Published at: 03/09/2025 09:00 PM
NAZI SUBMARINES OFF VENEZUELAN COAST
(Latest News, January-March 1942 and Elite, July 1936)
• On February 16, 1942, the German submarine U-502 invaded our territorial waters as part of Operation Neuland, sinking the Monagas tanker on the outskirts of the Paraguaná Peninsula, leaving 28 Venezuelan sailors dead.
• Three other submarines, U-156, U-67 and U-161, torpedoed and sunk the tankers Pedernales, Arkansas, San Nicolás, Rafaela, Tía Juana and San Rafael, in order to cut off the supply of 3,750,000 barrels of crude oil that were dispatched monthly from Lake Maracaibo to refineries in Aruba and Curaçao, in addition to looting fuel for their submersibles.
• Two days later, General Isaías Medina Angarita, in a presidential address on February 18, made a strong call for national unity in the face of the forces present on our shores of the fascist Nazi axis, in the following terms:
“Venezuelans!
The shadow of tyranny has desecrated the sacred waters of our Homeland. In the early morning of February 16, merchant ships that crossed the Gulf of Venezuela in peace, carrying the oil that fuels the world's freedom, were torpedoed by submarines of the Third Reich.
The Monagas, the emblem of our flag, lies in the depths next to his brothers Tía Juana and San Nicolás. Twenty-eight children of this land perished in the waves, and dozens of courageous souls struggle to survive.
Compatriots!
It's not just German steel that hurts our dignity: it's a cowardly attack on the neutrality we swear to protect. Venezuela, faithful to its tradition of peace, broke off relations with the Axis powers in December 1941, but this act of barbarism reveals Nazi contempt for the sovereignty of free peoples. The torpedoes that sank Monagas sought to strangle the vital flow of oil that supports the struggle of allied nations for democracy from Lake Maracaibo. 64% of the fuel that powers Royal British Air Force aircraft is born in our refineries in Aruba and Curaçao. Today, that oil blood is mixed with that of our sailors.
Brothers of America and the world! In this dark hour, we will not give in to fear. As Constitutional President, I have ordered:
1. Strengthening national defense. Under the Lending and Lease Act, four patrol boats equipped with sonars will arrive to guard our shores. The General Urdaneta gunboat, witness to the horror, will be modernized to hunt down the Nazi wolves that stalk the Caribbean.
2.- Unity against the internal enemy. The assets of German citizens linked to the Nazi Party have been confiscated. Eight hundred accomplices are under arrest; the German College of Caracas, a nest of fascist propaganda, has been shut down.
3.- Solidarity with the victims.
The heroic Lieutenant Wolfgang Larrazábal and his men will rescue every survivor.
The fallen will receive honors from the Fatherland. Town of Bolivar!
I invoke the spirit of our liberators: Miranda, who called foreigners to defend these lands; Bolívar, who founded the Republic with the sweat of the people. Today, as yesterday, Venezuela is not alone.
We swear!
As long as the sun illuminates the Orinoco and Avila, Venezuela will not be complicit in tyranny. If war comes to our doorstep, we will transform crude oil into courage. I declare to the world: Every drop of Venezuelan oil will be a heartbeat of hope for humanity! With faith in God and in the destiny of the Fatherland,
General Isaías Medina Angarita. President of the United States of Venezuela”.
• It was not the first time in our history that a courageous president decided to put an end to armed aggression on our shores. In his time, to stop the accelerated incursion of submarines and Nazi-Fascist agents in several cities of the country, General Medina expelled them, dismantling the entire propaganda apparatus that operated against Venezuela led by Joseph Goebbles, stopping the continuous radio broadcasting of pamphlets and speeches filled with the delusions of greatness of Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini.
• Both forerunners of other godless sharks of war that today also prowl the shores of our sovereignty: Donald Trump, Marco Rubio and María Corina Machado.
• Medina, at the time, did not hesitate to imprison and deport 800 German and Italian agents who received subsidies from the German Nazi Party, through several companies, clubs, schools and radio stations installed in several cities.
• These agents were responsible for war propaganda and the issuance of news and press releases that mentioned Aryan superiority and racial hatred; quite a declaration of intent to justify an invasion of Venezuela and seize the oil supply.
• Beneficiaries of the German government included the Nazi committees of Ciudad Bolivar, Valencia and Maracaibo; The Royal Club, the German Aid Society, the Italian fascist newspaper La Patria, The German School, the Domcke House and the Casa Parda.
• The German embassy official and agent of the Bayer company in Caracas, Arnorld Margerie, was the head of the Venezuelan Nazi Party. Its activities were directed and financed from Berlin by the head of Latin America, Frau Edith Faupel.
• The Venezuelan Nazi Party had 200 registered members, an extensive list of businessmen who defrayed their expenses and a payroll of more than 800 agents who operated in Caracas, Ciudad Bolívar, La Colonia Tovar, San Cristóbal, Maracaibo, Maracay, Los Teques, Coro, Puerto Cabello, Punto Fijo and Caripito.
• To neutralize this aggression on our shores, General Medina Angarita issued these orders:
• In Ciudad Bolívar, the Angostura Brewery and the Nazi House were raided and closed. In both establishments, German army uniforms, firearms, shields and flags of the Nazi party were confiscated.
• All anti-democratic news programs that broadcast Nazi propaganda were suspended at the Teatro Olimpia.
• The entire Italian diplomatic legation was expelled from the country. Likewise, the director of the magazine La Patria, the organ of Italian fascism in Caracas, was expelled.
• The directors of the newspaper El Faro, from the edo. Lara, were summoned to put an end to the open campaign deployed by this media outlet in favor of the “Nazi-Fascist Axis”.
• In Los Teques, edo. Miranda, the Austria and Gambinus breweries were shut down, and their owners were ordered to leave the country for distributing fascist propaganda.
• The activities of the German School were suspended, as its students were required to wear the uniform of the Hitler youth, sing the hymns of the Nazi Party and to salute with their arms raised.
• From Colonia Tovar, Aragua state, the Nazi officer, Captain Karl Aretz, an organizer of paramilitary groups, was expelled.
• In Guatire, in the place called Campo Alegre, the Don Pancho restaurant was closed, whose owners distributed brochures containing Hitler's speeches.
• In Caripito, edo. Monagas, a clandestine radio station dedicated to the propaganda exercise of the Nazi Party was confiscated.
• In Caracas, La Casa Parda, a center for indoctrination, fundraising and dissemination of war material, was closed. Its name refers to “the brown shirts”, armed gangs that brought Hitler to power, after committing barbaric acts, massacres, looting and lynching of Jews, communists, homosexuals, gypsies and Germans who dissented from Nazi-Fascist totalitarianism.
• In the magazine Élite, edition of July 18, 1936, fascist groups based in Venezuela announced their commitment to the genocide carried out by Mussolini's troops in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where 2,000 people were massacred, including 452 Coptic monks who opposed the Italian military presence.
• During another “Italian civilizational invasion” of Libya (1929-1934), 125,000 natives were murdered by colonial authorities of the European boot under the command of the father of world fascism Benito Mussolini.
Mazo News Team