19
What about the subsidiary hypothesis of balance-of-threat theory? That is, the idea
that “really weak states” may bandwagon with rather than balance against strongest threat.
It is just not possible to stretch the concept of bandwagoning to encompass Spain’s policy
vis-a-vis Britain. But, although one would be hard pressed to find evidence to support the
interpretation, one might argue that, come June 1940, it was the Nazi military specter just
over the Pyrenean border that most threatened Spain; not the weak and isolated Britain.
And, relative to its great power neighbors, Spain was quite weak. But, again, Spain not only
did not balance with Britain, it did not bandwagon with Nazi Germany. So, in sum, balance-
of-threat theory can not make heads or tails of Spain’s policy in 1940.
The Balance-of-Interests. Moving up to the international level we come to the balance-
of-interests theory of “revisionist” vs. “status quo” conflict and, in particular, to the thesis
that revisionist states form “bandwagon” alliances against status quo powers. As the
foremost proponent of this approach puts it: “calling for a New Order, dissatisfied states are
attracted to expanding revisionist powers,” and “motivated by profit more than security,
[they will] bandwagon with an ascending revisionist state.”
More specifically to the period
in question, he asserts that “Fascists worshiped strength, and what Mussolini called a Fascist
foreign policy meant in effect siding with the strongest power.”
In the second half of 1940,
when Germany undoubtedly appeared to be the strongest power, we find that Italy did jump
on the Axis bandwagon, but Spain did not. A major hole for the theory? You bet, for a
number of reasons.
First, Spain was as dissatisfied a revisionist state as any other on the Continent.
Setting aside what had been done to Spain’s empire in the Americas, it had been exploited
more recently and closer to home by Britain and France in both Europe and North Africa.
British controlled Gibraltar was, as the Spanish Foreign Minister would put it in September
1940, “a part of the living and torn flesh of Spain.”
France also was, in Spanish eyes, guilty
72
Stephen Walt, Origins of Alliances (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987), pp. 28-32.
73
Randall L. Schweller, Deadly Imbalances: Triplarity and Hitlers Strategy for World Conquest (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1998), pp. 21-22.
74
Deadly Imbalances, p. 22.
75
Said Suner to Ribbentrop in January 1941, “the Spanish government has not forgotten the humiliation which
Spain has had to suffer for centuries at the hands of England, France, and the United States.” DGFP, D, XI, p.
1189
76
Find cite. In June 1940, a Franco-inspired article in the Falangist press, entitled “Gibraltar, Honor and Duty
of Spaniards,” said Gibraltar, “rises like shadow between England and Spain” and is “the first of our great
problems…Gibraltar is part of Spain and no one can retain it without being guilty of despoliation.” BDFA, pp.
83-84
Convention