"Freiheit", also known as "Spaniens Himmel" or "Die Thälmann-Kolonne", is a song written in 1936 by Gudrun Kabisch and Paul Dessau, German anti-fascists.
The fight in Spain is put in the context of the universal struggle against fascism, with the chorus making direct reference to the situation in Germany during the period of Nazism.
The final chorus in the Ernst Busch version alternatively gives the line Wir kämpfen und sterben für dich: Freiheit!
The song was popularized among German fighters in Spain by singer and International Brigades member Ernst Busch and later became something of an unofficial anthem of the GDR.
The song was sung as a dirge by the dissident musician Wolf Biermann as a parodic critique of "the stagnation of the socialist ideal" in the GDR of the 1960s and 1970s.