As extracted from a recent isegoria.net blog entry:
"The first time in the world that armored vehicles were used in numbers strategically and as a new weapon of war was in Spain, at the battle of the Ebro, during their Civil War. All the nations should have been watching and maybe were, but only the Germans saw anything. The Spanish Republican chief of armor at that battle, who was the first man to comprehend and use tanks for full effectiveness was a Scottish independent soldier [a communist fighting with the International Brigade] named Malcolm Dunbar. His were the tank tactics which made Guderian and Rommel world famous in later years"
Regarding Dunbar:
"A middle-class, Cambridge-educated, homosexual aesthete, he could hardly have been a less typical volunteer. Yet, like a number of other intellectuals, in Spain he discovered a hitherto undiscovered talent for military life. Ranking only soldado (private) at the Battle of Jarama in February 1937, he rose quickly through the ranks, becoming Chief of Staff of the entire 15th International Brigade at the Battle of the Ebro in July 1938."
Englishman Dunbar as Chief of Staff of the International Brigade in Spain the FIRST to realize the potential of armor warfare and use tank forces in an effective manner?? This I have a problem with.
MORE THAN LIKELY DUNBAR HAVING DECISIONS MADE FOR HIM BY AN EMBEDDED SOVIET RED ARMY SENIOR COMBAT ARMS OFFICER/COMMISSAR.
SENIOR RED ARMY OFFICER TELLING DUNBAR WHAT TO DO AND DUNBAR GIVING THE ORDERS.
Furthermore regarding the use armor during the Spanish Civil War:
"The Spanish Civil War, although the testing grounds for the nations which would ultimately take part in World War II, proved inconclusive with regard to the proof of mechanized warfare. Despite attempts by Soviet, German and Italian advisers and soldiers to use newly devised mechanized theories, the lack of quality crews and the tanks, and the insufficient number of tanks provided bad impressions on the usefulness of tanks on their own."
ARMOR OF ITSELF NOT EFFECTIVE UNLESS PART AND PARCEL OF A COMBINED ARMS FORCE. LESSONS NEEDED TO BE LEARNED.
coolbert.