On August 24, 1936, the Non-Intervention Agreement was formally accepted by Germany, Portugal, and Italy, establishing a policy of neutrality in the Spanish Civil War. The agreement, promoted by Britain and France, was intended to prevent the conflict from escalating into a European war, but it was cynically exploited by Germany and Italy, who continued to provide military support to Franco while honoring the agreement's terms only for the Republican side. The Non-Intervention Committee, established to enforce the policy, proved ineffective and became a symbol of the Western democracies' failure to confront fascism.

The Non-Intervention Agreement was bitterly condemned by left-wing poets, who saw it as a betrayal of the Spanish Republic. Pablo Neruda and other poets wrote angry verses denouncing the policy, and the agreement became a recurring target in the anti-fascist poetry of the period. The policy also inspired a sense of isolation and abandonment among Republican poets, who felt that the world had turned its back on their cause.