on Guys!!

A lot of opinions being voiced here are based on how real history played out. In whatever version of the TW2K you use, history goes flying out the door by 1992. You don't have a collapsed USSR nor an aggressive Soviet military expansion policy playing out in any of these TW2K scenarios using REAL world military ORBATS in 1996 after 4-years of headlong military contractions in the wake of the failed Soviet Coup.

Does anyone really believe Spain and Portugal are just going to sit passively by as the Soviets blow up Europe and China At the very least, ALL of Europe, certainly NATO, is going to begin full mobilization as soon as Germany and Russia start a war. NO ONE is going to believe that all of NATO will NOT be involved or that the Chinese War will NOT eventually drag other Pacific countries in. If they do, ALL those delusion disappear at least by the invasion of the Persian Gulf countries.

Portugal and Spain both in the late 1980s were desperate to have a face on the world stage and badly wanted to be part of the "NATO club." Once they were in it, they were committed and they knew it. Trade was inextricably tied in, their economies were tied in, and their populations (as a whole) were scared shitless of the Communist and the Soviet Bear. They knew in that day that if they did not stand up and put their big boy pants on and REALLY contribute to the war, their reputations with the other members of the club would not recover for decades. They were going to have to fight, and they needed to be prepared to fight.

Spain, in particular, saw their membership in NATO as their best chance toward eventually getting Britain to relinquish control of Gibraltar back to Spain, so they were not going to muck it up by giving NATO the finger. They would be anxious to be perceived as ESSENTIAL NATO allies in Europe (and hopefully get to bail out the Brits in a major way) to earn the political capital to get Gibraltar back. Any other considerations would be secondary (and in my opinion after war the UK would cede Gibraltar back to Spain with a NATO base having a substantial UK presence there).

NOTE: I have always had a problem with how canon treated Spain, Portugal, and Italy. I just don't see Spain and Portugal sitting around passively or Italy remaining a PACT ally once the USSR starts indiscriminate use of nuclear weapons. After TDM, I don't believe for a second that the Italian alliance with Greece and the PACT remains intact, and I think Spain would react rather violently if France invaded Germany (or at least Andorra with which it has close ties). Spain and France will end up fighting, even if somewhat in a low intensity fashion.

[StainlessSteelCynic]

There's a lot of supposition there without any information from Spanish sources to support that particular point of view.
I think in this particular situation we're going to have to agree to disagree and really, that's all okay because ultimately, you can do whatever the hell you want with your own gameworld.

However, if a Spanish sourcebook is to stand any chance of becoming an official source and take a place in the canon, then there's some aspects that must be clarified. For example, it needs to clearly state what timeline it follows in regard to the various editions of the game.
In some cases, it's going to have to follow the real world logic more than the impassioned idea that "the Spanish were afraid of the communists so would have stood hard with NATO against the Soviet Bear".
Spain was so damned Socialist that their official communist political party was a partner member of their United Left Coalition, an organization that also had a pro-Soviet political party (albeit a minor party) as one of their members.
I don't think the Spanish were afraid of communism anywhere near as much as the Americans were.

[Vespers War]

I could see Spain being extremely wary about deploying forces to the east if the situations with ETA and Morocco both went bad at the same time. Deploying an expeditionary force to help Morocco would be a priority for both Spain in particular and NATO in general to make sure the Straits of Gibraltar remain friendly on both coasts.

Tweaking the outcome of Black October in Algeria so that it gains support from the USSR rather than Bendjedid dismantling the socialist system (and even removing the word "socialism" from the constitution entirely) puts Morocco under more of a threat, given Algeria's pledge to support Western Sahara. A combined Polisario uprising and Algerian invasion would demand a Spanish intervention that would be even more of a priority than sending forces east.

Similarly, if Euskadi Ta Askatasuna had things go slightly differently, it could have repercussions on Spanish deployments. In 1995, they very nearly assassinated Jose Aznar, the Conservative politician who became Prime Minister the next year, and there was an attempt on Juan Carlos I on Majorca in 1996. Either or both of those attempts succeeding would force a much stronger reaction than Spain actually had, likely involving military action in the Basque region.

