"In Many Ways, Spanish Civil War Was 'The First Battle..." Topic

…Of WWII'.

"Nearly 80 years ago, about 2,800 Americans volunteered to fight in the Spanish Civil War. The war began in July 1936, when Gen. Francisco Franco led a fascist military coup against the the country's newly elected democratic government. It lasted until Franco's victory in 1939.

Journalist Adam Hochschild tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross that "it was by far the largest number of Americans before or since who've ever joined somebody else's civil war."

Hochschild chronicles Americans' involvement in the war in his new book, Spain in Our Hearts. He says that the majority of Americans in Spain (including writer Ernest Hemingway, who reported on the conflict) were sympathetic to the Republican forces who fought against Franco's Nationalists…"
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Amicalement
Armand

If one neglects Japan invading Manchuria….

Good point.

Amicalement
Armand

> If one neglects Japan invading Manchuria….

Many Many "ones" do just that.

There is an ASL battle pack on the Pacific War from Bounding Fire Productions. Very interesting since it covers the earliest battles up to the end of the war.

Not at all.
There is no direct link between ScW and WW2. In contrary – bitter enemies in SCW, Nazi Germany and USSR, became allies in first campaign of WW2, against Poland.

There is indeed a direct connection.
There were many tactics and fighting methods tried out by the Condor Legion, where they "perfected" dive bombing and terror bombing of civilians, exactly the kind of thing that they did as part of their "blitzkreig" in 1939-40.
Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy became more closely aligned because of their joint support of the rebels in Spain.
Nazi Germany perceived the weakness of the western democracies, evidenced by their failure to support the legitimate government against the murderous rebels, which led to Nazi Germany tearing up the Treaty of Versailles and to German aggression in Europe, and thus directly leading to WW2.

In addition, Stalin allied with Hitler in part because of inaction by the western Democracies in defense of the Second Republic of Spain.

Indeed, his perception of the weakness of the Western democracies led him to make a rapprochement with the Nazis; their further weakness, as demonstrated by Munich and their failure to intervene in the spring of 1939 when Hitler disregarded Munich led him to ally with the Nazis.

In fact, the Rome-Berlin Axis was cemented during the SCW.