He was a lifelong friend and supporter of José Sanjurjo, the senior of the three generals who launched the coup of July 1936, which started the Spanish Civil War.

Born in Aretxabaleta, Gipuzkoa into a noble family, his father being the Viscount of San Enrique, Ansaldo joined the army air service (Aviación Militar) to fight in the Rif War.

On 22 March 1924, in a combined operation with a squadron of De Havilland DH-4 commanded by Joaquín Loriga,[1] his unit, composed of Bristol F.2 Fighters, destroyed a Dorand AR.2,[2] the only plane held by the Republic of the Rif, and hidden by the Rifians at Tizzi Moren, southwest of Alhucemas.

[1] In September 1925, Ansaldo's squadron air support was key to the relief of the Spanish stronghold of Kudia Tahar, east of Tetouan, and, just a few days later, his unit took part of the already ongoing Alhucemas landing.

[4] A great admirer of Charles Maurras and his Action française,[5] Ansaldo flirted with various shades of far-right politics before and during the Spanish Civil War.

[6] By 1932 Ansaldo's holiday home in Biarritz was playing host to various leading monarchists, and the group grew close to the Unión Militar Española, which was planning to overthrow the republican government.

He helped to fund both the Juntas de Ofensiva Nacional-Sindicalista and the Movimiento Sindicalista Española in the early 1930s and personally favoured the latter movement, which owed more to Blackshirts of Italian fascism in its character.

[11] In that capacity, Ansaldo became noted for his extreme violence not only for preventing any socialist activity in Madrid on May Day 1934 but also for his proclaimed intention of killing any of his own men suspected of betraying the Falange.

Flying only a small biplane, the flight hit difficulty when Sanjurjo, who was a very heavy man to begin with, insisted on carrying a large amount of luggage with him.