«All the Leaders of the Third Reich Fled to Latin America»...
April 2, 2009
The claims awakened the fantasy of numerous individuals whose interests revolved around the history of Nazi Germany. Hundreds of books and dozens of movies about operation ODESSA – the transfer of Nazi leaders to hideouts in various remote parts of the world - have seen the light of day as a result. Like many aspects of the short existence of the Third Reich the theme is indeed captivating. Currently there seems to be a Nazi history boom in Russia. Bookstores are loaded with literature on the subject. Biographies of Nazi leaders, memoirs written by Wehrmacht generals and Luftwaffe pilots, treatises on the Abwehr and the Gestapo may be a specific sort of pabulum, but in Russia they clearly have a permanent readership.
The swastika can be seen on most of the book covers. Once I inadvertently heard a piece of a conversation among people I did not know in a bookstore - someone said: “All the leaders of the Third Reich fled to Latin America”. I was not too surprised. You can run across much stronger statements in Internet like “Hitler remained alive for a whole decade after Stalin's death and the truth finally became impossible to conceal”.
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The attempts made by writers, journalists, and cohorts of sensation-seekers to float more positive and optimistic versions of what happened to Nazi leaders should not come as a surprise in the context of the current Western campaign aimed at radically reassessing the results of World War II and understating – if not altogether denying – the role played by the Soviet Union in routing the Nazi Germany and its allies. Oftentimes Nazi leaders are portrayed as fearless warriors who rose against the expansion of “the Russian Bolshevism” but were swept away by “the Eastern hordes”.
The final point in the biographies of many of the Nazi leaders was put by the Nuremberg Trials, but masters of falsifications either pretend not to notice the episodes or distort them in the style of the now-popular fantasy genre which ideologists of the dominant neoliberal doctrine brought to the forefront of the modern art. The reality which does not correspond to ideology can be cosmetically processed. A whole generation grew up on various fantasies like The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and likewise global projects, and quite a few people are prepared to believe in incredible transformations of reality, miraculous transfigurations, magic illusions, and mystical triumphs of the elevated virtual reality over the boring ordinary life.
The popularization of the hypothesis that Hitler survived in an underground “New Berlin” in Antarctica was one of the first attempts to plant the fantasy genre into historical literature. Allegedly engineers and construction workers delivered to the continent by 35 (!) submarines of Fuhrer's Convoy had been building the installation in enormous underground oases in 1939-1943.
Even wider circulation was enjoyed by the version according to which Nazi leaders had fled in numbers to Latin America and established a secret “Fourth Reich”. It was put forward by Ladislas Farago, an ethnic Hungarian who worked for the U.S. Naval Intelligence during World War II and cleverly utilized his unique knowledge and experience after it. He wrote books about the struggle between intelligence services and Nazi criminals that managed to avoid punishment by fleeing across the ocean. Farago's Martin Bormann and the Fourth Reich became a bestseller in 1970ies. By professionally arranging the materials at his disposal the author attempted to prove that A. Hitler's personal secretary, chief of Parteikanzlei, and “gray cardinal” Bormann escaped from the intelligence services of the anti-fascist coalition countries and made it to Latin America, where he lived without serious problems and died at a senior age. Farago presented in a lively fashion the history of searches for Bormann, cited a whole bulk of documents, and supplied details of conversations with eyewitnesses of Bormann's secret life and even with Bormann himself. The books left many readers convinced that the Third Reich's number two official had miraculously survived and discredited the report that Bormann's skeleton had been found at a construction site in Berlin a few years after the end of the war and identified.
In Farago's interpretation, Bormann created in Latin America a secret network of his aides and native sympathizers which replicated the “authority vertical”, the administrative system, and the security machine of the Third Reich. Bormann's empire allegedly spread over Argentine, Paraguay, Chile, and Bolivia, and also had bases in other Latin American countries.
Indirectly Farago's version was confirmed by the accomplishments of the so-called Nazi hunters, of whom Simon Wiesenthal, a survivor of a Nazi concentration camp, was the best-known. Flows of information – at times quite unreliable - concerning Nazi criminals at large converged in Wiesenthal’s headquarters. Thus Wiesenthal floated numerous legends about the powerful Nazi underground in Latin America. Nevertheless he must be credited with having done a lot to make Nazi criminals face justice. The information supplied by Wiesenthal led to the seizure of Adolf Eichmann in Argentine and helped to establish the whereabouts of Butcher of Lyon Klaus Barbie who - after protracted strife – was eventually deported to France. At one time there was hope that the notorious Nazi sadist - physician Josef Mengele would also be caught in no time in Brazil or Paraguay.
