South America was not exactly a hotbed theater of World War II. On the other hand, what if the USA offered to build you a steel industry and buy whatever you make. That might be worth a meaningless war declaration. After all, as was said in Brazil at the time, snakes will start smoking before the Brazilian army will fight the Germans. Spoiler alert, the snakes smoked. So fill your own pipe and sit back in your most comfortable chair. Welcome to todays offering from The Philatelist.
The poor printing and cheap paper let this stamp a little. They were however printing the stamp themselves. Also doing for themselves, Brazil was repatriating their dead from Italy and re-interring them at home with a proper memorial. That should count for something, quite a bit in my book.
Todays stamp is airmail C104, a 3.30 Cruzeiro stamp issued by Brazil on December 22nd, 1960. It was a single stamp issue. According to the Scott catalog, the stamp is worth 25 cents whether used or unused.
There was a lot of pressure on Brazil to join the war against the axis. One thing against was the sentiment of the elites. They worried a fascist defeat would have the winning force coming for them postwar. USA then dangled the offer of a steel mill and to pay in full for the training and equipping of an expanded Brazil military. First the USA was allowed to station at Brazilian bases. Germany responded by allowing their U boat submarines to target Brazilian shipping. 36 Brazilian flagged merchant ships were sunk with a loss of life of 1691 Brazilian sailors. War was declared. The USA then supplied 3 destroyers and eight frigates to help Brazil combat the U boats. With much American training 6 U boats were sunk near Brazilian waters.
The Brazilian government then set a goal of recruiting, training and equipping 100,000 soldiers to fight in Europe. This became sort of a joke in Brazil. Similar to the American expression “when pigs fly” the expression “when snakes smoke” became common on the idea that Brazil could field a competent force overseas.
The jokes failed to grasp the money and pressure behind the Brazil Expeditionary Force. Two years later, when the outcome of the war was no longer in doubt, 25,000 untrained and unequipped soldiers began landing in already Allied occupied Naples, Italy. At first they had to camp on the docks as no barracks were provided. Further months were required for training but eventually there were Brazilians present in some of the final Italian theater battles. There great success was in accepting German surrenders, over 90,000 including two complete divisions. Regular readers might remember the Trieste stamp from last week of the problems the Germans had surrendering in Italy. I can find no record of a similar double cross by Brazilians to what New Zealand did at Trieste.
There was a huge cost in lives in sending the expeditionary force to Italy. 948 deaths. So did the Allies come for the Brazilian leaders post war as was feared. Well no but ultimately yes. Unelected President Vargas had a 15 year run as dictator from 1930-1945. Elections were then forced on Brazil by the USA. In 1952, Vargas ran on his record of industrialization and being the self proclaimed father of the poor. He won office legitimately in 1952, but as in modern times, the advocates of democracy have a certain outcome in mind, and that wasn’t President Vargas. The USA paid for Brazilian Army forced President Vargas to resign. He signed the paper put before him but later in the day shot himself. Perhaps Brazil should not have accepted the candy and got in the white van with the tear stained mattress..
Well my pipe burned out. Come again for another story that can be learned from stamp collecting.