Between the two of these, enough forces could be tied up that Spain has little or nothing left to send to an eastern front. Spain's populace wasn't nearly as enthusiastic about NATO as its leadership (only 52.6% supported remaining in NATO in the 1986 referendum), and Spain's military wasn't integrated into NATO until 1999 in the real timeline; that might have been accelerated slightly in T2K timeline, but it would need to be massively accelerated to significantly affect the Twilight War. If someone felt so inclined, the government's decision to send Spanish troops to fight a "foreign" war while significant problems were on Spain's doorstep might even be the catalyst for a second civil war.

[mpipes]

Now a civil war with the Basque had not crossed my mind, and I concede that the Soviets would have worked hard to make that happen.

[Enfield]

Makes sense to me.
Spain could well have been reserved for a future publication (or just ignored as irrelevant to the core play area). Given they don't appear to have participated in any serious fighting the area seems perfect for a book similar to Bangkok - suitable to either T2K or Merc with few alterations necessary.
Doesn't help they were effectively cut off from the rest of Nato by France and Italy pulling out and essentially becoming another set of enemies.

I agree. The way I'm writing it up in my own campaign book is:

"Spain is not tormented by huge marauder groups like some parts of the world. Instead, it has suffered separatist rebellion, rioting, looting, and anarchy, as well as disease outbreaks, and corruption. In general, when government forces or civilian militias realize that non-Spanish NATO troops are in a given area, there will be surprise, wariness and, some cases, hostility, though not outright violence, but the following may happen in the worst reactions.

1. Military or police units may interdict them and try to send them back to where they came from.
2. More powerful military units may outright try to take them prisoner, certainly will want to know where they came from and why.
3. Civilians and others may be very wary of them, fearing invasion or something. In general, many civilians blame NATO and the Warsaw Pact for the War, and are not happy to see them. They are thought of as being warmongers and dangerous. People will be reluctant to help them or give them any information.

Marauder bands tend to be gang enforcers, groups of Anarchists on the warpath, looters/rioters, deserters, or separatist insurgents. The deserters usually become road robbers, gang members, or join the separatists. "

[Enfield]

Given the situation in southern Germany when the Italians suddenly invaded that would be the most likely time for them to be used. Have a mountain division slow down the Italians until the Germans and Dutch can redeploy but take heavy casualties in the process involves them in the war but not in a way that changes the overall canon.

I.e. the Spanish sent the division then after the Italians were stopped the survivors were pulled back to Spain. Spain gets hit in the nuclear exchange as detailed and after that the Spanish military is too busy at home especially after the Basques and Catalonians begin to rebel against the central government.

A very small change in the canon which has them involved in the general war but then unable to help further as Spain deteriorates into yet another civil war and what they have stays in Spain.

Adds some new info to the overall T2K story but in a way that doesnt change the canon in any way except to show how Spain might have been involved more than just sitting it out - which is basically not going to happen as I said. They fought too hard to get into NATO to sit out the war and do nothing.

Generally, I like that approach to why they are not directly involved towards the end better than them just dropping out.

[Enfield]

You might find this useful

https://apps.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a127635.pdf

The section under Reinforcement Forces is a particularly interesting read.

Thank you for posting this, much appreciated. I think someone could build a more interesting canon from this. Personally I don't always care about that anyway, after all I'm not building a sourcebook for publication but trying to produce an interesting campaign for my players. Nevertheless, others who are more interested in fitting canon could still work with it.

[Legbreaker]

Thank you for posting this, much appreciated. I think someone could build a more interesting canon from this. Personally I don't always care about that anyway, after all I'm not building a sourcebook for publication but trying to produce an interesting campaign for my players. Nevertheless, others who are more interested in fitting canon could still work with it.

Note that document is written from NATO's perspective on how they wanted to utilise Spanish forces. What Spain were actually willing to do is in the link I posted, which is also several years newer.
Given IRL the Socialists were in power up until 1996 (the beginning of the Twilight War) it seems extremely unlikely that would have changed - simply wasn't time to develop the necessary plans, doctrine and command structures which would have effected not only Spain but all the member nations of NATO.