Archives declassified by President Javier Milei this year contain an entire volume dedicated to tracking SS physician Josef Mengele – the Auschwitz “Angel of Death” – as he lived openly in Argentina, Fox News reported
Josef Mengele (center) during the Nazi era (AFP)
By 1956 Mengele felt secure enough to request his official records be changed to his real name after obtaining a certified birth certificate from West Germany’s embassy, Fox News reported. Authorities already possessed extensive knowledge of his residence, family, and business dealings – including possible financial help from his father – yet took no meaningful action, according to Fox News.
West Germany’s 1959 extradition request was dismissed by an Argentine judge as based on “political persecution,” Fox News stated. Fragmented intelligence, poor inter-agency communication, and frequent delays allowed Mengele to escape to Paraguay when pressure finally mounted, the outlet added.
A confidential 1960 memo still sought him and his former pharmaceutical partnership long after departure, Fox News disclosed. “I bring to the knowledge of the585 Chief that from the investigations carried out in order to fulfill the referenced OB, it follows that JOSÉ MENGELE, served as a partner of the medical laboratories ‘FADRO-FARM’ located at Drysdale 3573 Street, in Carapachay, District of Vicente López, and with offices, since July of this year, at Cramer 860 Street, Capital. The subject, listed as a medical doctor, was entered into the firm on July 10, 1958, as a contributing partner of $10,000 pesos in capital, and withdrew from the partnership in April of 1959,” the report stated.
Javier Milei holds an Israeli flag during his campaign rally in Lomas de Zamora, Argentina, Oct. 16, 2023 (AP / Natacha Pisarenko)
When formally reverting to his true identity, Mengele offered nervous justifications that revealed his SS past, according to Fox News. “Since entering Argentina, the subject resided on the property of the Mengeles, using the name of Dr. GREGOR […], the subject manifested that he had arrived in Argentina using a different name and distinct from his profession […]. Thus, it appears that, while maintaining his real name, the subject belonged to the SS Society […] during which time he demonstrated being nervous, having stated that during the war he acted as a physician in the German SS, in Czechoslovakia, where the Red Cross labeled him a ‘war criminal.’ He had studied Anthropology and was known to the Justice in the courts of Nuremberg, especially regarding the study of skulls and bones, but that union was considered a crime in National Socialist Germany,” the report states about Mengele when, in the course of changing his name from his fake alias to his real identity, the Nazi “explained” his motives for originally not using his real identity, it said.
Notorious for deadly experiments on twins and others, Mengele operated with chilling impunity, according to Fox News. Survivor testimony preserved in the files describes his sadistic methods in graphic detail, Fox News disclosed. “I met Mengele. I knew him well. I saw him many times in the Auschwitz camp, with his SS colonel’s uniform and, on top of it, the white doctor’s coat,” says José Furmanski, a Polish-born twin who encountered him repeatedly.
Furmanski recalled the fatal experiments carried out on pairs of all ages, Fox News noted. “He gathered twins of all ages in the camp and subjected them to experiments that always ended in death. Between the children, the elderly, and women… what horrors. I saw him separate a mother from her daughter and send one to certain death. We will never forget,” Furmanski said.
Protected later by Paraguay’s Stroessner regime and then by Nazi sympathizers in Brazil, Mengele lived out his final years on rural estates, Fox News reported. He died of a stroke while swimming in 1979 and was buried under an assumed name until identification in 1985, with DNA confirmation arriving in 1992.
