BELFAST RB BOOKLET 2020 - Flipbook - Page 87
Ci t y of Belf ast Grand Bl ack Chapt er - Dem onst rat i on Bookl et 2020
"IN LEAGUE WITH THE DEVIL" .. during the Spring of 1942, senior
SS Officers from the Stalag IV.B concentration camps attending a
conference hosted in Berlin by Otto Adolf Eichmann (left) listened
intently as Hitler's Chief Holocaust Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant
Colonel) declared .. 'Victory is ours; the end of the war is near but we
must hurry as this is the last chance to free Europe of the Jews which
would be carried out silently in the gas-chambers. After the war it will
not be possible to utilise such methods.'
Following
Germany's havens mainly in Latin
defeat in 1945, Eichmann was captured by America,
in
particular
American ground-forces but escaped soon amongst countries such as
after from a detention camp and was secreted Argentina, Chile, Brazil,
by sympathisers, hiding him in and around Colombia and Mexico, but
Germany. Later he ended up in a small village also included a few fascist
in Lower Saxony, living incognito until 1950 supportive areas within the
before moving to Argentina using false papers United States of America as
obtained with the help of a Rome based well as neutral Switzerland.
organisation directed by Austrian Roman
There were two primary routes, with the first
Catholic Bishop Alois Hudal (right).
transporting fugitives from Germany into Spain
Hudal helped to establish 'RATLINES' an then onto Argentina. The second direct from
organisation to assist prominent Nazis, Germany to Rome, through Genoa and again
other fascist officers and political to South America with each route initially
leaders, many accused of being war developed independently but eventually both
criminals, to escape and avoid capture came together, being supported by clergy of
the Roman Catholic Church.
in the aftermath of World War II.
But it was eventually left to an American
As the main organiser of the evasion plan,
Hudal was wilfully supported by Monsignor college historian, Professor Emeritus
Karlo Petranovi, himself an Ustasha war Michael Phayer of Marquette University
criminal, ably assisted by priests Krunoslav in Milwaukee, who has written various
Draganovic a Croatian Professor of Theology papers on nineteenth and twentieth
and Edward Domoter a Franciscan of century European history as well as the
Hungarian origin who had also been Holocaust, to highlight that the Roman
responsible for forging Eichmann's false Catholic Hierarchy had developed the
passport, using the name of 'Ricardo Klement.' 'ratlines' escape system and it had been
The aptly titled 'ratlines' group operated a fully supported by the Vatican.
system of escape routes which led to 'safe'
Phayer's assertion was also substantiated
Cardinal Secretary of State,
Eugenio Pacelli (middle) who
later became Pope Pius XII;
pictured signing the Concordat
between Nazi Germany and the
Vatican at a formal ceremony in
Rome on 20th July 1933; with
the Fascist Party Vice-Chancellor
Franz von Papen on the left and
right, Rudolf Buttmann the Reich
Interior Minister
IN MEMORY OF THE FALLEN - 85 - AND THE FUTURE OF THE LIVING