The Spanish fascists encouraged Moroccan men to abuse women

(Mirror.)

During the Civil War, dehumanising the enemies and treating them as invaders was a key strategy that was used in a contradictory way in the Spanish case. Having learned from other tribal conflicts at home and the previous colonial war against Spaniards—during which, according to military archives, chemical weapons were used by Spain in the Rif’s war (Stenner 2019)—some Moroccan soldiers were encouraged by high‐ranking officers to use violence against women.

Mechbal (2011) highlighted how Moroccan soldiers were thought of as naturally or intrinsically violent, corresponding to a tribal structure prone to anarchy and revenge. Some authors have suggested that they might have enjoyed the context of war and brutality; however, this idea should be revised using historical evidence and from an anti‐colonial perspective.

As previously quoted, Franco’s General Queipo de Llano contrasted the brutality of Moroccans against the ‘sissy character’ of Republicans. This brutality was particularly described in relation to sexual violence against women (Bolorinos Allard 2016).

Again, it was part of a political and psychological strategy to spread terror using the ancestral fear of ‘Moors’ that had recently been experienced in the 1934 repression of the miners in Asturias. That terror was particularly focused in small towns, against rural women, as Moroccan soldiers were predominantly deployed in the countryside and rarely fought in cities.⁹