August 4, 2012
Yes, there are a lot of Germans in South America as well as Arabs.
Argentina today has about 3½ million German-Argentines, and 3-4 Million Arab-Argentines. Somewhere between 6-7 million combined for the two groups. Not bad considering that today Argentina has only 45 Million people.
But the ridiculous speculations that arise from these facts are beyond belief.
LET’S GET RID OF SOME IDIOCIES.
Most Germans in Argentina arrived in Argentina long before World War II. Only 50,000 Germans arrived in the post-war years. And they came to a country which at that time had 300,000 Jews. Jews outnumbered the post war German refugees six to one.
Yes, there were war criminals among the post-war German refugees, however many were simply the wives and children of the criminals. These war criminals were not that many, even if notable. At that time, in 1945, there was a population of over 1 million German-Argentines, many of whom were multi-generational Argentine. Do you seriously think a few thousand Nazis were statistically significant?
There was NO a massive Nazi flight to Argentina to make a Fourth Reich; just a few thousand villains seeking to elude Allied Justice. And occasionally, evidence of their shenanigans will show up; but it does not mean they were a major force in Argentina. They were, instead, a minor, but nasty, curiosity.
Yes, these few Nazis had committed war crimes. But they were a miniscule part of German-Argentina’s history. These few Nazis added nothing, but an exaggeratedly bad reputation, to their ethnic community.
Hitchcock’s: NOTORIOUS
But the Nazis weren’t building
atom bombs in South America.
That was a fantasy from the beginning, a myth coming out of the US State Department, which spent 10 years scouring South America for a conspiracy that never existed. Hollywood even made movies about it: Hitchcock’s: NOTORIOUS.
In reality, these were former war criminals hiding out to avoid punishment in a country where they were not ostracized.
Juan Perón let these Germans in because he was foolish. He thought every German officer was a technical genius; and he thought these Nazis could improve Argentina’s industry. It never occurred to Perón that the Nazi party had recruited their cadres primarily from unemployed street riff-raff, who were incapable of benefiting any society. The cream of Germany had detested the Nazis.
The most infamous, Adolf Eichmann – who hid out as Ricardo Klement in Argentina – could barely keep and hold down blue collar jobs.
Perón’s wife, Evita, would comment on Perón’s fascination with the Germans that the General is so naive.
Neither was Perón a Nazi.
Argentina, though it has Germans, is not a Nordic country. Nazism was a racial philosophy. Nazism has a fascist understanding of government, but its core ideology was racist.
How in the world could Perón sell Nordic supremacy to Latin Argentina? After all, most Argentines are either Spanish or Italian, or a mix of both.
Do these gauchos look like Aryan Superman?
Argentina is a country where roughly half the population is of Mediterranean stock while the other half, though primarily-European, often has some degree of non-white Indian blood, albeit usually small amounts. Only about 15% of the country could qualify as Nordic. While there are blonds in Argentina, there are not enough of them to pull this idiocy off, and Perón knew it. You can’t sell Nordic supremacy to a Mediterranean people; particularly when half the Mediterraneans have traces of non-white blood. Even Perón himself, though appearing quite white, had some Tehuelche native ancestry.
Besides, though Perón admired German technical prowess, he personally found Germans to be too stiff.
Perón was not a racist. He even had a famous Jewish advisor. José ber Gelbard.
Juan Perón was a popular dictator, a strongman. He held elections, but rigged them, unnecessarily. He just preferred landslides over regular victories.
As for Nazis: While there were Nazis sympathizers in Argentina, the country was not a Nazi state. It cycled between corrupt, flawed democracies and juntas. Perón was somewhere in between: a dictator who had a popular constituency.
What Perón was was an admirer of the economic policies of Benito Mussolini. He admired fascist economics, not their racial, nor necessarily their political policies.
This is not to say that Perón was a nice guy. Absolutely not! He was a dictator of sorts. He was a strongman who had a popular base of support. The poor supported him for his semi-socialist policies.
WHAT ABOUT THE ARABS?.
The Arabs likewise started arriving in the 19th century. The number of Arab immigrants to Argentina dropped off precipitously after the 1950s.
These were not anti-Zionist jihadists fleeing to Argentina to team up with Nazis. ODESSA was not training FATAH in Argentina.
The vast majority of Arab immigrants were Christian Arabs who arrived long before World War 2, and long before the relatively small post-war immigration of Germans. The Maronite Lebanese in the mix were not even anti-Israel; but could often be anti-Muslim, as many Maronites are to this day.
To be sure, a few Arabs did flee Israel for South America in 1947-1948, after the war; but NOT as many as the myth says.
The Arabs did not go to Argentina to meet up with Nazis. This is a bald faced lie, and must be dispensed with.
The truth is that Argentina was like the USA. It took in massive amounts of European and Arab immigration. Unlike the USA, it was less picky about who came in.
If you want to see what the Germans in Argentina are really like:
This is just Germans drinking beer at an Argentine Oktoberfest.
And a lot of Latins are participating!
No one is planning to invade Israel!
There was no conspiracy for a Fourth Reich, nor a conspiracy to wage jihad on Israel with Panzer groups hailing from the Pampas.
The Arabs and Germans probably did not mix much except when they intermarried in a Catholic Church to produce little Argentines who wanted to be soccer players, not a mujahadeen, nor a Panzer-Gruppenleiter.
Argentina had enough issues. Do not exaggerate things by made up idiocies.
1 May 2021 – Edited: Had to update a dead video.