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Queipo de Llano, Gonzalo
(1875-1951)
Spanish soldier
An old-fashioned cavalry man who devel-
oped a surprising mastery of modern tech-
nology, Queipo de Llano became one of the
best-known generals of the S
PANISH
CIVIL
WAR
without appearing on the battlefields.
He first came to the attention of his compa-
triots in 1913 when, as a lieutenant colonel
he led a squadron of horsemen in a charge
that routed a much larger force of Moroc-
can raiders. The episode was made all the
more dramatic by occurring at the site of
A
LCAZARQUIVIR
, where Muslim forces had
inflicted a decisive defeat on King S
EBAS
-
TIAN
I of Portugal. Ten years later, by now a
brigadier general commanding the garrison
of C
EUTA
, he reacted with undisguised hos-
tility to the coup d'état of General M
IGUEL
P
RIMO
DE
R
IVERA
. Neglected by the Primo
dictatorship, which failed to offer him a
promotion, he became deeply embittered
and sponsored a journal,
Revista de las tropas
coloniales,
which contained thinly veiled
attacks on Primo's Moroccan policy. The
publication was soon shut down by govern-
ment order, and Queipo was placed on the
inactive reserve list. By 1928 he was calling
for the abolition of a monarchy that had
allowed power to pass into the unworthy
hands of Primo, and even after the latter's
resignation in 1930, Queipo conspired
against his successor. After the proclama-
tion of the Second Republic in 1931 Queipo
was rewarded for his zeal by being given
the prestigious command of the First Divi-
sion, based in M
ADRID
. He was later moved
into a seemingly important but actually
nominal position as head of the president's
military staff. As a prominent advocate of
the republic he had expected to be made
minister of war. By 1936 his list of griev-
ances had grown and ranged from being
passed over for high command in M
OROCCO
to the slights inflicted upon his in-law
Alcalá Zamora by the Popular Front regime.
Queipo de Llano joined the conspiracy
against the republic being formed by Gen-
eral E
MILIO
M
OLA
.
When the revolt of the Spanish army
broke out in July 1936, Queipo de Llano,
based in S
EVILLE
, carried out an efficient sei-
zure of power in A
NDALUSIA
and assumed
command of the revolutionary Army of the
South. Until December 1938 (when the
civil war was drawing to a close) Queipo
ruled this region as a virtual independent
fiefdom, allied with the rest of the “crusade”
led by F
RANCISCO
F
RANCO
but following a
course very much of his own design. He
disliked Franco's increasing reliance on the
right-wing political parties and their mili-
tias and resisted their attempts to impose
336
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