Europe’s Inroads Into Latin America

He was right that Europe would dominate Latin America

Carefully planned and executed by the EU and the Vatican

When Germany lay smoldering in the rubble of World War ii, a lone voice warned that Berlin’s will for global dominance had not been broken and that it would rise again—one final time. That voice said Germany had prepared a blueprint for its revival long before its defeat by Allied powers.

This final time, instead of stony-faced, jack-booted soldiers conquering nations by blitzkrieg force, it would be posh businessmen equipped with the weapons of the new euroforce: tailored suits, briefcases and laptops. This war would be fought in corporate boardrooms, at political functions and business lunches, and through meticulous international diplomacy.

And this time around, that voice warned, Europe would have the help of Latin America. Of course, that voice belonged to Herbert W. Armstrong, and time has proved that his forecast was spot on.

Nazi-Latino Underground

“Germany’s plans in South America were temporarily halted by her defeat in World War ii,” the Plain Truth reported in May 1962.

What were these plans? Germans had been making inroads into Latin America even back in the 1530s, in the earliest decades of European colonization—long before the various German peoples were united into one nation.

The primary influx of Germans occurred in the mid-1800s, when Latin American nations had stabilized and Germany remained disunited. In communities throughout Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina, Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Chile, Guatemala and elsewhere, industrious German immigrants began to exert robust influence in politics, culture and especially the business sector.

That Plain Truth article continued, “South America will be conquered by business agents, not by guns” (quoting T. H. Tetens, Germany Plots With the Kremlin; emphasis added).

Much of the German influence had a positive effect on Latin American development and prosperity, but as the decades went by and the Third Reich rose back in the homeland, some of these German immigrants proved to be aggressive Pan-Germanists, fascists and Nazis.

A study into these early Teutonic inroads into Latin America shows that some leading Germans planned to extend their vision of a German-led empire into Latin America and to capitalize on the Catholic culture they shared in order to tap into the reserves of the resource-rich continent.

Germany’s crushing defeat in World War ii slowed those plans, but it did not stop them. In fact, it set events in motion that delivered a great boost to Germany’s long-term strategy in Latin America.

After World War ii, over 55,000 Germans fled their native land to seek havens in other nations. Thousands of Nazi sympathizers also fled from Croatia, Hungary and Yugoslavia to continue working for the next European religious-corporate reich. Many of these war criminals fled through the Vatican-engineered “ratlines.” The majority of them ended up in Latin America.

The October 1957 Plain Truth said, “During World War ii, Argentina was an outspoken friend of Hitler, sheltering Nazi officers and men, offering safe haven for Nazi ships and submarines. Many Nazis found their way to Argentina and safety while Hitler’s regime was collapsing under the steady rain of Allied bombs.”

Juan Perón, president of Argentina during the postwar years, openly boasted about how delighted his government was to absorb well-trained, highly educated Nazi war criminals after Germany’s defeat. “The German government has invested millions of marks into the development of these people; we only paid for the airplane ticket,” he said.

By 1950, Berlin had carved out a high-level military presence in Argentina; German companies were again firmly planted in several Latin American nations; Adolf Hitler’s puppet ruler, Ante Pavelić, was injecting fascist ideology into Paraguay; and the Nazis had intelligence agents entrenched in Argentina, Chile, Venezuela, Ecuador and other nations.

In the decades since then, the Vatican has helped many German and other European corporations tap into Latin America’s most lucrative industrial and agricultural markets. German corporate giants such as ThyssenKrupp, Siemens, Bayer, Volkswagen, I. G. Farben and Deutsche Bank became household names south of the Rio Grande, across Panama, in the Andean nations, and clear down to southern Argentina and Chile.

Since Germany’s unification in 1990 and Berlin’s subsequent climb to the ruling seat of the European Union, all levels of EU trade and investment in the Latin American region have increased dramatically.

Herbert Armstrong knew far in advance that communism would fail to entice the Latinos and that British and American influence there would dwindle. He knew it would be German-led Europe that would ultimately achieve its long-term goal of economic and religious domination of Latin America. Europe today is rapidly achieving that goal.

Modern Symbiosis

The modern strategic partnership between the EU and the Latin American region was initiated in June 1999 at the first European Union, Latin America and the Caribbean (EU-lac) Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

The EU-lac includes all nations of the EU and Latin America, representing a population of about a billion people. It meets every two years to boost cooperation on issues ranging from trade and science to culture and politics. In 2010, the two sides created the EU-lac Foundation. Where in all of Europe and Latin America did they decide to build the foundation’s facilities? Hamburg, Germany.

In recent years, the EU has finalized free-trade pacts with Chile, Peru, Colombia, Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras and Nicaragua. It has also been laboring to conclude formal talks toward a free-trade pact with the entire Latin American region.

After 25 years of negotiation, the EU and the Latin American trade bloc mercosur signed a free-trade deal on December 6, 2024. Once ratified by the EU’s 27 member states, it will create a free-trade area of nearly 800 million people: those in the EU, plus Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay. These two blocs already trade about $115 billion with each other annually. The EU is second only to China in trade with mercosur—even more than the U.S.

By developing this relationship, which it calls a “strategic alliance,” Europe is directly challenging Washington’s bygone hopes of creating a Pan-American free-trade area. This challenge to U.S. influence was also predicted by Mr. Armstrong.

The Icy Exclusion of the United States

The May 1962 Plain Truth declared that “the United States is going to be left out in the cold as two gigantic trade blocs, Europe and Latin America, mesh together and begin calling the shots in world commerce.”

In perhaps the most powerful statement in its 1999 report, the European Commission declared, “The European alternative can thus represent a viable counterweight to what is sometimes perceived as excessive economic and political dependence.” This is saying that Latin America could and should break its dependence on the United States and instead rely on the Europeans.

