Posted on 08/27/2004 9:28:57 PM PDT by Azzurri
With a name like that, do you think he comes from German stock?
Sounds like that's possible.
Sorry to everyone about the run-on link, I must've had a broken html code in my post and accidently submitted before fixing.
The guy amazed me today. He looks like HHH, plays like Bill Walton. Always amazes me that our big white guys in the US are usually stiffs and every good international team has 2 guys like this who are fluid, quick and can shoot from anywhere on the floor.
There are a lot of German descendants living in Argentina - where a large percentage of the people come from European ancestors, much moreso than any other country down there with the exception perhaps of Uruguay. I am not sure about the numbers of Germans, I know Buenos Aires alone is supposed to be around 40% Italian, but there are quite a few other groups who immigrated there as well.
I did a quick Google search and found that the immigration records show about 3 % German speaking people (German, Swiss, Austrian).
Here's a link to a historical site:
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1990/1/90.01.06.x.html
The government doesn't keep detailed records by ethnic categories as they feel its racist. So you have to make a guess from immigration records, or count the names in the phone book.
Hoppy
How many is anyone's guess, but estimates range up to 60,000. The two most notorious found in Argentina were Adolf Eichmann and Josef Mengele.
For further reading on this, I recommend a thoroughly documented book called The Real Odessa by Uki Goni.
thanks for the details. Even more unpopular would be the suggestion (which I was told by some people while living down there) that the Nazi influence could actually be seen in Argentina's dirty war. I'm not sure about that, but it does sound plausible.
Bump
Yes, Argentina was a Nazis asylum after World War II. Argentina is a sad story. It used to a be thriving nation. Once had the seventh largest economy in the world. Today, it is in a sorry state because of Juan Peron's legacy. Argentina has a really bloated bureaucracy and corruption is rampant. It is also tolerated, liked many other Latin American nations. Back to subject, thousands of Nazis went there, many of them were French, Croatian, Belgium, Ukrainian, and Italian Nazis collaborators. The Nazis went there as early as 1943, according to Secretary of State Cordell Hull. Juan Peron was Secretary of Labor in 1943. He had sympathy for the Nazis and Fascists. When Peron became president in 1946, he helped thousands of Nazis escape with his wife Evita Peron. Adolf Eichmann, Josef Mengele, Klaus Barbie, Ante Pavelic, and Dinko Sakic to just name a few. Also, ODESSA operated in Buenos Aires. They went to Europe in a guise to promote Argentina. In reality, it was to deposit money Nazis gave to them, in Swiss Bank. Also, they picked up more Nazis war criminals to help escape. The Nazis were given Argentine passports and other papers in Spain. The Nazis escaped by using airplane or ship. Some did escape by submarine and landed in Buenos Aires or Patagonia. The Nazis fled to Argentina mostly went to Buenos Aires, Tucuman, Bariloche, or the Tri-Border region. Later, when Peron was overthrown in 1955, some Nazis left Argentina to go to Paraguay, Uruguay, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Peru, Ecuador, and Venezuela. Some even went to the Middle East, like Egypt. As of today, I would suspect some of them are alive and likely are funding terrorist groups. I have heard of Muslim terrorists operating in the Tri-Border area of South America, which is a popular Nazis hiding place. Nazis gold and assets is likely in Argentina even today and some of it might be funding terrorists today. As for the Dirty War, they actually had French veterans from the Battle of Algiers help them on how to torture and kill people. I would not be surprised by the Nazis influence though. Some Waffen-SS did serve in the French Foreign Legion and went to Indochina. Some Nazis in South America were involved in drug carteling, like Klaus Barbie.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.