The Smoking Snakes

by Norman Berdichevsky (September 2016)

The run-up to the Olympic Games in Rio was accompanied by numerous reports in the world press that were largely negative and highlighted Brazil’s unpreparedness, disorganization and problems of health, crime, sanitation, hygiene and a lack of enthusiasm on the part of many Brazilians, especially the poor slum dwellers in Rio’s favelas. These views typical of much American press coverage of Latin America in general and Brazil in particular were nowhere near as pronounced in the European media. By the end of week one, attitudes had changed completely and there was a marked enthusiasm on the part of athletes, spectators and organizers that the beautiful location and world-wide interest had made the games a great success. In fact, a few days before the grand finale, many Brazilians found occasion to turn the tables on the American media when four American athletes including gold medal swimmer Ryan Lochte were found by eye-witnesses and video camera evidence to have concocted a story of being robbed at gunpoint. It was quite amazing that most of the American press was content to dig no further than that the U.S. Olympic committee had offered an apology for Mr. Lochte’s conduct to the Brazilian organizers and people leading to speculation that the “robbery” must have been connected to a dispute over payment for illicit activity. Another athlete James Feigin reached a settlement with Brazilian authorities for falsely reporting a crime and agreed to pay a fine of $11,000 to a local judo academy and sending a receipt to the judge to get his passport back.

It comprised units from the airforce (a fighter squadron) and the army (a complete infantry division). In May last year, then Brazilian president, Dilma Roussef, met with veterans to celebrate the 70^th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day. This was an attempt on the part of the government to help stimulate Brazilian pride and lay the groundwork for future interest in the games which would portray Brazil in the best possible light as a country of be proud of as indeed they should be. The Brazilian volunteers fought in the Italian campaign while units of the Brazilian Navy as well as the Air Force also participated in The Battle of the Atlantic from the mid-1942 until the end of the war. Known by its Portuguese initials as the FEB (BEF in English), it took 20,573 Axis prisoners. Brazil was the only independent South American country to send ground troops to fight overseas, and endured both resentment from pro-Axis sympathizers in Latin America and Nazi propaganda which ridiculed “Latin Americans” confronting the “master race” .The FEB lost 948 men killed in action fighting at the Gothic Line in Central Italy and in the 1945 final offensive.

At the outbreak of World War II, Brazil declared neutrality. Like rival Argentina, this meant a much increased demand for both countries raw materials and agricultural products. American efforts to pressure Latin America to adhere to U.S. war efforts following Pearl Harbor and respond to FDR’s proclamation of a “Good Neighbor Policy” and the hemispheric solidarity notions of the “Monroe Doctrine” were coupled with diplomatic and economic efforts to bring Brazil and Argentina onto the Allied side. Argentina sullenly resisted these efforts but Brazil under its dynamic president Getulio Vargas, a nationalist leader who had been accused by many on the political left as a “fascist,” made the fateful decision to identify with U.S. interests in spite of a “mixed” political past.

At the Pan American States Conference in Rio, President Vargas announced the decision to sever diplomatic relations with Germany, Italy and Japan on 28 January 1942. This measure was resented by these three large ethnic communities in Brazil. In reprisal, German U-boats sank 13 Brazilian merchant vessels from January to July 1942. In August 1942, a single German U-Boat sank five Brazilian vessels in two days, resulting in more than 600 fatalities and inflaming Brazilian opinion. These sinkings were the main reason that led the Brazilian government to declare war against the Axis on August 22, 1942. Presidents Roosevelt and Vargas met on a U.S. Navy destroyer off the coast of Natal in the state of Rio Grande do Norte on January 28 and 29 January 1943 right after Roosevelt had taken part in the Casablanca Conference in Morocco.

After many delays, the Brazilian government eventually gathered a force of one Army Division with 25,000 men (replacements included), compared with an initial declared goal of a whole Army Corps of 100,000, to join the Allies in the Italian campaign. This had taken two years of preparation from the time of Brazil’s declaration of war – a fact attributed to mutual suspicion between the American and Brazilian authorities. More than 100,000 combat experienced Brazilian soldiers would have massively upset the balance in Latin America. Several South American countries (especially arch-rival Argentina) petitioned Washington not to employ larger numbers of Brazilians and not to turn them into a military juggernaut. The Americans agreed.

On July 2, 1944, the first five thousand BEF soldiers landed in Italy and dedicated its first weeks in Italy to acquiring the necessary and proper equipment to fight on Italian terrain and to training under American command, but were part of a multinational hodgepodge of forces. German propaganda made much of the political aspect of the presence of the Brazilian force in Italy. They targeted propaganda specifically at the Brazilians accusing them of being American tools and part of the multiracial force that included numerous “inferior peoples” such as the segregated African-American 92nd Infantry Division, the Japanese-American 442nd Infantry Regiment and British Empire forces including Indians, Gurkhas, Black Africans, Jews from the British Mandate in Palestine, South Africans and Rhodesians, exile units — Poles, Greeks, Czechs, Slovakians, as well as anti-fascist Italians, all serving under British command. French forces included Senegalese, Moroccans and Algerians.

Shoulder Patch of all BEF Troops

The BEF returned home to the largest parade in Brazil’s history. Their uniforms, weapons, and appearance as battled hardened veterans looked alien. They were disciplined and fit veterans who took enormous pride in their appearance and military bearing. The crowds along the parade route in Rio very quickly realized these men were indeed authentic heroes and lovingly mobbed them.

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Norman Berdichevsky is the author of The Left is Seldom Right and Modern Hebrew: The Past and Future of a Revitalized Language.

 

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Norman Berdichevsky contributes regularly to The Iconoclast, our Community Blog. Click here to see all his contributions on which comments are welcome.