LATIN AMERICA

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 77, 28 July 1942, Page 2

LATIN AMERICA

AXIS ACTIVITIES DECEPTION AND FALSEHOOD “You know, senor,” said an Argentine cargadore to William C. Hahn, writer for the “Sydney Morning Herald,” “we cannot understand why your people should come to us only now for friendship and understanding. Is it because of the war, perhaps?” “The Germans and Italians,” he continued, “were much more clever than you who speak English; many of them came to live among us, and their ships brought us the things we needed and carried away the produce we wished to sell. If much of the goods they brought us was of poor quality and wore out almost before it was used, we did not complain; everyone likes a bargain, and we were pleased to trade our beef for cheap German clothing and household wares at half of what better English and American products would cost. Especially when Americans did not want our beef. So now you ask us what we think of the war. Senor, we are men of freedom, just as you are. In the Plaza Independence you have seen the statue of Artegas; we do not forget him, and the things for which he fought. Yes, senor, our hearts are in sympathy with the cause of freedom everywhere. Look about you in the streets and you will see. But you were almost too late with the friendship which has always been welcome here in my country. Excuse me now, please, I must see to my men.” Mario was right, writes Mr Hahn. Is it a fundamental weakness of ours that we should always ignore the danger signs until nearly too late? On windows and brick walls I had seen the V sign of democracy. Uruguay was not grist for the Axis mill. But they tell a story in Montevideo. It is a bizarre tale worthy of the sinister imagination of a Poe. They tell you that when 79 bodies were brought ashore from the shattered Graf Spee, some of the coffins semed extraordinarily weighty. A band of young anti-Fascist patriots who had watched the ceremony dis- j interred some of those coffins under, cover of darkness. And what they j found was not the bodies of the j revered dead: rifles and cartridges j are of greater import than the resting- ; place of those who must die to serve totalitarian ends. They also say that the Graf Spec’s presence in South i American waters had a broader purpose than the harassing of Allied ships. But this weird affair of coffins without corpses was but a small part of a bold attempt to seize the reins of Government in Uruguay. For its failure we can thank the overoptimism and bad timing of Hitler’s minions, and the democratic spirit of these people. BUENOS AIRES I had been told that Argentina was a stumbling block to friendly AngloAmerican conferences with the southern republics; and as we steamed in towards the magnificent Puerto Nuevo of Buenos Aires, I saw the reason for Argentina’s position of importance in South American affairs. Buenos Aires is the best example of what Latin America is and will be in the years to come. A great sprawling metropolis of over three mililon souls, lying upon the flat delta country of the Plate, it offers everything to be found in northern centres of population. Beyond it stretch the pampas, rolling prairie country rich in grass, where vast herds of cattle roam and are groomed for export. Here, too, in the shadow of the towering Andes, endless fields of wheat ripple in the sunlight, and before the war ships of a dozen, nations carried the golden grain to I a hungry Europe. Buenos Aires manifests a lively in- j terest in culture: the windows of its | many bookshops advertise the good j taste of a reading public. The Teatro Colon is an opera house °f wide repute, and “La Prensa” is rated one of I the world’s best newspapers. The j people understand the art of living to | a marked degree in a country that is i young and growing. Mickey Mouse is there, too, grin- j ning at you from the foyers of up-to-date theatres, and American and English motor cars whirr down the tree-lined boulevardes; but Argentines do not like us, as a whole. Unfortunately, they have been right in their attitude. We in America, England and France have been so much preoccupied with our own worldly interests that we have neglected Argentina almost to the point of ignoring it. PROPAGANDA RACE American moving pictures nave provided much adverse propaganda: they depict the Latin as a sleek-haired romeo who idles his days in a tiled patio composing odes of love which he bays in the moonlight beneath his lady’s window, guitar in hand, and a sigh in his heart. And the fair maiden is invariably rescued from her dilemma by the hero, who turns out to be a blond northerner of unimpeachable virtue. South Americans view these films, with Spanish or (in the case of Brazil) Portuguese dialogue printed between scenes as in our old silent pictures: and they resent what they see and read. Nazi and Fascist agents were quick to take advantage of the situation; their Government-owned newspapers published, ostensibly for their own nationals—but oddly enough printed in Spanish—sang paeans of friendship . and praise, their denunciation of the democracies was too subtle to cause literary indigestion to the man in the street. All might have gone well for the destructive rodents of Hitler and Mussolini had their cleverness not led them to outsmart themselves. The attempted putsch in Montevideo sounded the alarm of freedom in all South American countries; temperamentally these people admire uniforms and the pomp which charac-

terises every public act of a totalitarian state; but their spirit remains democratic. BRAZIL We arrived in Santos, the world’s largest coffee port. Out in the bay a huge liner, the Windhook, of the German-South African Line, swung restlessly at anchor. Pirate fashion she had painted the red ball of the rising sun on her black flanks in an attempt to deceive a British cruiser which prowled outside. A foolish move; there was never a Japanese merchant ship of such tonnage launched; the British navy knew it. Three times she was chased into the shelter of Brazilian territorial waters. At last the Government, tiring of this game of cops and robbers, interned the vessel. A big Italian ship, the Conte Di Biancomo, was not as ingenious as the German ship in her desire to escape; she remained at her pier, and was quietly seized along with the Windhook. The city of Santos is not a prepossessing place. Its shops are small and cater to the needs of the poorer classes; the well-to-do journey up to San Paulo, some 40 miles distant, over a breathtaking railway built by the English some years ago, or entrust their lives to an apparent madman who hurtles up the mountain sides along a hairpin road in a battered Chevrolet. San Paulo, third city of South America, lies atop a frowning range in the lush coffee country of Brazil. Less publicised than the tourist city of Rio de Janeiro, it is commercially of far greater importance and strikes I the note of progress in this virtually i untouched land.

RUBBER PRODUCTION A short-sighted administration cost Brazil an opportunity of tapping that natural wealth; when American and British rubber interests began sounding the upper reaches of the Amazon for development, it specified an export tax too heavy for profitable investment. The rubber companies turned their eyes towards Malaya. And so to-day, except for th e Ford plantations in Brazil, which are as yet only partly productive, the loss of Far Eastern rubber is keenly felt throughout the Allied Nations. This faulty understanding has been remedied, even though the day is late, and the future will see much of the world’s supply of latex rubber carried down the broad Amazon.

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