In April 26 1937, after months of fighting the Basques during the invasion of the newly formed Basque Republic, Francisco Franco, desperate to deliver what he promised to his master Adolph Hilter, asked from Wolfram von Richtoffen to bomb the town of Gernika, the very heart of the Basque Country, here is what happened that afternoon.
This is what the Times reported a day later.
This is Colleen Corraldi's "Guernica" inspired both by the events and Picasso's painting.
This is all what the History Channel has to say about it, what a shame:
Guernica
Guernica, town (1981 pop. 17,836), in the Basque prov. of Vizcaya, N Spain. The Guernica oak, under which the diet of Vizcaya met, symbolizes the Basques' lost liberty. One of Picasso's greatest paintings commemorates the 1937 destruction of Guernica by German bombers aiding Franco during the Spanish civil war.
This is the German Goverment official apology for what happened that day:
Herzog's statement on 60th anniversary of Guernica bombing.
This weekend the small Basque town of Guernica remembered the bombing by German fighters sixty years ago. In a statement read out at the commemoration ceremony on Saturday morning, President Herzog addressed the descendants of the victims. He said "I want to take full responsibility for the past and expressly acknowledge the blame of the German aircraft involved." On April 26th 1937 the German Condor legion bombed Guernica, destroying three-quarters of the town. Up to 1700 people were killed. The air strike against the strategically unimportant town served to demonstrate the Nazi's support for the future dictator, General Franco, and also tested the strength of the Luftwaffe.
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