How the Spanish Civil War turned Belchite into a ghost town: Inside the Spanish settlement frozen in the aftermath

There are places where history survives in museums, and there are places where it remains embedded in the landscape. Belchite belongs to the second kind. About 25 miles south of Zaragoza, the Spanish settlement still contains large sections of a town devastated during the Spanish Civil War. Damaged buildings, ruined churches and scarred streets remain as reminders of the fighting that transformed Belchite from a functioning community into one of Spain's most striking wartime ruins.

The Daily Express reported that the remains have stood for about 85 years as a reminder of one of the most troubled periods in Spain's history. What makes Belchite unusual is not simply the destruction itself, but what happened afterward: the ruins were left standing.