Description
In 1938, the League of Nations established a special committee to oversee the repatriation of foreign combatants from the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). The departure of these foreigners, who would now be defined as foreign fighters, was a coordinated international process. Though some states had misgivings about the leftist political leanings of some returnees, the formal cooperation among states to safely repatriate its citizens stands in stark contrast to modern approaches to foreign fighters. Repatriation of foreign fighters today–now widely referred to as Foreign Terrorist Fighters—is highly politicised and is grounded in narratives of counterterrorism. Rather than repatriate citizens, states have removed citizenship and pathways for return. Drawing on primary documentation in the recently digitised League of Nations archive, this paper revisits the repatriation process during the Spanish Civil War to determine how international cooperation developed and the potential applicability to modern repatriation debates. This paper forms a part of a larger project focusing on narratives of repatriation across time and their consequences for international security.
