Ginés Vidal y Saura (27 March 1890 – 28 April 1945) was a Spanish diplomat. During World War II he was ambassador of Spain to Germany, a position he held between 1942 and 1945.

Biography A career diplomat,Wayne H. Bowen (2000). Spaniards and Nazi Germany: Collaboration in the New Order, University of Missouri Press, p. 121 Ginés Vidal held various positions in Spanish embassies in Havana, Warsaw, Berlin and Copenhagen, as well as at the High Commission of Spain in Morocco. After the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War, he joined the Nationalist faction. In 1938, he went on to serve in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Nationalist zone and was appointed head of the National Service of Politics and Treaties. Boletín Oficial del Estado núm. 549, de 23 de abril de 1938, pág. 6919 This position earned him a place on the Cultural Relations Board of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Lorenzo Delgado Gómez-Escalonilla (1988). Diplomacia franquista y política cultural hacia Iberoamérica, 1939-1953, Madrid: CSIC, p. 232 He became a close collaborator of Foreign Minister General Francisco Gómez-Jordana Sousa.Wayne H. Bowen (2006). Spain during World War II, University of Missouri Press, p. 49 In August 1940 he was part of an economic delegation that visited Berlin.Christian Leitz (1996). Economic Relations Between Nazi Germany and Franco's Spain: 1936–1945, Oxford University Press, p. 116 At the end of 1942 he was appointed ambassador of Francoist Spain to Nazi Germany, replacing the pro-Nazi José Finat. During this period, his missions were the acquisition of German military equipment,Christian Leitz (1996). Economic Relations Between Nazi Germany and Franco's Spain: 1936–1945, Oxford University Press, pp. 160–161 or the withdrawal of the Blue Division from the Russian Front. Ginés Vidal left Berlin on 11 March 1945, and died of cerebral embolism shortly after, on 28 April, while he was in Bern, Switzerland.D. Pike (2008). Franco and the Axis Stigma, Palgrave Macmillan, p. 181

Awards Grand Cross of the Order of Isabella the Catholic (1942)

Works Tratado de Derecho diplomático. Editorial Reus, Madrid. 1925. La política exterior de España durante la menor edad de Isabel II. Editorial Reus, Madrid. 1929

References