A lot has been written about Wiesenthal's efforts to put on trial Walter Rauff, the SS officer who designed gas vans, the mobile gas chambers used by the SS to exterminate prisoners. After trying to land in various countries he finally settled down in Chile where he got the job of an “adviser” with Pinochet's secret police DINA. Rauff patronized Colonia Dignidad regarded as a Nazi enclave in Chile. The colony was founded by former Nazi corporal and a fanatical follower of Hitler Paul Schafer. If the Fourth Reich ever existed, Colonia Dignidad would have been its only part to become known. In reality it was an extremely secretive cult whose leaders were involved in child abuse. On these grounds Schafer amassed a bulk of materials compromising a number of Chilean politicians, military officers, and influential businessmen and thus managed to avoid being punished for years. Only in May, 2006 Schafer and his aides were finally sentenced to long terms in jail.
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Interest in the Fourth Reich myth began to evaporate in the 1980ies-1990ies as at that time the Nazi criminals who found shelter in Latin America had to reach their seventies or even eighties. The page of history was about to be turned, but in 2000 the theme of the Nazi underground was revitalized by Argentinian journalist Abel Basti with his sensational books Hitler En Argentina and Bariloche Nazi: Sitios Historicos Relacionados Al Nacionalsocialismo. They were carefully documented and included photographs like post-war pictures of A. Hitler and his wife E. Braun whom he married in his bunker while the fighting of Berlin was raging. Basti's imagination and ability to invent and combine evidence were superior even to those of late Farago. The latter at least never claimed that Hitler personally headed the Fourth Reich in the name of the struggle against plutocracy, communism, Jewry, and Free Masonry. Basti wrote that A. Hitler, E. Braun, and Fuhrer's closest aides flew from the burning Berlin to Spain (or, alternatively – to Norway), and then crossed the Atlantic Ocean by three submarines and reached Argentina. In July-August, 1945 Hitler and his clique landed in the Rio Negro province near the Caleta de los Loros village and moved on further into Argentine. Allegedly, the same secret route prepared by SS chief H. Himmler's people was later passed by Bormann, Mengele, and Eichmann... Basti detailed the journey of A. Hitler and E. Braun across Argentina assisted by local Nazi sympathizers, and described the couple’s family life during which – despite the hardships of hiding – they even had children.
Bariloche Nazi: Sitios Historicos Relacionados Al Nacionalsocialismo became the favorite reading of Hitler's admirers. The two-storied mansion in Bariloche which – according to Basti – had served as Hitler's residence in 1945-1950 permanently attracts tourists. Other routes allegedly leading to the hideouts of Bormann, Mengele, and Eichmann had also become fairly popular. Paraguayan historian Mariano Llano expressed support for Basti's view as he also published a book on the rewarding theme entitled “Hitler. Nazi in Paraguay”.
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The flow of literature spreading the myth about Hitler's life in Latin America is unlikely to dwindle upon the publication of Basti's books. I am not trying to say that the fantasy genre has no right to exist. Demand for this sort of writings surges in crisis epochs when readers are hungry for whatever helps them to escape from reality. Besides, the fantasy interpretation of the past showing Nazi criminals remaining unpunished instills optimism into the present-day potential Fuhrers.
Basti's books were promoted globally, and among other countries the waves of the campaign reached Russia. Companies are trying to obtain a license to make a movie based on the material. We should expect that in the future new authors will create sensations by broadening the list of survivors to eventually include all of Hitler's associates. To eliminate discrepancies, those who were executed following the Nuremberg Trials could be look-alikes of the actual Nazi leaders and fanatics eager to sacrifice their lives...
Imagine the picture: a lovely estate in Argentina, a bunch of friends – Hitler, Bormann, Himmler, Goebbels, Ribbentrop, Keitel, Muller - at the dining table. Eva Braun wearing an apron is pouring coffee with cream and serving an apple pie. What an idyll...