‘Democracy must win or humanity will perish’

NOT long after Tzar Putin began to write his name in the history books of Russian brutality and atrocities, Ukrainian President Zelenskyy announced the creation of an ‘International Legion’ to help Ukraine defend itself.

In no time over 20,000 people from 52 countries volunteered to fight against the Russians.

They came with different political, ideological and personal motivation and a wide spectrum of skills. They spoke about “doing the right thing” and “wanting to make a difference”.

Ironically it was the Soviet Union in August 1936 which issued the call for the creation of an international volunteer corps to defend the democratically elected Spanish Republic following Franco’s coup.

Of the almost 200 Welsh volunteers I identified in my research who served in Spain as part of the International Brigades, one of these was Brazell Thomas of Llanelli, who died in 1938 attempting to take a key hill protecting the town of Gandesa.

A few years ago I visited the site where he died and tried to imagine this almost impregnable hill, fortified with bunkers, trenches, barbed wire and booby traps. The trench positions and machine-gun dugouts can still be seen.

Brazell Thomas, a tinplate worker, had at the age of 25, travelled to Spain with his friend Evan Jones – there were around 15 volunteers from Carmarthenshire.

It was a Welsh medic who pulled the wounded Brazell Thomas to safety, but he was hit fatally a second time.

Evan Jones was badly wounded and later lost his arm. The Moscow archives spoke well of Brazell Thomas and on the front of the leaflet from his commemoration service were written the powerful words: “Democracy must win or humanity will perish”.

Both in 1936 and now today volunteers ignored government advice to fight for democracy knowing that appeasement is an even more dangerous game. Those who prophetically saw the Spanish Civil War as the first act of the Second World War might also have seen Georgia, Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Chelsky and Londongrad as the warm-up acts for the political ancestor of Ivan the Terrible and the moral descendant of Stalin.