The Plain Truth asked its readers some sobering questions in its April 1966 issue: “Can you see why we warn readers that the Latin American Common Market and the Central American Common Market are dangerously close to becoming partners with the European Common Market? Can you see these giant combines are dangerously close to turning their backs on America and Britain, once and for all? Can you see why we warn you that the Nazis—hiding out all over South America—are dangerously close to rising again, this time to be victorious as prophesied in Isaiah 10, Jeremiah 25:15-33?”

Today, we might ask if we see the seriousness of the EU-mercosur combine, and the implications of its congealing cooperation. An economically unified, politically stable Latino bloc is necessary to ensure constant delivery of goods to Europe. It is also a way for the Europeans to reduce U.S. geopolitical power. These are major reasons why Europe, with Vatican assistance, is working hard to constantly shore up its influence in Latin America.

One sobering sign of this slide away from the U.S. came in February 2014. Fueled by anger over Washington’s unapologetic spying on Latin American and European leaders (including a tap on German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s mobile phone), the EU and Brazil agreed to lay an undersea cable stretching some 3,500 miles from Lisbon to Fortaleza. The $185 million cable project is designed to keep the U.S. out of the loop in EU-Latin American communications and could pave the way to push Washington further out of Latin America. The link was completed on February 1, 2021.

Once Europe’s unification is complete, the U.S.’s position with Brazil and other Latin American nations will slip rapidly into oblivion.

The Catholic Connection

The headquarters of the Catholic Church is in Europe. Yet it is not Europe but Latin America—incorporating Mexico, the Central American isthmus and the continent of South America—that constitutes the most catholicized landmass in the world. The region’s largest country, Brazil, has more Roman Catholics than any nation on the planet, and Mexico is a close second. No continent is more aligned with the Vatican than Latin America.

The Plain Truth recognized the deep importance of the religious roots Europeans and Latin Americans share. In October 1957, it said, “Latin American nations will join in with the European revival of the old Roman Empire ….” Throughout history, that empire has been guided by the Vatican.

In recent decades, the Vatican’s role in the EU-Latin American relationship has become increasingly pronounced.

During his 1979 to 2005 papacy, Pope John Paul ii visited all 24 countries of Central and South America. The visits were part of an effort to stabilize the region and to remind Latin America of the religion and culture it shares with Europe and of its trade obligations to the EU. Pope Benedict xvi, with a 2007 visit to Brazil, kept the momentum from his predecessor moving forward.

A few years later, Benedict handed the church’s reins over to a man who was perhaps better qualified than any other to orchestrate the third and final act of Latin America’s joining in with “the European revival of the old Roman Empire.” Pope Francis i, born Jorge Bergoglio, became the Catholic Church’s first Latin American pope in history. He grew up in Argentina—the Latin American nation more culturally and politically influenced by its connection to Nazi Germany than any other.

Pope Francis’s role in absorbing Latin America into Europe’s imperialist drive was crucial. Langley Intelligence Group Network said, “[H]e will be very strong towards bringing Argentina, Venezuela and Cuba into the Catholic fold.” Time proved that to be true.

The importance of Latin America to the Catholic Church was also underscored in the choice of Francis’s successor, Pope Leo xiv. Though an American, Leo spent much of his life in Peru, has Peruvian citizenship, and speaks fluent Spanish, in addition to English and Latin.

Remember, while Germany still lay defeated, Mr. Armstrong warned that it would rise again behind the cloak of a uniting Europe. He also declared that Europe would dominate the Latino common market largely by harnessing the Catholic Church’s religious dominance.

The Catholic Church seems set to draw Latin Americans under its influence and to forge an intercontinental empire, which is, in reality, the biblically prophesied seventh and final resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire!

EU Arming Latin America

Between 2020 and 2024 over 40 percent of weapons imported by South American nations came from the EU, according to sipri’s Arms Transfers Database. Compare this to the 12 percent from the United States and the 11 percent from Great Britain. It is also noteworthy that more of the EU arms came from France than any other nation.

South America is full of navies with arms purchased mostly from Europe and armies that rely completely on European tanks. This did not all happen merely in the last 10 years.

South America has clearly avoided being dependent on America for critical weapons systems, but it is dependent on Europe. That doesn’t happen by accident. Knowing they couldn’t afford to manufacture their own advanced weapons, national leaders evidently all came to a similar conclusion: They didn’t want to be dependent on the U.S. or Russia, so they chose to side with Europe. South America is welded to Europe’s military system. The alliance is secure. South America’s military is hugely dependent on Europe.

Chinese Checkers in Chile and Beyond

It is crucial to watch the deep economic inroads China is steadily making into Latin America, especially since the year 2000. Europe is certainly watching them! But there is a fundamental difference between Europe’s drive into Latin America and that of China.

Beijing is there for a straightforward reason: It needs resources to fuel China’s rise, and Latin America has plenty of them. The EU’s trade and humanitarian efforts in Latin America, on the other hand, are deeper and more complex. Rather than a simple thirst for resources, Europe’s efforts are founded on the blood ties, religion and language it shares with Latin American nations and peoples.

It is true that Europe’s influence in Latin America has slipped slightly as the ambitions of China, and Russia to a degree, have swelled. But we should not expect these powers to always view this as a zero-sum game. Instead, watch for the Europeans to increasingly partner with China and Russia in this vital region and beyond. Isaiah 23 and Ezekiel 27 show that the nations of Europe and Asia will form an alliance, called a “mart of nations,” which will work against the United States. Their cooperation in Latin America will provide a vital staging ground for their anti-American ambitions.