cadres had become Popular Militias. The basic structure of the defense cadres had been designed in order to respond to the need to extend and expand them by means of the incorporation of secondary cadres. All that was necessary was to make room in them for the tens of thousands of working class volunteers who joined the struggle against fascism, and extend their territories to Aragón. The confederal militias became the vanguard of all the armed units that were looking for fascist enemies to attack. They were the armed organization of the revolutionary proletariat. They were imitated by the other working class organizations, and even by those of bourgeois origin. Because of the absence of a unitary proletarian army, as many militias arose as there were parties andother organizations.

These defense cadres underwent a dual transformation. As the Popular Militias, which established the front lines during the first few days on the Aragón front, they introduced the collectivization of the land to the liberated Aragonese villages; and as the Revolutionary Committees, they imposed a “new revolutionary order” in every neighborhood of Barcelona and every town in Catalonia. Because of the common origin of these institutions in the defense cadres the confederal militias and the Revolutionary Committees would always be united and interrelated.

After the victory over the fascist and military uprising in Catalonia, the Defense Committees of each neighborhood (or town) formed Revolutionary Neighborhood (or municipal) Committees, assuming a wide array of names. These Revolutionary Neighborhood Committees, in the city of Barcelona, were almost exclusively composed of