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A '''fifth column''' is a group of people who rationally and clandestinely tries to undermine a larger group to which it is expected to be loyal. The expression dates from the [[Spanish Civil War]] in 1936 when the Francoist General Mola, whose forces were threatening Madrid, boasted that he had four columns approaching the city and a fifth column within it.
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During the [[Second World War]], when British citizens were anxious about supposed fifth-columnists in the UK, the artist [[William Heath-Robinson]] produced a series of cartoons about the Sixth Column, patriotic men and women devoted to frustrating the actions of the Fifth Column.