Death-Rays as Life-Savers in the Third Reich - Pedro Waloschek ...

1 Some Personal Memories of 1943
In March 1943 I had just passed the entrance examination to the state
grammar school, ‘Colegio Nacional de San Isidro’ and found myself in a
class of 27 privileged young people. In accordance with Argentinean
regulations, in five years time we would obtain free of any charges our
‘bachillerato’ (A-levels) needed to have access to universities.
Nationality, religion and race were immaterial to this system, and most
of my schoolfellows came from middle class backgrounds. Among them
was Germán Armando Plett, a tall, blond boy whose father ran a glazing
company and whose ancestry lay in Germany. Germán was a bit of a
know-all, especially as regards the war that was raging at the time. His
opposite number was Guillermo Isaac Mintz, the son of a well-to-do
Jewish businessman. Flat feet and a plump and crooked nose
augmented his overall chubbiness, and he frequently found himself at
the receiving end of Plett’s spite and ridicule.
In the schoolyard, Plett would share with us his opinions and boundless
knowledge. He did so at a volume that was loud enough for everyone
to hear, whether they wanted to or not. In this way we learnt that
German scientists had succeeded in developing a range of amazing
miracle weapons, which would help ‘us’ to a quick and conclusive
Second World War victory. Naturally he assumed that ‘we’ were all on
his and his pal Hitler’s side – except, perhaps, for Guillermo Isaac
Mintz and Pablo Vicente Lloyd. Pablo, whom we preferred to call by
his English name Paul, was a placid boy with a British businessman
father and a charming Danish mother. Guillermo and Paul were my
best friends.
Germán Armando Plett’s knowledge was scraped together from the
‘Deutsche La Plata Zeitung’ (German La Plata Newspaper) and the
nightly German radio broadcasts he was devoted to. He would
rhapsodise about the German army’s triumph as it embarked on a
strategic retreat from the occupied regions of the Soviet Union.
Ecstatically he recounted the heroic deeds accomplished by the
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